While the trauma that Palestinians continue to face in Gaza is sustained, brutal and seemingly never-ending, the universal susceptibility to trauma unites humanity as much as it divides the self. Dr. Gabor Maté, renowned physician and expert in trauma and childhood development, illustrates this point articulately on the latest episode of The Chris Hedges Report through attempting to make sense of the psychology, trauma and reason behind the actions of Palestinians, IDF soldiers, WWII survivors, Nazis and even himself.
The rapid fall of the Syrian Arab Republic government was both a shock and a catastrophe for that region and for the world. It was incomprehensible that the state which withstood a sustained attack since 2011 from the United States, Israel, Turkey and other NATO members, and gulf monarch states such as Saudi Arabia, would collapse so swiftly. The defeat was political, not military. There was surprisingly little actual fighting on the battlefield.
Russia, Syria’s most powerful ally, is engaged in Ukraine, while Turkey, Syria’s nemesis, played a two-sided game of working with its NATO allies while claiming to be negotiating in good faith with Russia.
Even as Bashar al-Assad was scrambling to get out of Syria, Israel was mobilizing its military to take advantage of the power vacuum that Assad’s ouster had created. After five decades of a low-level conflict between the two countries, Israel saw an opportunity to change the calculus, and it seized it.
As of Wednesday, Israel had struck Syria nearly 500 times. Their goal with these attacks has been to essentially destroy Syria’s military capability, and they have already succeeded. Reports by Israeli media claim that well over 80% of Syria’s weaponry, ships, missiles, aircraft, and other military supplies have been damaged or destroyed.
The charge of “advocating genocide” against Australian Mark Regev, a former Israeli ambassador to Britain and spokesman for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, will head to the International Criminal Court after Australia’s prosecution service dropped the case following a diplomatic note from Israel.
The charge against Regev was brought initially in a private prosecution by Uncle Robbie Thorpe, an indigenous Krautungalung Elder and human rights advocate.
Thorpe charged Regev with aligning himself as a government spokesman with statements made by Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, which the U.N. special rapporteur for the Palestinian occupied territories called genocidal.
Even as Bashar al-Assad was scrambling to get out of Syria, Israel was mobilizing its military to take advantage of the power vacuum that Assad’s ouster had created. After five decades of a low-level conflict between the two countries, Israel saw an opportunity to change the calculus, and it seized it. As of Wednesday, Israel had struck Syria nearly 500 times. Their goal with these attacks…
Marwan Bishara, Al Jazeera’s senior political analyst, has condemned Israel’s extensive airstrikes on Syrian installations — reportedly 500 times in 72 hours, comparing them to historic Israeli actions justified as “security measures”.
He criticised the hypocrisy of Israel’s security pretext endorsed by Western powers.
Asked why Israel was bombing Syria and encroaching on its territory just days after the ousting of the Bashar al-Assad regime after 54 years in power, he told Al Jazeera: “Because it can get away with it.”
Al Jazeera analyst Marwan Bishara . . . Israel aims to destabilise and weaken neighbouring countries for its own security. Image: AJ screenshot APR
Bishara explained that Israel aimed to destabilise and weaken neighbouring countries for its own security.
He noted that the new Syrian administration was overwhelmed and unable to respond effectively.
Bishara highlighted that regional powers like Egypt and Saudi Arabia had condemned Israel’s actions, even though Western countries had been largely silent.
He said Israel was “taking advantage” of the chaos to “settle scores”.
“One can go back 75 years, 80 years, and look at Israel since its inception,” he said.
“What has it been? In a state of war. Continuous, consistent state of war, bombing countries, destabilising countries, carrying out genocide, war crimes, and ethnic cleansing.
“All of it for the same reason — presumably it’s security.
A “Palestine will be free” placard at today’s Auckland solidarity rally for Palestine. Image: David Robie/APR
“Under the pretext of security, Israel would carry [out] the worst kind of violations of international law, the worst kind of ethnic cleansing, worst kind of genocide.
“And that’s what we have seen it do.
“Now, certainly in this very particular instance it’s taking advantage of the fact that there is a bit of chaos, if you will, slash change, dramatic change in Syria after 50 years of more of the same in order to settle scores with a country that it has always deemed to be a dangerous enemy, and that is Syria.
“So I think the idea of decapitating, destabilising, undercutting, undermining Syria and Syria’s national security, will always be a main goal for Israel.”
“They tried to erase Palestine from the world. So the whole world became Palestine.” . . . a t-shirt at today’s Auckland solidarity rally for Palestine. Image: David Robie/APR
In an Auckland Tāmaki Makaurau solidarity rally today, protesters condemned Israel’s bombing of Syria and also called on New Zealand’s Christopher Luxon-led coalition government to take a stronger stance against Israel and to pressure major countries to impose UN sanctions against Tel Aviv.
A prominent lawyer, Labour Party activist and law school senior academic at Auckland University of Technology, Dr Myra Williamson, spoke about the breakthrough in international law last month with the International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrants being issued against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Lawyer and law school academic Dr Myra Williamson speaking at the Auckland rally today. Video: Asia Pacific Report
“What you have to be aware of is that the ICC is being threatened — the individuals are being threatened and the court itself is being threatened, mainly by the United States,” she told the solidarity crowd in Te Komititanga Square.
“Personal threats to the judges, to the prosecutor Karim Khan.
“So you need to be vocal and you need to talk to people over the summer about how important that work is. Just to get the warrants issued was a major achievement and the next thing is to get them on trial in The Hague.”
ICC Annual Meeting — court under threat. Video: Al Jazeera
Israeli forces continued their offensive inside Syria, which began following the collapse of Bashar Al-Assad’s regime last Sunday. Israeli troops breached the demilitarized buffer zone established in 1974 between Syrian-held and Israeli-occupied Syrian territory in the Golan, and occupied new positions in the Golan heights and on Mount Al-Sheikh.
Israel’s new advances according to reports included the occupation of nine Syrian towns in the Golan, where Israeli forces forced inhabitants to leave their homes and move deeper into Syria. Israeli tanks continued to advance, reaching up to 18 kilometers inside Syria, approaching the Damascus-Beirut international highway, at no more than 23 kilometers from the Syrian capital.
Corporate media is heralding the fall of Bashar al-Assad and the emergence of Abu Mohammed al-Jolani as the new leader of Syria, despite his deep ties to both al-Qaeda and ISIS.
“How Syria’s ‘diversity-friendly’ jihadists plan on building a state,” runs the headline from an article in Britain’s Daily Telegraph that suggests that Jolani will construct a new Syria, respectful of minority rights. The same newspaper also labeled him a “moderate Jihadist.” The Washington Post described him as a pragmatic and charismatic leader, while CNN portrayed him as a “blazer-wearing revolutionary.”
AMY GOODMAN: We begin today’s show in Syria, where tens of thousands of people gathered at the Great Mosque of Damascus for the first Friday prayers since longtime authoritarian President Bashar al-Assad was toppled by opposition fighters.
DAMASCUS RESIDENT: [translated] Hopefully this Friday is the Friday of the greatest joy, a Friday of victory for our Muslim brothers. This is a blessed Friday.
AMY GOODMAN: Syria’s new caretaker Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir was among those at the mosque. He’ll act as prime minister until March.
This comes as the World Food Programme is appealing to donors to help it scale up relief operations for the approximately 2.8 million displaced and food-insecure Syrians across the country. That includes more than 1.1 million people who were forcibly displaced by fighting since late November.
Israel’s Defence Minister has told his troops to prepare to spend the winter holding the demilitarized zone that separates Syria from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Earlier today, Prime Minister Netanyahu toured the summit of Mount Haramun in the UN-designated buffer zone. Netanyahu said this week the Golan Heights would “forever be an inseparable part of the State of Israel”.
