Democracy Now! Audio - Democracy Now! 2025-12-23 Tuesday

Episode Date: December 23, 2025

Democracy Now! Tuesday, December 23, 2025

From New York, this is Democracy Now. I love the new owners of CBS. Something happens to them, though. 60 Minutes has treated me worse under the new ownership than they just keep treating me. They just keep hitting me. It's crazy. Hours after President Trump criticized CBS's coverage of him. The new head of CBS News, Barry Weiss, abruptly pulled a 60-minute segment to air Sunday about Venezuelan migrants who were tortured in El Salvador's second prison after being sent there by the Trump administration.

We'll speak to Alexa Kainek of the Human Rights Center at University of California, Berkeley. She was interviewed for the 60 Minutes piece about her research into Seikad. Then to journalist Jasper Nathaniel. He's recently back from the Occupied West Bank, where he was documenting Israeli settler and state violence against Palestinians. He was attacked by settlers in October. Press! American Press! American Press!

He's right here. Let's measure with it. There he is. Here he is, Gary. There it is. All that and more. Coming up. Welcome to Democracy Now.

Democracy Now.org. The War and Peace Report. I'm Amy Goodman. The Pentagon said Monday it had blown up another boat in the Pacific Ocean, killing one person. U.S. Southern Command published VIII. video on social media showing a vessel erupting in flames with a caption claiming it was engaged in drug smuggling, though it provided no evidence to back up that claim. The attack came as two Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee called on the Justice Department to investigate

the Pentagon's September 2nd attack on a boat in the Caribbean when a second U.S. strike killed two survivors of the initial attack as they clung to the wreckage of their vessel. Congress members Jamie Raskin and Ted Liu wrote, quote, The deliberate targeting of these two individuals is a blatant violation of the Department of Defense's Law of War Manual, which clearly states, quote, persons who have been incapacitated by a shipwreck are in a helpless state, and it would be dishonorable and inhumane to make them the object of attack, unquote. The Congress members add, quote, outside of war, the killing of unarmed, helpless

men clinging to wreckage in open water is simply murder, unquote. Meanwhile, Venezuelan officials have accused the U.S. of piracy after U.S. forces seized two oil tankers and were actively pursuing a third. This is Venezuelan foreign minister, Ivan Gil. These actions constitute acts of piracy as understood on the customary international law and codified by the United Nations as illegal acts of violence, detention or depredation committed on the high seas against ships and their cargo. President Trump announced the Navy will start building a new. class of warship named Trump-class battleships to create what he calls a golden fleet. A U.S. official told the Associated Press, construction for the new ship is planned to begin

in the early 2030s. A logo for the new ship class depicts Trump in the moments after his 2024 assassination attempt pumping his fist in the air. Navy Secretary John Fallon, said the battleship would carry nuclear cruise missiles. They all spoke yesterday in Mar-a-Lago, along with Defense Secretary Pete Hegeseth. In Gaza, at least two Palestinians were killed Monday as Israeli forces opened fire on Gaza City's Shijaya neighborhood. Palestinian media report Israeli warplanes also struck eastern parts of Gaza City and areas east of with the latest attacks, Gaza officials say Israel has violated the U.S. brokered October 10th ceasefire at least 875 times. Meanwhile, Israel continues to restrict the entry of tents, tarps, and blankets into Gaza, despite cold temperatures and heavy rain. The winter weather has been blamed for more than a dozen deaths, including at least three children who froze to death. This is Hanan Abu Taiba, a Palestinian mother whose family is displaced in living in a tent encampment in Khan Yunus.

The weather is cold and winter is still starting. We don't know when they'll tell us to return to our cities. As for the children, I have twin girls. I stay up all night holding them and covering them with the black blanket. They gave us to protect them from the cold. Israeli defense minister, Israel Katz, has vowed to build new Jewish settlements on land in northern Gaza that's currently being occupied by Israel's military. Katz said Monday the new settlements would replace those evacuated by Israel in 2005. His declaration came after Cardinal Pierre Batista, Pizabala, the Latin patriarch of Jerusalem, delivered a sermon in Gaza ahead of.

the Christmas holiday, rejecting plans by the U.S. and other foreign powers to lead Gaza's reconstruction effort. The Cardinal said, quote, it is we the people here who will decide how to rebuild everything, he said. Here in the U.S., nearly 50 House Democrats sent a letter to the White House Monday calling on President Trump to hold Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accountable for Israel's clear violations of the ceasefire. They write, quote, it is imperative that your administration exerts maximum diplomatic pressure on the Israeli government, including by leveraging U.S. assistance to bring an end to the near daily attacks on civilians,

including children, destruction of civilian property, and insufficient delivery of desperately needed humanitarian aid, unquote. Separately, a group of 17 U.S. senators, sent a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, urging the Trump administration to demand Israel allow free and independent press access to Gaza. It comes after Israel's Supreme Court Sunday granted a 10th extension to the government to respond to a petition brought by journalists seeking access to the Gaza Strip, but ruled that it must respond by January 4th. Meanwhile, the Israeli Knesset approved an extension of a law allowing officials to close foreign media channels on the grounds of harming state security.

