Pod Save the World - One Month of War Between Israel and Hamas

Episode Date: November 8, 2023

Tommy and Ben talk about where the world stands one month after Hamas’ attack on Israel, including the declaration from Gaza’s health ministry that 10,000 civilians have been killed, Netanyahu’s statement about Israel taking “indefinite” security responsibility in Gaza, Biden’s push for a pause in fighting, and the successes and fails of American diplomacy thus far. They also discuss growing calls in Congress for a ceasefire, dismal approval ratings for Biden from Muslim voters and anti-war feelings from younger Americans, and reactions to Obama’s comments on Israel and Gaza. Then they touch on Zelensky’s attempts to keep the war in Ukraine on the world’s radar, Pakistan’s plan to deport up to 1.7 million Afghan migrants, and Boris Johnson’s alleged offer to get injected with COVID-19 on television. Finally, Ben speaks with Jewish American author Nathan Thrall about his new book, “A Day in the Life of Abed Salama: Anatomy of a Jerusalem Tragedy”, which documents the realities of life for Palestinians in the West Bank. For a closed-captioned version of this episode, click here. For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail] and include the name of the podcast.

Welcome to Potsave the World. I'm Tommy Vitor. I'm Ben, happy Election Day. Of course, when this comes out, it'll be the day after Election Day, so we'll know for sure if it's happy. It's always happy to be reminded we live in a democracy. It's not actually. Yeah, healthy. Should be happy for Election Day on its unright.

Thriving democracy. Thank you. Kentucky, Virginia, Pennsylvania, a bunch of places for turning out. Let's go. Let's go. That also means, though, we're a year out from 2024, Ben. The big one. Yeah, it's a little frightening. Yeah, it's a little frightening. We have some big plans here that Kirk

media to cover the presidential, the Senate, the House races, all of it. If you want to help expand that coverage, join the Friends of the Pod community or subscription community, cricket.com slash friends, and just by joining you support Votesave America. How nice is that? This is the year to eni up and become a friend. Friend of the pot. Yeah. Hang out with us in the Pod Save the World Discord. We got a great show for you today, not elections, but a lot of stuff happening abroad. We are going to talk about how it's been one month after the Hamas attack. on Israel. And in today's episode, we're going to talk through what we know about the Israeli

endgame and the conflict, where U.S. diplomacy has been effective and where it has not been effective. And then we'll talk about the politics back home. And then former President Obama's thoughts from over the weekend. We're interesting. Made a little news. Yeah, just a little Tommy, you served up that pitch and he took a swing. And, you know, we got a lot of ripples. Yeah, it's something. And then we're also going to cover the latest news from Russia and Ukraine, some grim news for Afghan refugees and Boris Johnson's genius televised COVID plan. Be excited for that. And then, Ben, you did the interview today.

Who did you talk to? I talked to Nathan Thrill. He used to be in charge of monitoring the Arab-Israeli conflict for the International Crisis Group. He is now a writer. He has a book out recently called The Day in the Life of Abbott Salama, which is really through one story telling readers what it's like to live under occupation in the West Bank. that book came out just a few days before October 7th. So obviously his book release has been colored by that. But we talk about the story he decided to tell what the occupation is like for Palestinians,

what's happening in the West Bank now after October 7th. The reaction to his book, including the fact that a bunch of his events have been canceled, about a quarter of them, I think. And just how to think and talk about this issue, the same type of stuff we've been talking on this podcast. But it's a great step-back look at the broad. dynamic in play here and that's why we wanted to have this conversation yeah Ben so I I saw like I learned about Nathan through the controversy around his book I assumed it was some kind of like anti-Israel scre but it's just a book about life in the West Bank and gossip right I mean it's

following human beings and they're telling their story it's about it's about a father who's a kindergarten son died in a tragic bus accident but that it illuminates the nature of life in under occupation and so therefore through this very human story, it describes the kind of second-class citizenship of Palestinians and that is a story that people, some people, don't want to hear

right now, you know, and so we talk about the complexity of that, that dynamic obviously. Boy, I think I would have kept that book event going, but, you know, which is me. And then at the very end for our friends of the pod community members, Ben and I are going to answer some questions. If you want to join

the friends of the pod community, go to cricket.com slash friends. Okay, well, let's turn to the latest news from Gaza because it has been a month since the Hamas'arist attack. And the Gaza health ministry now says that the death toll since that fighting started has surpassed 10,000 people. That ministry is, of course, run by Hamas, but a spokesman at the Pentagon said that the U.S. believes the number of civilian casualties is in the thousands. So there's no doubt that the death toll is just horrific. The Israeli military or IDF says its ground forces have basically cut Gaza in half and that they are encircling Gaza City in the north, which is believed to be Hamas. Masa stronghold. The IDF also said that as of November 1st, they had dropped at least 10,000 bombs,

making this one of the most intense air campaigns in recent military history. And in the first two weeks of the conflict, most of those bombs dropped were 1,000 pound or 2,000 pound bombs, which were intended to target Hezbollah military positions and are incredibly poorly suited for urban environments if you want to avoid civilian casualties. Over the weekend, thousands of Israelis took to the streets in Tel Aviv to show support for the families of the hostages being held in Gaza and to demand that the Israeli government do more to bring them home. There is less contentious on how exactly to accomplish that goal. Some people in the streets are pressuring that Yahoo to consider an offer from Hamas to release captives in exchange for

releasing Palestinian prisoners held by Israel. Others are pushing him to continue the military effort until Hamas relents and lets hostages go. So it's divided opinion, but everybody wants those people home. Internationally, Israel is facing increasing pressure and isolation because of the war. South Africa, Chile, Colombia, Honduras, and Bolivia have all withdrawn their ambassadors in protest, as have Bahrain, Turkey, and Chad, though those three, I think, are less. They're hardly longstanding friends of Israel, although Bahrain is an Abraham Accord country. So, you know, Ben, I want to start with just trying to figure out what the Israeli government's endgame is when this conflict, because it's been a month.

Here's an excerpt from an interview Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu did with ABC News. Who should govern Gaza when this is over? those who don't want to continue the way of Hamas and certainly is not, I think Israel will, for an indefinite period, will have the overall security responsibility because we've seen what happens when we don't have it. When we don't have that security responsibility, what we have is the eruption of Hamas terror on a scale that we couldn't imagine. So reading between the lines that answer, I mean, it does sound like the plan is to capture the entirety of the Gaza Strip and then occupy it for an indefinite period of time, which is scary for a lot of reasons

for civilians, for the hostages, all the above. Yeah, I don't know how else to hear that answer. And if you look at what's come out the last two or three days, it's clearly an intention from the Israeli government to signal this is a more maximalist version of what they could do because you've seen them resist calls for humanitarian pause, which we can talk about. But we've seen them move sufficient ground forces to encircle Gaza City that it doesn't feel like these are going to be surgical operations. It feels like an effort to be prepared to move in and block by block, consolidate control of Gaza,

tunnel by tunnel. Destroyed tunnel by tunnel, destroyed tunnel networks. And then Netanyahu's comments indicate that, you know, if they're going to have quote-unquote security responsibility, I mean, they already controlled everything that could come in and out of Gaza. but, you know, security responsibilities would seem to indicate some kind of long-term open-ended de facto occupation, if not outright occupation of the Gaza Strip. And what people have to remember is, number one, the hostages, it's, I think, harder to secure their peaceful return to Israel or to other countries through a war than through negotiation.

