Pod Save the World - Why Rihanna cares about the farmers' protests in India (and you should too)

Episode Date: February 10, 2021

Tommy and Ben discuss the farmers’ protests in India, updates on the situation in Myanmar, Biden’s big foreign policy speech, Canada’s classification of the Proud Boys as a terrorist organization, debate over definitions of anti-Semitism and the double standards when critiquing Israel, and the political situation in Haiti.For a closed-captioned version of this episode, please visit crooked.com/podsavetheworld For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail].

Welcome back to Pod Save the World. I'm Tommy Vitor. I'm Ben Rhodes. Ben, another day in a pandemic life. We were just lamenting the random reporter who tweeted that there was a 20% increase in supplies of Pfizer vaccine sent to states and then deleted it and said, oops, deleted errant tweet based on miscommunication. I've never been more angry at Twitter in my life and that's saying something. But here we are. I know. It's like I lost a whole month of my life in between those tweets. Well, you know what's going to keep us busy recording this show. We have a lot of good stuff to cover. We are going to talk about the farmers' protests in India due to popular demand, which I think Rihanna deserves some credit for. A little update on the coup in Myanmar to see if there's any

major developments. We'll tick through some of the big takeaways from President Biden's foreign policy speech last week. There's a roiling debate about the definition of anti-Semitism that has big implications for freedom of speech and for U.S. policies, and we'll get into all of that, and the political crisis in Haiti that has created a truly dire situation for the people there, and we'll explain what's happening. Ben, just a couple quick housekeeping things. First of all, everyone needs to pre-order your new book after the fall. I assume they all already have, because we talked about it last week. But basically, if you don't pre-order Ben's book, you want Don Jr. and Dan Bongino to win is basically how I would describe it. Is that fair?

Yeah. We promise not to plug it every week between now and June 1st, but every now and then we have to check in. And it's worth reminding people, you know that there'll be some hot right-wing garbage populating, you know, like the latest triggering book from, you know, Candice Owens or Ben Shapiro's novel. Laura Ingram, you know, whatever. So we got to make sure that we have representation up there. But I appreciate everybody checking it out. And like I said, I'm really excited for you guys to take this journey with me.

So I won't subject you to every step of the journey by flacking the pre-order every week. But we'll remind you every now and then. And as we get closer to the book, we can maybe do some cool stuff with it. Like having some of the people that I have in the book, maybe we can have them on the show. We can we can unpack some of the issues. You know, something tells me that these issues of authoritarianism, nationalism, and what America is in the world are not going away. So, no, they're just getting closer to home. Exactly. Exactly. So basically, pre-order the book or Don Jr. wins. That's all. That's a big take home. Also, if you're not

listening to Pod Save the People, tune in each week to hear Drey McKesson discuss news, culture, social justice, and politics with his co-host Sam. Kaya, Dio. each week. It is an amazing show. It's about race and justice and activism. They are funny. They are smart. They cover issues that don't lead the newspaper every day. So subscribe to Pod Save the people wherever you get your podcasts. Okay. Ben, let's start in India because a lot of folks have been tweeting at us or reaching out asking us to cover this, many of them after Rihanna tweeted about it last week. So I'm excited to dig in. So this story starts in September of last year when the BJP, Prime Minister Modi's party, rush these three new agricultural laws through Parliament.

So these laws start the process of deregulating India's agricultural industry in ways that will really impact small farmers. And to give you some context here, agriculture is the main source of livelihood for about 60% of India's population. And according to a report now, Jazeera, 86% of India's cultivated farmland is controlled by farmers who own less than five acres of land each. So in other words, there are lots of very small farmers, not individuals, lots of farmers with various small farms. These new laws would allow farmers to sell their crops directly to private buyers outside of government regulated markets, and it would allow traders to stockpile crops.

Now, the Modi government and a lot of economists argue that those changes are long overdue and that they're necessary to modernize India's agricultural sector and attract private investment. They make the case that there's all these farmers, but it's farming is only 15% of GDP. The farmers are worried that these changes will eventually lead to the government doing away with rules that protect small farmers by setting minimum prices for certain types of crops. And, you know, the broader context here, again, is that Indian farmers are already struggling. A 2018 study by India's National Rural Development Bank found that more than half of farmers in India are in debt.

So after these laws were passed in September of last year, farmers started marching or driving their tractors literally to do Delhi the Capitol. The police tried to stop them at certain points, including with. tear gas and water cannons, but millions of them made it to New Delhi, and they've basically living in camps around the city since at times they have blocked roads in and out of the capital and in other parts of the country. The Indian government has cut off the internet for periods of time after there were certain clashes. So I noticed the State Department has said that the U.S. welcome steps that would impact the efficiency of India's markets and attract private

sector investment. So it seems like they support these laws. But they've also called for dialogue between the farmers and the government. Ben, just stepping back here, like, what do you think these protests mean for Modi? Because, you know, he is used to steamrolling his opponents, forcing through legislation. Like, the opposition is pretty feckless. But these protests have been a real, durable, political challenge for him. It's been interesting to see. Yeah, the whole issue is fascinating. And I think that there's kind of three questions to unpack. One is, you know, What is Modi trying to do? The other is how did he try to do it?