On Thursday, UN Secretary-General António Guterres called for an urgent deescalation of airstrikes on Syria by Israeli forces, and their withdrawal from the UN buffer zone.
In Ankara, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Turkey’s Foreign Minister and the President, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Blinken said the US and Turkey would [work] to prevent a resurgence of the Islamic State group in Syria. Meanwhile, Erdoğan told Blinken that Turkey reserves the right to strike the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, led by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), which Turkey considers “terrorist”.
For more, we go to Damascus for the first time since the fall of longtime authoritarian President Bashar al-Assad, where we’re joined by the Associated Press investigative reporter Sarah El Deeb, who is based in the Middle East, a region she has covered for two decades.
Sarah, welcome to Democracy Now! You are overlooking —
SARAH EL DEEB: Thank you.
AMY GOODMAN: — the square where tens of thousands of Syrians have gathered for the first Friday prayers since the fall of Assad. Describe the scene for us.
Report from Damascus: Searching for loved ones in prisons and morgues. Video: Democracy Now!
SARAH EL DEEB: There is a lot of firsts here. It’s the first time they gather on Friday after Bashar al-Assad fled the country. It’s the first time everyone seems to be very happy. I think that’s the dominant sentiment, especially people who are in the square. There is ecstasy, tens of thousands of people. They are still chanting, “Down with Bashar al-Assad.”
But what’s new is that it’s also visible that the sentiment is they’ve been, so far, happy with the new rulers, not outpour — there is no criticism, out — loud criticism of the new rulers yet. So, I’d say the dominant thing is that everyone is happy down there.
HAYAT AL-TURKI: [translated] I will show you the photo of my missing brother. It’s been 14 years. This is his photo. I don’t know what he looks like, if I find him. I don’t know what he looks like, because I am seeing the photos of prisoners getting out. They are like skeletons.
But this is his photo, if anyone has seen him, can know anything about him or can help us. He is one of thousands of prisoners who are missing. I am asking for everyone, not only my brother, uncle, cousin and relatives.”
AMY GOODMAN: Talk about this mad search by Syrians across the country.
SARAH EL DEEB: This is the other thing that’s been dominating our coverage and our reporting since we arrived here, the contrast between the relief, the sense of relief over the departure of Bashar al-Assad but then the sadness and the concern and the no answers for where the loved ones have gone.
Thousands — also, tens of thousands of people have marched on Sednaya [prison]. It’s the counter to this scene, where people were looking for any sign of where their relatives have been. As you know really well, so many people have reported their relatives missing, tens of thousands, since the beginning of the revolt, but also before.
I mean, I think this is a part of the feature of this government, is that there has been a lot of security crackdown. People were scared to speak, but they were — because there was a good reason for it. They were picked up at any expression of discontent or expression of opinion.
So, where we were in Sednaya two, three days ago, it feels like one big day, I have to say. When we were in Sednaya, people were also describing what — anything, from the smallest expression of opinion, a violation of a traffic light. No answers.
And they still don’t know where their loved ones are. I mean, I think we know quite a lot from research before arriving here about the notorious prison system in Syria. There’s secret prisons. There are security branches where people were being held. I think this is the first time we have an opportunity to go look at those facilities.
What was surprising and shocking to the people, and also to a lot of us journalists, was that we couldn’t find any sign of these people. And the answers are — we’re still looking for them. But what was clear is that only a handful — I mean, not a handful — hundreds of people were found.
Many of them were also found in morgues. There were apparent killings in the last hours before the regime departed. One of them was the prominent activist Mazen al-Hamada. We were at his funeral yesterday. He was found, and his family believes that — he was found killed, and his family believes his body was fresh, that he was killed only a few days earlier. So, I think the killing continued up until the last hour.
AMY GOODMAN: I was wondering if you can tell us more about —
SARAH EL DEEB: What was also — what was also —
AMY GOODMAN: — more about Mazen. I mean, I wanted to play a clip of Mazen’s nephew, Yahya al-Hussein.
YAHYA AL-HUSSEIN: [translated] In 2020, he was taken from the Netherlands to Germany through the Syrian Embassy there. And from there, they brought him to Syria with a fake passport.
He arrived at the airport at around 2:30 a.m. and called my aunt to tell her that he arrived at the airport, and asked for money. When they reached out to him the next day, they were told that air intelligence had arrested him.
AMY GOODMAN: That’s Mazen’s nephew, Yahya al-Hussein. Sarah, if you can explain? This was an activist who left Syria after he had been imprisoned and tortured — right? — more than a decade ago, but ultimately came back, apparently according to assurances that he would not be retaken. And now his body is found.
SARAH EL DEEB: I think it’s — like you were saying, it’s very hard to explain. This is someone who was very outspoken and was working on documenting the torture and the killing in the secret prisons in Syria. So he was very well aware of his role and his position vis-à-vis the government. Yet he felt — it was hard to explain what Mazen’s decision was based on, but his family believes he was lured into Syria by some false promises of security and safety.
His heart was in Syria. He left Syria, but he never — it never left him. He was working from wherever he was — he was in the Netherlands, he was in the US — I think, to expose these crimes. And I think this is — these are the words of his family: He was a witness on the crimes of the Assad government, and he was a martyr of the Assad government.
One of the people that were at the funeral yesterday was telling us Mazen was a lesson. The Assad government was teaching all detainees a lesson through Mazen to keep them silent. I think it was just a testimony to how cruel this ruling regime, ruling system has been for the past 50 years.
People would go back to his father’s rule also. But I think with the revolution, with the protests in 2011, all these crimes and all these detentions were just en masse. I think the estimates are anywhere between 150,000 and 80,000 detainees that no one can account for. That is on top of all the people that were killed in airstrikes and in opposition areas in crackdown on protest.
So, it was surprising that at the last minute — it was surprising and yet not very surprising. When I asked the family, “Why did they do that?” they would look at me and, like, “Why are you asking this question? They do that. That’s what they did.” It was just difficult to understand how even at the last minute, and even for someone that they promised security, this was — this would be the end, emaciated and tortured and killed, unfortunately.
AMY GOODMAN: Sarah, you spoke in Damascus to a US citizen, Travis Timmerman, who says he was imprisoned in Syria. This is a clip from an interview with Al Arabiya on Thursday in which he says he spent the last seven months in a prison cell in Damascus.
TRAVIS TIMMERMAN: My name is Travis.
REPORTER: Travis.
TRAVIS TIMMERMAN: Yes.
REPORTER: So, [speaking in Arabic]. Travis, Travis Timmerman.
TRAVIS TIMMERMAN: That’s right.
REPORTER: That’s right.
TRAVIS TIMMERMAN: But just Travis. Just call me Travis.
REPORTER: Call you Travis, OK. And where were you all this time?
TRAVIS TIMMERMAN: I was imprisoned in Damascus for the last seven months. … I was imprisoned in a cell by myself. And in the early morning of this Monday, or the Monday of this week, they took a hammer, and they broke my door down. … Well, the armed men just wanted to get me out of my cell. And then, really, the man who I stuck with was a Syrian man named Ely. He was also a prisoner that was just freed. And he took me by the side, by the arm, really. And he and a young woman that lives in Damascus, us three, exited the prison together.
SARAH EL DEEB: I spent quite a bit of time with Travis last night. And I think his experience was very different from what I was just describing. He was taken, he was detained for crossing illegally into Syria. And I think his description of his experience was it was OK. He was not mistreated.