That's just, you know, that's just the reality of it. I'm really glad you said that. Sorry to interrupt, but like we get a lot of feedback on the show. Some of it each week says we're pro-Israel or pro-Hamas. You know what I mean? It's like, that's fine. Everyone's entitled to their opinion. But like when we are the thing we're constantly thinking about are the civilians,

you see getting pulled out of rubble in Gaza and these 240 hostages in their families. And when you talk about wanting the Israeli government to show restraint when it comes to air strikes and restraint when it comes to the ground evasion, it's because we believe that showing restraint gives the hostages and these civilians the best chance of survival. Truly. I mean, you're seeing reports, Hamas is saying that hostages are dying in these airstrikes already. I don't know if that's true or not, but I don't know if that's true, but it stands to reason that if you're dropping a thousand pound bombs on places where hostages are being held, that they're at some risk, you know. So that's the hostage piece of this. But then the people of Gaza, people have to remember that Egypt has said they will not allow them into Egypt. And so that means that this entire ground campaign and this continued bombardment of Gaza is going to to take place with two million people who have nowhere to go. And the pace of destruction that we're seeing of just structures in homes in Gaza, they're going to be homeless. They don't have access to food and water and fuel. And so there's no answer in that Nanyahu answer about how are those

people going to live? And how are they going to be able to feed themselves and to have clean what are for their children and how are they going to avoid being caught in this this war? Who is the Israeli government's view? Who is Hamas and who's not? And so I think what we've learned from what Nainiao said the last couple of days and other messaging from the Israeli government is this is likely to be, you know, at least a month, two months, if not more, frankly, and is likely to kind of move into some type of long-term Israeli occupation of Gaza, which is a kind of harrowing thought because I don't see how that

doesn't lead to a significant amount of additional civilian deaths, greater risk for the hostages, continued risk of regional escalation. And, you know, this military objective of destroying Hamas, can that be achieved when Hamas's leadership, a lot of it is not in Gaza? They're in other countries. and frankly, the efforts to destroy Hamas could contribute to a radicalization that leads to something else emerging. Yeah. It just makes me filled with a lot of trepidation.

Me too. And look, it's easy, like, week to week to get overwhelmed by the statistics of war, the growing casualty count, the growing number of airstrikes. So we wanted to play for you a clip from a guy named Mahmoud Shalabi. He's the acting Gaza director

for medical aid for Palestinians. We heard from him on an episode several weeks back. Here he is describing what it's like when an airstrike hits near your home. I was sitting with my kids on the sofa and suddenly there was a huge explosion. A huge explosion. I've never heard this sound before. My child, my daughter, Ms.

She started screaming and panically, hysterically crying. I hugged her and I made sure that she's okay. I told her there is nothing wrong with us. We are all okay. al-h-h-h-a-l-h-h-h-h-h-hannes nothing happening to us and I made sure that all my children the three of them were sitting together and that their mom was next to them and then I went outside I rushed outside immediately to see what was happening I opened the door and they honestly could not see in front of me and

could not breathe it was gray it was cement it was gunpowder it was everything tiny particles scattered all over around me and I couldn't actually go out. I shut the door close. I took one of the masks, the remnants of COVID-19, soaked it in water, put it on my nose and mouth and when trashing outside, my neighborhood was destroyed. One simple rocket, just one rocket. So that's an example of how hard it is for people who are stock in Gaza and can't leave. This is another clip from a man named Hamza Elbu Heisi, who's a Gaza-based journalist who's talking about the agonizing choice that he has to make as someone with a foreign passport holder, but whose family doesn't necessarily have that freedom of movement. For cooking, we started to use woods to cook because the gas is finished as well.

We feel that we are back to the old centuries, honestly. I'm British national and I have my spouse with me, but she is. she doesn't have a visa and I cannot leave Gaza without her. She is very scared and very fragile. She's basically saying, you know, he can leave but he can't bring his wife with him. Yeah, there's, it's almost impossible to get your mind around what it must feel like to be in this incredibly condensed, already small strip of land and to be trapped there, you know. And again, we've said,

But we will say every week, Hamas, what they did on October 7th, absolutely outrageous, horrific, initiated this cycle of violence, didn't initiate the entire Israeli-Palestinian conflict, though. Let's be clear. And we talked about that with Nathan Thorel. But there are alternatives to what you just heard. I mean, there just are. It's not a requirement that bombs are dropped to destroy that man's neighborhood because of what Hamas did. And there are two million people that live there. And there are 4,000 children that are already dead.

And I just think that people need to create enough space to understand that that guy's not Hamas, you know. Yeah. So, you know, the Biden administration, they are trying every day to manage this conflict. The messaging and diplomacy about the war has evolved, albeit slowly. Initially, the White House basically only stressed that Israel had a right to defend itself. But for the past 10 days or so, officials like Tony Blinken and the Secretary of State have been calling for a humanitarian pause to allow aid into Gaza. President Biden reportedly raised the idea of a humanitarian pause directly with BB Netanyahu during a phone call on Monday. So far, those calls have been pretty firmly rejected.

In that ABC News interview, we heard earlier Netanyahu said there will be no general ceasefire without the release of hostages. and then he suggested he might consider, quote, tactical little pauses an hour here or an hour there to enable humanitarian goods to come in or hostages to leave. So not a lot of time. The New York Times reported that behind the scenes, the U.S. is pushing Israel to do more to protect civilians. They want more intelligence gathering. They want better targeting of airstrikes to reduce civilian casualties. And as part of that effort, they are preparing to send Israel smaller bombs to help avoid civilian casualties. So, like, in practice, I get it, but a very tough message to explain to the world how sending more weapons to Israel could avoid civilian casualties.

Tony Blinken has been all over the world. He was in Israel, the West Bank, Jordan, Turkey, and Iraq. Here's a clip from Tony. I think we've had important conversations and more than conversations. We're making sure that the different influence and relationships that countries in the region have, including the countries that I visited, or spoke to, that they're using that to make sure that this conflict and crisis doesn't spread. And that's critical. And I think countries are very much engaged in trying to make sure that that doesn't happen. So that's important. And sometimes the absence of something bad happening

may not be the most obvious evidence of progress, but it is. It's something we've talked about before in the show. And I remember talking with you in government. Like sometimes diplomacy prevents conflicts from happening or from spreading, I think. One way to interpret the specifics there is they're trying to keep Iran out of this fight. They're trying to keep it lit on things regionally. By the way, Tony went to the countries I talked about the Middle East. And then he went to Tokyo, South Korea and India for consultations for the G7. So I do not envy that guys.

Yeah. Travel schedule. But Ben, what do you, you know, a month in, what do you make of the U.S. diplomatic effort so far? Like, what do you think has succeeded and failed in your view? So I guess on the succeeding part, look, clearly the U.S. had a prioritization around. preventing that kind of regional escalation, Iran getting in or all of its proxies getting in, Hezbollah getting in. And so you had the deployment of U.S. aircraft carriers to the region. You had clearly the U.S. messaging Iran through everybody they could, probably third countries,

China, Turkey, Oman, Turkey, Qatar, messaging the Iranians stay out of this. When the Iranian proxies were attacking U.S. forces in Syria and in Iraq, you had U.S. airstrikes on the IRC. He said that messaging wasn't just diplomacy. It was also militarily. Thus far, you know, it hasn't spread. Nasrallah, the leader of Hisblo, gave a speech last week, highly anticipated condemning Israel, of course, but, you know, stopping short of getting in the war. His blow has been relatively restrained on Israel's northern border. Iran has not gotten more directly involved.

And so I think what Tony's alluding to it in terms of not spreading is thus far it has been contained. generally to Gaza and to the West Bank. So there's some success there. It's hard to draw a direct causation, but that hasn't happened and that's good. I also think there's an effort to try to probably keep some of a lid on just kind of this blowing up the region generally, you know, and we don't know what's happening inside of countries to, you know, prevent, I don't know, attacks on embassies and things like that. And then in terms of Israel itself, you know, have been small successes. We had the release of a few hostages negotiated through Qatar. We had some trucks periodically getting in across the Rafa crossing with humanitarian assistance for Gaza.

