It Could Happen Here - Producing Knowledge on Palestine feat. Dana El Kurd

Episode Date: November 20, 2025

Dana El Kurd speaks with professor, author, historian, and editor-in-chief of the Journal of Palestine Studies Sherene Seikaly. They discuss the importance of producing knowledge and learning about Pa...lestine, the intersectionality of the Palestinian cause, and how to combat a system trying to make you stupid. Sources: Journal of Palestine Studies – https://www.palestine-studies.org/en/journals/jps/about Donate to the Journal of Palestine Studies – https://palestine-studies.networkforgood.com/projects/18346-donate-to-support-palestinian-knowledge-production Mahmoud Darwish interview - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrvzKOYeQZY&embeds_referring_euri=https%3A%2F%2Feliaayoub.com%2F&source_ve_path=MjM4NTE AAUP & MESA report on Title 6 investigations - https://www.aaup.org/news/new-aaup-report-analyzes-weaponization-title-vi-doe-investigationsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 This is an I-Heart podcast. A decade ago, I was on the trail of one of the country's most elusive serial killers, but it wasn't until 2023 when he was finally caught. The answers were there, hidden in plain sight. So why did it take so long to catch him? I'm Josh Zeman, and this is Monster, hunting the Long Island serial killer, the investigation into the most notorious killer in New York, since the son of Sam, available now.
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Starting point is 00:01:54 And she puts host Matt Rogers and Bowen-Yag on notice. I don't think so, honey. I feel very, very triggered by this. Open your free IHeart Radio app. Search Las Culturista. And listen to the full podcast now. CoolZone Media. Hello, everyone. My name is Donna El-Kurd. And this is It Could Happen here. I'm a professor and researcher of Arab and Palestinian politics and a senior non-resident fellow at the Arab Center, Washington. Today we're joined by Shedin Seikari, a professor of history at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
Starting point is 00:02:33 Her book, Men of Capital, Scarcity, and Economy in Mandate Palestine, explores economy, territory, the home, the body. And she's also editor-in-chief of the Journal of Palestine Studies. Today, I wanted to invite Shadine on to discuss the importance of Palestinian knowledge production and Palestinian spaces for writing, researching, analyzing, etc. So, yeah, Shudin, thank you so much for coming on. Thank you for having me. So let's maybe start with a very basic question. What is the Journal of Palestine Studies? Could you give us kind of an overview?
Starting point is 00:03:08 Sure. So the Journal of Palestine Studies is the flagship journal of Palestinian Studies in the English language. It was established in 1971. So that makes it 54 years old. First, it was part of the then-Berut-based and still Beirut-based Institute for Palestine Studies and Kuwait University, which sponsored what was understood at the time as an international forum to discuss all aspects of the Palestine question and the Arab-Zainist conflict. And really, the people who established it were looking for shaping a space that could discuss these matters freely. And the story of the founders is a really interesting one because they were people like Hisham Sharabi, Walid Khalidi, Burhan Dushani, Fuad Zarruf, and Konstantin Zerak, who actually was
Starting point is 00:04:10 the person who coined the way that we name the Nekba in his book Manal Nekba that he wrote in 1948 in which he coined this term the catastrophe to think about 1948 which would be our ongoing condition and I think the way to think about these people in the way that they began the journal is to think about them as really confronting a landscape of erasure denial and urgency and occupying this kind of steady incessant pain of the original inception of the Nekba. You know, if you think about it in 1971, it was not that long before, a decade and a half. Yeah, right.