He was fed well, I mean, especially when I compare it to what I heard from the Syrian prisoners in the secret prisons or in detention facilities. He would receive rice, potatoes, tomatoes. None of this was available to the Syrian detainees. He would go to the bathroom three times a day, although this was uncomfortable for him, because, of course, it was not whenever he wanted. But it was not something that other Syrian detainees would experience.
His experience also was that he heard a lot of beating. I think that’s what he described it as: beating from nearby cells. They were mostly Syrian detainees. For him, that was an implicit threat of the use of violence against him, but he did not get any — he was not beaten or tortured.
AMY GOODMAN: And, Sarah, if you could also —
SARAH EL DEEB: He also said his release was a “blessing.” Yeah.
AMY GOODMAN: If you could also talk about Austin Tice, the American freelance journalist? His family, his mother and father and brothers and sisters, seem to be repeatedly saying now that they believe he’s alive, held by the Syrian government, and they’re desperately looking for him or reaching out to people in Syria. What do you know?
SARAH EL DEEB: What we know is that people thought Travis was Tice when they first saw him. They found him in a house in a village outside of Damascus. And I think that’s what triggered — we didn’t know that Travis was in a Syrian prison, so I think that’s what everyone was going to check. They thought that this was Tice.
I think the search, the US administration, the family, they are looking and determined to look for Tice. The family believes that he was in Syrian government prison. He entered Syria in 2012. He is a journalist. But I think we have — his family seems to think that there were — he’s still in a Syrian government prison.
But I think, so far, we have not had any sign of Tice from all those released. But, mind you, the scenes of release from prisons were chaotic, from multiple prisons at the same time. And we’re still, day by day, finding out about new releases and people who were set free on that Sunday morning.
U.N. Calls on Israel to Stop Bombing Syria and Occupying Demilitarized Zone https://t.co/iHNIkKKOrs
I want to turn to Gaza. Tell us about the Palestinians searching for their family members who went missing during raids and arrests by Israeli soldiers in the Gaza Strip. And talk about the lack of accountability for these appearances. You begin your piece with Reem Ajour’s quest to find her missing husband and daughter.
SARAH EL DEEB: I talked to Reem Ajour for a long time. I mean, I think, like you said, this was a pivot, but the themes have been common across the Middle East, sadly. Reem Ajour last saw her family in March of 2024. Both her husband and her 5-year-old daughter were injured after an Israeli raid on their house during the chaotic scenes of the Israeli raids on the Shifa Hospital.
They lived in the neighborhood. So, it was chaotic. They [Israeli military] entered their home, and they were shooting in the air, or they were shooting — they were shooting, and the family ended up wounded.
But what was striking was that the Israeli soldiers made the mother leave the kid wounded in her house and forced her to leave to the south. I think this is not only Reem Ajour’s case. I think this is something we’ve seen quite a bit in Gaza. But the fact that this was a 5-year-old and the mom couldn’t take her with her was quite moving.
And I think what her case kind of symbolises is that during these raids and during these detentions at checkpoints, families are separated, and we don’t have any way of knowing how the Israeli military is actually documenting these detentions, these raids.
Where do they — how do they account for people who they detain and then they release briefly? The homes that they enter, can we find out what happened in these homes? We have no idea of holding — I think the Israeli court has also tried to get some information from the military, but so far very few cases have been resolved.
And we’re talking about not only 500 or 600 people; we’re talking about tens of thousands who have been separated, their homes raided, during what is now 15 months of war in Gaza.
AMY GOODMAN: Sarah El Deeb, we want to thank you for being with us, Associated Press investigative reporter based in the Middle East for two decades, now reporting from Damascus.
Next up, today is the 75th day of a hunger strike by Laila Soueif. She’s the mother of prominent British Egyptian political prisoner Alaa Abd El-Fattah. She’s calling on British officials to pressure Egypt for the release of her son. We’ll speak to the Cairo University mathematics professor in London, where she’s been standing outside the Foreign Office. Back in 20 seconds.
Facing an increasingly dire food catastrophe under Israel’s famine campaign, the head of Gaza’s main humanitarian aid group says that its workers have resorted to eating animal feed to survive. In an interview with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Thursday, UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) Commissioner-General Phillippe Lazzarini said that the agency’s workers’ stories…
Northern Gaza’s Kamal Adwan Hospital underwent its worst night yet of Israeli attacks on Friday, the facility’s director has said, with Israeli forces destroying most of the hospital’s remaining water tanks and creating “catastrophic” conditions for the facility. In a statement on Friday, Hussam Abu Safiya, the hospital’s director, said that Israeli forces had detonated remote-controlled…
On Thursday 12 December, campaigners from Fossil Free London staged a demonstration outside the Norwegian embassy in Belgravia, condemning Norway and its government’s role in developing the controversial Rosebank oil field, which will see millions flow towards Israeli fuel giant, Delek Group, blacklisted by the UN for human rights violations. It’s all tied to Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza and its apartheid and human rights abuses across the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
Norway: complicit in Israel’s genocide
The demonstrators waved placards with slogans such as “Norway! Stand with Palestine for human rights and our climate” and “Shame on Norway, listen to the UN”. They chanted “Stop Rosebank, Free Palestine” as embassy workers entered the building:
Equinor, majority owned by the Norwegian Government, and Ithaca Energy share ownership of the controversial Rosebank oil field, which will see £250 million flow towards Ithaca’s controlling shareholder – Delek Group. The Israeli fuel giant operates in illegal settlements and provides fuel to the IDF:
The demonstration coincides with Greenpeace Norway filing a complaint against Equinor for failure to conduct due diligence over its links to Ithaca and Delek under the 2022 Transparency Act.
Joanna Warrington, campaigner with Fossil Free London, said:
Today, we gather outside the Norwegian embassy to shine a light on a toxic alliance driving both human rights abuses and climate devastation.
The Norwegian government, through Equinor, is pushing forward with the Rosebank oil field even though it will generate profit to fund the oppression and occupation of Palestinian people, who are already suffering at the hands of a brutal genocide.
Norway must choose people over profit, justice over violence, and stop Rosebank.
Featured image and additional images via Fossil Free London
The global media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has revealed an “alarming intensification of attacks on journalists” in its 2024 annual roundup — especially in conflict zones such as Gaza.
Gaza stands out as the “most dangerous” region in the world, with the highest number of journalists murdered in connection with their work in the past five years.
Since October 2023, the Israeli military have killed more than 145 journalists, including at least 35 whose deaths were linked to their journalism, reports RSF.
Also 550 journalists are currently imprisoned worldwide, a 7 percent increase from last year.
“This violence — often perpetrated by governments and armed groups with total impunity — needs an immediate response,” says the report.
“RSF calls for urgent action to protect journalists and journalism.”
Asia second most dangerous
Asia is the second most dangerous region for journalists due to the large number of journalists killed in Pakistan (seven) and the protests that rocked Bangladesh (five), says the report.
“Journalists do not die, they are killed; they are not in prison, regimes lock them up; they do not disappear, they are kidnapped,” said RSF director-general Thibaut Bruttin.
“These crimes — often orchestrated by governments and armed groups with total impunity — violate international law and too often go unpunished.
“We need to get things moving, to remind ourselves as citizens that journalists are dying for us, to keep us informed. We must continue to count, name, condemn, investigate, and ensure that justice is served.
“Fatalism should never win. Protecting those who inform us is protecting the truth.
A third of the journalists killed in 2024 were slain by the Israeli armed forces.
A record 54 journalists were killed, including 31 in conflict zones.
In 2024, the Gaza Strip accounted for nearly 30 percent of journalists killed on the job, according to RSF’s latest information. They were killed by the Israeli army.
More than 145 journalists have been killed in Palestine since October 2023, including at least 35 targeted in the line of duty.
