The Palestine Chronicle

1. Jill Stein – Who is the US Presidential Candidate Arrested at Pro-Palestine Protest?

By Robert Inlakesh

Jill Stein's recent arrest has been highlighted as an example of how peaceful demonstrators are cracked down upon unjustly by US law enforcement.

Green Party Presidential candidate, Jill Stein, was arrested by police at Washington University in St. Louis this Saturday, making her one of hundreds arrested during anti-war protests taking place at college campuses throughout the United States. 

Yet, many who are stuck in the American two-party paradigm are not even aware that this third option exists, due to a lack of relevant media coverage. 

Who is Jill Stein?

Born in Chicago, Illinois, Jill Stein practiced internal medicine in her professional life for 25 years and was a graduate of Harvard Medical School in 1979, after having studied psychology, sociology, and anthropology prior to this. 

While still working as a physician, Stein found intrigue in the connection between health and the quality of one's local environment, leading her to a path of activism after having noticed the links between toxic exposures and illness. 

As Pro-Palestinian Protests Escalate, Israel Lobby's Attack on Academic Freedom Continues

In the late 1990s, she began protesting the "Filthy Five" coal plants in Massachusetts and ended up receiving awards for environmental activism in the years 1998, 1999, 2000 and 2004. 

She also co-authored two reports on the issue, entitled 'In Harm's Way: Toxic Threats to Child Development' in 2000, and the 'Environmental Threats to Healthy Aging' in 2009. Despite having joined the Democratic Party in the United States, she decided to leave and join the Green Party when "killed campaign finance reform" in her State, she told reporters in 2016.

Having organized two campaigns to become governor of Massachusetts, despite beating her Republican opposition fell short of winning both races. 

She did however run for the local legislative body in Lexington, Massachusetts, winning a seat in both 2005 and 2008. At the Green-Rainbow Party state convention in 2006, Jill Stein was nominated for Secretary of the Commonwealth and in a two-way race with a Democrat, gained 353,551 votes, or the equivalent of 17.7% of the vote.

State-Backed Censorship: Israel's Persecution of Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian

Presidential Election

In 2012, Jill Stein ran for President of the United States, making history as the first Green Party candidate to have qualified for federal matching funds, but fell far short of competing with Barack Obama and Mitt Romney who she accused of both being representatives of Wall Street. 

In 2016, Stein again won 1 percent of the popular vote in the Presidential election and warned what the two-party corporate system could foster as the result of electing either Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump at the time.

During 2016, Jill Stein was also arrested for her activism that supported the Standing Rock protests by the North Dakota authorities. 

Assisting non-profits and marginalized communities to combat environmental injustice and racial discrimination, she has managed to win victories on "campaign finance reform, racially-just redistricting, and the clean-up of incinerators, coal plants, and other toxic threats". 

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She has also long been a proponent of a Green New Deal, ending the US's foreign wars and advocates for respecting international human rights law, as well as a Medicare-for-all system. 

As a Jewish American, she has also long been an active supporter of Palestinian human rights and has been particularly vocal in condemning Israel's genocide in Gaza. Stein, along with Cornell West are the only two actively pro-Palestinian Presidential Candidates who are running for office in the 2024 elections. 

Jill Stein's recent arrest, while being present in supporting the ongoing mass-student protest movement across college campuses, has been highlighted as an example of how peaceful demonstrators are cracked down upon unjustly by US law enforcement.

(The Palestine Chronicle)

– Robert Inlakesh is a journalist, writer, and documentary filmmaker. He focuses on the Middle East, specializing in Palestine. He contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle.

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2. War, Heat and Insects – This is What Life in a Gaza Tent Looks Like

By Abdallah Aljamal – Gaza

The Palestine Chronicle spoke with two Palestinians currently displaced in the city of Deir Al-Balah, in the central Gaza Strip. 

Amid the unparalleled scale of death and destruction, at least 1.9 million people were displaced by Israel's genocidal war on the Gaza Strip, according to UN figures. 

The total population of Gaza, at least prior to the war, was 2.3 million people. 

The vast majority of these refugees are currently living in tents, located in makeshift camps, due to Israel's systematic targeting of UN shelters, schools, hospitals, and even mosques and churches. 

Living in a tent, however, is not equivalent to safety as many airstrikes and artillery shelling have targeted the encampments across various regions of the besieged Strip.

Moreover, the living conditions in the tents are extremely poor, especially following an unusual heatwave in Gaza, which reportedly already killed two children.

Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA Commissioner-General, explained on Saturday that Palestinians living in the tents have to endure "death, hunger, disease, displacement, and now living in greenhouses-like structures under scorching heat".

The Palestine Chronicle spoke with two Palestinians currently displaced in the city of Deir Al-Balah, in the central Gaza Strip. 

Life in a Tent 

Hajjah Shaimaa al-Eisawi is living in a tent with her family, after escaping from the Hamad Towers in the southern city of Khan Yunis, which were targeted by the occupation forces.

"The tent is extremely hot, and the overall situation is very difficult. There are insects everywhere, the heat is intense, and it is impossible to adapt to this life," al-Eisawi told the Palestine Chronicle.

"Children suffer from everything. Although we constantly clean the tent, there are insects everywhere," she added. 

Al-Eisawi and her family remained homeless when Israel completely destroyed the city of Hamad.

"We managed to buy an apartment in Hamad with great difficulty. We were very happy but the occupation did not give us time to enjoy living in it. When the war broke out, we were forced to flee from our house, and we found out that it was completely destroyed." 

Secrets by the Sea – Gaza Survivors Seek Respite from Israeli Bombs, Heat and Tents

Al-Eisawi fled to the Nuseirat refugee camp and then settled in Deir Al-Balah.

"We spent the winter struggling with severe cold in the tents, and now we are suffering from the heat."

Al-Eisawi's husband, who suffers from heart disease, expressed his desire to go back to Hamad, so they decided to go back and they lived in their destroyed house for a week. 

"Then the occupation forces invaded the city again, and it was a very difficult week under intense bombardment," she explained.

When they tried to leave, however, they were forced to cross Israeli checkpoints. On their third attempt, Israeli occupation forces arrested al-Eisawi's husband while the rest of the family managed to return to the tents in Deir al-Balah.

"My husband has a heart condition and cannot endure torture or imprisonment, I hope he will be released soon," al-Eisawi told us, with a shaky voice. 

"Our life means nothing without him, we rely on him for everything. We hope the war will end, and we can live in safety," she said.

'Beautiful Activities' 

Even amid extreme conditions, however, Palestinians continue to show incredible resilience. 

Many refugees decided to organize activities and set up schools in the encampments, to allow children to study despite the war. 

Hajj Akram al-Ajjouri fled from the Jabaliya refugee camp, in the north, to Nuseirat, in central Gaza, and remained there for a month. 

When Israeli forces invaded Nuseirat, al-Ajjouri and his family headed to Rafah, where they stayed for a month and a half. Later, they returned to Nuseirat for 20 days before settling in tents in the city of Deir al-Balah.

"In all the encampments, I have organized beautiful activities for the displaced people, including events to praise the Prophet Muhammad", al-Ajjouri told The Palestine Chronicle. 