And that seems like that was, you know, largely the result of U.S. diplomacy. I think they also pushed them really hard to restore Internet and communications in Gaza when it went out that. That's right. Yeah. So, so, you know, that's on the positive side of ledger. I think on the negative side, look, what? When we were in government, you and I, you know, and I was in these meetings for eight years, you were in them for more than half of that. There were two ways of thinking about, I mean more than two, but I'll simplify, two ways of thinking about the relationship with someone like Netanyahu. There was a view that I think Joe Biden has, which you have to completely throw your arms around Netanyahu, no daylight publicly, back him completely in public, show love for Israel.

And then that's going to give you some leverage to affect Israeli decision making. Then I think Obama's view was, you know what, like we have. Israel's back as a country, but when Bibi Nanyahu's leader, the Israeli government does things that we really don't like, we're going to call it out. And you can go back and look at the previous Gaza War. You know, we, you know, we called certain air strikes disgraceful. And, you know, we were much more forward-leaning in some of the languages to criticize certain Israeli actions. Now, that didn't, you know, affect Netanyahu's decision-making per se. But what it did do is signal to the rest of the world. Hey, we're not, we're not all behind this. Like, we, you know, we see

the Palestinian loss of life as equal to the Israeli loss of life, and we are trying our best to kind of rein this in. And so that was an approach that maybe didn't totally affect BB's calculus, but at least allowed the United States to position itself as working for different outcomes. I think that where they've had serious problems is that that approach of hugging BB to get and do things, that's failed. It hasn't worked. And we should just say that. You know, and because you have the Secretary of State go over there to get a humanitarian pause, and you have the Israeli prime minister say, no, I'm not doing that. Because also implicit in this pause message, right?

And you see this in Franklin Ford's book about the 2021 Gaza crisis was basically that Biden gave Netanyahu about 10, 11 days worth of leeway. And then he finally got on the phone with him and said, hey, buddy, you're out of runway. The strikes had to stop. And they stopped. That was kind of the story we were told about 2021. but either that call has not been made in this case or they don't want to make it or BB is saying, I'm not going to do what you say.

Yeah. And they said this at the time, you know, like that they learned the lesson of Obama's failure. You know, and look, I mean, this isn't about one piece or reason to be right or wrong. It's about what is working. Because also on the pause itself and just to kind of focus it on that, I've talked to some people and different governments, you know, I think what the Arabs are advocating for, the Arab governments, is like something in between a short pause and a ceasefire. It's basically like five days, seven days, something that would allow you to put in massive amounts of humanitarian aid to get into Gaza, maybe get a significant

amount of wounded people out, and have really intensified negotiations to get hostages out. That makes a lot of sense to me, you know? Bebe, even when he's trying to throw a bone to the U.S., it's like, maybe even an hour, as you said, like, maybe you'll have like a two-hour pause to get 20 trucks in. And he said in such a dismissive way. Yeah, yeah. And so I think they're in this position where you can tell that the administration is increasingly frustrated with BB. They're kind of putting out on background, you know, we don't like this. We're advocating for a longer pause.

But to that point about the phone call that, you know, that you just made, Tommy. I mean, I think that's the core point is that we haven't even done the supplemental yet. Right. So if we're going to, if assuming that does go forward, you know, would there, how many, it could be 15,000 Palestinian instead. Half of Gaza could have been destroyed by then. And in the middle of that, we're going to ship over $15 billion, at the same time that we're kind of leaking out on background that we don't like what's happening. I mean, that's what worries me is that how does that impact obviously Palestinian lives? How does it impact every other U.S. priority in the world?

You know, we've talked a lot in this podcast about how the global South didn't want to get behind, say, our support for Ukraine because they thought it was hypocritical. That was before the Gaza War. Yep. And I'm just trying to imagine the U.S. trying to get support for anything. if this goes the way it looks like it's going. Yeah. And there was a report on October 27th in the Washington Post where a member of the Hamas leadership based in Beirut said that there were negotiations that were brokered by Egypt and Qatar where Hamas proposed to release all foreign civilian hostages in exchange for a five-day ceasefire. And then Israeli civilian hostages would be released

if additional demands were met, he said, including the release of Palestinian women and children in Israeli prisons and the opening of the Rafa border crossing. so wounded civilians can receive care in Egypt, and fuel, food, medicine, and water can enter Gaza. Now, obviously, like, there's a lot of stipulations there. Like, you have to figure out a way to make Hamas uphold its end of the deal. But if your priority is getting back hostages and protecting civilians in Gaza, I think trying to negotiate that kind of deal would make a lot of sense. That doesn't mean that after five days, there's a permanent ceasefire.

And Israelis go on with Hamas existing in its current forum. in Gaza, like to your point you've made earlier, like we both anticipate that the Mossad will hunt Hamas leaders to the end of the earth who are part of this terrorist attack and there will be continued military operations. But, I mean, if you want to get hostages home, this seems like an opportunity. Yeah. And look, I, you just made a really important point. I mean, I understand that Israel doesn't want to accept and shouldn't accept some reality in which they're forced to live next to Hamas with a bunch of rights. rockets for the for the for the for the rest of you know for the foreseeable future here the question is

there is there a much is there just a different approach to take here to dislodge Hamas to kind of end them as a political entity with a lot of support from Arab partners that also don't want Hamas around and yeah I would fully expect Israel to continue to target umas leadership and try to deny Hamas certain military capabilities and to try to have there be but but again the thing that's going to do that over time is there for there to be a different Palestinian leadership than Hamas in Gaza. And I worry that just destroying Gaza, it doesn't accomplish that question of what are you replacing Hamas with? What are you building? And to people listening to getting really frustrated and saying, I don't understand why you guys can't get behind Israel has every right

to dismantle Hamas, the way they are doing this now with a government led by Bibi Naini Naino, remember, this isn't a question of what government you want to project on Israel. It's led by this guy, Netanyahu. They are doing it this way. They are doing it. in a way that is killing a lot of innocent people. And I don't think that is the way to accomplish what Israel wants to accomplish. And I also think that it has obviously profound humanitarian consequences for Palestinians and frankly profound consequences for U.S. interests that could go for many years here. Yeah, I mean, humanitarian consequences in the short term, long term, it's the most likely way to repeat this cycle of violence. Yeah. One really frustrating piece of

pushback you're seeing in the press from Israeli officials is saying, you know, look at past U.S. wars, including World War II, there were unbelievable levels of civilian casualties. You know, how can you criticize us when there is this history of, like, you know, new king Japan, for example. I just find that to be such, like, obviously wars are hell, civilians have died in every conflict. I'm not trying to be naive here. But like, the notion that the military effort required to defeat the Nazis is somehow comparable to taking out Hamas's leadership feels crazy to me. And it just seems like kind of a glib way to disqual, way to dismiss civilian casualties, then really to take on the issue and try to do something about it.

Yeah, it's also the point that those laws of war were developed after World War II to prevent that from happening. I mean, every time I hear that talking about, I'm like, well, yeah, everybody got together and decided, hey, we shouldn't do that again. And that doesn't mean the U.S. has, like, clean hands after that. I mean, Vietnam, enormous amounts of indiscriminate bombing, horrific, but I think that's bad. And again, you have, what's so frustrating about this whole argument is, because I've seen this too, you have international laws of war, not for like, because there's such a thing as an easy war

where, you know, you have them because you want to restrain the loss of civilian life in any armed conflict. And so if you start to say, and this is why, by the way, we had issues with delivering cluster munitions to the Ukrainians, you know, even though that's not technically, I think, a violation of the laws of war, if you start to say, well, the laws of war don't apply to the, the wars that certain wars that we care about. I care about, yeah. Like, well, then nobody's ever going to, there's no incentive for anybody ever follow any laws of war. Right, right.