The law will now remain in effect until at least the end of 2027. In Lebanon, at least three people were killed Monday when Israeli forces bombed a car near the southern coastal city of Saidan. Israel said it had killed three Hezbollah operatives and the strike. Lebanon's government denied that, saying a Lebanese soldier was among the dead. The U.N. peacekeeping force in Lebanon, known as Unifil, reports Israel's carried out more than 10,000 violations of its ceasefire with Hezbollah since signing the agreement over a year ago. Denmark announced it'll summon the U.S. ambassador after President Trump appointed a special envoy to Greenland. Trump tapped Republican Governor Jeff Landry of Louisiana for the position who vowed to, quote, Greenland a part of the U.S., unquote.

Trump has repeatedly insisted the U.S. needs Greenland for security reasons and called for its takeover using military force. This is Denmark's foreign minister, Lars Rasmussen. Out of nowhere, there's now a special U.S. presidential representative who, according to himself, is tasked with taking over Greenland. This is, of course, completely unacceptable. The Trump administration recalled nearly 30 U.S. ambassadors and other senior diplomats around the world Monday in an unprecedented shakeup of the U.S. Foreign Service. About half of those recalled are from African nations.

All of them were nominated to their posts by President Joe Biden and confirmed by the Senate to terms of three to four years. A State Department official said the mass firings were part of enforcing President Trump's. America First Agenda. The Trump administration announced Monday it's pausing leases for all large offshore wind forms under construction citing national security risks. Ted Kelly, lead counsel for clean energy at the Environmental Defense Fund, said in response, quote, for nearly a year, the Trump administration's recklessly obstructed the buildout of clean, affordable power for millions of Americans, just as the country's need for

electricity is surging, unquote. The Trump administration's order impacts five projects being built in the Atlantic Ocean, including a Virginia offshore wind farm that was set to be completed by the end of next year. Virginia has the largest concentration of data centers in the world leading to soaring energy costs. This comes just days after the media company directed by Donald Trump Jr., announced a $6 billion merger with a firm that hopes to build the world's first viable nuclear fusion power plant. A federal judge said ICE agents who raided a nutrition bar plant in upstate New York in November violated a worker's constitutional rights.

In body cam footage made public in a federal court ruling, ICE agents lined up workers and directed them to self-identify as citizens or non-citizens. 57 people were detained in the raid. Judge Brenda Sands said the conduct of federal agents was grossly negligent as body cam footage showed men in masks and tactical gear, entering a women's restroom and ordering a woman to pull up her pants and get out. Resistance. Hang it. Necessi goes to open the door, now. I think you back up.

Necessitos move us. We'll have to open a door. Convorte. He's in there. Yep. Get down! Get down! Get down!

What the on? Females, females, females, females. You have to say all right. Miss, pull up your pants come out of the bathroom. Pull your pants come out of the bouncer. A federal judge ruled Monday, the U.S. government had denied due process to Venezuelan men who were deported to the notorious Seckot Prison in El Salvador earlier this year after President Trump invoked the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to remove them. them without hearings. Judge James Bosberg of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia wrote in his opinion, quote, on the merits, the court concludes this class was denied their due

process rights and will thus require the government to facilitate their ability to obtain such hearing. Our law requires no less, unquote. Judge Bosberg gave the Trump administration until January 5th to either facilitate the return of the deported men back to the U.S. or offer them hearings. The Justice Department Monday briefly published thousands of additional documents related to the late serial sex offender, Jeffrey Epstein, after it failed to meet a congressionally mandated deadline of December 19th to release all unclassified records. The second tranche of documents were available online for several hours Monday afternoon but disappeared from the Justice Department's website without explanation around 8 p.m.

The documents contain wide-ranging references to Donald Trump. One email, written by an assistant U.S. attorney during Trump's first term in early 2020, found Trump was a passenger aboard Epstein's private jet on at least eight flights between 1993 and 96. On at least four of those flights, Epstein's co-conspirator, Delane Maxwell, was also present. The email reads, quote, for your situational awareness, wanted to let you know that the flight records we received yesterday reflect that Donald Trump traveled on Epstein's private jet many more times than previously has been reported or that we were aware, including during the period, we would expect to charge in a Maxwell case, unquote. On Monday, 18 survivors of Epstein wrote a joint letter condemning the Justice Department's release of just a fractal. of the files demanded by law and called on Congress to hold hearings to ensure the Trump

administration is fully complying with the Epstein Files Transparency Act. They write, quote, survivors deserve truth, survivors whose identities are private, deserve protection, the public deserves accountability, and the law must be enforced, unquote. To see our interview with Congress member Rokana, go to democracy. Now.org. And Paramount Skydance announced that Larry Ellison, the founder of Oracle and the father of Paramount CEO David Ellison, will personally guarantee $40 billion in the company's hostile bid for Warner Brothers discovery.