RSF continues to investigate these deaths to identify and condemn the deliberate targeting of media workers, and has filed four complaints with the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes committed against journalists.
RSF condemns Israeli media ‘stranglehold’
Last month, in a separate report while Israel’s war against Gaza, Lebanon and Syria rages on, RSF said Israel’s Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi was trying to “reshape” Israel’s media landscape.
Between a law banning foreign media outlets that were “deemed dangerous”, a bill that would give the government a stranglehold on public television budgets, and the addition of a private pro-Netanyahu channel on terrestrial television exempt from licensing fees, the ultra-conservative minister is augmenting pro-government coverage of the news.
RSF said it was “alarmed by these unprecedented attacks” against media independence and pluralism — two pillars of democracy — and called on the government to abandon these “reforms”.
On November 24, two new proposals for measures targeting media critical of the authorities and the war in Gaza and Lebanon were approved by Netanyahu’s government.
The Ministerial Committee for Legislation validated a proposed law providing for the privatisation of the public broadcaster Kan.
On the same day, the Council of Ministers unanimously accepted a draft resolution by Communications Minister Shlomo Kahri from November 2023 seeking to cut public aid and revenue from the Government Advertising Agency to the independent and critical liberal newspaper Haaretz.
‘Al Jazeera’ ban tightened
The so-called “Al-Jazeera law”, as it has been dubbed by the Israeli press, has been tightened.
This exceptional measure was adopted in April 2024 for a four-month period and renewed in July.
On November 20, Israeli MPs voted to extend the law’s duration to six months, and increased the law’s main provision — a broadcasting ban on any foreign media outlet deemed detrimental to national security by the security services — from 45 days to 60.
“The free press in a country that describes itself as ‘the only democracy in the Middle East’ will be undermined,” said RSF’s editorial director Anne Bocandé.
RSF called on Israel’s political authorities, starting with Minister Shlomo Karhi and Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu, to “act responsibly” and abandon these proposed reforms.
Inside Israel, journalists critical of the government and the war have been facing pressure and intimidation for more than a year.
We are not silent. We are being silenced. The students who, during the last academic year set up encampments, occupied halls, went on hunger strikes and spoke out against the genocide, were met this fall with a series of rules that have turned university campuses into academic gulags. Among the minority of academics who dared to speak out, many have been sanctioned or dismissed. Medical professionals who criticize the wholesale destruction by Israel of hospitals, clinics and targeted assassinations of health workers in Gaza have been suspended or terminated from medical school faculties with some facing threats to revoke their medical licenses.
The issuance of arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former War Minister, Yoav Gallant, on November 21, not only shocked the Israeli and U.S. establishment but also some of the 125 State Parties to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC), who would soon be tasked with executing those warrants, once they’ve been certified and communicated to them by the Court Registry.
This past week, in the sprawling chambers of the World Forum Convention Center in The Hague, representatives of those countries gathered for the 23rd Session of the ICC’s Assembly of State Parties (ASP), the representative body that funds, governs, and supervises the implementation of the ICC’s founding treaty.
Leila Khaled is a historic activist for the liberation of the Palestinian people. At 80 years old, she continues to be active in promoting international collaboration with political organizations, popular movements and governments to denounce Israeli violence and broaden the struggle for the formation of the Palestinian state.
Venezuela is one of the countries that echoes this struggle the most. The defense of the Palestinian people has been, since Hugo Chávez, one of the pillars of Venezuelan foreign policy. In the last week of November, Khaled was in Caracas to participate in the International Conference of Solidarity with Palestine.
On Wednesday, the U.S. was one of just a handful of countries to vote against a resolution in the UN General Assembly this week calling for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, despite the Biden administration’s supposed renewed efforts to obtain a ceasefire before Donald Trump is in office. The resolution, which also called for the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages…
On Wednesday, the House overwhelmingly passed a $900 billion military budget in a bill that also bans the Pentagon from citing the official death toll from Israel’s genocide in Gaza and restricts health care for trans youth. The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) passed 281 to 140, with 81 Democrats and nearly all Republicans voting “yes.” It sets aside $895 billion for military…
The fall of the Assad regime in Syria continues to reshape the country and the greater Middle East. In Damascus, leaders of the armed group HTS have retained most services of the civilian government but vowed to dissolve Assad’s security forces and shut down Assad’s notorious prisons. “People have this sense of regained freedom,” says Syrian architect and writer Marwa al-Sabouni in Homs. Still…
Israel is dropping bombs on Gaza with such destructive power that the strikes are disintegrating Palestinians’ bodies, a UN officer has reported as Israeli forces are killing dozens each day with relentless bombardments in the region. UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) communications officer Louise Wateridge told BBC that doctors at Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza have…
Less than two weeks after a surprise rebel offensive began to retake areas of Syria for the first time in nearly a decade, the Assad regime fell on December 8. Once seen as entrenched and immovable, the government’s collapse came 53 years since Assad family rule began in Syria and nearly 14 years after the start of an uprising that called for its overthrow. The rebel takeover was rapid…
Though there are thousands of children in Gaza currently in need of urgent medical care outside of the strip, Israel’s brutal blockade means that it would take over seven years to complete these evacuations at the current rate, the UN has reported. The UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) wrote on Wednesday that there are “thousands of families” being deprived of health…
On 10 December, Sky Newsshared a video of prime minister Keir Starmer at “an RAF base in Cyprus”. What it failed to mention, however, is that this wasn’t just any old airbase. In reality, it’s RAF Akrotiri, that Tory-Labour governments have used to turn Britain into an active participant in Israel’sgenocide in occupied Gaza. You’d think that’d be an important note to add. But no.
RAF Akrotiri: ‘we can’t tell the world what you’re doing here’
RAF Akrotiri is a unique colonial relic on occupied Cypriot territory, and part of the “largest Royal Air Force base outside the United Kingdom”. And as Declassified UK has reported, covert US flights have been leaving from the base throughout Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Dozens of British warplanes, meanwhile, have flown to both Israel and Lebanon. British spy flights and intelligence officers on the ground have also been passing information to Israel. No wonder Starmer told the troops at RAF Akrotiri:
it’s been a really important, busy, busy year.
Declassified co-founder Matt Kennard has insisted that Britain’s actions are those of “a country which is participating” in Israel’s genocide – “a direct participant”. But unfortunately, most people in Britain won’t be aware of this, due to the mainstream media choosing to turn a blind eye to it. Maybe they would claim that’s because, as Starmer said:
some – or quite a bit – of what goes on here can’t necessarily be talked about all the time. Although we’re really proud of what you’re doing, we can’t necessarily tell the world what you’re doing here. …
Although we’re not saying it to the whole world, for reasons that are obvious to you, the whole world is relying on you.
Nonetheless, what he did clarify is that the base’s actions are to make “our allies safe”. And considering that he calls Israel “a very strong ally”, and has been using taxpayers’ money to fly over Gaza in recent months, we can only assume that he’s talking primarily about keeping Israel’s wanted war criminals safe.
'The whole world and everyone back at home is relying on you.'
Prime Minister Keir Starmer tells British troops at an RAF base in Cyprus that he is 'grateful' for their work after a 'busy, busy year'.https://t.co/xItZsH7tea
We must not be silent about UK complicity in Israel’s genocide
The government is trying to keep quiet about the actions RAF Akrotiri is participating in. And the complicit corporate media is faithfully playing along. So it’s on all of us to spread the word.
Political leaders themselves will avoid talking about genocide, to protect themselves not only from demands to stop it, but also from scrutiny of their complicity – Israel has been helped by RAF surveillance, British-made weapons and parts for its bombers, and diplomatic support, all of which the Starmer Government has continued.