"One of the refugees, who was a teacher, dedicated a tent to educate children," he explained. 

"The occupation deprived our children of education since the beginning of the war, therefore these activities are very important," al-Ajjouri added.

"We will look for other activities to support our children. We hope the war will end soon, and the suffering we endure will end, and we can return to our homes safely, God willing."

(The Palestine Chronicle)

– Abdallah Aljamal is a Gaza-based journalist. He is a correspondent for The Palestine Chronicle in the Gaza Strip. His email is abdallahaljamal1987@gmail.com

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3. Cruelty of Language: Leaked NY Times Memo Reveals Moral Depravity of US Media

By Ramzy Baroud  

As Gaza continues to resist the injustice of the Israeli military occupation and war, the rest of us, concerned about truth, accuracy in reporting and justice for all, should also challenge this model of poor, biased journalism.

The New York Times coverage of the Israeli carnage in Gaza, like that of other mainstream US media, is a disgrace to journalism.

This assertion should not surprise anyone. US media is driven neither by facts nor morality, but by agendas, calculating and power-hungry. The humanity of 120 thousand dead and wounded Palestinians because of the Israeli genocide in Gaza is simply not part of that agenda.

In a report – based on a leaked memo from the New York Times – the Intercept found out that the so-called US newspaper of record has been feeding its journalists with frequently updated 'guidelines' on what words to use, or not use, when describing the horrific Israeli mass slaughter in the Gaza Strip, starting on October 7.

In fact, most of the words used in the paragraph above would not be fit to print in the NYT, according to its 'guidelines'.

Shockingly, internationally recognized terms and phrases such as 'genocide', 'occupied territory', 'ethnic cleansing' and even 'refugee camps', were on the newspaper's rejection list.

It gets even more cruel. "Words like 'slaughter', 'massacre' and 'carnage' often convey more emotion than information. Think hard before using them in our own voice," according to the memo, leaked and verified by the Intercept and other independent media.

Though such language control is, according to the NYT, aimed at fairness for 'all sides', their application was almost entirely one-sided. For example, a previous Intercept report showed that the American newspaper had, between October 7 and November 14, mentioned the word 'massacre' 53 times when it referred to Israelis being killed by Palestinians and only once in reference to Palestinians being killed by Israel.

By that date, thousands of Palestinians had perished, the vast majority of whom were women and children, and most of them were killed inside their own homes, in hospitals, schools or United Nations shelters. Though the Palestinian death toll was often questioned by US government and media, it was later generally accepted as accurate, but with a caveat: attributing the source of the Palestinian number to the "Hamas-run Ministry of Health in Gaza". That phrasing is, of course, enough to undermine the accuracy of the statistics compiled by healthcare professionals, who had the misfortune of producing such tallies many times in the past.

The Israeli numbers were rarely questioned, if ever, although Israel's own media later revealed that many Israelis who were supposedly killed by Hamas died in 'friendly fire', as in at the hands of the Israeli army.

And even though a large percentage of Israelis killed during the Al-Aqsa Flood Operation on October 7 were active, off-duty or military reserve, terms such as 'massacre' and 'slaughter' were still used in abundance. Little mention was made of the fact that those 'slaughtered' by Hamas were, in fact, directly involved in the Israeli siege and previous massacres in Gaza.

Speaking of 'slaughter', the term, according to the Intercept, was used to describe those allegedly killed by Palestinian fighters vs those killed by Israel at a ratio of 22 to 1.

I write 'allegedly', as the Israeli military and government, unlike the Palestinian Ministry of Health, are yet to allow for independent verification of the numbers they produced, altered and reproduced, once again.

The Palestinian figures are now accepted even by the US government. When asked, on February 29, about how many women and children had been killed in Gaza, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said: "It's over 25,000", going even beyond the number provided by the Palestinian Health Ministry at the time.

However, even if the Israeli numbers are to be examined and fully substantiated by truly independent sources, the coverage of the New York Times of the Gaza war continues to point to the non-existing credibility of mainstream American media, regardless of its agendas and ideologies. This generalization can be justified on the basis that NYT is, oddly enough, still relatively fairer than others.

According to this double standard, occupied, oppressed and routinely slaughtered Palestinians are depicted with the language fit for Israel; while a racist, apartheid and murderous entity like Israel is treated as a victim and, despite the Gaza genocide, is, somehow, still in a state of 'self-defense'.

The New York Times shamelessly and constantly blows its own horn of being an oasis of credibility, balance, accuracy, objectivity and professionalism. Yet, for them, occupied Palestinians are still the villain: the party doing the vast majority of the slaughtering and the massacring.

The same slanted logic applies to the US government, whose daily political discourse on democracy, human rights, fairness and peace continues to intersect with its brazen support of the murder of Palestinians, through dumb bombs, bunker busters and billions of dollars' worth of other weapons and munitions.

The Intercept reporting on this issue matters greatly. Aside from the leaked memos, the dishonesty of language used by the New York Times – compassionate towards Israel and indifferent to Palestinian suffering – leaves no doubts that the NYT, like other US mainstream media, continues to stand firmly on Tel Aviv's side.

As Gaza continues to resist the injustice of the Israeli military occupation and war, the rest of us, concerned about truth, accuracy in reporting and justice for all, should also challenge this model of poor, biased journalism.

We do so when we create our own professional, alternative sources of information, where we use proper language, which expresses the painful reality in war-torn Gaza.

Indeed, what is taking place in Gaza is genocide, a horrific slaughter and daily massacres against innocent peoples, whose only crime is that they are resisting a violent military occupation and a vile apartheid regime.

And, if it happens that these indisputable facts generate an 'emotional' response, then it is a good thing; maybe real action to end the Israeli carnage of Palestinians would follow. The question remains: why would the New York Times editors find this objectionable?

– Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of six books. His latest book, co-edited with Ilan Pappé, is "Our Vision for Liberation: Engaged Palestinian Leaders and Intellectuals Speak out". Dr. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA). His website is www.ramzybaroud.net

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4. ‘We Cannot Breathe’ – Gaza Residents Living in Shelters, Inhaling Fume

By Abdallah Aljamal – Gaza

"We have no alternative for cooking food but to light fires. Our hands have turned black and burnt, and so have our faces".

The Government Media Office in the Gaza Strip has announced that diseases and health complications such as chest pain, breathing difficulties, respiratory illnesses, and asthma have spread across the region due to the lack of cooking gas, which forces residents to rely on open fires for cooking.

Along with a genocidal war, which has killed and wounded well over 110,000 Palestinians in Gaza, Israel has also imposed a complete siege on the enclave.

"There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed," Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said on October 9. Since that moment, only a very limited quantity of aid has entered Gaza, leading to a catastrophic humanitarian situation. 

The Palestine Chronicle spoke with three residents from Gaza, who talked about the hardship they have been enduring during the last seven months.

Secrets by the Sea – Gaza Survivors Seek Respite from Israeli Bombs, Heat and Tents

Our Faces are Burnt 

"We have been out of cooking gas in my house since the first month of the war, and there is no cooking gas in Gaza City to refill our cylinders," Hajj Abu Mahmoud Shhaiber told The Palestine Chronicle. 