This comes about a week after the Board of Warner Brothers rejected Paramount's offer in favor of Netflix. Meanwhile, the executive producer of CBS News is 16. minutes is facing criticism for shelving a segment on the deportation of Venezuelan immigrants to El Salvador's notorious Secaut prison, reportedly telling colleagues she was under pressure from CBS's news editor-in-chief, Barry Weiss. According to the Washington Post, the segment was pulled this past weekend after Weiss asked for an on-camera interview with a member of the Trump administration.

In an internal email to producers, the segment's correspondent Sharon Alfonzi called the decision to pull the segment political. Democratic Senator Edward Markey said on social media, quote, this is what government censorship looks like. Trump approved the Paramount Skydance merger. A few months later, CBS's new editor-in-chief kills a deeply reported story critical of Trump, unquote. Meanwhile, TikTok's Chinese owner, ByteDance, has signed a deal to sell its U.S. operations to a group of investors led by Larry Ellison. Under the deal, a new U.S. company will monitor TikTok's algorithm and decide on the app's content moderation rules. And those are some of the headlines. This is Democracy Now. Democracy Now.org, the Warren Peace Report.

Coming up, we look more at the controversy over the 60-minute story. We'll speak to Alexa Koenig of the Human Rights Center at the University of California, Berkeley, who was interviewed for the now-killed 60 Minutes piece. Stay with us. ...toe... ...you know... ...and... ...that...

...the... I don't know I'm going to I'm going to I'm I'm The Heelers, The Heelers by the late Randy Weston, He performed the song when he spoke to Democracy Now in 2012 to see the interview and his performance go to Democracy Now.org.

This is Democracy Now, Democracy Now.org, The Warren Peace Report. I'm Amy Goodman. The new head of CBS News, Barry Weiss, is facing growing criticism after she abruptly canceled a segment on 60 Minutes about Venezuelan immigrants who were tortured in El Salvador's secotte megaprisen after being sent there by the Trump administration. CBS announced the segment had been pulled three hours before the broadcast Sunday, after Weiss requested multiple changes and reportedly urged 60 Minutes to include an interview with Trump advisor Stephen Miller, who has orchestrated Trump's immigration crackdown. On Monday, Weiss told colleagues at CBS, I held that story because it wasn't ready. Unquote. CBS correspondent Sharon Alfonci, who reported the segment, wrote an internal

note criticizing the decision. She noted that her team had requested comment from the White House, the State Department, and the Department of Homeland Security. Alfonci wrote, quote, if the administration's refusal to participate becomes a valid reason to spike a story, we have effectively handed them a kill switch for any reporting they find inconvenient, unquote. Alfancy went on to write, quote, our story was screened five times and cleared by both CBS attorneys and standards and practices. It's factually correct. In my view, pulling it now, after every rigorous internal check has been met, is not an editorial decision. It's a political one, she wrote. The controversy comes less than two months after Barry Weiss was installed as editor-in-chief of CBS News.

In October, she sold her right-wing digital media outlet the free press to CBS's new parent company, Paramount Skydance. Paramount's biggest shareholder is the billionaire Larry Ellison, a close ally to Trump. Paramount CEO is Ellison's son David, who installed White. and her post. Democratic Senator Ed Markey of Massachusetts said in a statement, quote, This is what government censorship looks like. Trump approved the Paramount Skydance merger. A few months later, CBS's new editor-in-chief kills a deeply reported story critical of Trump, a sad day for 60 minutes, and journalism, unquote. Barry Weiss made the decision to hold the segment, even though CBS had already

begun promoting the story online. Again, as soon as the planes landed. The deportees thought they were headed from the U.S. back to Venezuela, but instead, they were shackled, paraded in front of cameras, and delivered to Seacot, the notorious maximum security prison in El Salvador, where they told 60 minutes they endured four months of hell. Did you think you were going to die there? We thought we were already the living dead, honestly. The full episode was actually streamed in Canada because CBS sent the finished piece to its Canadian distributor before the segment was spiked.

Many media commentators have noted Barry Weiss's decision to hold the segment came shortly after President Trump publicly criticized CBS on Friday. But NBC's really bad. And CBS, I mean, I love the new owners of CBS. Something happens to them, though. 60 Minutes has treated me worse under the new ownership than they just keep treating me. They just keep hitting me. It's crazy. We're joined now by Alexa Kainig, co-faculty director of the Human Rights Center at the University of California, Berkeley, where she is also a research professor of law.

