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The double standards of free speech on Palestine amid Israel’s war on Gaza
As the war in Gaza continues, why is the West cracking down on free speech?
A battle is playing out in the realm of public opinion on Israel’s war on Gaza.
While demonstrations have taken place across the globe in solidarity
with Palestinians, there have been campaigns to silence critics of
Israel’s actions.
Commentators, academics and even common citizens have reported
increasing threats and retaliation for expressing their views or voicing
solidarity with the Palestinian people, often in countries that
proclaim to uphold values of freedom of expression and democracy.
On UpFront, Marc Lamont Hill speaks to Dima Khalidi,
director of Palestine Legal, and Ilan Pappe, renowned author and
professor of history at Exeter University, about the limits to free
speech on the Israel-Gaza war.
Angela Davis: ‘Palestine is a moral litmus test for the world’
UPFRONT October 27, 2023
Citing
the late poet June Jordan, political activist Angela Davis stresses the
importance of Palestine for other social justice movements.
There
has been a long history of solidarity between Palestinians and Black
Americans, and these last few weeks have been no exception.
While Israel continues its bombardment of Gaza, numerous Black
activists in the United States have come together to demonstrate their
solidarity with Palestinians.
These two places are more than 6,000 miles away from each other, with
very different histories. So what’s behind this common recognition of a
shared struggle?
On UpFront, renowned political activist Angela Davis speaks
with Marc Lamont Hill on the history and meaning of Black American
solidarity with the Palestinian cause.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER:
Angela Y. Davis is Professor Emerita of History of Consciousness and Feminist Studies at UC Santa Cruz. An activist, writer, and lecturer, her work focuses on prisons, police, abolition, and the related intersections of race, gender, and class. She is the author of many books, from Angela Davis: An Autobiography to Freedom Is a Constant Struggle.
ABOUT THE PROGRAM HOST:
Dr.
Marc Lamont Hill is an award-winning journalist and author and is the
Steve Charles Professor of Media, Cities, and Solutions at Temple
University. Hill is known for his work
addressing the intersections of race, justice, politics and culture. His
latest best-selling book is ‘We Still Here: Pandemics, Policing,
Protest and Possibility’ which follows on the success of ‘Nobody:
Casualties of America’s War on the Vulnerable from Flint to Ferguson’.
Hill has received numerous prestigious awards from the US National
Association of Black Journalists, GLAAD, and the International Academy
of Digital Arts and Sciences.
About the show:
Through rigorous debate, Marc Lamont Hill cuts through the headlines to challenge conventional wisdom.
Author and journalist Marc Lamont Hill knows better than most what can happen to media professionals who advocate for Palestinian liberation. Fired from CNN back in 2018 for doing exactly that, he’s an excellent resource to weigh in on Gaza, and how the mainstream media messaging around the issue of Palestinian liberation is changing rapidly. Also, he dives in to his viral interview with a former Israeli deputy former minister re collective punishment, and explains what he learned from interviewing a Hamas spokesperson. You won’t want to miss this.
"Where is your humanity?"
US Democratic Representative Ilhan Omar gave a recent speech outside the Capitol building where she, along with a group of other Democrats, called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza:
Today marks 5 years since the tragic shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue. We remember the 11 lives lost and their loved ones. As we remember this loss that shook Pittsburgh, it’s more important than ever to fight against antisemitism and embrace all faiths with compassion.
Democracy
Now! is an independent global news hour that airs on over 1,500 TV and
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democracynow.org Mondays to Fridays 8-9 a.m. ET.
As Gaza Barrage and Deaths Surge, Angry Accusations Fly at U.N.
Israel
said it struck more than 400 targets in Gaza in its broadest single-day
assault of the conflict. Palestinian officials said more than 700 were
killed, the highest one-day toll of the war.
PHOTO: Mourning relatives killed in an airstrike on Tuesday in Khan Younis, in the Gaza Strip, after an Israeli aerial bombardment that Israel said was the heaviest of the war, and that Gazan officials said was the deadliest. Credit: Yousef Masoud for The New York Times
Escalating
its onslaught against Hamas, Israel hit the Gaza Strip with hundreds of
airstrikes in a single day, Israeli officials said Tuesday, and
officials in Hamas-controlled Gaza said it was the deadliest day for
Palestinians there since the conflict began.
It
was not possible to independently verify the claims, but it was clear
that even before Israeli soldiers have set foot in the Palestinian
enclave to retaliate for Hamas’s Oct. 7 rampage in Israel, a
humanitarian disaster in Gaza was growing worse by the day.
If
a diplomatic solution is possible, there was little sign of it Tuesday
at the United Nations, where diplomats spent the day issuing futile
pleas for a ceasefire and bitter denunciations.