Starting point is 00:05:00 And I think what's important about, you know, in the last couple of years, people have been kind of making demands about Palestinian studies as part of, you know, some of the student movements and the staff and faculty movements. and I think it's really important for people to know that this comes from a much longer tradition of the production of knowledge as a real insistence on existence. Absolutely. Palestinians have been producing knowledge about their state of affairs,
Starting point is 00:05:35 you know, just like today, academics in Gaza are producing knowledge, right? And I'm always, like, struck by how, just ahead of its time, the General of Palestine Studies is like a lot of our understanding of the conflict that are now finally starting to seep into the mainstream
Starting point is 00:05:54 were first discussed in these pages. Some of the research findings about the history were first articulated in these pages. And so that kind of knowledge production is just it is a form of resistance to erasure. Absolutely. And just, you know,
Starting point is 00:06:10 some of those would be, for example, plan delet, which was the, you know, the plan, which would lead to the destruction of 450 to 537 Palestinian villages. And this plan would come to be recognized through the work of Benny Morris as an Israeli historian who had access to Israeli documents. But it's actually was Walid Khalidi, who had been evidencing and showing the empirical foundations of planned out. And it was in the Journal of Palestine studies that he published those findings. Right. In that case, I think that again, for people who are really engaging the movement for free Palestine and free Palestinians, we really have to be approaching
Starting point is 00:07:04 the political economy of who gets to speak. Right. And whose knowledge production is uplifted as legitimate and worthy. And I think you see a lot of this kind of centering of Israeli voices. And I think we really have to, in this moment, it's urgent to center Palestinian knowledge production. Yeah, there's just so many ways that we witness this all the time, that it's not something worthy of discussion unless an Israeli voice says it. And there's an inherent suspicion about the Palestinian scholar, the Palestinian analyst, the Palestinian knowledge producer of some kind. Now, of course, the last two years have been a true upheaval, the genocide in Gaza, a tragedy that we, honestly, we haven't really absorbed and possibly can't. And we've
Starting point is 00:08:01 seen in the last two years a concerted effort to erase Palestinians further from the American Academy, but from also like scholarship, generally speaking. But before I get into that, I wondered if you could kind of give your impression of what did doing Palestinian studies look like before October 7th? How was it easy? Was it acceptable? I mean, I know the answers, but I'd like you to say them.
Starting point is 00:08:30 So I think one of the things that's been interesting to observe, and I would date this as happening around COVID, when our colleagues in various disciplines started confronting the reality of their archives closing. So I'm a historian. So I speak from that place. You know, people who study Europe, people who study the United States kind of confronting the reality that they might not access archives that they're accustomed to accessing. And in a similar way, facing the kind of targeting and, you know, surveillance, the bipartisan targeting and surveillance of academic knowledge production
Starting point is 00:09:14 and trying to explain to people, this is what we've existed under all along. Now, I think there are similarities across communities of knowledge production, so I think people who work in black studies, who work in indigenous studies, who work in queer studies, gender and sexuality, have also been under the duress of surveillance and targeting. I think for those of us who have been doing Palestinian studies, what does it mean? Especially if you're a Palestinian doing it, but whoever you are, it means you have to show up 10 times more ready than anybody else. It means you have to conduct yourself as if you are always being recorded. Right. It means that every single word that you say, you should be able to stand up for in a court of law. And all of those kinds of restrictions, actually, you know, you give us lemons, we're going to make lemonade. Because those restrictions have imposed on us a kind of rigor that is the least that we can do.
Starting point is 00:10:29 A decade ago, I was on the trail of one of the country's most elusive serial killers, but it wasn't until 2023 when he was finally caught. The answers were there, hidden in plain sight. So why did it take so long to catch him? I'm Josh Zeman, and this is Monster, hunting the Long Island serial killer, the investigation into the most notorious killer in New York, since the son of Sam, available now. Listen for free on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Robert Smith, and this is Jacob Goldstein, and we used to host a show called Planet Money.
Starting point is 00:11:04 And now we're back making this new podcast called Business History about the best ideas and people and businesses in history. And some of the worst people, horrible ideas and destructive companies in the history of business. Having a genius idea without a need for it is nothing. It's like not having it at all. It's a very simple, elegant lesson. Make something people want. First episode, how Southwest Airlines use cheap seats and free whiskey to fight its way into the airline business. The most Texas story ever.
