Palestine and the Problem of Narrative with The Good Shepherd Collective

Jared: All right. Welcome everybody to another edition of Millennials Are Killing Capitalism Live. Good morning, folks. Today we have a conversation with a couple of members of the Good Shepherd Collective. I definitely encourage folks to take a minute, You know, like the video, you know, subscribe to the channel if you're not. I realize about half of the people who watch these shows every time are not subscribed. So if you're one of those folks, just subscribe to the channel and you'll be able to follow the work that we're doing a little bit better. Then, you know, in addition, check out the show description. There is a link to the Good Shepherd Collective website, goodshepherdcollective.org. There's also a place where you can give and support their work. And I'll just say quickly up front that Good Shepherd Collective, this is from their website, is an anti-Zionist, anti-colonial organization. They work alongside their partners on the ground to openly discuss and address the violent and unjust structures operating in Palestine and provide educational resources and action items to bring Palestinians closer to justice. Good Shepherd Collective understands oppression to be rooted in systems and laws that guide civil formation and order, and as such, reject the binary discourse of Israelis versus Palestinians, and instead focus their energy on addressing settler colonialism and other forms of violence by targeting the structures that facilitate these regimes. There's more on it. You can go on and read the full The full kind of description, it's in the show description. Also go on their website, learn more about their work. They do a lot of cool stuff. We did have a previous conversation that's also linked in the show description, which was related to the piece that they wrote in Ebb Magazine, which I was trying to see if I could grab. Maybe I'll grab it in a minute. And What else? So that conversation is linked in the show description. It's an audio conversation. Anyways, I'm excited to welcome Vanna and Lara to the stage for this conversation today. Thanks for being here. Just to start, why don't you each say just a little bit about yourselves by way of introduction yourself as individuals?

Lara Kilani: Thanks so much for having us, Jared. It's so nice to be here with you again. My name's Lara Kilani. I'm part of the Good Shepherd Collective, as Jared said. I'm Palestinian American, she/her pronouns, and I'm based here in Palestine and happy to be here with you all.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Hey, thanks, Jared, for inviting us again. My name is Dana Abu-Zuluf, and I'm also a Good Shepherds Collective member, and I'm currently located in Ireland doing my PhD in international law. Thanks for having me.

Jared: Thanks for having— thanks for being here, both of you. And just, of course, want to recognize, of course, today is the start of Eid. And obviously, it's a very bittersweet one, but nonetheless, we do want to, of course, recognize that with folks here who celebrate. So let's start with— we wanted to have a discussion to start and just Do some— we had that discussion months ago, kind of catch up, talk about some of the things that you all have been thinking about and putting out and discussing, and some of the work that you all do thinking about it in relation to some of these questions. So let's just start with narrative, because I think that's a good place for us to start. It's an— we're at a time when we've seen a really strong narrative shift from where we were maybe a month or two ago in some ways.

Lara Kilani: Yeah.