And then the third is, how is this a part of a kind of a broader, you know, sense of dissatisfaction with his kind of increasingly autocratic rule? What he's trying to do, like, India has this problem. And a lot of, you know, developing countries have had a challenge where essentially, you know, when you have an agricultural-based economy and kind of a subsistence farming based economy, yes, there's a certain point at which you can get more efficiency, you can get more product, you can ultimately make more profits for the farmers themselves if you're kind of connecting what they're growing in some fashion to markets and where the demand is for things.

That said, you know, before I go, you know, all neoliberal here on the reforms, there needs to be a step-by-step process where the farmers know that they're protected, that they're not just going to get swallowed up by some kind of massive multinational entity, that there's not going to be some period in which they literally lose their livelihood as there's this kind of transition happening. So even if the intent of some of these reforms is ultimately to get a better deal for farmers, clearly they didn't feel hurt in the process and don't have the assurances that they feel they need that they're not going to lose everything. And that leads to how this was done. Modi did this, and the BJP, his party did this, in much the same way that we've seen them do other things.

We've talked about how they rammed through those Kashmir laws. We've talked about how they tried to ram through those citizenship laws. There wasn't a process of consultation. It was this kind of top-down dictate that was literally going to impact the lives of hundreds of millions of people in India. And so, you know, how they went about it is a part of what they got wrong. Because if they'd had a consultative process, if they'd listened to farmers, it brought them in, you know, then they might have been able to address some of those concerns in the legislation itself and not had this kind of explosion of protest. And that leads me to the last point, which is that part of what's

happening is a kind of catharsis, that there hasn't been a space for Indians to challenge things that they didn't like about Modi's rule because he has such a tight grip on the politics and media of the place. And there's such intimidation and trolling and targeting of journalists and critics and activists. And now the farmers have kind of created a space where lots of people who have grievances with how things are going under Modi can join a movement. And that is very powerful. I mean, I think some estimates I saw Tommy suggested that like this might be the largest movement ever, you know, given India's size and the people participating in it. And so I think that's about the laws. I think that's about the way they pass the laws. And frankly, I think it's just

about having a space where people can come together to protest Modi. Yeah, I mean, I think you put it well. I mean, there is this balance of trying to modernize an agricultural system that when some of these laws were written, there were concerns about the hoarding of food because people might starve. And now there's an attempt to make them more responsive to price fluctuations in market dynamics. I get the economist nerd brain piece of this. But, you know, that statistic I mentioned about roughly half of Indian farmers being in debt. The reporting on that was often coupled with the fact that like 10 to 20,000 Indian farmers died by suicide between 2018 and 2019. So these are people who feel like they're

already an incredibly desperate economic situation. And you're right. I mean, the government jammed this through. And it's pretty disheartening to see the Modi government go back to some of the tactics they used against people in Kashmir, like shutting down the internet and basically turning off all this sense. So, yeah, I mean, he's got a real political problem here. There's a lot of people. They're incredibly sympathetic figures in many cases. These are just like simple farmers who want a fair price for their crops. I mean, it does seem like he's in a tough spot. No, and this is like the margin between life and death for these people, between putting food on the table and starving, and the disrespect and disregard to their grievances is not the way through

this. You know, it's listening to them, you know, and even some friends of mine, you know, Rana Ayub, who's been on this podcast, a friend of mine, always subjected to online. harassment trolling, the vitriol in this current circumstance. And then the vitriol directed it, you know, celebrities who tweet about it. That's not going to solve this problem for Modi. It's not going to solve your political problem by like unleashing Twitter mobs on people and trying to censor people. Clearly there's a broad enough dissatisfaction here in India. It's attracted the attention of the world. And if you think that you're going to get through that by like trashing Greta Thurnberg because she tweeted about this and trying to make

these farmers out to be a bunch of, you know, enemies of the state. Like that's not going to work. And it just shows you something we've talked about before this, the laziness that that autocracy can lead you to, you know, because you stop doing politics. You just start thinking you can say and do whatever you want. And ultimately, you know, you're accountable to these people, these farmers who, you know, have every right to insist that the government take their concerns into account. And, and ultimately, you know, you're accountable to, And, you know, and yes, like, you know, Modi can make an argument that he's trying to reform this sector so that they're able to produce more. They're able to sell more of their goods. Ultimately, it's to their profit. But you got to make the argument. And you got to address in your legislation

the things that have them worried, probably with good reason, that if this is just thrown open to the markets, that they're going to get swallowed up and not going to have a way to make a living. So, you know, worth watching because this isn't going away. Yeah. And look, if you're an ultra-small farmer, you are right to be wary of big agro business and you are right to wonder what leverage you could possibly have as a guy with like two acres when compared to, you know, some billion-dollar conglomerate. So, yeah, a story will keep watching.