"I have searched everywhere, but there is no gas available, and the occupation prevents its entry into the north of the Gaza Strip," he added.

Therefore, for the last seven months, the Shhaiber family has been forced to cook our food on firewood. This, however, has caused us significant health complications.

"My wife, my daughters who help us with cooking and myself, we all suffer from chest pain, respiratory issues, and breathing difficulties," he told us, explaining that the problem is exacerbated by the fact that there is no medicine in Gaza City, and that all health centers and hospitals have been destroyed or shut down. 

'Domicide' – How and Why Israel Destroyed the Al-Sahli Towers in Gaza's Nuseirat Refugee Camp

"We have no alternative for cooking food but to light fires. Our hands have turned black and burnt, and so have our faces," Shhaiber continued. 

"I always feel short of breath, and I am constantly coughing and wheezing, but unfortunately, we have no alternative, due to the Israeli siege."

No Other Option

"I still live with my children in the Northern Governorate. My home and my family's home were destroyed, but we live in displacement centers," Rond al-Masri told us. 

"I lost my gas cylinders during the bombing of my house, and I don't have a stove or gas for cooking. Therefore, I have to rely on canned food when it's available to feed my children," she continued. 

Rond told us that they are forced to light fires to prepare food.

"There is no other option available to us, and there is no alternative to cooking gas but to light fires. Throughout the day, my children search for wood and cardboard for us, and if available, we light a fire and prepare food," Rond said.

'My Life is Sad' – Palestine Chronicle Children's Press Conference in Gaza

Rond's children got sick and the woman explained that this is due to a combination of factors. 

"They have fallen ill due to poor hygiene, and from spending long hours under the sun searching for food. Moreover, exposure to carbon monoxide from the fires and the smoke they constantly inhale have caused us respiratory diseases," the woman said, desperately.

"In northern Gaza, there are no hospitals or clinics to obtain medication . I can only heat some water for my children to drink and alleviate chest and respiratory pains," Rond said. 

'Immediate Actions' 

According to another resident, Muatasim Jabr, this is part of Israel's deliberate policy to kill Palestinians in every way possible. 

"They kill us by bombing and gunfire, but death by hunger is the most painful and agonizing. Killing through disease by spreading respiratory illnesses in the absence of treatment is also incredibly painful and deadly," he said.

"Many respiratory diseases require oxygen, and the occupation destroyed the central oxygen room at Al-Shifa Hospital," Jabr explained, adding that now there is only a small oxygen room at the Kamal Adwan Hospital, in the Jabaliya refugee camp.

'Dizzy, Tired, Exhausted' – How Palestinians in Gaza Speak about the Widespread Famine

"Unfortunately, it is insufficient to cover the thousands of cases in need of oxygen due to bombings, killings, and the spread of diseases," the main said.

Jabr called on international institutions, the United States, Arab countries, and European countries to pressure the occupation to stop the war and to provide the basic needs for the residents of the Gaza Strip. 

"We need immediate action to save Gaza from the environmental, health, and humanitarian disasters caused by the occupation during this war".

(The Palestine Chronicle)

– Abdallah Aljamal is a Gaza-based journalist. He is a correspondent for The Palestine Chronicle in the Gaza Strip. His email is abdallahaljamal1987@gmail.com

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5. From Gaza to Columbia: Takeaways from the New Student Movement

By Benay Blend

In a move that highlights Kanafani's call for breaking boundaries, students from various associations in Gaza issued a statement calling for a global student bloc.

Shortly after October 7, students at Columbia wrote a statement expressing sympathy for Israeli and Palestinian individuals who had lost family members on that day. What at first sounds like "both sides-ism" evolves into an analysis that holds Israel's colonial system accountable for its actions.

"The weight of responsibility for the war and casualties undeniably lies with the Israeli extremist  government and other Western governments," the statement reads, "including the U.S. government, which fund and staunchly support Israeli aggression, apartheid and settler-colonization." It then goes on to bring the issue home by calling for the following:  an end to the university's discrimination against Palestinian students; divestment from joint programs with Israeli institutions, and finally, acknowledgement that under international law, Palestinians have a legal right to resist.

In retaliation, Columbia suspended the charters for Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and Jewish Voice for Peace JVP). When the students established an encampment in solidarity with Gaza on the university's lawn, President Shafik authorized the police to sweep the camps and proceed with mass arrests.

Undaunted, students continue to hold down the protest which has now spread to other campuses. The number of encampments as of a few days ago was at least 50. Aside from the most obvious, that for the first time since perhaps the Occupy movement, there are the origins of a new national, coordinated campaign, there are several other takeaways from the student camps.

In New York City, responses from government and university officials prove that the notion of diversity does not often lead to change. For example, the president of Columbia University, Menouche Shafik, is an Egyptian woman, testified before recent House Education and Workforce hearings that in her mind such chants as "from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free" and "long live the Intifada" are anti-Semitic.

Matching her rhetoric with direct action, Shafik requested that the police perform a sweep of the pro-Palestinian Columbia encampment and arrest students as well as faculty supporting them. By equating Judaism and Zionism, support for Palestinian liberation with terrorism, Shafik has turned the campus into a police state, thereby turning the clock back to pre-1968, before a similar student rebellion led to protections for speech and protest on campus.

State officials have followed suit. New York Governor Kathy Hochul eventually apologized for saying that "there would be no Canada" if it attacked Buffalo, in an analogy to October 7^th. By assuming that this is a logical comparison, Hochul glosses over the ways that Israel has turned Gaza into an open air concentration camp, a position that gives it the legal right to resistance.

Hochul went on to explain her desire to visit Israel, a country she believed had endured its own 911, thus comparing the Resistance to the terrorists who struck the towers, again a false analogy that cancelled out her earlier apology. Hochul declined AIPAC's offer to pay for her trip to Israel but said later that New York taxpayers would foot the bill for the trip.

New York Mayor Eric Adams, a moderate Democrat from the black community, also visited Israel. "I am going to try to find a plot of land so it can be my retirement place," Mr. Adams told the magazine Mishpacha. "I love the people of Israel, the food, the culture, the dance, everything about Israel." Apparently Adams has no problem with living on stolen land, a stance that perhaps explains his condemnation of  the "antisemitism being spewed at and around the Columbia University campus," again equating Zionism with Judaism, a false comparison apparently popular with US politicians.

At the University of New Mexico (UNM), the encampment's launch coincided with Nizhoni Days, an annual celebration of Native culture and education hosted by UNM Native students, Native student organizations, and supporting UNM departments. In a state with a large Indigenous population, it makes sense that there should be connections between stolen land at home and colonialism abroad, with Palestine at the center.

David Correia's An Enemy Such as This: Larry Casuse and the Fight for Native Liberation on Two Continents over Three Centuries (2022) traces the life and death of Larry Casuse, an Indigenous freedom fighter whose struggle against colonialism in New Mexico, where, Correia writes, settler colonialism was born. His struggle, and indeed his family's generations-long fight, provides lessons for those fighting against settler colonialism today.

On day 4 of the UNM encampment, April 25, participants are asked to wear red to honor Missing and Murdered Indigenous Relatives (MMIR). Included on the shrine pictured in the above photo there is a graphic of a watermelon, a symbol of Palestine, along with a demand for Land Back.