Starting point is 00:11:37 There's a lot of mavericks in that story. We're going to have mavericks on the show. We're going to have plenty of robber barons. So many robber barons. And you know what? They're not all bad. And we'll talk about some of the classic great moments of famous business geniuses, along with some of the darker moments that often get overlooked. Like Thomas Edison and the electric chair.
Starting point is 00:11:54 Listen to business history on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever. You get your podcast. On this week's episode of the next chapter, I, T.D. Jakes, get to sit down with Oprah Winfrey, a media mogul philanthropist, and global trailblazer. My life, although it may look like an anomaly, it has only been possible because I was obedient to the calls. This episode dies deep into how Oprah turned pain into purpose.
Starting point is 00:12:29 and what it really means to evolve with everybody watching. Every decision I have ever made has come from sitting with the spirit and asking God, what would you have me do first? Whether you're rebuilding, reimagining, or just trying to hold it together, this one will speak directly to you. Listen to the next chapter on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast, episodes drop weekly. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty and I'm the host of the On Purpose podcast.
Starting point is 00:13:06 Recently, I had the honor of sitting down with the iconic Chris Jenna. You never quite know what or where life is going to lead you and where it's going to be the best lesson you ever learned and not get distracted by the noise. This is a lot of noise. Even if one of your children has been through something really difficult with their partner or an ex-partner, you still love them as part of the unit. and the family. These are, in most cases, the fathers of my grandchildren.
Starting point is 00:13:34 I love these men, and that love doesn't go away when we experience really challenging times with them. Compassion is key into really feeling what somebody might be going through. Even though you don't agree with them, if you once love them, then love is love. Listen to On Purpose with Jay Chetty on the IHart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. It also means, I mean, I think for a lot of us, yourself included, right? I was just, somebody was interviewing me yesterday about, oh, have you faced harassment or censorship? And I think, at least in my case, I'm constantly.
Starting point is 00:14:25 you know, experiencing these things and just kind of swallowing it. Right. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. Just like getting along with the business of the every day. So, you know, there was this moment back in 2015, 2016, where for whatever reason, every month, one of the bots of one of these surveillance websites would start highlighting me and insulting me on Twitter, you know, liable,
Starting point is 00:14:54 calling me names, going after how I look, like really vulgar, misgendering me, that kind of thing. And I'd come out of my lecture, you know, and, you know, I teach big classes, and I'd come out of a big, you know, 250-person lecture, which requires so much focus and energy and being present and, you know, that adrenaline rush. And I'd look at my phone and I'd have 50 notifications and it would just be one insult after another. And that's just part of the job. Yeah. And that's just how it's been, right? Like, you know, from the beginning at least of my graduate career and I started grad school,
Starting point is 00:15:42 you know, September 11 happened when I was in grad school and I was in New York when it happened. And, you know, we've been under surveillance. we've been named. We've been watched as part of what we do, as you said. And in fact, I got my master's at the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, and they wrote a book back in the 80s about the surveillance, and I think it's called They Dare to Speak. Oh, right, right, yeah.
Starting point is 00:16:11 These early accounts of the concerted attempt to silence us. And so what I like to remind people is at this moment, you know, you said, oh, they're trying to erase Palestinian scholars. I mean, at least they're trying to erase the voices who are putting forward a critical take on Israeli settler colonialism and genocide. And I think what I like to remind people is that there is way more of us now than there's ever been before. Yeah, good point. Ten years ago, people like you and me wouldn't have jobs in the academy.