I imagine these protests aren't going away. Tommy, I'm reminded. I don't think we've ever done this anecdote on POTS of the World. But I learned a lot about agricultural policy and the Iowa process in 2007. And I remember that Hillary Clinton, one of the contrasts we drew, is that like her agricultural plan was written by like a lobbyist for Monsanto. And we made our whole plan. Obama's whole plan was actually going to be like, and it was good politics, but it was also, I think, good policy. The whole plan was that we're going to go out and we're

going to listen to small farmers in Iowa. And then our policy is going to reflect what they tell us, which led to one of the greatest lines in any Obama speech in history, which is, you Your authorship, which was Obama speaking in Washington County, Iowa. And he was able to say that the only Washington insiders he listened to in writing his rural plan was the Washington insiders in Washington County, Iowa. That's how you run a caucus campaign, people. To be totally honest, I have no idea if that was my line or Josh Ernest's line. But hey, you know what, man, it worked. Washington County, Iowa is where it's at.

It sounds cheesy, and it sounds like a canned line. But it's actually not a bad rule to live by, which is like you're making policies that affect farmers. like listen to the farmers. Right. Absolutely. Absolutely. Okay, so let's go for that political crisis in India to the one in Myanmar. The last week we spent a lot of time discussing the coup that had just occurred in Myanmar. Just a quick, super quick reminder of what happened. The military surrounded Myanmar's parliament building.

They arrested civilian leaders like Aung San Suu Kyi. They declared a one-year state of emergency. And then the military is basically de facto dictator of the country. after we recorded the military accused Aung San Suu Kyi of illegally importing walkie-talkies. I guess that was like the best fake crime they could come up with here. There have been a series of major protests ever since. Ben, you know, I know you watch this closely. You've been talking to people in and out of Myanmar.

Any major updates since we talked about this last week? And have you seen any sign that the international community might be able to exert enough pressure to actually reverse what happened? Well, first of all, I think one of the major updates is you've had most of the globalization now in the streets of Myanmar. You have people protesting. And it's quite inspiring. And I've been hearing from a lot of friends who are in those protests or no people in those protests. And one of the points that they make is that the younger generation in Myanmar, like, has not lived under the kind of sclerotic military dictatorship in the same way that the older generation has. If you're 20 years

old in Myanmar, you were 10 when things kind of opened up and you've become accustomed to having a degree of freedom. I don't suggest it was a total democracy, but some rights. And so it's been inspiring, and we should, just as we pay tribute to the Indian farmers, like, at great personal risk, there are thousands and tens of thousands of people turning out to protest across the country. By the way, the NLD, Aung San Suu Kyi's party usually wins even in military districts. So one of the interesting things is if the military tries to crack down, you know, whether it's, you know, there's any dissension in the ranks, if you will. Because I think the next thing to look for, unfortunately, tragically, is whether there's a kind of violent crackdown on this popular

mobilization we're seeing. I would hope that the U.S. and the international community is focused on doing everything it can to prevent that. In terms of what they can do, you know, I think that there's the pressure, right? The pressure should be focusing like a laser on the core military leadership, the commander-in-chief. How do you take away his money? How do you sanction him? before you throw a shroud of sanctions over the whole country, which kind of mummifies things where they are, can you target that pressure at the military itself and, you know, kind of create a choice for them, you know, take an off ramp, come back to some kind of democracy within the next year, or else we're all going to be trapped and, you know, you're going to be under sanctions and

unfortunately the place is probably not going to know democracy for some time. You know, I think there's still a window. I think there's an opening. And I think the combination of mass protests and mobilization on the streets combined with international pressure hopefully can make enough people in that military thing twice. Because what you need is you need a split in that military where enough of the senior people are going to the commander-in-chief who kind of ran this whole play and said, you know what, like, we're not, we're not with you. This is not the right course, you know? So bears in mind, but we should all be, I mean, I've got some incredible messages, videos that people sent me of people just taking extraordinary risks, facing water cannons, you know, risking detention,

people under house arrest, people whose parents have been rounded up. A friend of mine texted me today, their cousin was picked up at 4.30 in the morning and the middle of night. Like, it's bad stuff. But we have to kind of, again, have that sense of solidarity with the people that are turning out because if they can keep turning out with international support, that's the only way you have to affect the calculus of the military. Yeah. And look, so we know that, you know, the Biden administration has commented on this.