In honor of Diné-Palestinian Solidarity, activists are showing the film "Spaces of Exception" which draws connections between Rez life and Palestinian refugee camps. Showings are at the Navajo Nation Museum on April 26 and at the Fort Defiance Chapter House on April 27.

Students across multiple Atlanta universities are protesting the genocide of Palestinians as well as the Cop City project, an institution that would destroy the Weelaunee Forest. Moreover, it was managed by the Muscogee and Cherokee peoples before it became a slave plantation then morphed into an Atlanta prison farm.

The proposed destruction of a forest in Atlanta, Georgia in order to make way for Cop City serves as a case study for the ways in which settler colonialisms are connected. The origins of the project can be traced to the Israeli Urban Warfare Training Center (UWTC), funded with $45 million from the U.S. These centers are laboratories for strategies deployed against marginalized peoples that range from occupied Palestine to the working-class and undocumented communities in Atlanta.

At many of these encampments internationalism is on full display, a strategy that harks back to the late Palestinian revolutionary/writer Ghassan Kanafani. As Louis Brehony notes, Kanafani played an important role in placing the Palestinian struggle into an internationalist, anti-imperialist perspective.

"Imperialism has laid its body over the world," Kanafani wrote, "the head in Eastern Asia, the heart in the Middle East, its arteries reaching Africa and Latin America. Wherever you strike it, you damage it, and you serve the world revolution."

Given that Kanafani believed the Palestinian cause was not for Palestinians only, but instead belonged to all the "exploited and oppressed masses" of his era, he would have welcomed that sector to join the student movement.

In a move that highlights Kanafani's call for breaking boundaries, students from various associations in Gaza issued a statement calling for a global student bloc. "It is time to smash the US imperialist war machine," they declared. "From Gaza to Columbia, to Ann Arbor and Berkeley, our hands are joined to end Nazi genocide and achieve our collective liberation."

Writing for Mondoweiss, Yumna Patel recalls her participation in Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) at NYU at a time ten years ago when protests did not draw the crowds that it does today. "We are witnessing history in real time," she writes, "and one can't help but feel that while the crackdowns will no doubt escalate, these students are charting a new path forward in this country. A path that rejects colonization and imperialism, and rejects the complicity of our academic institutions in the U.S. war machine and in global oppression."

Despite her elation, Patel expresses fear that "protests that were quite literally started in order to bring attention to the genocide in Gaza, have instead themselves become the story." Rather than blaming students, who she believes are acting in good faith, she calls on the media to continue centering news from Gaza, where reports of mass graves have just unfolded.

Though Israel has targeted educational institutions in Gaza time and time again, its students are still determined to continue their studies. On April 15, Palestine Chronicle Gaza correspondent Abdallah Aljamal posted an interview with Mohammed Abu al-Rous, a teacher at  the Malaysian Quranic School on the outskirts of the Nuseirat camp.

Though Israel tries to destroy the rights of children to their education, they will not win. "We will teach our children in tents, under the sun, and anywhere else," declared Abu al-Rous.  "We are determined to raise an educated and informed Palestinian generation, capable of resisting the occupation and exposing its crimes in all international forums."

This is the story, Abu al-Rous and others like him. The student camps are there in solidarity to make sure that they succeed.

– Benay Blend earned her doctorate in American Studies from the University of New Mexico. Her scholarly works include Douglas Vakoch and Sam Mickey, Eds. (2017), "'Neither Homeland Nor Exile are Words': 'Situated Knowledge' in the Works of Palestinian and Native American Writers". She contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle.

The post From Gaza to Columbia: Takeaways from the New Student Movement appeared first on Palestine Chronicle.

6. Push to Erase Palestinians: Canadians Promoting Genocide

By Yves Engler

For those of us who believe in human rights for all it's necessary to disrupt the institutions seeking to erase Palestinians.

In the name of protecting Canadian Jews many are promoting the cultural and physical erasure of a faraway people.

Recently there's been a push to suppress a traditional Palestinian garment. To the delight of many, the speaker of the Ontario legislature banned kaffiyehs from the provincial assembly.

In a sign of support for this racist policy, prominent 'progressive' doctor and Ottawa-Carleton District School Board trustee, Nili Kaplan-Myrth, recently bemoaned a fellow trustee who "put on a keffiyeh", making it "not safe for Jews".

Similarly, author Dahlia Kurtz posted about a friend who panicked when a worker at her child's daycare had on a kaffiyeh and a similar thing happened when the president of a Canadian Union of Public Employees local wore the garment while addressing members.

In a particularly odious expression of this thinking, right-wing X account 'Love My 7 Wood' quote tweeted a picture of a member of the Alberta legislature wearing a kaffiyeh noting, "She and her NDP colleagues wear that for one reason and one reason only. To intimidate Jews." (To which I replied "All Palestinian culture exists for one reason and one reason only. To intimidate Jews.")

She and her NDP colleagues wear that for one reason and one reason only. To intimidate Jews. https://t.co/A0zvhGorrv

— Love My 7 Wood (@LoveMy7Wood) April 19, 2024

Others have sought to erase Palestinian poetry. B'nai Brith recently gloated that they got a Toronto library branch to remove prominent poet Refaat Alareer's "If I Must Die" from a display. Four months ago Alareer and five family members were wiped out by the Israeli military and on Friday they killed his daughter, her husband and their infant child.

Not content with suppressing Palestinian poetry and garments, many express their ethnicity/religion by seeking to suppress Palestinian history.

Recently, there was a push to stop the Peel District School Board from marking the Palestinian catastrophe, which saw over 700,000 ethnically cleansed from their homeland in 1947/48. To the chagrin of some, the suburban Toronto school board adopted Nakba Remembrance Day' as one of over 20 similar historic or cultural days.

A Canadian Jewish News headline explained "Peel school board's move to add 'Nakba Remembrance Day' to its calendar spurs objections from Jewish parents—and the Ontario education ministry". The story reported that the Jewish Educators and Family Association of Canada "launched an online campaign from within the Jewish community, encouraging people to write to [education minister Stephen] Lecce protesting the addition of Naqba (or Nakba) Remembrance Day."

A similar campaign was instigated after the British Columbia Teachers Federation called for education on the Nakba last month. The founder of Nonviolent Opposition Against Hate, Masha Kleiner, instigated a petition to oppose it.

Alongside the push to erase Palestinian history and art, there's a bid to starve Palestinians. The advocacy agent of Canada's Jewish Federations, the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA), is boasting that they filed suit against Ottawa for funding the UN agency for Palestinian refugees. They want the Federal Court to order the government to block assistance to refugees in Gaza even though the International Court of Justice has twice ruled that humanitarian assistance must be delivered to Gaza.

The federations, CIJA, B'nai Brith, Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Centre, Honest Reporting Canada and other organizations have supported the slaughter of 40,000 Palestinians over the past six months. CIJA's director in Israel David M. Weinberg calls Palestinians in Gaza "the enemy population" and pushed "to reduce Gaza neighborhoods from which Hamas operated to rubble (as a matter of principle and not just for military advantage – and no, this is not a war crime)."