Alexa Koenig was interviewed for the unaired 60 Minutes piece talking about her students' research into human rights abuses in El Salvador's Seqat megap prison. The Human Rights Center's Investigations Lab recently aided Human Rights Watch in its report on Seqat titled, You Have Arrived in Hell, Torture and Other Abuses Against Venezuelans in El Salvador's Megap Prison. Alexa Koenig, thank you so much for joining us in this first interview since the 60-minute story was spiked. If first, as you are both a professor of law and also teach in the journalism school, can you talk about the significance of this story being spiked? I'd be happy to, and thanks so much for having me this morning. One of the things that the Human Rights Center at UC Berkeley is really committed to is training a next generation of students, whether they're journalism students, law students, or otherwise, how to find facts in online digital spaces, how to assess the quality of that information. We know that online places can be rife with propaganda and other mis and disinformation, and getting that truth, those facts out to the public. One of the first tenets of ethics and journalism is, of course, to seek truth and report.

That is something that we really try to ingrain in our students and to make sure that that doesn't fall along political lines, but that there's a fidelity to finding those facts and to getting them out as broadly as possible. When this story was spiked, that was, of course, incredibly disappointing, given the extraordinary amount of work that was done by Human Rights Watch and its partners, also by our student investigation team who'd been working pretty much around the clock for several weeks to pull together some of the digital content that could be used to corroborate or potentially disprove what the individuals who'd been released from Seikot Prison had said they'd experienced while in captivity. So I think that this is a big moment for American politics. It's a big moment for getting facts and truth out to the public about what has been done in their name, what is being done with taxpayer dollars. And I do think this is a story that eventually needs to come out. So if you can explain exactly what this story was. I mean, you have Sharon Alfancy responding in an internal memo to the spiking of the story by Barry. Wyss installed by Paramount, the father and son, Larry and David Ellison, close allies of

President Trump, saying that there should have been interviews with the Trump administration. And yet you have the producer of the piece saying they repeatedly asked different departments from Homeland Security to the Trump administration to respond, and they didn't. and that if you followed that rule, any time a government didn't want a story to be aired, they would just say no. I can't speak to, of course, what happened within 60 minutes or the exact contents of the show. But what I can certainly speak to is the kinds of work that was being done in the very careful reporting and investigation for the Human Rights Watch report that had come out fairly recently before the segment was being investigated and wrong. reported. One of the things that we really tried to support human rights watch on was figuring out how they could corroborate or filling gaps in their reporting through digital open source

information. One of the things that we built with the United Nations Human Rights Office was something called the Berkeley Protocol on digital open source investigations. Those are the global standards for how to do digital investigations responsibly, fairly, and with an eye towards ethics. And so one of the pieces we did was we pulled together a number of videos that had been posted to YouTube and other places online. A lot of times influencers had been invited into Seacot Prison and they had gathered video imagery of the internals of this particular facility. This is one of the most locked down prisons in the world. One of the things that I think Human Rights Watch was really trying to make sense of is what is the layout of that prison? What is module 8? What does that look like? What does it

contain, what kind of water did these men have access to, what kind of light sources did these men have access to, and whether that met international standards for people's human rights being protected. And so by taking hours of video footage and really breaking it down screen by screen and analyzing the content of that imagery, we were able to piece together a picture of Seacot Prison that could be basically investigated in parallel with the testimonies of the men who'd recently been released. I think very importantly, we did not have access to those testimonies.

That is, I think, a really important component of this story, because it meant that we were not being biased by these very human narratives that are such compelling narratives when you finally do have a chance to see them. But that we were able to kind of build from the ground up, almost literally, from satellite imagery of the earliest construction of the prison

to these internal videos, what the conditions were like that these men had been held in. Can you talk more about what you and the Berkeley students did in showing the structure of this prison, of this notorious prison, where the Trump administration sent hundreds of Venezuelan men? For both my students and myself, I think it was really probably the best word I can use is upsetting. to see the conditions in which these men were being held. I know that the narratives circulating around them was that they were among the worst of the worst and that they were really vicious individuals. But what we saw, regardless of that, which I think we now know from the Human Rights Watch report, in many instances, just was not true, was that the conditions were not

conditions that would be consistent with international minimum standards for how people are held in detention facilities. For example, there was a place where men would be held with a tremendous degree of sensory deprivation, meaning no light. There was no natural source of light. It was incredibly dark in there. And one of the things that we could find from these influencer videos was just that people had bare concrete to sleep on.

One of the things that we found was the water sources and some of these cells was so contaminated that there was just one source of water for these men to access. The men, we later knew from the Human Rights Watch report, were often drinking the same water that they were using for bathroom facilities, for washing and cleaning themselves, for cleaning their cells. So it was likely very contaminated. All of this was very consistent when we looked at the actual built infrastructure of these facilities with what these men said they had endured well in captivity.