The State Department is watching it closely. President Biden actually gave a major foreign policy speech last week. He went over to the State Department to deliver it. And even just that location felt significant, right? I mean, like Mike Pompeo was notionally the America's top diplomat, but he spent four years, like, LARPING as the shadow national security advisor or defense secretary, right? So like Biden seemed to be sending a message that actual diplomacy is back. So the speech talked about, you know, standing up for democracy and universal rights,

rebuilding strained alliances, taking on China. There was some newsworthy bits. Like some of it had been announced before. Some was new. They announced an extension of the new START treaty for five years. That treaty sets the cap on the number of deployed U.S. and Russian nuclear weapons. Biden said the administration will stop a planned withdrawal of U.S. troops from Germany. Last year, Trump said he was going to remove one third of the U.S.

troops stationed in Germany from the country. Biden seems like he's walking that back. Biden named a special envoy to help negotiate an end to the war in Yemen. They announced the end of U.S. support for offensive military operations in Yemen. He announced that the U.S. would raise the cap on refugee admissions back up to $125,000 this year. They released a presidential memorandum about restoring LGBTQ rights. Ben, any big takeaways for you from that speech? And did you notice any swagger in the building? Is that something that may or may not be back? I mean, I thought it was like a level set, you know, it was like, okay, diplomacy is at the center. We care about alliances. We're going to talk about values again. We're going to talk about, you know, Alexei Navalny. I thought the two

kind of governments that seem to be most in the crosshairs, Russia and Saudi Arabia, right? So Saudi Arabia were pausing and reviewing arms sales. We're withdrawing support for Yemen. Russia, obviously, a lot of criticism and kind of warning of consequences around Navalny. Again, the reason that's notable is that, you know, Donald Trump's best friend was Maham bin Salman and his, whatever, his special friend was Vladimir Putin. So a pretty clear effort to differentiate from Trump. They had kind of their progressive campaign promises that they worked through and fulfilled, you know, raising the refugee cap and withdrawing support for Yemen in particular. But, you know, I think the question is still like, what, what, where does this lead? You know, so

on Yemen, on Saudi Arabia, what's on the back end of that review of arms sales? On Russia, what are the consequences? Is it going to be a sanctions kind of policy, or is it going to be more of like a spotlighting Putin's corruption and giving a robust support for democracy policy, which is fine, by the way, I don't expect every answer for speech. I think that, you know, you'll remember at the beginning of Obama's time in office, we went to the State Department and he gave a similar speech about kind of our values or at the center. We prohibited torture. You know, diplomacy's back.

You know, similar message. But Biden's job was even bigger because with Bush, we were responding to the excesses of the war on terror. You know, Biden's just kind of saying like, hey, here we are again. We care about diplomacy. Like we're normal. We're democracy. We're normal humans, you know.

And like that was like about, you know, we're not withdrawing from Germany. You know, like, like, this is like how far, I mean, so my takeaway was just like it kind of illustrated just how crazy things had gotten and insane. And now like having kind of level set, return to kind of Obama era status quo and a whole bunch of issues, New Start and others, now they have the more consequential task of figuring out where are they going to, you know, where are they going to push the envelope? Yeah. But they had to do, I mean, it was so necessary for a step.

And so, like, they deserve a lot of credit for a really great start the entire administration. It is funny, though, like, my emotional bar is set so low that I found myself applauding them being opposed to, like, blatant bigotry. Yeah. Just like, all the worst excesses of the Trump regime. I mean, well, look, I should have mentioned at the top where happy second impeachment day, day one, I guess. Yeah. I didn't even bring it up.

I haven't watched it yet. And I think Biden, to draw that connection, like, I think Biden did a good job. job and that speech and acknowledging, you know, hey, I'm talking about democracy. We understand that we don't look too good over here. There was just a violent insurrection here a few weeks ago. And he had an interesting kind of line or two about if we can show that even as flawed as we are, that we can fight through it and overcome this kind of garbage. Maybe that actually begins to build back credibility internationally. I think that's exactly the right note to take. It's kind of a humble note of like, hey, we're not, we're just like everybody else. Like, we're not here

to, like, beat you over the head with American exceptionalism. We've seen that it can happen here. And, but we're dealing with it. And maybe if we can deal with it effectively, then so can you. But part of that is got to be accountability, right? So if Trump is acquitted, that undermines Biden saying we've dealt with it here. And so all those Republican votes for acquittal are undermining our capacity to set a Democratic example anywhere. Yeah. And look, so it's impeachment 2.0 day. You know, the reason for that, obviously, is the attack on the U.S. Capitol in January 6th. You know, we're doing our best to clean up our act. But in the interim, we're actually exporting terrorism. And last week, Canada declared that the proud boys, one of the right-wing groups that was a part of that attack on the Capitol. They declared that they're a terrorist group. They also listed a group called the Adam Woffin Division and the base, which are literally. literal, like very intense, scary neo-Nazi groups. And then something called the Russian imperialist movement, which is a Russian nationalist

group. So those are, those designations mean that the police can, like, seize their assets, that it's a crime to provide those groups with assistance. Canadian officials told the Washington Post that the fascist mob attack on the U.S. Capitol was not the driving factor, but did provide information that informed their decision to designate these groups. So the Proud Boys was founded in 2016. guy named Gavin McGinnis, who is one of the co-founders of Vice Media, which is just still one of

the weirdest things that's ever happened. They are white nationalists. They pretend to just be chauvinists when in fact they are violent. They're white supremacists. Trump famously told the proud boys to stand back and stand by during the debate. You know, they are bigoted and violent. And like, I think a gateway to these even fringier groups. So I guess my question is, were you surprised to see Canada kind of jump ahead of us in this? this debate by starting to designate some of these groups? And what did you make of the decision generally? I mean, I think it shows you that this is a real issue. This isn't just we don't like their politics. We don't like that they're white supremacists. We don't like that they're neo-Nazis,

which we obviously don't. The Canadians, like, they're not trolling. Like, they must be looking at information that suggests that there's an organized, violent faction of the proud boys that just like, you know, there's an organized violent faction of, you know, ISIS, right? Like, that they made a determination that this isn't just kind of an online movement of right-wing nuts. There are people that intend to carry out acts of violence, you know? And I think that that presents the complexity of what you're going to talk to Congresswoman Omar about here. Like, you don't want a massive 9-11 infrastructure, but you also don't want to ignore that It's not just that they're like Trump supporters.