In December the mayor of Hampstead, who boasts about leading "one of the most concentrated Jewish populations outside of Israel", expressed his support for wiping out all Palestinian children. Jeremy Levi told me he would continue supporting Israel even if they killed 100,000 or more Palestinian kids since "good needs to prevail over evil".

Jarring admission from mayor of Montréal suburb. At event with Israel consul yesterday, Hampstead mayor Jeremy Levi told me he would continue supporting Israel even if they killed 100 000 Palestinian children in Gaza since "good needs to prevail over evil" pic.twitter.com/gJlO9H3pS0

— Yves Engler (@EnglerYves) December 11, 2023

Many within the Jewish community are, of course, appalled by this supremacist, genocidal thinking. Jews Say No to Genocide has become an important organizing force in Toronto and in Montreal a contingent of Hasidic Jews have participated in many anti-genocide demonstrations in recent months. Independent Jewish Voices has also organized a slew of events against genocide.

Still, it's remarkable how many Canadians' religious/ethnic identity is expressed by seeking to erase a people 8,000 kilometers away. As I've detailed, the political forces at play are multifaceted, but part of it is a network of Jewish Zionist organizations that actively promote this type of thinking. There are numerous private schools, summer camps, community centres, synagogues and other organizations that push people into worshiping a violent faraway state that oppresses millions.

This elaborate genocidal network is rarely scrutinized. But, for those of us who believe in human rights for all it's necessary to disrupt the institutions seeking to erase Palestinians.

 – Yves Engler is the author of Canada and Israel: Building Apartheid and a number of other books. He contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle. Visit his website: yvesengler.com.

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7. Aggression and Counterattack – How Important is Iran in the Palestinian Quest for Liberation?

By Ilan Pappe – The Palestine Chronicle  

The only regional power that constantly and unconditionally supported the Palestinian cause is Iran. 

Ever since the death of Egyptian President Gamal Abdul Nasser, none of the regional powers in the Middle East had shown genuine solidarity with the Palestinian liberation movement. 

Jordan severed its ties with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in 1970; Lebanon ceased to be the geographical hinterland for the movement in 1982; Syria, which probably was more loyal than other states, did not allow Palestinian independent strategy and visions while Egypt altogether ceased to play a prominent role in regional politics. 

Other Arab countries were also quite absent from the Palestinian struggle. 

Türkiye, under Erdogan, at times showed greater solidarity, in particular with the besieged Gaza since 2005, but also pursued an ambivalent policy due to its strategic relationship with Israel. 

The only regional power that constantly and unconditionally supported the Palestinian cause was Iran. 

Erroneous Equation

The Western narrative equates erroneously, and probably intentionally, Iran with the Islamic State (ISIS), that very same organization that, in actuality, planted bombs in Iran, killing many people. 

It should also be remembered that the Western support of Sunni Jihadism as a counterforce to the secular and left anti-colonial movement planted the seeds from which both Al-Qaeda and ISIS grew and prospered. 

Their violence was also directed against Shia groups in Southeast Asia and the Arab world. Many of these groups are directly linked to Iran. 

Contrary to Western propaganda, the Iranian support to mainly Shia resistance groups is part of its perception of self-defense and not derived from a wish to impose a kind of Jihadist regime all over the world.

De-Zionized Palestine

Since the fall of the Soviet Union, over 30 years ago, Israel is the only state in the region that enjoyed unconditional support from an external superpower and its allies. 

And it is important, even at the risk of sounding trite, to mention once more what this unconditional support is for. 

Under this US-championed international immunity, Israel stretched over the whole of historical Palestine, ethnically cleansed more than half of its population over the years, and subjected the other half to a regime of apartheid, colonization and oppression.

Thus, direct support for the Palestinian cause from an important regional power such as Iran is meant to counteract the existential danger faced by the Palestinian people in the last 75 years. 

Iran is a complicated ally. It still has some way to go in terms of its own human rights record. 

The vocabulary and reservoir of images used by Iranian leaders and, at times, media does a disservice to the truly genuine Iranian solidarity.

Slogans such as "Small Satan" or "Death to Israel", along with promises of total destruction, are all unnecessary tropes for galvanizing a nation that is already galvanized. Indeed, during the dictatorship of the Shah, the Iranian people supported Palestine and resented their regime for its close ties with Israel. 

Aside from rhetoric, however, the policy itself is highly valuable in terms of redressing the imbalance of power between apartheid Israel and the occupied Palestinians, who, again, are facing an existential threat.

It should also be noted that the language Israeli propaganda uses in referring to Iran, the Palestinians or Hamas is far worse – as was revealed in full in the material the government of South Africa handed over to the International Court of Justice last December.

In this respect, many of us share Iran's vision of a de-Zionized and decolonized one-state solution in historical Palestine, which, at least I hope, will also be a democratic welfare state.

Iran's policies towards Israel are portrayed in the West as motivated by antisemitism of the worst kind. 

Due to Israel's intrinsic resentment of any pro-Palestine sentiments, in the Middle East or anywhere else in the world, Iran's strong position in support of the Palestinians makes it the main target for Israel and its allies. In order for Israel to maintain Western-led pressure on Iran, it often, if not always, rewrites the history, the very chronology of the events, thus always presenting Iran as an aggressor and Israel as a country in a permanent state of self-defense.

Israel's Aggressions and Iranian Counterattack

For a long time, Iran has tolerated sabotage acts on Iranian soil, including the assassination of scientists, the killing and wounding of its personnel in Syria and the Israeli pressure on the US to abolish the Iran nuclear deal in 2015.

Imagine if Iran would have destroyed an American embassy, killing some of the most senior officers of the US army, one would only imagine what the American reaction would have been.

In their last attack on Israel, on April 13, Iran did everything in its power to show that it is not seeking collateral damage or wishing to target civilians. In fact, they gave Israelis more than ten days to get ready for the strike. 

Yet, Israel and the West were very quick to declare that the Iranian attack was an utter failure that caused no damage at all. A few days later, however, they had to admit that two Israeli air bases were, indeed, directly hit in the Iranian strike. 

But this is hardly the point. Of course, both sides have the capability to inflict great damage and loss of life on each other. This balance of power, however, has implications that are far more important than the ones analyzed by military experts.

A Counterweight

If the Hamas operation on October 7 cast doubt on the invincibility of the Israeli army, the technological know-how Iran has introduced is another indicator that Israel is not the only military superpower in the region. 

It should also be noted that Israel needed direct support from Britain, France, the US, Jordan and some other Arab countries to protect itself from the Iranian attack.

So far, there is no sign Israelis internalized the important lessons they should have learned in the last seven months: about the limitations of power, the inability to exist as an alien state in the midst of the Arab and Muslim world, and the impossibility to permanently maintain a regime of racial apartheid and military oppression.

In this respect, the technological capacities of a powerful regional power such as Iran, by itself, is not a game changer. But it does constitute a counterweight to a strong and wide coalition that has always supported the Zionist project since the very beginning. A counterweight that was not there for many years.

It is obvious that the situation in historical Palestine will not change through the development or transformation of one single factor. Indeed, change will occur as a result of many factors. The combination of these processes will eventually merge into a transformative event, or a series of events, which will result in a new political reality that is situated within decolonization, equality and restorative justice in historical Palestine.