Starting point is 00:16:47 It may be in a couple years we won't have jobs, but. I don't know. Like, I'm not, I don't want to sit on our laurels and think, oh, okay, we arrived. In any case, the whole concept of arrival and career arrival at this moment has completely changed for me. I don't know how it is for you, but the effect of the genocide has made it so that the bankruptcy of the institutions we work for, the rapid ways in which they are engaging with obedience and authoritarianism. Yeah. It's like what we've worked for our whole careers. It's like, I don't think this makes sense actually, do you know? Right. So I would say it's been like that all along. People even saying to you things like, oh, what do you mean you study Palestine? You know, like what is that? Yeah. So yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'm in a different discipline, but certainly it was, I remember, as a student, hungry for information. I mean, it was rare to find something about the Middle East to be taught, let alone Palestine.
Starting point is 00:17:57 The level to which they delegitimized Arab and Palestinian sources or questions of importance to Palestinians and Arabs, normatively speaking, politically speaking, also theoretically speaking. I mean, I can tell you so many stories. Like, every person who has ever wanted to study Palestine, especially as you said, if you are Palestinian is discouraged from it. And it's told not to. It's told this doesn't fit. It's told, you know, I'm in political science. The theories don't account for Palestine. It's just outside of space and time and theory. And you can't account for it. You can't discuss it. And the harassment, the harassment campaigns all of us have been facing.
Starting point is 00:18:37 I mean, it takes such a mental and emotional toll. And yet we produce. And yet we get tenure. And yet we teach our classes. And we're excellent. in our teaching and our students love us and want to learn. But, you know, as you said, like, it really has exposed the degree to which these universities, because they have been, well, one, like, we are in America, but also because they have been so divorced from their actual missions. Like, how meaningless a space this has now become. But that's, like, on the harassment and, like, kind of these kinds of obstacle side, I also think, like, people don't recognize, like, the resources that are needed to teach and study and research
Starting point is 00:19:20 Palestine, that other people in the academy, other knowledge producers get very easily. And it's, there is so little for people who study Palestine. And of course, that impacts what kind of academics are able to do this and, and how many people we even missing from this discussion, right? I agree with you. That has been the condition before October 7th. I think now after October 7th, that after they have attempted to use Palestine as kind of a cudgel to attack the higher, you know, higher education generally. Like now people are recognizing it maybe more, but that has always definitely been the case.
Starting point is 00:19:58 Oh, also, I just wanted to remind listeners and bring it up. Like, I remember Barry Weiss, who is now the head of CBS. I mean, she made her claim to fame attacking Arab and Palestinian professors in Colombia as an undergrad. Yeah. And that's seen as totally valid. Yeah. No, I mean, I think, you know, Palestine is cultural and also, you know, I've been saying this for a while. Palestine is paradigm, right?
Starting point is 00:20:28 You know, if you look at the Memdanian, I think it reveals also kind of what Palestine also stands for, which is, the way that both the Democratic and the Republican Party have really no link to the popular realities on the ground. Right. And that in effect, you know, part of the Trump base was really responding to this disparity, right? This lack of investment in the political system. And I think, you know, that for me was the, I don't have.