It's that some of these people are like stockpiling weapons and have like target list and want to carry out terrorist attacks. And the government of Canada wouldn't be doing this otherwise. And I think the other awkward fact is that like there are Republican elected officials in this country who provide aid in comfort and support to terrorist organizations like this, you know. And how do we untangle that, you know? and the same people that are like talking about like unity are like also refusing to condemn like what may be, you know, terrorist plotting by the proud boys, you know, and it just shows you how much work we have to do and, and again, how much we had to be careful that we're doing the work, but that the work is focused not on like, again, painting with a broad brush, everybody who's,

you know, politics I might hate. How do you separate out? Like who are the violent elements, who are like the militias it might actually do something versus, you know, just the people that I, I hate their views, you know? And then that, that's hard work. Yeah. You know, look, our next topic kind of dovetails off of this one because in part because of these neo-Nazi groups, white nationalist groups, extremist groups like the proud boys, there is this growing conversation about the definition of anti-Semitism. And the conversation started in part because there was this rise in anti-Semitism in 2016, but what's gotten particularly interesting about it is the way it has become part of a broader debate about freedom of speech and U.S. policy towards Israel.

So to get specific here, like we're talking about what's called the working definition of anti-Semitism that was published by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, or IHRA. So that definition is used by schools, international agencies, and even countries to help them define anti-Semitism and deal with it. Some of the ways they define anti-Semitism are quite obvious, right? There are vile stereotypes, calls for violence, Holocaust denial, you know, blaming Jewish Kabbalist, like blatant stuff that is easy, that is obvious to spot, and it's easy to condemn.

But it gets complicated and somewhat controversial when the IHRA definition gets into rhetoric around Israel itself. So specifically, there's two examples that they list that have been singled out as particularly challenging. One is, quote, denying Jews the rights to the rights to Israel itself. self-determination or calling Israel a racist endeavor. And the other is applying a double standard to Israel that isn't applied to other countries. And so a coalition of progressive American Jewish organizations said that this effort to combat anti-Semitism is, quote, being misused and exploited to instead suppress legitimate free speech, criticism of Israeli government actions, and advocacy for Palestinian rights. In this conversation dovetails the broader one about

whether anti-Zionism is inherently anti-Semitic. So this is very complicated. fraught stuff. I'm just sort of throwing at you here. But the Trump administration adopted this definition of anti-Semitism a year plus ago. I forgot exactly when. And then last week, the Biden administration said that they too will champion and embrace the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism, including the parts that touch on sort of criticism Israel.

And so, Ben, I'm curious what you make of this broader conversation in like the debate you and I have had over the course of the show over many years about where to draw the line between criticism of Israel and singling the country out in ways that are unfair. And were you surprised that the Biden administration adopted this IHRA definition? I mean, I think the first, you're right, it's incredibly complicated stuff, right? It bears underscoring that anti-Semitism is something that has to be dealt with constantly and vigilantly, because the big lie that usually informs just about every fascist ideology we've had to deal with usually has some nexus to Jews, you know, and it's usually blaming the Jews for pulling all the strings,

blaming the Jews for, you know, stab in the back narratives, the big lie about the Holocaust not happening. Like, people can get, I know, like, exhausted, like, wait a second, why are we always talking about any Semitism, when we also have obviously so many challenges around structural racism. But it's because there's a reason that this constantly pops back up in so many different societies, and it needs to be beat back down. Because if you allow any Semitism to fester, we've seen where it leads. And it's not just the Holocaust, which should be enough. But, you know, you've seen attacks on Jews and, you know, over the years everywhere, basically. So it has to be dealt with. That said, the first thing is this is not the principal challenge.

Like we were just talking about the proud boys, like the danger and the world today feels much more like the traditional far right just any Semitism. We hate Jews. We hate, you know, we have conspiracy theories about Jews. Then it does, then it feels like it's all tied up with Israel. You know what I mean? Like, look at the Tree of Life synagogue shooting. That was like a right-wing white nationalist who objected to them helping refugees. It wasn't a BDS activist, you know? And so it just feels to me like, first of all, this is actually not where the root of the issue is today.