This matrix requires a strong Iranian presence, which can even be more effective if coupled with reforms inside Iran itself. It also requires the global south to prioritize Palestine; a similar change should also be registered in the global north. 

A united and younger Palestine liberation movement, alongside the de-Zionization of the global Jewish communities, are also two important factors. 

The social implosion inside Israel, the economic crisis and the inability of the government and the army to address the current needs, are also crucial developments. 

When fused, all of these factors will create a powerful transformation on the ground, which will lead to the creation of a new regime and a new political outfit.

It is too early to give the new outfit a name and it is premature to predict the outcome of the liberation process.

However, what is quite visible is the need to help this new reality to unfold as soon as possible. Without it, the genocide in Gaza would not be the last horrific chapter in Palestine's history.

– Ilan Pappé is a professor at the University of Exeter. He was formerly a senior lecturer in political science at the University of Haifa. He is the author of The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, The Modern Middle East, A History of Modern Palestine: One Land, Two Peoples, and Ten Myths about Israel. He is the co-editor, with Ramzy Baroud of 'Our Vision for Liberation.' Pappé is described as one of Israel's 'New Historians' who, since the release of pertinent British and Israeli government documents in the early 1980s, have been rewriting the history of Israel's creation in 1948. He contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle.

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8. As Pro-Palestinian Protests Escalate, Israel Lobby’s Attack on Academic Freedom Continues

By Robert Inlakesh

Following a crackdown by the New York Police Department (NYP), resulting in around 100 arrests, the encampment only expanded and began to attract significant attention.

As pro-Palestinian protests escalate throughout college campuses across the United States, so too there been a ramping up of efforts from Israel Lobby affiliates, corporate media and the political establishment, to curtail freedom of expression at academic institutions.

On April 17, students from Columbia University set up tents in the communal area of their campus, refusing to leave until their academic institution divest from companies affiliated with Israel. 

Following a crackdown by the New York Police Department (NYP), resulting in around 100 arrests, the encampment only expanded and began to attract significant attention on both broadcast and social media.

It wasn't long before other Ivy League colleges throughout the US would join in and form their own encampments/protest movements. 

Student encampments and actions for Palestine are spreading like wildfire across the country. Dozens joined in on the protests for Gaza today alone.

Here's a wrap-up of the latest campuses to heed Columbia students' call to step up pressure on universities to divest from Israel. pic.twitter.com/55Og3hIoEw

— BreakThrough News (@BTnewsroom) April 25, 2024

As the riot and anti-terrorism police, along with State Troopers and even the National Guard being called upon to disperse the protests, the corporate media lit up with stories of alleged "anti-semitism on campus". 

This was then re-enforced by Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who released a video in which he directly called for the US authorities to end the university protests, which he predictably labeled "anti-Semitic". 

Following Netanyahu's comments, the speaker of the US House of Congress, Mike Johnson, took to delivering a speech at Columbia University, in which he not only called the protesters anti-Semitic and sought to legitimize combating their first amendment rights, but also made up allegations that Hamas had raped and beheaded babies on October 7.

In the Orwellian double-speak tradition, professors at the Columbia University have also been targeted by what they call "deliberate misrepresentations" and outright smear campaigns, undermining their right to free speech.

Specifically at Columbia University, professors Mohamed Abdou, Katherine Franke and renowned scholar Joseph Massad, have been subjected to pressure campaigns which have included distortions of their views and even outright lies about them, with petitions and corporate media articles written in attempts to have them fired from their positions.

According to the American Association of University Professors, what is currently happening in the world of academia is "a new strain of McCarthyism in the US."

 Some other professors who have endured smear campaigns includes, but is not limited to, the following:

Rula Abisaab (McGill), Khaled Abou El Fadl (UCLA), As'ad AbuKhalil (California State), Sahar Aziz (Rutgers University), Hatem Bazian (UC Berkeley), John Cheney-Lippold (University of Michigan), Juan Cole (University of Michigan), Lawrence Davidson (West Chester University), Noura Erakat (Rutgers University), John Esposito (Georgetown), Wa'el Hallaq (Columbia University), Henni Samia (Cornell University), Ibrahim Kalin (Georgetown University), Rashid Khalidi (Columbia University), Dina Khoury (George Washington University), Rebecca Lopez, (University of Arizona), Mohammad Mahallati (Oberlin's College), Lynn Mahoney (San Francisco State University), Ussama Makdisi (UC Berkeley), Jasbir Puar (Rutgers), Rebecca Zapien (University of Arizona).

Students on college campuses, who are currently bravely standing up to their own institutes, have for years been subjected to pro-Israeli groups that have placed them on blacklists with the intent to ruin their careers. Pro-Palestinian students on campus are frequently incorrectly labelled anti-semites, this includes Jewish students, while the students from Muslim and/or Arab backgrounds are often labelled as supporters of terrorism.

During a recent interview on MSNBC's Morning Joe show, the Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt was quoted as having said that "Iran has their military proxies like Hezbollah, and Iran has their campus proxies like these groups like SJP and JVP," when commenting on the ongoing protests across the US.

In response to this, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) called upon MSNBC to ban Greenblatt. 

CAIR Deputy Executive Director, Edward Ahmed Mitchell, stated that "Mr. Greenblatt's increasingly unhinged and outrageous comments must be condemned, and MSNBC should no longer give him a platform to peddle his hate speech."

Student Protests Escalate: From Columbia to Harvard, Calls for Action, Johnson Heckled

"Falsely claiming that Jewish and Palestinian student organizations are literal proxies of the Iranian government is a dangerous and defamatory slander that has no place on MSNBC or any other television network,"  Mitchell also added.

A hostile environment already exists for free speech, on campus, when it comes to voicing criticism of Israeli government policy. With the development of the student protest movement, the efforts to stifle free speech at academic institutions are intensifying and endanger the very future of these institutions.

(The Palestine Chronicle)

– Robert Inlakesh is a journalist, writer, and documentary filmmaker. He focuses on the Middle East, specializing in Palestine. He contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle.

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9. Secrets by the Sea – Gaza Survivors Seek Respite from Israeli Bombs, Heat and Tents

By Abdallah Aljamal – Gaza

The Palestine Chronicle spoke with four displaced Palestinians who described the horrific conditions they are experiencing and their ongoing struggle to survive. 

Temperatures are rapidly rising in Gaza where hundreds of thousands of people are still displaced and are living in tents, due to Israel's genocidal war which is now in its seven month.

The refugees are experiencing catastrophic conditions and try to escape the heat by camping near the coastline in Deir Al-Balah, Khan Yunis and Rafah. 

The Palestine Chronicle spoke with four displaced Palestinians who described the horrific conditions they are experiencing and their ongoing struggle to survive. 

We Love the Sea 

"I currently live with my children and grandchildren in tents in the city of Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip," Abu Wael Jarwan told the Palestine Chronicle.

"My son was martyred, and my house was bombed by the occupation. We have lived in these tents throughout the winter. Now, spring has come, but the war still continues, and we are still living in the same tents," he said.