Starting point is 00:21:08 hope in electoral politics and, you know, I don't want to be cynical or anything, but I think what the Mim Denny win shows us is that people are disgruntled and they're sick of the kind of extractive billionaire class doing what they want to do at the expense of the rest of us. And I think the media is really complicit in all of this. Absolutely. Absolutely complicit in the genocide. absolutely complicit since the you know war on iraq since the second war on iraq in rendering news as entertainment you know and and it's like you could see the freak out that people had the media had about memdenny right across the board it wasn't just the fox news no new york times everybody yeah and and all of the you know television media too so it's just
Starting point is 00:22:08 I think there's also a link to higher education in that way because I think there has been an investment in making people stupid. Right. Yes, that's what I was going to say. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that's exactly what I was going to say is the Palestinian issue and Palestine studies and research and knowledge production. The fact that there exists the few Palestinians in higher education has been used to attack higher education, but it's not really about Palestine. I mean, it is a little bit about Palestine. Of course, these people are anti-Palestinian, but it's about preventing social mobility. So you're saying, like, there's all this disgruntlement in the public space. Our students are disgruntled. They want to learn. They've been promised something with
Starting point is 00:22:53 this college education. And, you know, even the slight bit of social mobility that has existed as a result of higher education is too much for the Trump administration. Yeah. It's too much for for this right wing. So how is that is a class issue? Absolutely. No, it absolutely is, you know, as are all of the kind of struggles we stand in solidarity with, you know, it's like, really, it is intersectional. And we didn't need Trump to teach us that, but that's the lesson that keeps being delivered time and again. And one of the things that's really struck me, and this has been the case for the last 10 years, 11 years, long before. for Trump. And I think one of the challenges we face today is not to over-determine the Trump
Starting point is 00:23:39 administration as the site of all of the catastrophes that we're in today. And one of the things I've noted for the last 14 years is, I don't have to teach students that history isn't about things always getting better. That's not a lesson they need to know. They understand that teleology and the fallacy of advancement is a lie. They understand that because they live it. As you say, they're in debt, especially those of us who teach at public universities. Most of our students are indebted. A lot of them have two or three jobs. They are housing insecure. They're food insecure. They don't have a clear vision of the future. And if they protest genocide, they're labeled anti-Semitic. Their universities crack down on them.
Starting point is 00:24:26 They're doxxed. I mean, it's so outrageous. Obviously, I don't need to tell you. Their identification with Palestine is also about their own experiences with Greece. Of course. So I think that's the, that really is the momentum, you know, that we're witnessing is that kind of identification. Yeah, absolutely. A decade ago, I was on the trail of one of the country's most elusive serial killers. But it wasn't until 2023 when he was finally. caught. The answers were there, hidden in plain sight. So why did it take so long to catch
Starting point is 00:25:07 him? I'm Josh Zeman, and this is Monster, hunting the Long Island serial killer, the investigation into the most notorious killer in New York, since the son of Sam, available now. Listen for free on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Robert Smith, and this is Jacob Goldstein, and we used to host a show called Planet Money. And now we're back making this new podcast called Business History about the best ideas and people and businesses in history and some of the worst people, horrible ideas, and destructive companies in the history of business. Having a genius idea without a need for it is nothing. It's like not having it at all. It's a very simple, elegant lesson. Make something people want.
Starting point is 00:25:54 First episode, How Southwest Airlines Use Cheap Seats and Free Whiskey to Fight Its Way Into the Airline. business. The most Texas story ever. There's a lot of mavericks in that story. We're going to have mavericks on the show. We're going to plenty of robber barons. So many robber barons. And you know what? They're not all bad. And we'll talk about some of the classic great moments of famous business geniuses
Starting point is 00:26:13 along with some of the darker moments that often get overlooked. Like Thomas Edison and the electric chair. Listen to business history on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. On this week's episode of the
Starting point is 00:26:29 Next chapter, I, D.D. Jakes, get to sit down with Oprah Winfrey, a media mogul, philanthropist, and global trailblazer. My life, although it may look like an anomaly, it has only been possible because I was obedient to the calls. This episode dies deep into how Oprah turned pain into purpose and what it really means to evolve with everybody watching. Every decision I have ever made has come from sitting with the spirit and asking God, what would you have me do first? Whether you're rebuilding, reimagining, or just trying to hold it together, this one will speak directly to you. Listen to the next chapter on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast episodes drop weekly. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty, and I'm the host of
Starting point is 00:27:29 On Purpose podcast. Recently, I had the honor of sitting down with the iconic Chris Jenner. You never quite know what or where life is going to lead you and where it's going to be the best lesson you ever learned and not get distracted by the noise. This is a lot of noise. Even if one of your children has been through something really difficult with their partner or an ex-partner, you still love them as part of the unit and the family. These are in most cases, the fathers of my grandchildren. I love these men and that love doesn't go away when we experience really challenging times with them. Compassion is key into really feeling what somebody might be going through, even though you don't agree with them. If you once love them,
Starting point is 00:28:17 then love is love. Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. I think it's important for listeners to know some of the contours of what has happened after October 7th. And like you said, it's not a Trump thing. It started under Biden about how Palestine has been used in the academy. I mean, as I said earlier, I have done an episode on this. So I will link that.