And the other thing is like, why is this happening now? It feels like this is like a foothold to tar BDS as any Semitism, writ large, and in any effort to call Israel an apartheid state, which, by the way, a number of Israelis recently did, and that's a whole other conversation, as kind of outside the boundaries of discourse. And I think that's wrong. Not because I agree with BDS as like the tactic, but because you can hold a view that Israel's policies in the Palestinian territories are tantamount to apartheid or inherently discriminatory and not hate Jews. Like, they're separate. I think it's possible to separate it out.

Yes, are some of the people who hold those views anti-Semites? Yes. And they should be condemned. when we see any Semitic tropes. But I feel like this is an effort to kind of expand the capacity to discredit and marginalize discourse that I don't even, I'm not even saying I agree with it in terms of the BDS tactic, but people, I don't think all those people are necessarily any Semites. And I certainly don't think they're anywhere near as dangerous as the proud boys, you know?

And Israel is also in a very strong position right now. They're normalizing relations with Arab neighbors. They're clearly the regional kind of superpower. And so why is this happening now, you know, versus 10 years ago or 20 years ago? It just feels like an effort to kind of prevent certain types of criticisms of Israel being leveled. So again, it's complicated because I want there to be a zero tolerance for any Semitism in discourse. I just think that like this seems to feel like something that is designed to go beyond that, to any certain kinds of criticisms of Israeli policy get put under that umbrella. And one last danger of that, Tommy, is that in some ways that makes the focus on the kind of insidious anti-Semitic discourse that's out there tied up in Israel and Israeli policy.

and no, we need to kind of have a focus here on, like, what is the kind of discourse that endangers Jews versus what is like even over the top criticism of Israel that we don't like? Because I still, I think those are different things. Yeah, look, it's so funny, like, you and I talk about wildly complicated fraught topics all the time. The only time I could feel us both kind of getting halting and feeling like palpably nervous about a conversation.

is this set of issues, in part because I do feel like my speech about BB Denyahu and his policies can be twisted and lead to accusations of something far more sinister. I mean, you and I were both singled out as like enemies of Israel that are trying to disrupt the relationship between the U.S. and Israel in a prominent Israeli newspaper's op-ed page. And so what I think you're referring to, right, is like this language in this IHRA definition that talks about denying Jews the right to self-determination, I think is what is the logic that leads to BDS being called anti-Semitic because they're saying, well, if you boycott, divest from, or sanction the state of Israel

that denies Israel is their right to a state. And like, I can understand that logic, but that logic is never applied to Palestinians in the West Bank. It's never applied to Gaza, right? And then, like, so, you know, that makes the sort of double standard language feel even more complicated. Like, you know, you, I know as a Jew are not particularly welcoming to anti-Semitism. It's something I think you'd like to see stamped out from our history.

Me too as well. But, you know, like you mentioned earlier, I mean, like one of the largest Israeli human rights organizations in the world released a paper on January 12th where it referred to the area comprising Israel, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip as an apartheid regime. Those are not my words. Those are an Israeli human rights organization's words. And accusing all those individuals in that organization of anti-Semitism, it doesn't seem like that's a fair characterization of a group that, you know, is doing academic research. Like here's, because here's where I think, you know, just put a fine point on what you said in the challenge. Like, I'm what I think would have once been called the liberal Zionist, right? which, by the way, like probably pisses off listeners from all new perspectives in the sense that I believe in the just nature of the state of Israel as a homeland for the Jewish people, but as a state that can, number one, live side by side with a Palestinian state where Palestinians also get self-determination.

and number two is a state that can respect the rights of its Arab citizens. And to just draw your example, like, yeah, comments I made on this podcast led to like a headline, you know, in the, I think it was the Jerusalem Post. It was like, Erdogan, Hamas, the Ayatollahs, and Ben Rhodes all agree, you know, that the Abraham Accords, you know, are bad or something. And, you know, it's kind of you chuckle because it's, it is funny. But, like, what's dumb about it is, I don't. share the views of Hamas and the Aitollahs in Iran. And they're radical, they're making what used to be mainstream progressive positions

slotted over here. And that's, you know, like, if you're critical of Israel, like you're no different than Hamas or you're no different than the Supreme Leader of Iran, that's fucking bullshit, you know? It's not true. It's disingenuous.

It's bad faith. And it undermines the very legitimate criticisms you have to make of, of, of some of the things that come from Hamas or that come from the Supreme Leader, because you're saying that they're no different than me and you? You know, like, come on. And if I'm a young person who's horrified by the treatment of the Palestinians, and I'm on campus and I'm 19 years old, and I want to just do something, I want to get involved in something.

And so I start to join the movement on my campus to say that we should divest from certain investments in Israel, right? Again, I think that usually ends up going too far. You can debate about whether you can prescribe it to areas, of course, where there's settlements. But like, you're going to then tell that 19-year-old kid who's just trying to take a stand for Palestinians who he sees suffering that he's an anti-Semite. You're going to tell him that? That's fucking bullshit. Because, like, you know, he may just be or she may just be someone who sees a wrong in the world and wants to do something about it, like generations of Americans before.