So calls for a ceasefire or some sort of humanitarian pause are slowly growing in Congress. Last week, Senator Dick Durbin called for a ceasefire, albeit a conditional one where Hamas releases prisoners first. But he used the word ceasefire, which like two weeks before was getting people run out of organizations, for just saying it out loud. Senator Brian Schatz called for a humanitarian pause saying, quote, the scale of human suffering right now is untenable. Senator Chris Murphy said, quote, it's time for Israel's friends to recognize that the current approach is causing an unacceptable level of civilian harm.

It does not appear likely to achieve the goal of ending the threat from Hamas. I urge Israel to immediately reconsider this approach. Those statements followed a number of similar calls from Democrats in the House. And then we have some survey data been. NBC News reported on a poll in Michigan that surveyed President Biden standing with Arab and Muslim Democrats and younger voters. They basically did an oversample of those two categories. And it found that only 16% of Arab and Muslim voters surveyed said they would vote for Biden if the election was held today. Previous polls suggest that Biden got about 70% of Arab and Muslim voters in 2020.

So that would be really bad. 61% of voters under 30 said they'd vote for Biden if the election were held today with 56% giving him a poor rating on the Israel-Palestinian conflict. Michigan is home to about 240,000 Muslims. So that kind of drop in support would tip. the election to Republicans. I should know that like we have some friends in the in the Biden administration. I talked to them and they'll say to you, look, his handling of this conflict is actually probably the most popular thing he's doing right now, the most popular issue area. And maybe that's true, but I do worry it's because like some, you know, right wingers are saying they support Biden on

this issue, but they would never vote for him. And so, you know, look, obviously people might be saying, like, why are you guys talking about the political considerations? Well, look, Joe Biden is a political animal, right, like to his credit to his detriment. But like he tends to find the center of an issue and like we'll listen when he's pushed on issues so that's why activism really matters but also you know there's this weird sense too that people seem surprised that there's a generational divide within the democratic party emerging on support for israel and like i don't know i keep reading these articles i'm like one younger people have always made up the bulk of an anti-war movement which is essentially what this is so no surprise and two if you're under 30 the only israel you've known is led by b b b b benni

a right wing nationalist like hard right Republican who you know went all in in support for Trump there are A PAC aligned groups like DMFI that are getting involved in Democratic primaries like running ads attacking progressive Democrats in the House like when you make those political decisions there's going to be a political fallout which I think you are probably seeing reflected in younger generations saying wait no I actually I don't support what Israel is doing I don't support those values Yeah, I think the Nenya point, you can't have a situation. This guy's been prime minister forever, like you said, you know, completely tried to undermine, obviously, you know, our boss, Barack Obama, to the point of flying to Washington at the invitation of Republicans to make a speech to Congress against the Democratic president's foreign policy, completely embraced Trump.

his re-election campaigns, you know, he had billboards of himself with Trump, right, was literally trying to dismantle Israeli democracy before October 7th with mass protests in the street. So the idea that the young border is supposed to memory hold that, you know. No, this is the, it matters who's running a country, you know, and Netanyahu is a guy who is in charge in Israel right now. And I think the other point I'd make about these polls, you know, I'm not as, as you know plugged in as as you guys are at potse of america about this stuff but just talking and interacting with younger people and and arab and muslim voters that i know the thing the reason i'd be concerned about it is as you said some of the support that biden's getting is probably

some people that you know are not going to vote for joe biden in the day when i talk to people this is not like a small issue for them. You know, the Arab community in Michigan, it's not like they're going to forget this. You know, I think there's a view that like maybe, you know, 10 months or now, they're like, you know what? I didn't like Israel policy back in last year, but, you know, I don't like Trump.

So this feels like an issue, a really motivating issue, a voting issue, for a bunch of constituencies in Democratic Party. And so from a policy perspective, you know, the question becomes, what can you do to show that you care about Palestinian life that even if you're not exerting a ton of control of what Israel is doing right now, can you do something to kind of build back next year an aspiration for Palestinian state or to resumption of Palestinian life in society?

But also can you speak to those people in a way that is not just saying like, you know, we support Israel, but we want them to follow the laws of war or putting out on back. ground that you know you want you have to go and engage those communities in a sustained way and show that you're hearing them and that you know they that you might disagree with them that's you know that's that that may very well be the end of it but but but i i worry that just letting that sit um is politically not a great idea and and also dismissing it because some of those people are acting like fucking lunatic anti-semites you know like we can't reinforce enough blaming jews what the Israeli government's doing is anti-Semitism and is terrible. But I think dismissing all of

those polls because you can point to some nutcases who are like tearing down postages of hostages or doing some stupid shit on campuses, that's actually even worse because you have to be able separate out like the bad actors from just people who are worried about this. Yeah. And I mean, I think the other thing you're seeing a lot of is people like scoffing at the suggestion that the Arab or Muslim American community is going to vote for Trump over Biden. It's like, guys, they're just going to stay home. You know, you can't be so condescending. Or they'll vote for a third party. And also, like, there, a lot of these folks who are showing up in these polls frustrated about the current handling of Gaza, we're mad in 2021 about the handling of that war in Gaza. Yeah. So it's not like a new issue. Also, lastly,

Joe Biden's trying to pass this massive supplemental funding bill that includes support for Israel, a very little bit of humanitarian support for the Palestinians, the Ukraine funding. Like, politics matter. Forget the Taiwan weapons. There's a technical Taiwan weapons in there. There's so many weapons. You know, like political support really matters when you're trying to move a bill like that. And it's getting harder every day.

So finally, Ben, you know, we were in Chicago last weekend. It was this very fun, incredible reunion of, you know, sort of the Obama team. And, you know, without, you know, wallowing in our own nostalgia, it was very fun to just kind of remember a different era in our politics. The pre-Trump era, mostly. But we interviewed him for Positive America, the full interviews. out earlier this week. But I asked him about Gaza, specifically what his advice was for people who want to understand and engage in this conversation about the conflict. But they don't want to say the wrong thing. They don't want to upset anybody. They're terrified by the, you know,

horrible debate that's happening on Twitter every single day. It was a long answer. So we're not going to play the whole thing, but here's a brief clip. The problem with the social media and trying to TikTok activism and trying to debate this on that is you, You can't speak the truth. You can pretend to speak the truth. You can speak one side of the truth. And in some cases, you can try to maintain your moral innocence, but that won't solve the problem.

And so if you want to solve the problem, then you have to take in the whole truth. And you then have to admit nobody's hands are clean that All of us are complicit to some degree. I think the two keys to understanding that comment are, Ben, are one, he's been writing his memoir, second passage, second book, and thinking about all the problems we didn't solve. And it's clear that's kind of eating at him, including this. And then two, you can tell that Obama finds the way social media has sent us to our corners. We no longer talk to each other. We no longer try to persuade each other to be enormously frustrating.