Starting point is 00:28:49 But also, you know, there is now evidence and data around how this issue has been weaponized. So the AAPUP, the American Association of University Professors alongside the Middle East Studies Association, just put out a report on this exact question about how Title VI investigations. So investigations of alleged discrimination, specifically about anti-Semitism and nothing else. First of all, there's been a huge uptick in them and have been used to target these universities. The vast majority of these cases has to do with faculty extramural speech. So like these faculty members having an opinion about genocide outside the class. I mean, honestly, I always remember, I think Edward Said said, like, being a Palestinian in the academy is like being an outlaw. That's like how it feels. Yeah, it's fugitive labor,
Starting point is 00:29:37 for sure. Yeah. Definitely. And I think one of the findings has been also, I don't know if it's 95% of the cases have been shown to be fraudulent, yeah, to be totally fraudulent. So, yeah, it's a real policing of speech. It's a real kind of weaponization of the charge of anti-Semitism. And honestly, sort of one of the things I think that really happens, too, is that students don't get the tools to actually recognize and understand actually existing anti-Semitism. Right. As it is being rehearsed in like these show trials that we saw in Congress and in the rhetoric of many of the, you know, people affiliated with the administration in the kinds of alliances that even the Israeli state, right, has made with various right-wing
Starting point is 00:30:36 anti-Semitic states. So it's like, I think one of the things that it's kind of like watching a train wreck, just hitting one train after another and just being like, what is the absurdity, you know, I myself was accused of being anti-Semitic for having a history of anti-Semitism. So what surprises me is the way that people are allowing and facilitating this to happen, you know, and the way that they're not able to recognize how high the stakes are, what it means to be Palestinian in this moment, you know, when you've been sitting watching for two years, your people being shredded, and you're facing the reality of what the stakes are in this moment, which is the annihilation of Palestine and the annihilation of Palestinians,
Starting point is 00:31:32 your threshold for shock becomes very high. Yeah. And so, I mean, I'm sure it's the same for you. I don't know if, like, what, it's like a constant trauma response, you know? Absolutely. Yeah, my emotional reactions are shut down, and I'm in a state of being in the present, okay, we got through today, hopefully we'll get through tomorrow. I don't, I kind of am prepared for the worst at all times. And, you know, it's a condition of vigilance that I think people,
Starting point is 00:32:11 when they continue to feed this kind of right-wing agenda of making people, stupid and eroding even the possibility of higher education, it's the kind of condition that will be much more general, you know? Yeah. And all these ice rates at the same time, you know, it's, I just saw, I haven't been able to listen to it, but a scholar who powerfully is talking about the Mexico-Palestine border and the links between ICE and the IDF and the ways to think about these two things together and please share that with me i i haven't seen it i mean yeah as you said when we take away Palestine from the academy when we use palestine to attack the academy as imperfect as the academy is it is this larger attempt to take away people's analytical tools and
Starting point is 00:33:09 frameworks to understanding their reality to understanding how the reality intersects with these other things because they don't want you to be able to solve it. They don't want you to be able to mobilize. And then, of course, there's this, as I said, this class dimension of wanting to keep people in their place. There are too many black and brown people in the academy now. We can't have that kind of social mobility. I just want to emphasize for the listeners why it's so important for Palestine to be researched and studied and things like that is self-evident. I don't need to explain it. But why is it so important that Palestinians are the ones who do that? I mean, again, it feels self-evident, but I'll say it.