"The tents we live in are only about 400 meters away from the sea. As the temperatures began to rise, my grandchildren asked me to take them to the beach," Jarwan explained.

"I thought they just wanted to sit on the beach, but when we arrived, I was surprised to find thousands of displaced people swimming in the sea," he said.

"I couldn't control my grandchildren, and they ran towards the sea, trying to escape from the heat of the sun that scorched our bodies in the tents," he added. 

"They stayed in the water for more than three hours, and it was hard for me to get them out because they did not want to return to the tents. They love the sea and swimming in it makes them feel just like before the war."

Seeking Dignity 

Ahmed Abu Subha was scared of taking his children to the beach of Deir Al-Balah, due to Israel's relentless bombardment, especially by gunboats firing towards the Gaza coast.

But when photos of Palestinians swimming in the sea emerged on social media, his children insisted so much that he was forced to venture out and reach the Gaza beach. 

"The place was filled with thousands of children, women, young people, and the elderly. Everyone was trying to find an escape from the heat of the sun, and from the tents that are a constant reminder of war and suffering," Abu Subha told us.

"Everyone here wishes to return to our old lives and be able to provide a safe, dignified environment for the children."

My Secrets

"We have no relief amidst this war aside from the beach," Mohammed Aladgham, who was displaced from northern Gaza to Deir Al-Balah, told us. 

"We go to the sea to release the negative energy that has affected us since the beginning of the war," he added.

"We sit on the beach for several hours while our children swim and play on the seashore. The temperature is high these days, and we are not used to living in tents. But this is just a phase until we return to our homes."

Rasmi Obeid, another displaced refugee from northern Gaza, often goes to the beach alone, to restore the balance of his spirit.

"I do not want my children to see how tired I am. We are tired of this war and of life in tents. These days, I can only entrust my secret thoughts to the sea, confide my fears and worries to the ocean."

"Sometimes I take my children and my wife to the beach. The temperature inside the tents is very high, and my children have developed allergies and skin rashes," Obeid said. 

"This life is very difficult, and there must be a solution soon, so we can return to our homes as quickly as possible," he concluded.

(The Palestine Chronicle)

– Abdallah Aljamal is a Gaza-based journalist. He is a correspondent for The Palestine Chronicle in the Gaza Strip. His email is abdallahaljamal1987@gmail.com

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10. Manipulation Politics: Israeli Gaslighting in the United States

By Dr. M. Reza Behnam

Although the pro-Israel camp and their allies continue to dominate and influence Congress and the executive branch, they have slowly begun to lose control of the narrative.   

The Middle East will not be the same in the wake of October 7, 2023. More was breached on that day than the prison wall that Palestinian fighters burst through. The fantasy Israel has staged-managed, and the United States has parroted, for over seven decades has finally seen the light of day. The global community can no longer be gaslit. 

Merriam-Webster defines gaslighting as "the act of grossly misleading someone especially for one's own advantage." The term has resonance for what Israel and the United States have successfully done over a number of generations—creating a benign identity for Israel that has never corresponded with its ruthless settler-colonial reality.

The awful truth is that it has taken the death of over 34,000 Palestinians for many in the United States and the world to say "Free Palestine." The mainstreamed Israeli "good guy" narrative that has colonized the US body politic for so long is being whittled away by the horrific images of daily genocide and ecocide from Gaza.

A country does not become cruel overnight. It takes intent, years of practice and strategies to effectively hide the cruelty. Since it declared itself a state in 1948, the occupied territories known as Israel has relied on an elaborate state-run public relations industry to convince Western audiences, particularly Americans, of its bravery and noble intentions.

For over six months, Israel's brutality has been brought into the living rooms of America. Until then, Israel had made certain that its foundational myths and beacon of democracy tale dominated American politics and government, religion, journalism, academia, cinema and television.

Those who have been successfully gaslit, whether consciously or unconsciously, and who wish to maintain existing power structures continue to deny the genocide being live-streamed before their eyes, and have galvanized to crush those opposed to Israel's war on Palestinians.  

American Politics and Government

For decades, Israel has manipulated US politicians emotionally and financially to advance its expansionist ambitions. Israeli lobby groups, like the powerful American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), have poured billions into the coffers of receptive politicians.

Pro-Israel spending has fueled Congress's overwhelming support for the apartheid regime. Rarely, if ever, do they question why aid is being given to the fourteenth richest (per capita) country in the world. From 1990 to 2024, for example, the "I am a Zionist," president, Joe Biden has received $5,736,701 from pro-Israel lobbies.

In 2024, AIPAC plans to spend $100 million in an effort to unseat progressive members of Congress (eight in number) who have been critical of Israeli policy and who have called for a ceasefire in Gaza.  

In January 2024, The Guardian newspaper published its analysis of campaign data.  It found that congressional members supportive of the war received the most money from Israel lobby groups.It also revealed that 82 percent of its members support Israel; 9 percent are supportive of Palestine; and 8 percent were equally supportive of both.  

Religion

Israel's leaders have also capitalized on the powerful force of religion to whitewash their settler-colonial project. They have exploited the ideology of biblical chosenness and divinely sanctioned land ownership to legitimize land theft, to dispossess the Palestinians and to sell its genocidal war on Gaza.    

An Israeli Democracy Index, 2013 survey revealed that two-thirds (64.3 percent) of Israeli Jews consider Jews to be the "chosen people." The prominence of this belief has resulted in attitudes and government policies of exclusion, entitlement and ethnic chauvinism.  

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's war rhetoric has been suffused with violent biblical references. He has cynically ascribed the term Amalek—the staunch enemy of biblical Israelites—to Palestinians. The far-right in Israel has, for a long while, used such references to justify killing Palestinians.

The Evangelical right has stood solidly with Israel; even more so during its war on Gaza. The Israel, Zionist lobby and Christian Zionist (religious right) alliance have had enormous influence over US Middle East policy. For every one Jewish Zionist, there are 30 Christian Zionists. Netanyahu has courted Evangelicals cognizant of the power they exert within Congress.  

Christian Zionism demands of its followers absolute support for Israel, believing that the Rapture and Second Coming of Christ require the gathering of all Jews in Israel, and that supporting Israel will bring God's blessing on them and on their nation.   

Many American evangelicals have been cheering Israel's war on Gaza, believing it to be a prelude to the end times prophecy.  

Christian Zionists have found powerful allies in the White House and in the US Congress. In the Trump White House, for example, evangelicals held seats of power with the likes of former Vice President Mike Pence and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.  

There are at least 100 evangelicals currently serving in Congress, including the Republican Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson. It has become almost mandatory for members to attend AIPAC and Christian evangelical events, as well as excursions to Israel to assure the apartheid leaders of their continued loyalty.  

Journalism

American public opinion has been molded to look with favor on Israel. Mainstream journalism has become largely a stenography service for US-Israeli interests. Most of the pundits and so-called experts on television, for example, come from think tanks funded by pro-Israel groups: The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, American Enterprise Institute, Foreign Policy Research Institute, The Heritage Foundation and Council on Foreign Relations.  

Intellectually honest analysis or criticism of Israel is met with orchestrated pressure from Jewish lobby groups or with the dreaded label of antisemitism. Such tactics have been used to create a climate of intimidation, which has often led to self-censorship.