But what did you make of that answer and I don't know, his willingness to kind of dive into it? Yeah, no, look, there's so many dimensions of this because there's the answer and then there's a reaction to his answer that we've seen in the last couple days. I mean, first of all, I think the very important point he makes there, which actually I think was probably as much directed at the left of this conversation as it is at the kind of provisial side of this conversation is that social media incentivizes only talking to people who agree with you or attacking people who disagree with you. And anybody who wants to actually change something needs to be able to present. persuade somebody else. And and also that there are there are competing narratives in this conflict. It is absolutely the case that Israel has been targeted by its neighbors, by terrorism, by invasions of, from Arab states, by any Semitism, and by Hamas on October 7th. It is also entirely the case that the Palestinians were massively displaced, have been living as under occupation,

in some cases have been displaced. And we could go on on. The point is that, you know, You have to have space for both of these narratives to coexist. You can't just say one is entirely right and the other just doesn't exist. And so that's a very Obama thing to be able to say the whole truth has to be confronted in order for us to find any way forward. So that's one feeling I had. The second was just a real disgust at the kind of right-wing funhouse mirrors with this. And by the way, some of the mainstream political media in this country. Because the things that he said that are being seen as like, whoa, I can't believe he said that are essentially that he said that.

there's a brutal occupation of Palestinians and two that he said no one's hands are clean. Does anybody like have other language to describe what is going on? Because there is a military occupation of like the fact that the occupation is a controversial word is only like an indication of the stupidity of American political discourse because there is a military occupation of the West Bank that has been underway since 1967. The Israeli military is in the West Bank and Palestinians live under military, If you want to invent, what else are you going to call it? And so the fact that it's controversial that in 2023, almost 60 years after 1967, that it's

controversial to say occupation, that's absurd. And then saying no one hands are clean, it doesn't mean that he doesn't think that what Hamas did isn't horrific. But does anybody think that we've all handled this well? No. Like, like, I had some reporters, you know, you know when like political reporters email you because they want you to take the bait, it's like throwing out of that. So I got a lot of those.

So I got out of those like, wow, and like 10 exclamation points, like no one hands are clean, you know. And I'm like, wow, what? It's like talking to himself, too. Yeah, exactly. This is absurd that this is controversial. So it's part of the dumb way in which we just like, because this conflict is so complicated, it's easier to make it like some American politics thing. Yes. You know?

And it's not. It's like, people are getting killed. Like, Israelis got killed by Hamas. Palestinians are getting killed in Gaza. Like, and it's easier to like ignore that and be like, whoa, did Obama? like do something that you know is controversial let's focus on that so i was i was pretty disappointed in that and then he was self-reflected but i'm going to say again because i'll just i will be the obama defender on this one you have an iran deal in place uh you don't have the embassy moved to

jerusalem uh and you don't have an abram accords that totally cuts out the palisians i don't think we're here i'm just going to say it because everybody else is saying like well Obama gave money to iran that's why this happened but no maybe trump pulled out of a deal that was de-escalating tensions and then ratchet up those tensions. I mean, so if you want to play that game, like, you don't have the facts on your side. Yeah, I was literally sitting there for like seven minutes or however long the answer was

and like really appreciated in hearing him talk out loud in that way. And it just felt honest, right? In the room, it felt really good. It felt real. It felt honest. It felt self-reflective. It felt self-critical. And it made me appreciate him all over again.

But my broken internet brain was going to all the ways in real time that it was going to get twisted. And so, of course, the right wing went with the Iranial piece and was like, oh, Obama, you funded this air attack. And then the left, I saw the sort of lefties dunking on him with this Tanahasi Coates clip where Tanahasi is talking about visiting the West Bank and how you always hear that the conflict is complex. But when you get there, you see that it's actually very simple. And what he's talking about is the point you are making that, like, the immorality of occupation is not complicated. It's black and white. It's very clear that when you're living occupation, there's nothing just or moral about a Palestinian not being able to walk on the same.

street as an Israeli, right? That's one of the examples he used. But Obama's talking about there is the history is complicated. Figuring out a solution to the problem is complicated. Getting two sides of someone in the political will to solve the problem is complicated. So that's like the experience that Obama was drawing from. But to just bend to really crystallize the stupidity of it, the political playbook wrote up that when Obama said nobody's hands are clean, that the quote could be lumped into, quote, those notorious evoccurious evoccurts. phrases politicians used in moments of passions sick, such as Bush's notorious mission accomplished. Now, first of all, I believe that mission accomplished was written on a banner on an aircraft carrier.

It wasn't like a slip of the tongue from Bush, but also, what the fuck are you talking about? What does that even mean? He's not even President of the United States now, by the way, too. Like, it's just so stupid. So stupid. It's just like, oh, can we create a controversy around something Obama said that is self-evidently true. Like most of the billions of people on earth who are familiar with this conflict would hear what Obama said and be like, yeah, that's basically true. But the authors of political playbook

are like, how can we write something that is so fucking annoying and over the top that maybe some other people will be forced to follow our, you know, daily newsletter? It's a shot at Biden. It's a shot at Hillary. It wasn't a shot of Biden. Is Obama unpacking his thoughts about this? You think he didn't run the initial statement by the Biden administration? Of course he did. It's just talking about the whole thing is just, there was a lot of stupidity. But I encourage people to actually listen to the whole answer, not because everything is right that he says.

It's just like somebody who's smart trying to unpack how they're thinking and feeling about it. And you can disagree with parts of it as anything anybody says on this issue someone will disagree with. But the idea that it's some kind of usually consequential statement is crazy. No, he's a human being watching the same news reports that we are

and he's horrified by them. And he was reacting in real time. And I appreciated that honesty and vulnerability. Potsie of the World is brought to you by Karyuma. Karyuma has been our go-to sneaker for a while now because they are so comfortable. They go with everything and they're made with consciously sourced materials. I wear my Karyuma sneakers all the time. They look good.

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eco-friendly, the most decking and railing designs, the most trusted. Trex, performance engineered for your life outdoors. Visit Trex.com today. We're going very long, so we have a couple more quick things where we get to Ben's interviews. So we did want to go through some of the news about the war in Ukraine because, of course, that war is still raging, even though our focus has been more on Gaza lately. So President Zelensky is doing his best to stay on Washington's radar screen. On Sunday, he went on Meet the Press, where he delivered this memorable soundbite. Do you ever feel defeated?

I have a lot of power. But even feeling strong and have a lot of energy, it doesn't mean that we want to fight all our life because the price is high, like I said, because the war takes the best of us, the best heroes, the best men, women, children. That's it. but we are not ready to give our freedom to this terrorist Putin.

That's it. That's why we are fighting. That's it. Kristen Welker is like, oh, life service. Come on parts of the world. We won't beep you. Yeah, we won't believe you, Slensky. That interview came after Zelensky had to publicly rebuke his top general for saying

the war had become a stalemate. And shortly after Zelensky fired his head of special operations forces. This also, you know, this week coincided with. considerable public anger at the Ukrainian military leadership within Ukraine because 19 Ukrainian soldiers were killed by a Russian air strike as they were all congregating together for a medal award ceremony. They were all out in the open for too long and they got targeted. And it's a tragic mistake that's really created a huge controversy. And then Ben over in Russia, Putin signed a law pulling Moscow out of the comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty. This is largely a symbolic move.