In November, Human Rights Watch on Christosol, this is what you're talking about, released a report supported by your investigations lab, titled, You've Arrived in Hell, Torture and Other Abuses Against Venezuelans and El Salvador's Megaprisen based on interviews with 40 of the men who are ultimately released from Seqat. Democracy now spoke with the report's authors. This is Noah Bullock, Executive Director of Christa Sal. One of the conclusions we make is that torture is institutionalized in Salvadoran prisons. It's a state policy. It's almost as if the prison guards operate on a protocol.

It's impossible. This is the actions of bad guards or bad apples. People were subjected to beatings almost daily. Upon arrival, they were beaten. When they asked for food and water, they were beaten. When they asked for medical care on the way to the clinic, they were beaten. They were often denied food, water, clothing as a basic hygiene as a tool of punishment or reprisals. And in the case of the report, we also showed how the Venezuelans resisted and protested the beatings, but then were subjected again to more beatings.

There was a punishment cell called the island in their module where a tiny space, a solitary confinement cell where they were taken and beaten regularly. They would be deprived for hours of food and water, or in some cases, days. And even, sadly, we were documented cases of sexual abuse. And it's important to note that the testimonies were consistent across 40 different individuals who gave testimonies. We were able to document and corroborate their testimonies with photographic evidence that was assessed by forensic, independent forensic experts. So that was the head of Christosol who worked with Human Rights Watch. And you can see our interviews with both Noah Bullock of Christaul and Juan Papier of Human Rights. Watch at Democracy Now.org.

Before their report in August, ProPublica and the Texas Tribune released a joint investigation that revealed how the Venezuelan men deported by the Trump administration say they endured those months of physical and mental abuse at Seqat. It included a video featuring three of the men who were held there, Juan Jose Ramos, Andri Blanco Bonilla, and Wilmer Vega, San Diego. This is an excerpt. Fear, fear, fear, fear, fear, fear, terror. An officer from El Salvador got on board, and he said, either you get off the easy way or the hard way.

How will you get off? We're not getting off. Oh, the hard way then. And they started hitting us with batons. The prison director told us, welcome to hell, where you enter alive and leave dead. They forced us to kneel against our will, beating us. There were many people screaming, asking for help, for mercy. The shackles were so tight, and they injured our ankles.

Many were even bleeding because we were cutting ourselves with the shackles. They would say to us crudely, walk, you piece of them. I remember telling an officer I can't walk. If you loosen the shackles, I can cooperate, but I can't walk. I have a medical condition. I'm hypertensive. I was beaten to the point of fainting. They dragged me until we got to the cell block.

Then they threw me down. My head hit the floor. I woke up and asked God, why am I here? I felt like my world had collapsed. They started putting 10 to 15 people in each cell. I believe the Seco prison is not a prison meant to hold him. inmates. There, I feel like we were treated like animals. Food tastes like soap. It was shocking. The bathrooms were disgusting. They used the water we had to use the shower.

Sewage black water pipes ran through the cells. Some people developed respiratory illnesses because of that. The walls were full of mold. Sleeping on metal, because the beds were iron. I said, how long are we going to survive this? So those are three Venezuelan migrants who the Trump administration sent to Salvador's notorious SACOT prison. They were featured in the Texas Tribune ProPublica report in August, but they're very similar to the stories that were told in the 60 Minutes report. I mean, I just watched the 60 Minutes report, not because it aired on CBS, but because

the contractor in Canada played the 60 Minutes report because they were sent it because they're used to running the 60 Minutes, and it was before it was spiked by the CBS editor-in-chief, Barry Weiss. I want to read more from 60 Minutes producer Sharon Alfonzi's internal memo about the decision to hold the segment. She writes, if the standard for airing a story becomes the government must agree to be interviewed, then the government effectively gains control over the 60 minutes broadcast. We go from an investigative powerhouse to a stenographer for the state. These men risk their lives to speak with us. We have a moral and professional obligation to the sources who entrusted us with their stories. Abandoning them now is a betrayal of the most

basic tenet of journalism, giving voice to the voiceless. Again, those are the words of Sharon Alfonci in an internal memo responding to the spiking of her story. We're speaking to Alexa Kainig, who participated in the 60 Minutes Report with her students at the Investigations Lab at the University of California, Berkeley. If you can talk about this tenant giving voice to the voiceless. And what it means, now that this story is out, it maybe end up being the most viewed story in 60 Minutes history precisely because CBS tried to kill it. And what this is teaching your students at U-Cal, at Cal? What it's teaching our students at UC Berkeley is really the importance of rigorous reporting

and really tight fact-checking. One of the gold standard, or the gold standard for any investigation is to bring together physical evidence with testimonial evidence, so the stories of survivors in crisis and conflict, with documentary evidence, so the written reports and records that can actually be collated now increasingly from digital spaces. I think what these students are doing is trying to bring that process deeper into the 21st century,