And people like Starmer want to avoid scrutiny because, as UN special rapporteur Francesca Albanese has stressed:
the UK is violating its obligations under international law not to aid and assist a state which is committing international wrongdoings.
Britain has an international legal “obligation to prevent” genocide, she has explained, whether it’s already happening or simply at risk of happening. But instead of fulfilling that obligation, the Tory-Labour governments have been actively supporting Israel despite international courts, human rights groups and other experts accusing it of committing genocide.
Kennard has argued that, if the world doesn’t hold British politicians and others to account for their participation in the Gaza genocide, “the law of the jungle” will reign in the world. And it’s on all of us to stop that from happening. So we must continue to call out what politicians have been doing in our name.
A New Zealand advocacy group for Palestine has condemned the government for refusing to provide humanitarian visas for Palestinians with family in the country while welcoming a growing number of Israeli “visitors”.
The Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) claims the visitors are likely to be “complicit” in Israel’s genocidal war crimes in the 14-month war on Gaza.
The protest group said in a statement that “many if not most of these ‘tourists’ are actively serving in the Israeli Defence Force’s genocidal attacks on Gaza and Lebanon”.
“The United Nations, the International Court of Justice, and most recently Amnesty International, have variously described the Israeli attack on Gaza as genocide,” said PSNA national chair John Minto.
The New Zealand government had no idea how many Israeli “tourists” were doing military service, because they were not required to provide that information as they arrived, he added.
“Genocide duty in the Israeli armed forces is compulsory for nearly all Israelis, so there will be a high proportion of active or reservist soldiers coming to Aotearoa with blood on their hands.”
Urgent to deny entry
Service in the IDF for 32 months is compulsory for nearly all Israeli men when they reach 18 and women are required to serve 24 months.
Members of Israel’s ultra-orthodox community were included in the conscription from June after previously being exempt.
After the initial period, Israelis must be available as reservists until age 40.
PSNA’s John Minto said the New Zealand government must urgently deny entry to any Israelis who were serving or had served in the IDF.
“Combat reservists are now on average serving four months in the IDF. So it’s not just a narrow younger age group.”
According to Minto, the New Zealand government had a list of extremist Israeli settlers who it banned from entering Aotearoa — but he viewed this list as “hopelessly inadequate”.
Obligation to prevent genocide
“The International Court of Justice has obligated countries to prevent Israeli genocide and work to end Israeli occupation of Palestinian Territory,” Minto said.
“When our border immigration officials are not required to even ask if an Israeli is serving in the military, or is an illegal settler, then our government is ignoring both of its obligations.
“The soldiers perpetrating this genocide might pretend to be innocent thrill-seeking tourists when they visit here, but they are directly responsible for operating occupation, apartheid, genocide and ethnic cleansing.”
Wanted alleged war criminal Yoav Gallant, the former defense minister for Israel, has reportedly visited the White House for a meeting with a key Biden official — just weeks after the International Criminal Court (ICC) put out a warrant for his arrest over crimes against humanity. Gallant posted on social media that he met with President Joe Biden’s Middle East envoy, Brett McGurk…
Medical workers in Gaza’s remaining hospitals and field clinics are pleading with the international community for desperately needed assistance and an arms embargo against the Israeli occupation, as they continue to work under indescribable conditions — including being deliberately targeted by Israel’s occupying forces. In a conference call with reporters on Monday…
Israeli forces have reportedly killed dozens of members of the same family in a strike in northern Gaza, as the last main hospital in the region is rapidly being destroyed by Israeli strikes and raids. Gaza medics have said that at least 25 people were killed by an Israeli attack on a multi-story building in Beit Hanoun, with dozens of others injured in the strike. According to Euro-Med Human…
As Israelexpanded its illegal occupation in south-west Syria amid the jihadist victory over the Assad regime, independent MP Jeremy Corbyn called for foreign troops from the apartheid state to leave the country – but there is another illegal occupation in Syria, by NATO’s second-biggest army Turkey.
Corbyn on Turkey, Israel, and Syria
Corbyn asked UK foreign secretary David Lammy to assure that Turkish troops would leave northern Syria and respect the rights of Kurdish-majority communities there. Unfortunately, no assurance came. So Turkey’s anti-Kurdish campaign of terror in Syria looks set to continue.
Can we be assured that the foreign troops that are in Syria at the present time, particularly the Turkish troops in the north, will leave; and that they will respect the right of the Kurdish people to be able to live safely in their own area and that any incoming government in Damascus will also respect the diversity of the country and all of the minorities, particularly the Kurdish minority?
As the people of Syria come out of the horrors of war, torture and imprisonment, I asked the Foreign Secretary what he was doing to protect the rights of Kurdish people, and whether he would call for an end to Israel's illegal occupation of the Golan Heights. pic.twitter.com/7LNV8fYLK6
Unfortunately, however, Western governments ignore the bloody hands of their close allies. So Turkey shares in Israel’s shameful impunity. In particular, British authorities have long played along with Turkey’s anti-Kurdish warmongering, failing to challenge its war crimes and ethnic cleansing in northern Syria and elsewhere. And this is despite the key role the Kurdish people played in defeating Daesh (Isis/Isil).
Turkey expands its occupation in northern Syria amid Assad’s downfall
At the end of November, Turkey began to expand its occupied territory in north-west Syria to the south and the east.
Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) have been advancing and gaining territories from the Syrian government in the southern and eastern countryside of Aleppo since November 26 – the most significant conflict following a 2020 ceasefire brokered between Turkey and Russia. pic.twitter.com/u1FoFdxtGP
"SDF have withdrawn [from Manbij]. Turkey and its militias are now trying to reach the Tishreen dam. There are a lot of attacks against Tishreen and the dam, with SDF fighting the SNA outside Tishreen at present. They are using heavy… pic.twitter.com/Ru7uLctapp
a humanitarian disaster is escalating in northern Syria, receiving insufficient attention from public opinion or an adequate humanitarian and security response.
It explained:
In just two weeks, more than 120,000 people have been displaced from the Shahba (Til Rifat) to northern Syria.
And it added:
On December 7, these armed factions launched a large-scale attack on the city of Manbij and its surrounding areas, exacerbating an already dire humanitarian crisis that surpasses the capacity of organizations operating in northeast Syria. The attacks targeted infrastructure and health facilities, resulting in the destruction of some and
rendering them out of service, while many humanitarian workers were forced to leave the Manbij area.
This situation has directly impacted humanitarian aid efforts for displaced people in northern and eastern Syria. Humanitarian organizations face immense challenges in these circumstances, compounded by pre-existing dire conditions in the region. These include large camps like Al-Hol Camp and detention centers that still hold thousands of ISIS members, adding further pressure to the already strained resources.
Manbij is a multi-ethnic city whose population grew from 100,000 in 2004 to around half a million people, including surrounding villages. Kurdish-led forces liberated it from Daesh (Isis/Isil) in 2016.
Stop Turkey’s impunity. Stand with Rojava.
The autocratic, war criminal regime in Turkey has been waging its campaign of terror in northern Syria ever since the left-wing, Kurdish-led Rojava revolution gained international attention for successfully resisting Daesh advances in 2014 and 2015. Turkey has subjected the largely-Kurdish communities of the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES) to a humanitarian crisis, resulting from regular attacks, ethnic cleansing, and illegal occupation.
Corbyn is absolutely right. It’s essential that we stand alongside Kurdish and other people in northern Syria who helped to defeat Daesh. And that means opposing Turkey’s ongoing war against them.