Israel’s
foreign minister, Eli Cohen, began his address to the Security Council
by holding up photos of Israeli children kidnapped when Hamas gunmen and
allied militants streamed into towns and military bases, shooting
mostly unarmed civilians and seizing hostages. “I have to remember and
never let you forget,” he said.
In a
scathing address of his own to the council, the Palestinian Authority’s
minister of foreign affairs, Riyad al-Maliki, accused the international
community of “selectivity and double standards.” Officials in Gaza say
that 5,791 people there have been killed since Oct. 7.
“Doesn’t
this wholesale killing offend you?” Mr. al-Maliki demanded. Officials
of Egypt and Jordan accused Israel of violating international law in its
conduct of the war.
PHOTO: Israel’s foreign minister, Eli Cohen, and the Palestinian Authority’s minister of foreign affairs, Riyad al-Maliki, separately addressed the United Nations Security Council on Tuesday. Credit: Eduardo Munoz/EPA, via Shutterstock
The U.N. secretary general, António
Guterres, tried to thread the needle. “The grievances of the Palestinian
people cannot justify the appalling attacks by Hamas,” he said, “and
those appalling attacks cannot justify the collective punishment of the
Palestinian people.”
Mr. Guterres did
not emerge unscathed from the angry exchange, after he said that the
attacks by Hamas, in which more than 1,400 people in Israel were
slaughtered, “did not happen in a vacuum,” prompting the Israeli
ambassador to the United Nations to demand his immediate resignation.
“It’s really unfathomable,” declared the
ambassador, Gilad Erdan. “It’s truly sad that the head of an
organization that arose after the Holocaust holds such horrible views.”
In
Gaza, the situation appeared to be growing worse by the hour. “The
situation is desperate,” the World Health Organization warned on Tuesday
With Gaza’s power grid down and fuel for
backup generators scarce, six hospitals there were forced to shut down,
the W.H.O. said, and those that have managed to stay open are running
out of supplies, their workers taking boxes off delivery trucks and
straight into operating rooms.
Israel
has tens of thousands of troops massed outside Gaza, waiting for orders
to invade the territory, where some 200 Israelis seized in the Hamas
raid are being held hostage. In the meantime, Israel has been pounding
the enclave with airstrikes, more than 400 in the previous 24 hours
alone, up from 320 a day earlier, its military said Tuesday.
The Israeli government has been under pressure to delay a ground assault to allow desperately needed provisions to get to civilians in Gaza. The United States government has also urged Israel to slow down out of concern that it has no real plan for achieving its goal of defeating Hamas, which controls the territory, once and for all.
But
on Tuesday, John F. Kirby, a White House spokesman, made clear during a
press briefing that the Biden administration does not support calls for
a cease-fire. “A cease-fire right now really only benefits Hamas,” he
said.
Israeli officials say they are
using the air barrage to destroy Hamas installations, many of which are
well concealed within — and beneath — residential neighborhoods and
commercial districts, which have been devastated in the bombardment. But
the challenges that poses became even clearer on Tuesday, a day after
the militants released two women kidnapped in Israel.
Speaking to reporters at a hospital in Tel Aviv, one of the women, Yocheved Lifshitz, 85,
described being marched through a network of subterranean tunnels under
Gaza that she likened to “a spider web,” eventually arriving at a large
room. In the first public account to emerge from any of the hostages,
Ms. Lifshitz said she had been beaten by her kidnappers, but then had
been treated relatively well in the tunnels.
PHOTO: “I went through hell,” said Yocheved Lifshitz, a hostage who was released on Monday. Credit: Alexi J. Rosenfeld/Getty Images
About
20 of the hostages are believed to be children, and on Tuesday, family
members pleaded with Hamas to release them. Some demonstrated outside
U.N. headquarters in New York, while others have protested in front of
Israel’s military headquarters in Tel Aviv.
Israel’s
prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, warned Israelis on Tuesday to gird
themselves. “It could be a long war,” he said after meeting with the
president of France, Emmanuel Macron.
For his part, the French leader offered both support — “You are not alone,” he declared — and a note of caution.
“The
fight must be without mercy,” Mr. Macron said, “but not without rules.
Because we are democracies that are fighting against terrorists,
democracies that respect the laws of war, democracies that do not target
civilians, in Gaza or elsewhere.”
Mr. Macron later traveled to the West Bank, where violence has surged
in the last two weeks, to meet with the Palestinian leader Mahmoud
Abbas in Ramallah, and planned to head to Jordan on Wednesday to meet
with King Abdullah II and possibly other regional leaders.