polling from social media and having advanced skills, we often now train journalists and others and basic fundamentals of digital open source investigation precisely because so much of people's lives today are lived online. I think they learned just how abundant the kinds of information is, even for something as locked down as a prison like Seacot, that there is always, or almost always going to be information that circulates in these digital spaces, and then it could be an extraordinarily powerful way to help find the facts. What, again, I think, was so important about the work that these students did was to bring that together with the incredible reporting that's been done by journalists,

including at 60 minutes. And I think when you get everything pointed in the same direction around the who, what, when, where, why, and how, and what people really experienced, you have a high degree of confidence that what you're getting at is the truth. And today, when there is so much noise circulating both online and off, to be able to get to that truth and have some common understanding of the facts of what is being done on behalf of the United States is a really important way. It means for us to preserve democracy and ultimately fight for the rule of law. Finally, there's a really interesting point in the 60 Minutes piece.

It's the story of Christy Gnome going to El Salvador, standing in front of caged men, most of them all tattooed. Can you talk about what your students found? Who were those men? Yes. So the implication by Christy Gnome standing in front of them, these were the men from Venezuela that had been sent to El Salvador. But what you can tell from the tattoos and the types of tattoos on the men in the background is that these were almost certainly not the men from Venezuela who had been recently deported from the United States.

These were likely Salvadoran gang members and others who were there for a backdrop, I think, for her particular presentation. So I think even just from that imagery and being able to pull together an understanding of who, in what countries use tattoos as a symbol of who they are and their affiliations and who does not, became really powerful visual information to strongly suggest that these were not the men. She was implying that they might be. And I wanted to ask you finally about the significance of the breaking news, just as the story broke of the spiking of the story, Paramount Skydance.

announced that Larry Ellison, the founder of Oracle and the father of Paramount CEO, David Ellison, who installed Barry Weiss as editor-in-chief at CBS. Larry Ellison will personally guarantee $40 billion in the company's hostile bid for Warner Brothers' discovery. This comes about a week after the Board of Warner Brothers rejected Paramount's offer in favor of Netflix. So if you can talk about the significance of this, if Paramount were to take over, they would take over, is this correct, HBO and CNN as well? One of the trends that I am concerned about is the concentration of ownership over media. We're seeing that with social media sites being purchased up.

We're also seeing it with more traditional media when so much of our ability to communicate out facts to the world is concentrated in a small number of people. there's a squeezing of independent media and the ability to get independent perspectives and voices out more broadly. I think we're working with an information ecosystem that is highly dangerous for ensuring that there's a diversity of voices and perspectives that can be used to hold power to account and to strengthen the ways that we operate in society. We need that diversity. It's one of the hallmarks of America. And I think the ability to bring facts to the American people in ways that they can at least have a common basis of understanding for what's

happening in the world. Alexa Koenig, I want to thank you so much for being with us for doing this first interview since the 60 Minutes piece was spiked with Democracy Now. Alexa Kainig is co-faculty director of the Human Rights Center at the University of California Berkeley, where she's also a research professor of law. She was interviewed for the 60 minutes piece about her research into Seikot, along with the students at the Investigations Lab at University of California, Berkeley. Coming up, another story about journalism, journalist Jasper Nathaniel. He's recently back from the occupied West Bank, where he was documenting Israeli settler and state violence against Palestinians when he himself was attacked by settlers as he

tried to document them attacking a woman in her 50s who was there protecting the olive trees. Stay with us. The center of your skin, the color of your eyes, the kindness in your voice, the kindness in your voice and the truth. in your words the softness of your head the brightness of your mind the grace with which you move

amazes me you are so beautiful in every way The justice in your actions, the goodness of your heart, the wisdom in your choice. In every way, here on DemocracyNow, Democracy Now.org, the Warren Peace Report. I'm Amy Goodman. As the Israeli cabinet approves another 19 illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank, we look now at Israel's archaeological apartheid. That's the new piece by the New York-based journalist and writer Jasper Nathaniel,

who recently returned from the Occupied West Bank after months documenting Israeli state and settler violence against Palestinians. He's going to join us in a minute. In October, Jasper Nathaniel was ambushed by settlers as he filmed an attack on Palestinian farmers. in the village of Termasaya on the first day of the olive harvest. During the attack, a mass settler, Israeli settler, wielding a club, beat a 55-year-old woman unconscious. She was hospitalized with a brain hemorrhage. This is Afaf Abu Aliyah describing being attacked. We were picking olives, then a vehicle passed by.

going by. Then a woman started screaming settlers, but we didn't see them. They were hiding between the other trees. She told me, settlers, settlers, then me, my sister-in-law, my brother-in-law, and my son ran away from the area. I was looking around and I saw around 20 settlers and they started

beating me on my head. I fell to the ground and I couldn't feel anything. They continued beating me. I didn't see anyone and then two people came and carried me. As for Nathaniel and a group of Palestinians were also chased by a swarm of Israeli settlers just before the settlers were carrying clubs. Press, press, American press! American press! Press!