But it is a reminder that the only nuclear arms control agreement still in place is the New START Treaty. So not great. And then lastly, the Wall Street Journal reported that U.S. intelligence agencies believe that the Wagner mercenary group is preparing to send air defense systems to Hezbollah. That would be a hell of an escalation. And, you know, again, quite the middle finger to be bin at Yahoo. Because the Israelis very pointedly refused to provide missile defense systems to the Ukrainians. And now, you know, Putin's stooges over at the Wagner group are seemingly going to help. about a terrorist organization targeting him. So, Ben, you know, look, I get that Zelensky's audience

in shooting down the sort of stalemate observation is the U.S. Congress, right? Because he's trying to help Biden get the supplemental through and get all the additional funding and weapon systems he needs to keep this war going. But, I mean, if we're being honest, it does seem like it's a stalemate, right? No, there's no question. I mean, I think that was one of those moments of candor where someone says something that everybody kind of feels to be true. Right. And the same thing, sense that the front line has only moved like a few miles over the course of this multi-month counteroffensive. And I think that you put your finger on it. The reason that comment matters is the bulk of that supplemental is Ukraine funding because the administration is clearly trying to get

the funding they need to get through the whole year to the election. And the idea that it's a stalemate, you know, some Republicans will use that, I'm sure, to say, why are we pouring arms in tens of billions of dollars into a stalemate. And that, you know, the message that Zelensky is trying to get across is, you know, look, A, we need this just to stay alive, right? I mean, you know, in other words, like if the Ukrainians are cut off, it's not just about whether or not there's stalemates, whether or not Putin can make gains. But also the special operations change indicates that their strategy is shifting a bit from kind of pushing across this entire huge front line to maybe focusing on particular areas or maybe doing things behind enemy lines through special operations

or drones or other things. But it's a reminder that like the even larger war that is taking place in Europe, you know, there's not a clear endgame there either. And so part of what is so uncertain right now is you've got these two wars, you've got this massive supplemental bill. And I don't think anybody could say clearly what what's the end game in either Ukraine or Gaza. And that's beyond the control of the White House. I'm not even suggesting it's a challenge for them. It's not their fault. It is what it is.

Yeah. Let's hope that that Wagner Group transfer of the missile defense system to Hezbollah does not happen. Although if it did, and there's intelligence about it, it's the kind of thing you can imagine the U.S. or the Israelis taken out on the runway when it lands. And part of what makes me so imbizant, we haven't done World War Watch on this podcast in a while because it's kind of evident. but that's when those two wars start to feel like the same conflict. That's when you, that's like when your defcon alert, you know, goes up a bit because it's like, you know, the Wagner group trying to transition air defense systems to Hezbollah and Israel hitting that. Then suddenly this is kind of one theater, you know, and that's a little alarming.

Not ideal. Another sort of major brewing issue as we're all focused on Gaza and Israel is, over in Pakistan where hundreds of thousands of Afghan refugees are being forced to leave the country. This is part of Pakistan's repatriation plan that aims to remove undocumented people from the country. November 1st was the deadline that the interim Pakistani government gave for people without legal documents to either leave voluntarily or face arrest or deportation. The authorities have been going door to door to check migrants' documentation and possibly push them out of the country. There's about 4 million Afghans living in Pakistan, and about 1.7 million of those people are

expected to be affected by this policy, many of whom are the children of refugees whose parents fled fighting in previous conflicts. And so these kids have never actually lived in Afghanistan but are being forced to go back there. Pakistan's government says deportations are necessary because 14 out of 24 major terrorist attacks this year were carried out by Afghan nationals. They are concerned. The broader relationship between Afghanistan and Pakistan has been deteriorating. Pakistani officials accused Afghanistan of providing a safe haven for the terrorist group TTP. What an irony, man.

I literally like depressing irony and role reversal there. So again, regardless of why these deportations are happening, this outcome is catastrophic for the people involved. Many folks are getting, you know, forcibly pushed out of their homes, you know, a gunpoint. They have nothing but the clothes on their backs. They're going to return to a country that is basically a failed state that's reeling from decades of conflicts,

natural disasters, earthquakes, like you name it. So I guess Ben, I mean, we want to dig into this deeper down the road and talk to some of the folks being impacted. But do you think there's any country or political entity or any way to force the Pakistanis to stop with this plan or are they just going to do it? I mean, they seem pretty intent on doing it. And the hypocrisy is extreme, given the fact that they gave the Taliban a safe haven for all those years.

And Taliban could not have won the war in Afghanistan. the key without Pakistan giving them a safe haven and now they're shock shock that that's coming back to hunt them i do think look pakistan gets a lot of international assistance they get it uh in terms of direct assistance get it in terms of kind of financial assistance uh and i do just think there has to be an effort to leverage that to say you know we're not we're not we're not keep bailing pakistan out um if this is how they're going to treat 1.7 million people um many of whom you know to use analogy, it's kind of like the dreamers here. Like there are people that are like, you know, in their 30s and 40s and never really lived in Afghanistan, you know, um,

there has to be some way to, to, to slow this down, to slow this role and to like, uh, and to try to at least identify like a less comprehensive and onerous deportation. To just say 1.7 million people have to leave the country tomorrow. It runs counter to kind of how the world is supposed to manage these things. Now, I can hear the Pakistani argument like, you know, the U.S. deports people. And so I'm not suggesting there's no basis for Pakistan saying, like, there needs to be documentation, things like this. But the way, they're doing this is it makes no sense. It's vindictive.

By the way, it's probably going to hurt Pakistan too. I'm sure a lot of these people are in the Pakistani economy. This is just a dumb policy. And so I think in addition to being a cruel one. And so I do think there has to be, you know, donor nations, international institutions like the IMF that have supported Pakistan. I think need to be raising this because there is leverage here. It just has to be used. Yeah.

One final story before Ben's interview. Listeners might know that the United Kingdom has set up this ongoing independent investigation into the government's handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. Good idea, but also it's a doozy. We should dig into this more down the road because Boris Johnson is going to testify at some point soon. And in the meantime, all of the WhatsApp messages from these various officials are dribbling out, including from Johnson, his top aides. And the way they talk about Boris Johnson and the way they talk about each other is

un-fucking believable. They think he's a blithering idiot. They hate his guts. Like top civil servants are destroying him, you know, in these messages. It's amazing. But Ben, this revelation caught our eye today. This is from a witness statement. A person said that at one point early in the pandemic, Johnson, quote, suggested to senior

civil servants and advisors that he wanted to be injected with coach. COVID-19 on television to demonstrate to the public that it did not pose a threat. So that's Bojo for you. Inject me. We had inject me with bleach. I was going to say that was where I was going to go with this because like, actually I'm not entirely sure which of those is dumber. Probably the bleaching a little bit.

I mean, but like not by much because Boris Johnson almost died of COVID. Remember he was like in the ICU, you know? They were making contingency planning for what to do when he died. They were like deputizing people and thinking about a rollout. Because you know what that that kind of demonstrates about Boris Johnson? I think sometimes there's a sense that people act like dumb populace, but they're actually like smart. Or sometimes Americans look at Brits and they're like, he speaks with the British accents and he sounds kind of smart. It just demonstrates that the guy's a moron. Like he's just stupid, you know. And actually, no, he's not some like, you know, like super, well, maybe he's like the Wizard Vaz behind the curtain. There's nothing behind the curtain. I mean, this guy is a guy that literally, let's just, he's not that young. and he's not that healthy looking. No, no. Terrible hair.

Yeah, yeah. Like, I, you know, like this is not the smartest bulb in the light bulb. He's a profoundly unsurious person. And apparently he made this suggestion multiple times to different sets of civil service. And remember, this is a guy who skipped like a bunch of the early COVID meetings because he was, I think, writing a book about Shakespeare or something. Like, he was doing some grifting bullshit when he was supposed to be running the country. But it's a reminder that it is a horrifying moment. in like the world's history to the most powerful countries on earth were run by clowns.

And meanwhile, just a quick British point here, like the NHS, national health service workers who've been underfunded for years because of Tories are fucking busting their ass, like, getting the nation through COVID. And this blowhard is like, maybe I'll object myself on national TV. Like, like, and while then they demagogue the NHS, like, I, like, pour one out for like the nurses and doctors of the British National Health Service that have this lunatic, leading them through this thing, you know? Some Machiavellian advisor should be like, yeah, let's do it.

Yeah. Yeah, well, yeah. Maybe they did actually. Let's go. Let's go. Getty up. We don't know. One quick note before we go to a break. So the cover for our new POTSave America book has out been.