Starting point is 00:33:47 Like, Palestinians have agency, and they are full human beings, and they know best what questions are relevant, and they have a unique perspective on the issue of Palestine, as well as other issues. And so not only are you engaging in the ratio of Palestinians when you don't amplify that kind of knowledge production, but you are making scholarship poorer. You are limiting what you know. know about this issue. Yeah. So what do you think, you know, kind of broadly speaking, students, scholars, sympathizers, what do you think they should do in this moment? I want to just go back to the point about why is it important to have Palestinian voices? Because when we say that, we're not doing it in an identitarian way, right? Of course. Yeah. Anybody who wants to study Palestine should study Palestine. In doing so, you should be centering the lessons that Palestinians have offered
Starting point is 00:34:48 us. First and foremost, in this moment, the Palestinians of the Gaza Strip. And in my own practice at the Journal of Palestine Studies, what I've tried to do in each of the editor's notes, is really lift up all of the testimonies that we've received from Palestinians in Gaza, written and social media and all of these, but also lift up the international voices of Palestinians like yourself, and the many, many, many people who are writing and giving us tools to understand and analyze. And the reason that's important is because the main problem that we face, I believe, is the way that certain people are more susceptible to being excluded from the category of the human. Once you exclude people from the category of the human,
Starting point is 00:35:38 it's much easier to kill them and make them expendable. And I think our work really in centering Palestinian voices rejects that logic, right? Rejects the logic of are we human or not? Are we going to evidence our humanity or not? No, we can tell our stories. And I think that telling of the story changes the angle of vision. If you're looking at what's happening in the Gaza Strip from the perspective, of people who are living it, you will see different things
Starting point is 00:36:11 than if you're looking at it from, you know, a drone or, you know, a geopolitical lens. So that's one thing. I think another thing that's really important is, you know, I mean, Mahmoud Darwish said this, actually in an interview in Journal of Palestine Studies, he said, you know, the Palestinians are talked about because they're facing Israeli Jews,
Starting point is 00:36:40 because the Jewish question is the question of Europe. Oh, that's right, yeah. And I find that one of the things that continues to be an issue until now is that what scholars and thinkers and analysts are adjudicating is the question of Europe. And the question of the sustainability of European values and European notions and all of these things, And I'm not interested in that.
Starting point is 00:37:08 I want to center the question of Palestine and what that, what kind of other tools that might offer us. So I think in a way, linked to what the earlier conversation about a political economy of value of scholars, right? There's a kind of also here, a political economy of concepts. And I believe that we have to really provincialize Europe. We have to provincialize Europe. as the means and the ends of all things.
Starting point is 00:37:39 Yeah. It is not generalizable, no. Just ask different questions and look at it from a different perspective. Yeah. In terms of what do I think students and scholars and all of us should do is, it's going to sound strange, but first and foremost, study, study, read, learn. Those are the critical tools that you gain that will allow you to define. that will allow you to defend yourself in a world that is intent on making you stupid. We all have to reject that.
Starting point is 00:38:13 I think it's a moment where there's a temptation to slide into sensationalism or to slide into circulating, especially on social media and that whole economy, right? So I think we have to be vigilant. I think we have to be rigorous. And I think we have to study. And I think more than anything else, the lesson I keep coming back to is we have to take care of each other in the communities that we build. Yeah, that's exactly right. I think you begin arming yourself with the tools to understand this moment and think of ways to defend yourself in your community.
Starting point is 00:38:55 And you can't do that without being grounded in this knowledge that came before you. Yeah. So listeners, please crack open a Journal of Palestine Studies. And of course, I'll link to all of this in the show notes. Shadyin, I could talk to you for hours. Thank you so much for your time. This has been really enriching. Thank you so much for having me and for all the work that you do. Thank you so much. Listeners, I'm going to also put in the show notes a fundraising campaign for the Journal of Palestine Studies. So if you can, you have the capacity. That's, a surefire way to help resist these dynamics. All right. Thanks so much. Take care. It Could Happen here is a production of Cool Zone Media.
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