And it's not fair to treat people like that, to boot them out of the mainstream of American society just because they don't like how Palestinians are being treated. Nobody should like how Palestinians are being treated. And it shouldn't be like some extremist position to articulate it. Yeah. And the irony of some of the biggest whiners about cancel culture being the leading voices trying to shut down legitimate debate over some of these questions and policies is outrageous. Everyone, by the way, again, Peter Beinart has written extensively on these subjects.

He's far more thoughtful than I am. You should check out his stuff. Check out his substack because he's written in great detail. Ben, I do think it would be unfair if we didn't know, you know, some concerns that we both have had about the Biden administration on these subjects. So Tony Blinken, our friend, the Secretary of State, did an interview with Wolf Blitzer. Wolf asked him from CNN. Wolf asked him several questions about the U.S.-Israel relationship. first was like, do you regard Jerusalem as Israel's capital? Tony said, I do, yes. More importantly,

we do, like President Biden, the administration. And then Wolf asked if the Biden administration would support Palestine having its capital in East Jerusalem as part of an agreement. And Tony didn't say yes to that. Instead said, well, basically, we need to resolve those matters through negotiations, right? The location of the capital of Palestine is a final status issue that has to be resolved. And here's my question. Why is Jerusalem unequivocally Israel's capital, but the location of Palestine's capital has to be determined by these final status and negotiations, right? Like shouldn't both of them be, don't both of them need to be resolved through negotiations,

right? I mean, it feels like there's a bit of a double standard getting set up within the Biden administration's policy already. Yeah. And I guess another reason why it's disappointing, right, is it at the end of the Obama administration, John Kerry gave a speech as Secretary of State in which he laid out the U.S. positions on final status issues, including the fact that, you know, everybody knows that the Palestinian state would have, East Jerusalem would be a part of its capital.

Tony was the Deputy Secretary of State at that time, you know. And I understand it may just be, you know, like too difficult, obviously, to walk the fact that the embassy has been moved to Jerusalem. But yes, to your point, if we as the United States have therefore formally taken this position of recognizing Jerusalem as a capital, of moving our embassy and our diplomatic representation there, we should at least be able to articulate the aspiration for what might be the Palestinian capital, particularly because it's not as if the Israeli government seems eager to be in a negotiation. You know, like the reason to not take positions is in part, well, they're negotiating.

We don't want to get in the way of that. Like, well, there's, does anybody think that Nanyahu is about to sit down and negotiate a two-state solution? Absolutely not. And that, and so unless the U.S. is taking public positions that describe what a Palestinian state should be, you're going to see that riddled away, you know, as the Israelis continue to build settlements and the facts on the ground continue to be what they are. It does seem like trying to offer that vision of a better future is particularly important on the heels of the Trump administration where, you know, Trump and Pompeo and Jared Kushner gave the Israelis every political gifts they could think to give them.

Jared Kushner, like, openly mocked the Palestinian authorities, basically denigrated them in interviews and then offered them an absolutely horrible deal. that they rejected. And that led to the U.S. and Palestinians cutting off any talks for, I think, an entire year. Yeah. No, and people like dunk on us by saying, well, you know, like we moved the embassy and, you know, like predictions of terrible things happening didn't come to fruition. Only if you're not Palestinian, you know.

Like, it's not like it's been a great couple of years for the Palestinians since the embassy was moved. And peace just looks in statehood and self-determination just seem further and further. away. You know, Palestinians were killed on the day that that was moved. So, so again, like, we not, we come back to this a lot. You know, we, it's not, again, it's not because we want to be critical of Israel. I'd really like not to be, you know. It's just that there's so much kind of momentum in a certain direction right now that I think every now and then you need to pop up and say, wait a second, like, whatever happened to that idea that the Palestinians are

supposed to get a state, you know. And that's not inconsistent with loving Israel and thinking Israel should not be singled out or, you know, held the double standards. I think any country should be held to the same standard, right? And in this case, the standard, I think, is that they're an occupying power in the West Bank. And unless that is, you know, the reality you support, then you should be able to be critical of that. Agreed. Everyone should be able to be critical of policies and individual leaders. and hope to, you know, push for a better future here.

Last topic. So we have not talked about Haiti in a very long time, but the people of Haiti are living through a political and economic crisis that many observers say has left the country in a worst state than it has been in recent history, which is pretty dire. I mean, Haiti is long ranked among the poorest countries in the world, the poorest in the Western Hemisphere. And over the last year, gangs have started a wave of kidnappings for ransom. that are seemingly targeting anyone, like not just the rich, like any person who has enough money

to get on a bus might be kidnapped. It has led to schools being closed because the schools can't protect students or teachers from kidnappers. Gangs reportedly control entire sections of Port Prince the Capitol. So it's a really, really dire just security situation for the people. The political crisis stems from a fight over the link of President Jovenel Moyes' term. Moise was elected to a five-year term that was supposed to start in 2016. but those results were disputed, which led to these long-running protests, and an interim government took charge for about a year. So Moy's argument is basically, the year with the interim government doesn't count towards

my term. I should get my full five years in power. Therefore, I should stay in office until February of 2022. The opposition says, no way, buddy, your term is up in February of 2021. Over the weekend, Moy's said that there was a coup attempt on him and that 23 people had been arrested as a result. I don't know that we've seen a lot of real evidence yet of a coup attempt, but it's notable. Last year, the president, Moy, has essentially dissolved the rest of the government.