It’s no secret that Israel has sought to annex the West Bank for decades—and now, many believe the time may be near. For Rabbi Arik Ascherman, the struggle to defend Palestinians in the West Bank from settler attacks has become his life’s work. But it’s a task that is only becoming more difficult with time, as the extreme dehumanization of Palestinians becomes all-the-more normalized by the genocide in Gaza. Ascherman returns to the Marc Steiner Show to discuss the brutal violence unfolding in the West Bank, and what, if anything, can be done to address Israel’s anti-Palestinian racism.
Studio Production: Cameron Granadino Audio Post-Production: Alina Nehlich
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Marc Steiner:
Welcome to The Marc Steiner Show here on The Real News. I’m Marc Steiner. Good to have you with us, and this is another episode of “Not In Our Name,” as we continue to look at what’s happening in Israel-Palestine and the devastation taking place in Gaza, and what we do about it.
And the person I’m talking to today is somebody I’ve known for a while, I’ve interviewed before. Rabbi Arik Ascherman first came on my radio program in public radio in April 5th, 2002, and we’ve been in touch ever since. He is an American-Israeli, a Reform rabbi who puts his life on the line to defend Palestinian rights, to end the occupation, to stop settlers from destroying people’s homes and villages and taking their sheep. He has been executive director of the Israeli Human Rights Association called Torat Tzedek (Torah of Justice) for 29 years. He served as co-director and executive director and director of special projects, and president and senior rabbi for Rabbis for Human Rights. He’s been beaten, arrested, threatened with death for defending Palestinian farmers, for working to find a way for Israelis and Palestinians, for Christians, Jews, and Muslims to live in the Holy Land together and share that space.
He’s back here in the United States to raise funds for his work and the work going on in Israel-Palestine and to talk about the reality of what’s going on there now in the Gaza War where 45,000 Palestinians have been killed, along with over 1,700 Israelis. He joins us in studio now, and Arik, welcome back. Good to see you.
Arik Ascherman:
Okay, thank you. Thank you for having me again.
Marc Steiner:
So let me ask you, I want you to describe for people listening to us what it’s like for you and the Palestinians you stand with when you’re attacked, when you go in there to defend Palestinian shepherds, defend them on their land, that right-wing Israeli settlers want to take from them with the backing of the government and the army. Talk a bit about that, about what you experience, and what that’s like and what actually happens.
Arik Ascherman:
It could be anything. I mean, you can Google “Ascherman knife” and see me being attacked by a masked knife-wielding settler. If I’d-
Marc Steiner:
Well, you have been beaten, you’ve been stabbed, you’ve been thrown in jail.
Arik Ascherman:
I’ve been all that, and of course, what I’ve suffered is so minuscule compared to what Palestinians suffer. But the fact is that sometimes I just look these settlers in the eyes and I stare them down and they back down, and sometimes we get beat up or worse. But of course, it’s not just the settlers.
One of the greatest successes we’ve had in my career was the Morar High Court decision, which mandates how the Israeli security forces must protect Palestinian farmers. And at least until October 7th, you really literally could see Israeli soldiers protecting Palestinian farmers to harvest their olives, we’re right now toward the end of the olive harvest season, next to settlements or inside settlements. But one of the other … We just had a harvest, for example, in a place called Deir Jarir-
Marc Steiner:
Palestinian olive harvest.
Arik Ascherman:
… and the settlers came and attacked us, and the Palestinians, of course. The army came and they did what the high court decision explicitly said they cannot do. It says explicitly, the Israeli High Court, and the Israeli High Court is often the flak jacket for the occupation, but sometimes they do the right thing. They said, “If Israelis attack Palestinians, the army must not close the area without an order, and throw everybody out to protect the Palestinians. You must do everything possible, all the means at your disposal, to let the Palestinians continue their harvest,” unless there really and truly is no other way of preventing bloodshed, and that certainly was not the case, but that’s what they did. They issued an order, and I explained to the officer on the ground what he was doing was illegal. Of course, it wasn’t his decision either. It was made by the brigade commander.
And then I spoke with the legal advisor for the occupied territories, or one of his officers, and once he agreed that he would start looking into this, I asked all of our human rights defenders that were there accompanying the Palestinian for the harvest, I said, “We will move out of this area for now even though this was an illegal order.” And I’m on tape saying, “and the soldiers and the police are not our enemies.” But I soon realized, if I hadn’t realized it previously, that if I don’t see them as our enemies, they see us, and me in particular, as their enemies.
Marc Steiner:
Right.
Arik Ascherman:
So, we go outside, and then after an hour of waiting, they arrest me and two others for having taken too much time to leave the closed area. And then what I often do … The point is to give us a ban, to give us a 15 … because they want us out of the picture. Just as we’ve got a high court case coming up in another week for one of the most violently expelled, separated communities, Wadi al Sikh, where literally at gunpoint they would say, “You’re out of here in an hour or you die.” And again, I was in jail because I was accused of, having two days earlier in Wadi al Sikh, attacking soldiers. But I refuse to agree to the ban, and then you spend a night in jail, you go before the judge.
And in the past the judges would cancel these requirements. No longer. And the words that came out of the mouth of the police officer that was there to defend the police decision were anarchists. I don’t even think they know what anarchists are. We are provocateurs. To work for justice, for work for decency, for work for Jewish values as I see it for basic human rights, is a provocation in their eyes.
A couple days later, the same thing. We’re with a farmer who I’ve worked with for 20 years, and after trying to go through all the rules and regulations to be able to get to his … We just went to his trees, and you hear the soldiers [inaudible 00:06:21] “The provocateurs are here.” And again, I have some reticence to talk about what happens to us when it’s so minuscule, as I said, compared to what happens to Palestinians, but it’s indicative. It’s an indicative of what’s happening to our society that anybody today who tries in any way to stand for Palestinian human rights is a traitor, a fifth golem as I’ve been called, and a provocateur.
Marc Steiner:
And even though you could be killed in the process of defending Palestinian rights in Palestine at this moment, they, if they wanted to, could just throw you in jail for 20 years, if they wanted to. And you are in many ways isolated inside of Israel. The group of Israelis, I had a friend of mine say, who now lives in Vietnam, who’s Israeli, “We’re all gone, the left in Israel. The Jews who are on the left in Israel left. They’re here, they’re in Vietnam. They’re in France, they’re in Britain, they’re somewhere else.” But you continue to do it, put your life on the line to say, “No, this is not what we should do,” knows who we are. A, The question is, how long can you do that? And B, this could also end up in the complete destruction of the Jewish people inside of Israel, and Palestinians as well.
Arik Ascherman:
There’s all real possibilities. Once, even when I was only 60, and now I’m 65, my partner says to me, as I’m getting up at 4:00 in the morning to go wherever I was going, “You know, you’re not that young anymore. Why do you do this?” And I say, “I will continue to do it as long as I’m able and as long as it’s necessary.” Unfortunately it’s still necessary, and thank God I’m still able. But already, before October 7th, back just when this government was elected in January of 2023, when they took office, I wrote in the Haaretz newspaper what our [inaudible 00:08:17] has to be, and I said, “Part of it may be our blood.”
People have become so insensitized to Palestinian blood, but there are still some Israelis who maybe are shocked a bit by Israeli blood. And it’s not that I have a death wish, and again, it’s to make something of our risks, which are so, again, minuscule compared to what the Palestinians go through, but the fact is that one of the few tools we have left in the toolbox is to put ourselves on the line and put ourselves in danger.