Here, what are we? Right behind it. He's right here. He's about to smash him. There he is. Here he's scary. There it is. To talk more about this.

To talk more about this, and Israel's de facto, annexation of the occupied West Bank. We're joined now by Jasper Nathaniel, New York-based journalist who covers Israel's occupation on his substack, infinite jazz. He's written extensively on state-backed settler violence. And Israel's use of archaeology, interestingly, as a tool of annexation. His latest piece is Israel's archaeological apartheid. I want to go back to that day. When was this that this took place? The attack on you and the attack. attack on the woman who is left unconscious. It was October 19th, so just about two months ago. And explain exactly what happened, how you got to this area, what you were facing, who you were with. So it's in a village called Termosaya, which interestingly is an 80 to 90 percent American citizens live in this village.

And so the reason I mentioned that. U.S. Israeli citizen settlers? No, no, no. Palestinian-American citizens living in this village. So the village is actually largely built on the American economy because a lot of the people who live there go back and forth. They have businesses in the U.S., and then they maintain homes in their ancestral land in Termosia. So the person that I was with that day, he's a farmer and he's also an attorney in Anaheim. So, you know, this is important because these people should be protected by the U.S. Embassy by the State Department just as much as I should.

So basically the olive fields attached to termicide, which belong to the residents there, have been occupied by these really violent settlers over the past couple of months. And anytime farmers have tried to get to their land, they've been attacked. And so this year for the olive harvest, which is a really important event every year for Palestinians, both because there's a sort of deeper significance to it, but also because it's their livelihood. The olive harvest this year, they decided to all go out together as one group in hopes that they would have protection in numbers, basically. And so I was embedded with the Palestinian farmers on that day on October 19th.

And basically what happened was as soon as we started driving into the olive fields in a sort of caravan, a settler who I later learned is a sort of infamous leader of the local violent settlers, stood in the middle of the road, brandished his pistol, pointed it at us, and was talking on his cell phone. And as he was talking, settlers started appearing behind him. And so we understood, okay, they know we're here, they know we're coming, and they're prepared for us. So the caravan turned around, and we found another way into the olive fields. We were there for a bit. It was not a great harvest this year, mostly because of the weather and climate change. So then,

when it was time to leave the olive fields, on our way out, we were trapped. There were basically two ways out. One road, there were settlers blocking us. And the other road, there was an Israeli military Jeep. And so I was talking to the farmer that I was with Yasser, and we decided that the safest bet would be for me to actually get out of the car and try to talk to the Israeli soldiers. You're a Jewish American. I'm a Jewish American and a white American, Frank. And the person I was with is a Palestinian American who has brown skin. And so, you know, it's frankly very dangerous to drive towards Israeli soldiers or even to walk towards them.

And so we decided, as, you know, the white Jewish American, they were less likely to shoot me, frankly. And so I walked up to the soldiers and I was waving my arms and they were aiming their rifles at me, which is just sort of standard procedure when soldiers talked to you in the West Bank. And I said to them very clearly, we need help getting out of the olive fields because there are settlers blocking us in who are not letting us out. We're just trying to get back into the village of Termesia. They sort of questioned me. They wanted to know what I was doing there. I think they were kind of confused to see me in the olive fields.

And finally, they said, okay, get back in the car and we'll help you get out. We'll accompany you. Yes. And so I get in the car with Yasser. We drive up towards them. And as we're driving up, we see that same settler from earlier with the gun standing right next to them. And so, again, I stick my head out the window and I say, are you going to help us get by this guy? And they say, yes, yes, just wait a minute.

We'll get them out of the way and then we'll go. As soon as they say that, they get back in the car and speed away and leave us alone with this infamously violent settler, who's known to the IDF, in part because they collaborate. rate. So we then are thinking, well, this is a dangerous situation. We've just been left alone with the settler. Clearly the soldiers just set us up or something. And he's talking on his cell phone again. But then he's sort of, he's on an ATV. He drives away. And so we think maybe we're okay. There's another Palestinian there in his car, which has, he's been attacked already. So his windshield is smashed. His tires are slashed. And so I get out of the car and I offer

to help push him so that he can sort of get to the ridge of the hill and roll back. down into town. And as I'm pushing him, that's when this huge mob of dozens of settlers wearing masks, wielding clubs, sort of appear from the hills and start chasing us. So that video that you see was taken by somebody on the other side of the olive fields. So this is literally about three or four minutes after the ID of soldiers promised us safe passage out of the olive fields. So you're then, they bring you up there, they desert you, and then suddenly these settlers come. armed? They were, well, the first guy that we saw had a pistol, and he was pointing it at us. You know, to the extent that I was able to get a good look at the mob that was chasing us,