He's been ruling by de facto decree ever since. Some people have alleged that his party was working with these gangs that have been rolling through point of prints to target opposition neighborhoods and leaders. In practice, it just doesn't seem like the government is in control of much of the country at all. They can't provide basic services. and the people of Haiti are suffering horribly. The Biden administration, the United Nations, the OAS organization of American States,

like Western Hemisphere-based organization, they've sided with Moise's interpretation of what his departure date should be. In other words, they think he deserves another year at office. But Ben, I mean, this political dysfunction is just devastating for Haiti. The country was decimated by this massive earthquake, almost 11 years. ago today. They were promised all this relief money. Much of it never materialized. The U.S. has a long, deeply troubled and complicated history with the government of Haiti, with the country of Haiti. But do you think there's anything that we should be doing to try and help and resolve this crisis?

Like, it's just hard to see such desperation, you know, in your own backyard and not know how to begin to help the people. Yeah. I mean, I told you, I was just so struck by reading these counts and hearing all these ordinary Haitian voices saying it's never been worse, right? Yeah. When you think about what Haiti's been through with dictatorship and earthquake and cholera outbreaks and obviously the poorest country in the hemisphere, like, I mean, if it's gotten to a point where it's never been worse, like that is a really sobering statement. And look, it does feel like the government, there's kind of descended into this kind of

criminality where they were doing something wink-wink with these gangs that have now grown so out of control that they're like just kidnapping people for ransom as if it's like their business model. I think the U.S. is guilty of under the successive administrations, you know, including our own, of paying a lot of attention to Haiti for bursts of time. And then like your attention drifts, right? So there's an earthquake and everybody gets seized with it and you commit a lot of money, but then three years later, less people are working on it. Some of the money hasn't materialized. It's hard to do things in Haiti, right? So there's good reasons sometimes why the money doesn't materialize because you're worried about, you know, corruption or what have

you. I just think that the United States needs to get together with, you know, other countries in this hemisphere, other Caribbean countries, and design like a 10-year engagement plan here. You know, like the sustained assistance. And for people, People want to say that that sounds neo-imperialist? No, like, they need help. Like, they need help with governance. They need help with development. Like, obviously, you know, they'll make their own choices about who their leaders are. And they'll make their own choices about whether to accept help or not. But like, I just think all I can say, right, with, again, admittedly not a ton of specificity here is as a starting point, a group of countries needs to come together and decide

we're going to focus on this for a while, you know, because that seems to be what has been missing in the past is the attention ebbs and flows. And the only way to make real headway is to keep your attention on this even when it's not a political crisis or it's not kind of forcing its way onto the pages of the New York Times. That's well put. I mean, look, I was part of the very sort of acute period of attention to Haiti right after the earthquake, went down there for five days. I remember being very inspired and proud of the assistance that the U.S. was able to provide in that sort of immediate aftermath in terms of rescuing people, getting food in, removing rubble, like all the things that we have the infrastructure to do. But man,

is this, the U.S. is really bad at long-term sustained development. keeping an eye on potential corruption and preventing that from siphoning off dollars, from getting international partners to deliver on their entire commitment so that, you know, if Haiti's promised $14 billion and only four or five or six show up, like there's some accountability for that. But God, yeah, I mean, like, I, a lot of people were tweeting us, you know, have you followed the situation in Haiti? I did not realize just how dire it had gotten.

It's really horrifying. Yeah. No, you put it well. Like it's what we're doing and how we go to other countries and, kind of corral them. And we can keep our attention usually when there's a security interest. You know, so like Columbia, we had a 15-year-Aid program because there was a security, narco trafficking and a left-wing insurgency, right? The question is, can we sustain attention if it's a humanitarian interest? And I hope that we can when it comes to Haiti.

So we were hoping to have Congresswoman Ilhan Omar on the show today. We wanted to talk to her about these renewed calls for new domestic terrorism laws in the way. of the January 6th fascist mob attack on the U.S. Capitol. We also wanted to talk to her about some of her concerns about U.S. sanctions and the way they have done more harm than good over the years. Unfortunately, she had some committee work that led her to have to cancel the interview. It's a wild day up on Capitol anyway with the second impeachment happening. But we will try to book her down the road because I think those are both important conversations. And she is an important voice in these debates.

Ben, thanks to you for, I don't know, I'm running out of things to say. Just want to be in the studio. Now that we're in the books, yeah. Yeah, I'm bored to I wouldn't be in the studio. Oh, boy. All right, everybody. Thanks for listening. Talk to you soon.

Pod Save the World is a crooked media production. The executive producer is Michael Martinez. Our associate producer is Jordan Waller. It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle Segglin is our sound engineer. Thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Yiel Freed, Naramokonian, and Milo Kim, who film and share our episodes as videos each week.