Concern
remains high that the fighting between Israel and Hamas might set off a
regional conflict that could be even harder to contain. Israeli forces
have also been clashing with the militant group Hezbollah, which exercises de facto control over southern Lebanon; Hezbollah, like Hamas, is backed by Iran, an avowed enemy of Israel.
PHOTO: The funeral of Yam Goldstein, who was an Israeli soldier, and her father, Nadav, on Monday in Shefayim, Israel. Credit: Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times
In
Lebanon on Tuesday, the caretaker prime minister, Najib Mikati, met
with U.N. peacekeeping forces and Lebanese troops stationed in the south
of the country, calling for peace and denouncing Israel for “repeated
attacks” on Lebanese soil, according to a statement.
Secretary
of State Antony J. Blinken and other U.S. officials said there might be
a surge in attacks on American troops from Iran-backed militias in Iraq
and Syria because of the Israel-Hamas war.
In
Gaza, a densely populated enclave wedged between Israel, Egypt and the
sea, basic life necessities remain in desperately short supply, but some
aid has begun to get in.
Egypt has
allowed 54 trucks through the Rafah crossing into Gaza to date, and
among their loads were 477 tons of medical supplies, 291 tons of food
and 87 tons of water, Diaa Rashwan, the head of Egypt’s State
Information Service, said at a news conference on Tuesday. An additional
250 trucks were waiting to cross.
Humanitarian
groups have called for still more food, water and medicine to be sent
in, as well as fuel — but Israel has balked at that last demand, because
it says Hamas could use fuel for military purposes.
PHOTO: A water filling station on Tuesday in Khan Younis, Gaza. Credit: Samar Abu Elouf for The New York Times
While
Israel has cut off fuel shipments to Gaza, the Israeli military
contends that Hamas has stockpiled an ample supply — and has refused to
share it with hospitals.
There were
hints that the Israel position might change, however. Asked whether
Israel would allow fuel into the Gaza Strip, Herzi Halevi, the Israeli
military’s chief of staff, appeared not to rule it out.
“Fuel?”
he said. “We will ensure that it is where it needs to be to treat
civilians. We will not allow fuel for Hamas so it can keep fighting the
citizens of Israel.”
Hospitals in Gaza
are paying a heavy price for the fuel shortages, with dozens of health
centers out of commission, Palestinian officials said. A Health Ministry
spokesman said in a statement on Tuesday that “the health care system
has reached its worst stage in its history.”
The
World Health Organization said that thousands of patients were at risk
of complications or death as more shutdowns loom, including 1,000 people
on dialysis, 130 premature babies and patients in intensive care or in
need of surgery.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS:
Vivian Yee
is the Cairo bureau chief, covering politics, society and culture in
the Middle East and North Africa. She was previously based in Beirut,
Lebanon, and in New York, where she wrote about New York City, New York
politics and immigration.More about Vivian Yee
Farnaz Fassihi
is a reporter for The New York Times based in New York. Previously she
was a senior writer and war correspondent for the Wall Street Journal
for 17 years based in the Middle East.More about Farnaz Fassihi
A version of this article appears in print on Oct. 25, 2023, Section A, Page 1 of the New York edition with the headline: Gaza Deaths Rise As Anger Flares In U.N. Speeches. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper
Piers Morgan Uncensored is joined by host and creator of The Young Turks and Presidential hopeful Cenk Uygur to discuss the ongoing war between Israel, Hamas and Palestine and a passionate and emotive debate over whether Israel's treatment and occupation of Palestine is just as bad as Hamas' attack on Israel.
Cenk says that he has "had enough of the bigotry against Muslims and Palestinians", explaining that there is far more coverage and public condemnation of the atrocities committed by Hamas than there are the atrocities committed by Israel. He questions why people do not call the Israeli government terrorists when they've killed three times as many civilians as a terrorist group.
We Must Not Kill Gazan Children to Try to Protect Israel’s Children by Nicholas Kristof October 21, 2023 New York Times
PHOTO: In Gaza, children inspect damage from an Israeli bomb. Credit: Samar Abu Elouf for The New York Times
The crisis in the Middle East is a knotty test of our humanity, asking how to respond to a grotesque provocation for which there is no good remedy. And in this test, we in the West are not doing well.
The acceptance of large-scale bombing of Gaza and of a ground invasion likely to begin soon suggests that Palestinian children are lesser victims, devalued by their association with Hamas and its history of terrorism. Consider that more than 1,500 children in Gaza have been killed, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health, and around one-third of Gaza homes have been destroyed or damaged in just two weeks — and this is merely the softening-up before what is expected to be a much bloodier ground invasion.