they were wielding these huge clubs. And, you know, I think a lot of the time when people see like videos of settler attacks on the internet, it's maybe a couple of settlers who show up and start harassing Palestinians and then there's a confrontation and then they attack. But in this case, it was clear that this was a planned ambush. Again, it was the first day that the Palestinians had gone back into the olive fields that these settlers had occupied. And they showed up basically as an army with these clubs that had clearly been built as weapons, and they were there, they were out for blood. They weren't just sticks that they picked up. Oh, no. I mean, these are, I mean, they look like golf clubs almost. I mean, they have these big knots at the end that, you know,

we're able to break through our windshield. So talk about what happened, how you discovered this woman. So I am running away in that video that you show, and I reached the bottom of the hill. I'm going to show that video as you talk. And when I get to the bottom of the hill, Yasser, the guy who I was with before, is down in the car. And he's stuck, though, because now there's basically a bottleneck of cars trying to get out of the olive fields. And I jump into the car, and, you know, this mob is right behind me. One of the settlers who was sort of out in front, really big guy with a big club wearing a mask,

it's right behind us. He smashes through our rear windshield. With the club. With the club five or six times. And again, we were stuck. And so, I mean, both Yasser and I thought, these guys are going to drag us out of the car. And who knows what's going to happen? And I should say, a couple kilometers away, a 20-year-old Palestinian-American, Seifolam-Musselet, was beaten to death by a mob just like this.

in his olive fields. And so this was sort of on my mind as this was happening that this is how it happens. The guy smashed through our windshield and then he actually runs out in front. There's still a huge mob behind him sort of showering us with rocks and beating cars, lighting cars on fire. And then we see out in front a woman maybe 30 or 40 feet away standing under an olive tree. And she had been there picking olives as part of the harvest. And the settler just, sort of beelines right to her. And, I mean, it was the single most heinous act of violence I've ever witnessed. And I've seen a fair amount in the West Bank. I mean, he clubbed her once, knocked her completely unconscious. Clubbed her head? Yes. And then he stood over her body and

struck her twice more in the head while she was down. And then the mob kept running, throwing rocks. Yeah, I mean, it was just a full-on attack, basically. And how did she survive? So I got out of... We just played the clip of her in the hospital. Yeah, so I got out of the car, and there were two other Palestinian guys, and we basically ran to her and helped carry her to safety into another car. And she was rushed to the hospital, in addition to a couple other people who were also severely wounded. And she was in a coma for several days. I mean, she had a brain bleed. And it was touch and go, is my understanding. So we only have three minutes. And I want to make sure we get all aspects of this story in. What did the Israeli government say at that point? And how did this

story change? So immediately, you know, I had obviously filmed it and shared it and it started to go a bit viral, and the Israeli government immediately put in a statement that the IDF arrived at the scene of a confrontation and dispersed it. And I can just say that that is categorically untrue. Not only did they not arrive, but they were there right before it started before leaving. And so the Israeli military did absolutely nothing. And then the last thing I'll say is just the next day, I was back in the olive fields, and there was enough outrage that there was a sort of nominal investigation happening on the ground, the soldiers, Israeli soldiers and police officers who were there doing this investigation were accompanied by the settler with

the gun, who we understand to be a leader of the local settlement. And so what happened when your video got out? I mean, it drove enough outrage that I think it sort of forced the Israeli authorities to act in some way to, you know, act like they are doing something to crack down on this violence. And actually, a couple weeks later, the man who clubbed the woman was actually arrested, but they've, you know, done nothing to dismantle the network of settler terrorists there. Which brings us to that larger point, how this relates to settler violence in the West Bank and what's happening now with Bezalalzumacher.

Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, a little context on what's happening in the West Bank right now and why this is happening is that Smotritch basically pulled off a bureaucratic coup to take over control of West Bank governance and install other settler ideologues who can run all the bureaucratic processes to approve new settlements, basically. And so what's happening right now is these really violent settlers are going out into the fields. They're stealing land from Palestinians, attacking people. Every once in a while, the Israeli government will condemn them, But then what happens is they turn around and they retroactively legalize the land that was stolen

and basically reward the violent settlers by giving them the stamp of state legitimacy. And then, you know, within weeks, months, years, you have a new settlement right there where the violent settlers had, you know, gone out and stolen the land. We're going to do part two of this conversation and post it online at DemocracyNow.org where I'm going to ask you about Muhammad Ibrahim, the Palestinian-American teenager, released from an Israeli military prison in late November after more than nine months in custody without trial. Palestinian-American, you've just come from Florida, where you spent time with him.

Jasper Nathaniel, New York-based writer and reporter who covers Israel's occupation of the West Bank on his substack called Infinite Jazz. And we'll talk about your new piece, Israel's archaeological apartheid. That does it for our show. Happy birthday to Yusra Razuki. We have job openings at Democracy Now for video news production and digital fellowship programs. Go to DemocracyNow.org. I'm Amy Goodman. Thanks for joining us.