I was thinking, an outrageous situation, a family from the village of [inaudible 00:08:59] and an outpost on June 18th was set up 200 meters from their home, and they fled also with soldiers coming and firing guns in the air. And then the soldiers, who maybe realized at some level said, “Well, come back and live in your home, and call us if there’s a problem.” Really? Before they’re injured or dead? And we got a court order that they couldn’t touch the home. The home’s been destroyed by the settlers. Part of the family are US citizens. We begged that the United States would do something to defend their citizens. Nada. And sometimes I think, “Well, maybe we have to go and put up some tents where that demolished home was, if the court won’t agree to order that outpost removed.” And what might happen to us if we do that? I’m not sure it would be very pretty, but sometimes I don’t see what else we have left to do.
And again, we’re going to have to weather the storm, do whatever we can to protect whoever we can protect, at least that Palestinians should know that they are not alone. Find ways of getting out of our echo chamber to try to really understand what makes our fellow Israelis tick, the ones that you keep on saying, “How can they do these things and also be in courts as one of our last best hopes?” Try to educate. But it really is just doing whatever little we can do until this too shall pass.
Marc Steiner:
In all the years we’ve been talking together now, it’s been longer than I realized, 22 years of conversations.
Arik Ascherman:
Yes, it’s been a while.
Marc Steiner:
There was a time when, in our early years of talking together, that you actually thought, we actually thought, we could see maybe a peace blooming. There was a possibility of Palestinians and Israelis coming together. We could build a future somehow, whether it was two states or one state or some cooperative arrangement, that there was hope, but it seems to have gone in the other direction. I mean, give us your analysis. All these years, you’ve been fighting for this. Where you think we’re going and why are we here?
Arik Ascherman:
I think you’re absolutely right. I think for so many years there was some kind of feeling that we were moving in the right direction, and that’s gone, certainly since our current government was elected, certainly after October 7th, certainly with the election results here. But you know, just before leaving home in Jerusalem, last Shabbat that I was in synagogue, and we had a d’var Torah, a sermon, and then breakout groups talking about how we deal with the trauma of the situation that we’re in. And everybody, no matter what your political beliefs, is traumatized. There’s no way of overestimating the depth of the fear, anger, fury, trauma that Israelis are feeling after October 7th, which is one of the reasons that Israelis are just so incapable right now, for the most part, of having any empathy for what we’ve been doing to the Palestinians.
But the theme was particularly [foreign language 00:12:36] uncertainty, and the trauma caused by uncertainty. In the breakout groups, I said, “I embrace uncertainty right now, because if I think of what is certain, it’s awful, it’s terrible. And the one thing that gives me some hope is that there’s that joker in the deck of uncertainty.” Maybe Trump’s unpredictability, all these things, what the late Rabbi Michael Lerner spoke about, the God of the Exodus as the God that makes possible what seems impossible. But you are absolutely right, that hopefulness. And people used to laugh at me for being one of the last optimists standing, and I don’t like to say it about myself. I’m still an optimist in the long run as a person of faith, but in the short term, I’m not. I’m not really optimistic right now, and I think right now we are heading into darkness.
We’ve just started the Jewish month of Kislev at the end of which we’ll celebrate Hanukah. We need that Hanukah light, we need that Hanukah miracle, but we’re also taught in the Jewish tradition, [foreign language 00:13:54] you don’t count on miracles. And when we look honestly at our situation, whether we talk about our government in Israel, the fact that for so many Israelis that maybe in the past had some kind of sympathy for Palestinian human rights, today, West Bank Palestinians are like Japanese-Americans after Pearl Harbor. Nobody is standing with them.
The international courts have no teeth. Certainly, we can’t expect very much from the international community right now, and that means that Palestinians are simply unprotected, and things aren’t great either for the Israeli Jews and other Israelis living in poverty whom we also try to protect. We had a meeting just before I left of our coalition to work on public housing for Israelis, and nobody has any bandwidth to think about people living in poverty who are also the hardest hit by the realities of war.
Marc Steiner:
There’s so much in what you said that raises so many questions. And I understand the pain Israelis are going through, the attack on October the 7th, and the kibbutzim attack, Mefalsim/Kissufim, kibbutzim where my family lived, and relatives I didn’t even know were killed in those attacks. And some I know that I’ve been in communication with from Uruguay and Mexico City, which is where many of them came from, were on the left in Israel, so I understand that pain completely. But why do you think there’s such a detachment, then, from the mass murder of Palestinians by Israelis now? At least 45,000 people have been killed. More have been injured and wounded, entire communities leveled, people under the rubble, we don’t know how many. And how do you read that as somebody who’s been so active in trying to stem Israeli violence and to protect Palestinian lives and to build a different world, how do you begin to address what you just described?
Arik Ascherman:
Well, first of all, again, I say you cannot overestimate the depth of the trauma that people … And I would hope that what we’ve suffered should sensitize us to the suffering of others. But today, even Israelis who were in the past more progressive simply see Palestinians as demons, as Amalek, as people that there’s no way of making peace for. There is simply a total collapse.
And it’s also, Israelis could surf the net and see what you see, but they usually don’t. They don’t see the exploded body parts. They don’t see the hand of the child sticking out of the rubble in Gaza. What we hear 24/7 is about our pain. We hear the radio waves and television are filled day after day, hour after hour with the stories of the murdered and raped Israelis, the fallen soldiers, the kidnapped, the people who have had to have been evacuated from their homes because they’re on the border, and it’s just like never the twain shall meet. We are simply living in different realities, and there may be some other factors as well, but let’s start with those.
Marc Steiner:
In all the years, I’m going to come back to exactly what you said, let me start here that in all the years that I’ve been covering this with some intensity since 1993, in all the years that I’ve been involved in Israel and in Palestinian affairs, which has been since 1968, and before that when I was younger, I’ve never experienced a darker time that I can remember in my life. I understand the pain of what occurred on October the 7th. In my mind, you can’t question that. As I just said, part of my family was gone in that attack.
At the same time, one of my closest friends here in Baltimore, who’s Palestinian, his nephew was shot and killed by rampaging settlers in Ramallah. 14 years old, doing nothing. Maybe threw a stone. And one of the things that you know from the history of Jewish people is that beneath much of the work, secular and religious, is a humanitarianism, is a kind of wanting to reach out to the person who is being persecuted like you’ve been persecuted. So, how does that turn around? I mean, you live there. You’re in it.
Arik Ascherman:
Well, first of all, as you alluded to, and I think we’ve spoken about in the past, Israelis or Jews are arguably strong candidates for the dubious title of most oppressed people in human history, and that leaves scars on our souls. Again, I would hope … When I speak with Palestinians or when I speak with anybody, I think about the fact that we, who for centuries, so much wished that somebody was standing with us, was in some form of solidarity when the knock came on our doors in the middle of the night, our homes, our doors were burst open in the middle of the night. And often when I’m speaking with the Palestinians, where given the dire situation and the very limited ability that we have right now to do much other than batting down the hatches, [foreign language 00:19:49] until there will be better times, to protect, to preserve whatever we can in any ways that we can, I say to people, “I can’t promise much except for that you won’t be alone. You will not be alone.”
But for you and I and so many others for whom the lesson of Jewish history is that never again means never again for anybody. And I remember back when I was an undergraduate, and the issue was apartheid in South Africa, and bringing my rabbi to speak at one of the rallies, the late Ben-Zion Gold, [foreign language 00:20:36] and he said, “When I left the gates of Auschwitz and left my family in the ashes, I made two promises to myself, one to dedicate my life to the well-being of the Jewish people, and that’s why I’m a rabbi today, and that this should never happen again to anybody, and that’s why I’m here at this rally today.” And that just seems so obvious to you and I, but for many people, they go the opposite direction.