I’ve flown into beautiful, sun-washed Tel Aviv, where the graffiti reads “Destroy Hamas.” Israelis have been shattered by the Hamas terrorism and kidnappings, an attack that felt existential and explains the determination to dismantle Hamas, whatever the cost. The anxiety in Tel Aviv is palpable, peaceful though it seems, while Gaza is an inner ring of hell and probably on a path to something much worse.
The United States speaks a good deal about principles, but I fear that President Biden has embedded a hierarchy of human life in official American policy. He expressed outrage at the massacres of Jews by Hamas, as he should have, but he has struggled to be equally clear about valuing Gazan lives. And it’s not always evident whether he is standing four-square with Israel as a country or with its failed prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, a longtime obstacle to peace.
What are we to make of the Biden administration’s call for an additional $14 billion
in assistance for Israel and simultaneous call for humanitarian aid for
Gazans? Defensive weapons for Israel’s Iron Dome system would make
sense, but in practice, is the idea that we will help pay for
humanitarians to mop up the blood caused in part by our weapons?
What are we to tell Dr. Iyad Abu Karsh, a Gaza physician who lost his wife and son
in a bombing and then had to treat his injured 2-year-old daughter? He
didn’t even have time to care for his niece or sister, for he had to
deal with the bodies of his loved ones.
“I have no time to talk now,” he told a Times colleague, his voice trembling over the phone. “I want to go bury them.”
In
his speech on Thursday, Biden called for America to stand firmly behind
Ukraine and Israel, two nations attacked by forces aiming to destroy
them. Fair enough. But suppose Ukraine responded to Russian war crimes
by laying siege to a Russian city, bombing it into dust and cutting off
water and electricity while killing thousands and obliging doctors to
operate on patients without anesthetic.
I doubt we Americans would shrug and say: Well, Putin started it. Too bad about those Russian children, but they should have chosen somewhere else to be born.
Here
in Israel, because the Hamas attacks were so brutal and fit into a
history of pogroms and Holocaust, they led to a resolve to wipe out
Hamas even if this means a large human toll. “Gaza will become a place
where no human being can exist,” declared
Giora Eiland, a former head of the Israeli National Security Council.
“There is no other option for ensuring the security of the State of
Israel.”
I think that view reflects a
practical and moral miscalculation. While I would love to see the end of
Hamas, it’s not feasible to eliminate radicalism in Gaza, and a ground
invasion is more likely to feed extremism than to squelch it — at an
unbearable cost in civilian lives.
I
particularly want to challenge the suggestion, more implicit than
explicit, that Gazan lives matter less because many Palestinians
sympathize with Hamas. People do not lose their right to life because
they have odious views, and in any case, almost half of Gazans are
children. Those kids in Gaza, infants included, are among the more than
two million people enduring a siege and collective punishment.
Israel
has suffered a horrifying terrorist attack and deserves the world’s
sympathy and support, but it should not get a blank check to slaughter
civilians or to deprive them of food, water and medicine. Bravo to Biden
for trying to negotiate some humanitarian access to Gaza, but the
challenge will be not just getting aid into Gaza but also distributing
it to where it’s needed.
A prolonged
ground invasion seems to me a particularly risky course, likely to kill
large numbers of Israeli soldiers, hostages and especially Gazan
civilians. We are better than that, and Israel is better than that.
Leveling cities is what the Syrian government did in Aleppo or Russia
did in Grozny; it should not be an American-backed undertaking by Israel
in Gaza.
The best answer to this test
is to try even in the face of provocation to cling to our values. That
means that despite our biases, we try to uphold all lives as having
equal value. If your ethics see some children as invaluable and others
as disposable, that’s not moral clarity but moral myopia. We must not
kill Gazan children to try to protect Israeli children.
Nicholas Kristof joined The New York Times in 1984 and has been a columnist since 2001. He has won two Pulitzer Prizes, for his coverage of China and of the genocide in Darfur. You can follow him on Instagram, Facebook and Threads. His forthcoming memoir is “Chasing Hope: A Reporter’s Life.” @NickKristof
Thousands rallied at the U.S. Capitol this week calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, in what organizers with IfNotNow and Jewish Voice for Peace called the largest-ever protest of Jews in support of Palestine. Hundreds were also arrested during a sit-in of the Cannon House Office Building. We feature addresses by Rep. Rashida Tlaib, the only Palestinian American member of Congress, and author Naomi Klein.
Democracy Now! is an independent global news hour that airs on over 1,500 TV and radio stations Monday through Friday. Watch our livestream at democracynow.org Mondays to Fridays 8-9 a.m. ET.
"I'm for truth, no matter who tells it. I'm for justice, no matter who it's for or against."
--Malcolm X
It’s been a devastating time. Alexandria got onto Instagram Live last night to give some updates, and be in community, about the situation in Israel and Palestine.