It's called Democracy or else How to Save America in 10 easy steps written by yours truly, Vavro, and love it. It's an easy guide to saving American democracy. Lots of funny pictures and jokes. But best of all, Cricket is donating the profits to support Vote Save America, its partners and other organizations mobilizing for progressive outcomes in 2024. and beyond. So check out the cover now and pre-order at cricket.com slash books or wherever books are sold and there are signed editions available from

bookshop.org. All right, we're going to take a quick break and we come back. You'll hear Ben's interview with Nathan Thrall. With Trex, you get the most of everything, the most wood inspired, the most eco-friendly, the most decking and railing designs, the most trusted. Trex, performance engineered for your life outdoors. Visit Trex.com today. With Trex, you get the most of everything. The most wood inspired. The most eco-friendly. The most decking and railing designs.

The most trusted. Trex. Performance engineered for your life outdoors. Visit Trex.com today. All right, I'm very pleased to welcome to Podsaid the World, Nathan Therall, who is a Jewish-American journalist who lives in Jerusalem. He spent years reporting on Israel and Palestine. He's the former director of the Arab-Israeli project at the International Crisis Group, a tremendous organization that people should follow on this and other conflicts. He's also the author of a new book, A Day in the Life of Abed Salama, that I heartily recommend to people

if you really want to understand the complexities of the occupation and life on the West Bank. But Nathan, thanks so much for joining us. Thanks for having me. So we'll obviously get into the kind of current events here, but I want to start with your book. I was really struck by it because a lot of people tried to capture the complexities and realities of Israel and Palestine by kind of pulling back and looking at history and looking at different dynamics and groups. But you really narrowed down and focused in on kind of one incident, one person's story. And I want you just describe, how did you find like a deeper truth

that you were looking for about the situation in the West Bank, about the occupation through this story? Just walk people through who haven't read the book, obviously, a bit about the story you chose and what it illuminates. Yeah. So I tell the story of a tragic bus accident involving a group of Palestinian kindergartners who lived in the town of Annata, which is partially annexed by Israel, annexed in 1967 and partially unnext. And this is a town just outside of Jerusalem. The part that's annexed is inside the municipal boundary of Jerusalem. And that's the city I live in. I would pass by this community nearly every day. And the community is

encircled by walls. It has the 26 foot tall concrete wall of the separation barrier on three sides. And on the fourth side is another kind of wall, which is the wall that runs through Route 4370, a segregated road with Israeli traffic on one side, Palestinian traffic on the other, famously known as the apartheid road. And I would pass by this walled enclave and hardly pass it, pay it any mind. And after this accident occurred, I couldn't stop thinking about the families that share the city with me and live a radically different life. and I began to reach out to everyone involved in this accident, both Jews and Palestinians.

And I quickly realized that by telling the story of this accident, I could in fact tell the whole story of Israel-Palestine in Microsm. You know, it's called a day in the life of Abid Salama, but it's really about the entire life of Abid Salama and some of the other characters in the book. And what I do is I follow Abed. On the eve of the accident, he takes his five-year-old son, Milad, to go by treats for a kindergarten class trip. And in this walled enclave, they have no playgrounds. The streets are, look like rubble. There is no lane in the main streets.

It's barely wide enough for a car and a bus to, pass one another. This is 130,000 people living in this tight, dense urban ghetto without a single ATM. And even the emergency services cannot enter without an army escort. So this is an area of gross neglect. And because the members of this community have different statuses within Israel, Some of them have green West Bank IDs that don't allow them to enter the rest of Jerusalem. Some of them have blue Jerusalem IDs that do allow them to enter Jerusalem. So this kindergarten class trip couldn't go to a nearby play area just on the other side of the wall. For example, in the settlement of Pizgatsaev, a stone's throw away.

And they had to follow the winding path of the wall to a play area on the outskirts of Ramallah. and after they passed through a checkpoint, they were struck by a giant semi-trailer that was going back and forth from a settlement quarry, transporting stones to a factory in East Jerusalem that would help to pave the roads inside Israel with the natural resources of the West Bank. And the bus flipped over and caught fire. Six children died. One teacher died. and the people who were left to deal with the accident because the emergency services took so very long to come. The first Israeli fire truck came over a half hour after the accident, after all of the kids had been evacuated, the kids who lived. And the bystanders there were taking these soot-covered children off of the bus, and they themselves had a mix of IDs, green IDs and blue IDs. So if you were a

Palestinian bystander with a blue ID and somebody put a kindergartner in the back of your car, you would drive to a superior Jerusalem hospital and take the child there. And if you had a green ID, you might go somewhere else like Ramallah. And Abed, when he hears about the accident, he races to the scene. He tries to flag down an Israeli jeep, an army jeep, to get a ride just a few minutes up the road to the accident site. They refuse. He gets there and other parents are already there. And there's a crowd and he cannot see a single child from the accident. And he asks people in the crowd, you know, where are the children? And they tell him, you know, they're at a military base up the road, a minute up the road. They're at an East Jerusalem Hospital. They're at this West

Jerusalem Hospital. They're in Ramallah. They're in Nablus. And he himself, Abed has a green West Bank ID. He can't go to most of these places to look for his child. He can't go to an Israeli military base. He can't enter East Jerusalem or West Jerusalem. So he goes to Ramallah and he calls on a relative who has a blue ID to go look in the Jerusalem hospitals for his son. And it's more than 36 hours before he finds out the fate of his five-year-old boy. And we follow Abid through those 36 hours, but the theme of the book is really more than just Abid's personal quest, but really how these Jewish and Palestinian characters live these separate and unequal lives in very close proximity and how those lives come into collision on the day of this tragedy. people ask why people use the word apartheid i don't if people have a better word to describe what you just went through um they can try to find it in english language um i want to ask you though you know

you you talk about the jewish and Palestinian perspective in your book i think the impact on Palestinians is pretty clear from what you just said what do you think has been the impact of the occupation um on on jewish Israelis how does how does how have a policy like that affect a country like Israel? Well, I think that people live with a kind of internal contradiction, a deep internal contradiction. They're told on the one hand that we have the most moral army in the world and that our cause is just.

And on the other, they see the deep injustice that's undeniable and that's excused in different ways. It's the situation that's lasted more than a half a century now is described as temporary. There are many kinds of excuses that people make and there are talking points that people go to. So I think that living with that situation and justifying it to yourself and telling yourself that you are a democracy and that you are moral and liberal, I think that that is a terrible contradiction for people to hold in their minds that tortures them. And what would you say to somebody, you know, who might be listening to this interview and thinking, you know, maybe there's some people just don't want to hear this.

And it's probably a lot of people. And don't worry, we'll get to that. I'm going to ask you about the reaction to your book in a second here. But to people who will say, you know, what I've heard, and I'm sure you've heard even more than me, which is that it's the Palestinians' fault. They wouldn't make peace. they elected Hamas and Gaza. They have this bad leadership, the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank. They, you know, when we pulled that back from places we got rockets, that this is necessary. This

system you described is necessary so as to ensure that Israeli civilians aren't threatened. You've heard all that. What would be your answer to that, that listener who's probably thinking those things right now? So I think that, you know, the fundamental issue, is one of historical understanding and of framing. And I think that for the vast majority of Israelis, including that in particular, this is less true of the Israeli right, actually, but the Israelis of the center and center left

and most people in the U.S. and certainly most U.S. officials is a, their framing of the conflict is a 1967 framing. They basically believe that the, primary issue to be resolved is the occupation of Gaza and the West Bank and East Jerusalem that began in 1967. And for Palestinians, the occupation is the most egregious form of oppression that they face today. But it is not the primary or sole issue that the conflict is about. It is about Zionism.