And we’ve talked before about Rabbi Shimshon Raphael Hirsch, who back several decades before Theodor Herzl, the founder of modern political Zionism, said the Torah is saying that [foreign language 00:21:18] the abomination of Egypt is simply this, that they believe that might makes right, and therefore they had absolute power over us. They could do with us what they want, enslave us, embitter our lives. And he predicted several decades before Herzl, someday we’re going to have a state, and the Torah’s warning us, “When you have the power, as you will, do not use it as Egyptians use it against us,” even though that’s maybe the natural human thing to do, to repeat learned behaviors, but we do.
And so many Israelis are motivated by the weight of Jewish oppression over the centuries, the feeling that there’s an anti-Semitic world out there who is looking for any way possible to destroy us. And your incredulity is just a indicator of just how we are in such different worlds from so many of these people. But I think, whether it’s the same way that so many of us maybe are incredulous about what motivated people to vote for Donald Trump, and I think at some point we’re going to have to get out of our echo chambers and into theirs, which isn’t an easy thing to do, and somehow really listen to what some of these people are saying. But I know I’m repeating myself, but it’s the reality.
Marc Steiner:
So look, you spend your time in Israel-Palestine defending Palestinian farmers and Palestinians, standing between them and settlers, and them and the army who want to evict them from their lands, push their sheep and them off their lands, and you’re sitting with part of the minority now, a small minority of Israelis, who are saying, “Not in our name. This shouldn’t be allowed to happen.”
Arik Ascherman:
I never felt marginalized for all the over 29 years I’ve been doing this, and now I feel so marginalized. We are such a small group.
Marc Steiner:
Yeah. So, I want to talk about what you think the future holds. When Ruwaida Amer was on our program here the other week, a Palestinian woman in Gaza who lost her family, her home destroyed, blown up, people under the rubble, people she loves, I mean, what do Israelis think if they’re going to go in and destroy people’s lives like this? That’s the end of it? They’re just going to give up and go away? I mean, if people talk about the pain of October 7th, or the pain of the Holocaust, which is painful … I mean, I grew up with people with numbers on their arms in my home. I know what antisemitism is. I know how deep it runs. But if we think that destroying Palestinian lives is somehow going to bring us peace, is going to create something … I mean, we’re destroying an entire world.
Arik Ascherman:
That’s the ultimate tragedy, because even if you don’t give a fig about Palestinian human rights, even if you don’t see them as human beings, even if you can’t see a foot from the Jewish people, what we are doing, in addition to the abominable injustice that we are doing to other human beings, is not going to bring us the peace and security that we deserve.
Our sages taught us [foreign language 00:24:44] the sword comes into the world because of justice delayed and justice denied, and the improper teaching of Torah. And our sages were not in favor of the sword, but they were realists. They knew the world they were living in. And with all the caution I have to take not to justify the unjustifiable, you can’t justify what was done. As someone who’s fought all my working career against the occupation, you can’t justify it in the name of the evils of the occupation, what was done on October 7th. But if you really want to understand it, injustice brings about the sword.
There are hardcore Hamas leadership that even if we were to have a just peace tomorrow, they would still be dedicated to destroying Israel. But what drives the masses into their arms is what we’re doing to the Palestinians. And even if we were to entirely destroy Hamas tomorrow, there’d be something more, because you can’t kill the desire of a people. There’s been a few cases in human history where brute force has quashed entirely resistance, but generally that’s not what happens.
And it’s like there’s another image in the Talmud in Ta’anit of someone who has become ritually unpure because they’ve touched a dead lizard, and they go into the ritual bath, the mikvah, to purify themselves, but they can’t purify themselves because they’re still holding onto the lizard. And the reality is, which sadly, again, even if you don’t care about other human beings other than Jews, as long as they’re holding on to the lizard of the occupation, as long as we are oppressing Palestinians, as long as we are taking their land and acting with violence and uprooting their trees and everything else, we’re not going to have, as Israelis, any kind of peace and security.
And when I talked before about the moral imperative that I feel not to leave people alone, to at least stand with them, and probably stand maybe between people and the people that are coming to burst down their door, frankly, there’s also some self-interest there as well, because that’s what you said. What do we think? Let’s say that someday this will end, as, you know, King Solomon’s ring, the round ring that said, “This too shall pass.” When we come out of that ark and see all the destruction surrounding us, ah, but now we’re ready to make peace, will Palestinians who have seen all their loved ones wiped out, will they have any interest in making peace with us? Again, I …
Marc Steiner:
So, let me, in the time we have here, there’s two kind of final thoughts. One’s political and one’s about the future, which is also political, I suppose, and it comes also down to your personal work is what I want to get to. But very quickly before I get there, do you see a difference between the Ben-Gvirs and the Hamas?
Arik Ascherman:
Sometimes I think they all get together at night to plan how to just make the rest of our lives miserable with a sick idea, that they benefit from ongoing conflict and bloodshed. And of course, it is … People reminded me that when the racist mayor, Rabbi Kahane, Mayor Kahane, who was the one person whose party was ever banned from the Knesset because of racism, when he would walk into the Knesset to speak, everybody would leave, including the Likud, including the other right-wing politicians.
Marc Steiner:
The right wing, right.
Arik Ascherman:
And today, Ben-Gvir, a Kahane supporter all his life, now he tries to pave that over a bit, who until he realized it wasn’t going to help him get elected, had a picture of the murderer, Baruch Goldstein, who went in and shot people up and murdered people in the Hebron mosques, Tomb of the Patriarchs and mosques-
Marc Steiner:
When the right-wing Israelis attacked the mosque and killed all those people, yeah.
Arik Ascherman:
And he’s in the Knesset and now a minister. I mean, you really do have to ask, “What has happened to us that that could be acceptable?”
Marc Steiner:
Arik Ascherman, let me first say, thank you for coming to the studio today and being here, but I also thank you for putting your life on the line for Palestinians and for an equitable Holy Land that very few were willing to do, especially fewer and fewer people are willing to do. And I think that’s one of the things that maybe we should work on in the future conversations here is to bring you and others and Palestinians we’ve had on together to talk about what the future might be and how to get there. Because right now, to me, it’s a very dark future and a very frightening place.
Arik Ascherman:
Very dark.
Marc Steiner:
Talking to Palestinians-
Arik Ascherman:
And maybe there’ll be some Hanukah lights.
Marc Steiner:
It’s very scary.
Arik Ascherman:
Yeah.
Marc Steiner:
Their lives are on the line, just like your life’s on the line for saying “No” to what’s happening to them. So again, Arik Ascherman, thanks so much for the work you do. I appreciate you joining us in studio, and we will link to all the work you’re doing so people can see exactly what takes place, and we will stay in touch. Thank you so much for being here.
Arik Ascherman:
Thank you.
Marc Steiner:
Once again, let me thank Rabbi Arik Arscherman for joining us today, and we’ll link to his work and videos about his work on our website. And thanks to Cameron Grandino for running the program today, Audio Editor Alina Nehlich for working her magic, Rosette Sewali for producing The Marc Steiner Show, and the tireless Kayla Rivera for making it all work behind the scenes, and everyone here at The World News for making the show possible.
Once again, let me thank Rabbi Arik Ascherman for being here today, and more importantly for putting his life on the line for fighting for ending the oppression of Palestinians and working for an Israel-Palestine where all can live together in peace. Please let me know what you thought about what you heard today, what you’d like us to cover. Just write to me at mssattherrealnews.com, and I’ll get right back to you. Once again, thank you, Rabbi Ascherman, for joining us today. Take care.
The United Nations’ special envoy to Syria said Tuesday that the Israeli military’s rapid move to seize Syrian territory following the Assad government’s collapse is a grave violation of a decades-old agreement that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims is now dead. “What we are seeing is a violation of the disengagement agreement from 1974, so we will obviously, with our colleagues in New…
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