It is useful to look at a few examples to understand how alternative narratives regarding Palestine have been discouraged for decades.  

Ariel Sharon, former Israeli defense minister, filed a libel suit after Time magazine ran a cover story in 1983 accusing him of encouraging the massacre of Palestinians at the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in Lebanon in September 1982. In 1984, Americans for a Safe Israel filed a petition requesting that NBC's license be revoked over its reporting of Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon.  CBS faced similar criticism for airing veteran reporter, Bob Simon's "60-Minutes" report about Christians living under Israeli occupation. A full-page ad in The Wall Street Journal excoriating Simon appeared soon after.  

CNN's founder, Ted Turner, caused an uproar when he told the Guardian in 2002 that Israel was engaging in terrorism against the Palestinians, resulting in threats to the networks revenue. Walter Isaacson, then CNN Chair, appeared on Israeli television to denounce Turner and the network's chief news executive, Eason Jordan, flew to Israel to appease the regime.    

Magazines such as The New Republic, The Atlantic and Commentary have also been influential in creating an Israel-centric worldview. Pro-Israel syndicated columnists Thomas Friedman, Bret Stephens, George Will and David Brooks—whose son has served in the Israeli army—dominate the op-ed pages of major newspapers.

Since the October assault, a number of journalists have faced censorship, retaliation or dismissal for presenting the Palestinian narrative or for criticizing Israeli violence.  The firing in October of Michael Eisen, editor of eLife, a prominent academic science journal, after he retweeted an article from the satirical Onion titled, "Dying Gaza's Crticized for Not Using Last Words to Condemn Hamas,"reflects how censorship has reached into all media platforms. 

All foreign news organizations operating in Israel are subject to Israeli military censors. To suppress the horrors coming from Gaza, Israel has refused to permit foreign journalists independent access to that beleaguered Strip.  Only Palestinian reporters already there have been able to report; for that, they and their families have been targeted. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, as of April 25, at least 97 journalists and media staff have been killed and 16 injured since the war began. 

Academia

For over two hundred days, Israel's supporters have been straining to preserve their stranglehold over American universities. They are aware that people are losing their fear of Israel's watchdogs like Canary Mission, Stand With Us and Hillel; groups that have made it their mission to suppress critical discussion around Israel on college campuses.  

Academic freedom has been denied professors who have bravely challenged  accepted Israeli renderings. Professors Rabab Abdulhadi, California State University, San Francisco, Steven Salaita, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Norman Finkelstein, De Paul are among the academics who have been intimidated or terminated.

Pro-Israel forces have stepped up their pressure on administrators, as demonstrations on university campuses have grown. Wealthy donors have used threats to withhold, or have withheld, donations if speech critical of Israel is allowed. Administrators have responded, dismissing professors, setting limits on free speech, conflating protests with antisemitism and using police to break up demonstrations. More than 100 Columbia University students were arrested on April 18 after the university called in the New York Police Department to clear a protest encampment.  

Students reported being sprayed with a putrid smelling chemical agent at a Columbia demonstration. They later learned that they were sprayed with a chemical called "skunk;" an agent developed by Israel and that has been used for years by the Israeli military against Palestinians in occupied Palestine.  

Earlier in April, the University of Southern California, citing unspecified security concerns, canceled plans for a graduation speech by this year's valedictorian, Asna Tabassum, a Muslim student. Disappointed, Tabassum said the school had succumbed "to a campaign of hate meant to silence my voice."

Pro-Israel groups have also looked to Congress to neutralize the growing pro-Palestinian protests. House Republicans have held hearings to "investigate" antisemitism at America's prestigious universities. Thus far, the presidents of Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania have resigned following their appearances. And on April 24, Speaker Johnson called for the president of Columbia University, Nemat Minouche Shafik, to step down.

Safety and antisemitism have been used as weapons to silence campus criticism of Israel. In November, after Jewish students complained of feeling unsafe upon hearing remarks critical of Israel, Columbia banned its chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace. 

The intensity of Israeli indoctrination is reflected in the reaction of some Jewish students who believe that protests targeting Israel constitute personal attacks on them as Jews.   

Many young American Jews have been raised with the idealized image of Israel as a righteous state, necessary for Jewish safety. A large number have made the free ten-day trip to Israel sponsored by Birthright Israel, an organization supported by the Israeli regime and wealthy philanthropists like the late Sheldon Adelson.  Birthright, founded in 1999, has played a large role in shaping loyalty to Israel.  Predictably, the reality of the occupation has never been a part of the group's tour.  

Cinema and Television

Israel loyalists have masterfully utilized the media to shape public perceptions and attitudes. Movie and television screens have been filled with an abundance of positive, sympathetic images of Israel that have shaped public perceptions.     

Undoubtedly, the 1960 film, Exodus, firmly implanted the heroic image of Israel in the minds of many Americans. The heroism of the Palestinian people fighting to preserve their homeland from Israeli domination has yet to hit the big screen.     

Beginning with the 1921 silent film classic, The Sheik, filmmakers have cast Middle Easterners, Arabs and Muslims as exotic, uncultured, idiotic, lecherous and violent, indistinguishable from one another. 

Although racist depictions of Arabs is not new to the film and television industry, media providers Showtime, Netflix and HBO have amped up the propaganda with series such as Homeland, Fauda (meaning chaos in Arabic), The Messiah, The Spy, and Our Boys. These dramas, from which many Americans draw their information, portray Israel's secret police as virtuous defenders of law, hunting down threatening Arab "terrorists."

Caricatures and negative cinematic imagery have contributed to the destructive dehumanization of Arabs, as witnessed today in Gaza. The powerful political narrative created around Arabs has allowed Israel's genocide of Palestinians to become an image on a screen or just another news event. 

For more than eight decades—from photoplay sheik movies of the 1920s to the elaborately produced films of the present—Hollywood filmmakers have perpetuated Middle Eastern stereotypes that have cultivated prejudice and division between peoples and nations. These stereotypes have created a pattern of socialization that has made the Middle Eastern world distant and vulnerable to attack. 

Conclusion

Although the pro-Israel camp and their allies continue to dominate and influence Congress and the executive branch, they have slowly begun to lose control of the narrative.   

President Joe Biden, however, remains dedicated to the Israeli fantasy. He has embraced and subsidized a racist supremacist Israeli regime; a 57-year apartheid occupation; squatter colonialism and genocide in Gaza. 

While professing commitment to achieving a Palestinian state, the United States alone vetoed an April 18 Security Council resolution that would have allowed full United Nations membership for the state of Palestine. And while Israel continues its intense bombing in Gaza, Biden signed legislation on April 24, allocating another $26.4 billion for Tel Aviv to continue its atrocities. 

Israeli gaslighting has reached into and exerted influence in almost every segment of American society. Consequently, Israel has grown into an entity unbound by borders, exempt from international law and able to commit genocide with impunity. 

The horrific images coming from Gaza are, however, making it increasingly difficult for Israel and its US allies to silence dissent and to continue gaslighting the American public.

– Dr. M. Reza Behnam is a political scientist specializing in the history, politics and governments of the Middle East. He contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle.

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