It is about a political ideology that began in putting Jews, settling Jews, inside historic Palestine in 1882 at a time when the Jewish population was roughly 5% of historic Palestine and having a project to establish a Jewish homeland against the will of the native majority. And that culminated in 1948 and the mass expulsion and flight of 750,000 Palestinians. We're talking about within the territory of what became Israel, 78% of historic Palestine, we're talking about 80% of the population is removed. And overnight, a Palestinian majority was turned into a minority, and they were not, after the armistice agreements were drawn, up. They were not allowed to return. That's what the conflict is primarily about for Palestinians. And I think that at the most basic level, that is the cause of this huge perception gap

between Palestinians and their allies and Israelis and their allies over what is a fair deal and who's at fault for their not having been a deal until now? That's very useful context. And, you know, further concessions, right, were envisioned the demilitarization of any Palestinian state, the kind of long-term Israeli military presence in the West Bank. People should get a sense of just how far the line continues to move even in more recent negotiations. I want to ask you, obviously, about the current situation.

And before, again, getting to the reaction to your book, you know, we've been talking a lot about Gaza. And one of the reasons why I want to talk to you is you've obviously focused a lot on the West Bank. And the West Bank hasn't got as much attention recently, but there's been a huge uptick in violence in the West Bank. We've had, according to estimates, at least 155 Palestinians killed in the West Bank since October 7th. Some of that by kind of Israeli settler violence, kind of vigilante type violence. What is your sense of the current situation in the West Bank? West Bank? And what should people be looking for as the world's attention is on Gaza in terms of the potential for things to escalate in the West Bank? So while all eyes are on Gaza, it is an

opportunity for far-right settlers and settler militias to advance their old project of dispossessing Palestinians. And we were already prior to October 7th looking at a situation of record levels of displacement by settler militias in the West Bank from the beginning of 2022 until September when the UN issued a report saying that over 1,100 Palestinians had been forcibly displaced in the West Bank in that period. This is a level. of displacement we had not seen in decades, just since October 7th, an additional 800 people have been forcibly displaced largely by settler militias. Palestinians entire communities removed many articles in the press describing this as ethnic cleansing.

So that is one of the main things that we should be looking at in the West Bank. And the other thing that we should be looking at is the potential. for a collapse of the Palestinian Authority. On the first weekend after the October 7th attack, we saw mass protests in city centers in the West Bank, clashes between Palestinians and the Palestinian Authority, which is perceived as working hand-in glove with Israel to solidify Israel's control and perpetuate.

the occupation. And I have never seen, prior to those images, I had never seen anything that looked more like the beginning of the end of the PA. And we haven't seen something on that scale since, but this is all very fresh. And it's quite possible that we are going to see major disruption and political collapse in the West Bank. Yeah, which would lead to a very volatile situation, right, because you still have millions of Palestinians there and they lose all governing authority and you've had settler militias unleashed. It could get a lot worse there. I want to ask about your book. So it comes out right before October 7th. You told the Washington Post that you estimate that a quarter of your appearances were canceled in terms of like your book tour, mainly in the

United States, but also in Europe, I think. And that's run the gamut from, you know, Arkansas having laws against BDS and Sarah Huckabee Sanders. you know, condemning you and, but even seemingly well-meaning people saying it's just not the time to have a conversation about this book because we're focused on what happened. I mean, how do you react to the cancellations of your, these types of events? What do you just say some of those audiences here, the Jewish American audiences that might be very interested in the story in your book and some of the issues around the occupation, but who felt after October 7th, I don't want to engage with that because I'm just feeling solidarity.

and I don't want to signal that I'm somehow not fully behind Israel in this moment. I mean, how do you unpack that in your own experience and for other people? Yeah. So there have been an array of reasons that different events of mine have been canceled. And some of them have been, you know, by the UK police canceling a, you know, 400-seat event in London, citing public safety. others have been an entire conference of Palestinian Americans whose conference in Houston was shut down. The pressure was put by a pro-Israel organization on the Hilton Hotel to cancel the conference, and that was canceled. And others have been, as you say, Jewish groups who, for example, a progressive

synagogue in New York that told me now is not the time. You know, our people are grieving and they're not prepared to, you know, hear a story about occupation right now. And my response to them has been, first of all, I've spoken to many Jewish audiences since October 7th. Those talks have all gone very well. People have been grateful for it. There's a way to talk about these issues with sensitivity and acknowledgement of the terrible grief that Israelis and Jews are feeling after October 7th, while also acknowledging the grief of Palestinians who, you know, are mourning the loss of more than 4,000 children as we speak today. And I've told them that not only have those events gone well and have people been grateful to have this conversation, but there has never been a more necessary and urgent time to have these conversations.

we have seen round after round of bloodshed in Gaza. And when that bloodshed occurs, everybody says, let's have calm. This book is about calm. This book is about what that quote unquote calm looks like. That calm isn't calm. That calm is violent and it's oppressive and it leads to violence in reaction to it. And unless we do more than call for calm, unless we actually look at this system of seven million Jews, seven million Palestinians, all living under Israeli control, the vast majority of those Palestinians living without basic civil rights, unless we address that and talk about it and think about how we're going to end that system, we are doomed to see more and more of this bloodshed, which I'm. I think all of the audience that I'm speaking to want to see come to an end.

Yeah, well, that's another conversation for another time will be potential solutions in the back end of this. I want to ask you one last question. You know, you've become friends with Abed Salama through this through telling his story and his family story, the tragic loss of his child and what it illuminates. You also were traveling together for this book tour when October 7th happened and the days after. I'm just wondering what that was like for you to be with this Palestinian whose story you've so deeply embedded through this horrific attack by Hamas and then through the Israeli strikes on Gaza. What was that like? And what was that experience like for him?

So it was extremely difficult for him to be away from his family during this time of war. and he had to cut our book tour short because of the situation in the West Bank. It really feels like the second intifada right now. Entire communities are shut down. Mobility is greatly restricted. In Abid's community of Anatta, after October 7th, they shut down the two exits. There's one exit toward the rest of Jerusalem for those with blue IDs, one exit at the bottom for people with both green and blue IDs.

and it just takes, you know, four soldiers to put down a gate or put up a couple roadblocks, and they can shut down 130,000 people. It's like that all over the West Bank. You know, every Palestinian family is relying on higher paying jobs in Israel and the settlements, and those jobs don't exist right now. And even Abbott's son, who works in Ramallah, was told by his employer, and Ramallah don't come because of all of the settler. violence, it's not safe on the roads. So there is a situation of extreme violence right now and

economic constriction. Abbot's wife's cousin was just killed in Al-Bire while driving his car when Israel was doing a military operation to arrest some people there. And he just felt that he couldn't be away from his family. But prior to that, when we were together and processing October 7th and watching the war unfold in Gaza, you know, it was, for me, you know, an experience of us of us bonding even more over our shared horror at the killing of civilians and our joint, condemnation of war crimes, no matter who commits them. And so I was, I never had any doubts that Abbott and I saw eye to eye on that. And I was, you know, grateful actually to be with him as we were watching all of this unfold. Well, look, people should definitely check out the book.

It's an extraordinary window into daily life. It's also just a, profoundly human story a day in the life of Abbotsalamah. And it reminds us that if you actually put aside rationalization and competitive grievance and just focus on new humanity of the people involved in this, things become a lot clearer. But thank you, Nathan, for joining us, for your voice on this issue and look forward to keeping in touch. Thanks so much for having me on, Ben. That's it for POTS day of the world. However, we're going to stay in here and answer some subscriber questions, Ben. So to hear that and to get episodes ad-free,

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