Jared: And yet, I think that at the base, that there are still very different narratives that people have about October 7th. And I think that these still have implications for the types of solidarity, as well as how they think about struggling and supporting struggle in this moment. And so I was really curious about what you both think about this. I'm kind of posing it as, I wonder the degree to which our understanding of October 7th, that this might be the crux of it, whether that's the crux of it or whether it's that we really need to be thinking about this in terms of settler colonialism and colonization and then decolonization. And how these relate to the way people practice Solidarity and the way that they struggle in this moment. And so I'm curious about what you all thought about that kind of opening question.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Yeah, that's a really good question. And we really contemplated a lot about this, considering that we're like one of the sort of more vocal people on exactly what happened and what we believe happened. So we actually thought that we, or we believe that we found 3 kind of types of narratives. Or 3 narratives on October 7th that we witnessed dominating solidarity discourse. And we're not saying that those are all of the narratives that were there, but those are the main ones that sort of plagued all of the discourse, the solidarity discourse. And they're the avoidant type of narrative. The second type of narrative, which is the decolonization is a metaphor narrative. And then the last one is the post- Saidism narrative. The first one, the first type of response or narrative to October 7th is that you would have a certain type of groupings or people that would not mention or discuss what had happened on October 7th. So make it sort of taboo to discuss. And they just kind of make it taboo to discuss it within the premises of resistance. They would only focus on genocide on Palestinians post- October 7th, but they would also express solidarity publicly. They would have protests, teach-ins, conferences, et cetera. Now, the second type is the type is, decolonization is a metaphor type. This type of narrative really we've seen that is often hesitantly kind of acknowledging October 7th as a moment of armed resistance by a colonized people. But this type would still reiterate that they did not like the method of resistance. They did not like the way it was carried. And this type would often also have or believe in some of the Zionist propaganda about what happened on October 7th. They might not believe precisely in the ones that were debunked, but they would still believe that some sort of, or have an idea as an Islamophobic or Orientalist idea that the resistance force, the forces in Gaza are inherently violent or maybe capable of doing something like that. There's no criticality there. They believe that they're capable of doing it. Even if it's debunked, they still have that sort of mindset. They might frame it under like, we understand Palestinians have been going through such a very difficult time and under settler colonialism and they have the right to resist, but we don't like the way they've done it. We'd wish that they've done it in a nice way, in a less violent way. And that was very violent, what they have done. The last type is the both-sidism type, which is the type that we've seen a lot of institutions have, which is both the condemnation of October 7th publicly, but also believing that the response is disproportionate response, quote unquote, of course, is disproportionate and that Palestinians do not deserve it. The Palestinians are mere victims. Of course, for this type of narrative or people that have this narrative, Palestinians are void of agency, right? So it's just that we feel bad for Palestinians. They shouldn't have to go through that. It's too much. Those 3 narratives we've seen the most dominant. Of course, we have this, of course, narrative where people still acknowledge Palestinian resistance as not merely as a right, but as a calculated revolutionary praxis that helps demystify decolonization to all of us. They see it as a moment of decolonization. But this type is unfortunately the least dominant. And the reason for that, and that's the most interesting part, is that a lot of these groups that share this type of, you know, 3, both these 3 types of narratives that I, you know, discussed, is that they discuss that these conversations about resistance, about decolonization, they could be somehow antithetical to building a broad solidarity movement. So there's an emphasis on this idea that if we want to build a broad solidarity movement, we must not isolate layers of people that feel uncomfortable or feel some sort of discomfort with resistance and decolonization. So this idea, there's this, what do you call it? Maybe A pretext for why they have those views. And then you have people who, you know, that would obviously still do not discuss October 7th, but might internally obviously believe in the resistance and believe in all of that, but might not say it publicly. And the reason for that would be, which is the second reason, is that it is the reason of the audience again. The audience that you're speaking to, or mostly that these people and institutions and these narratives are speaking to, is it the Orientalist capitalism colonial West? If your audience is that, if your audience is the West, there's little to no hope that Palestinian resistance or decolonial discourse will be dominant. That is simply it. That is simply the understanding that we have as the Gilchaper Collective is that right now there's no possibility that the West is going to suddenly wake up and realize as, well, decolonization is wonderful. Palestinian armed resistance is amazing. We need to support it. That's not going to happen, unfortunately. We have to be well aware of the dynamics of who we're speaking to in the Global North. But also there are plenty of other reasons, right? So we have institutional reasons. There are certain limits set on these important discourses and narratives that need to be had about October 7th and decolonizations that people are not really discussing beyond the idea of what is the dominant one, which is, you know, it's horrible, it's horrific, it's barbaric, and all these words that we've been hearing, all of these Western media pundits saying. But also the worst of it all really is another limit, which is the legal institutional limit. Because ultimately the legal institutions that have this sort of respectability to them, They always almost— oh, not almost always, they probably always equate the violence of the colonizer with the violence of the colonized, right? So it happens to be that way, really. What happens is that you end up having these legal institutions also mask as well an important conversation, prevent people from having an important conversation, because inherently, again, they are complicit or complacent with within these colonial legacies. So these are, I would say these are precisely the moments that we feel like these narratives, the dominant ones, can become violent against. They can become what you call epistemic violence against Palestinian narratives, right? Because we cannot have, we cannot express anything about October 7th without that sort of being taboo, right? So when we talk about the fact that Palestinian resistance was calculated, It was done for certain political and for liberatory reasons. It was emancipatory. All of these things are continuously kind of pushed back on. And we see this. This is very visible to us.

Jared: Yeah, absolutely. I really appreciate you breaking down those 3 dominant forms. I think you have good Like categories there of a lot of what I've seen. And yeah, I appreciate that. Lara, did you want to add some things?

Lara Kilani: Yeah, I mean, I won't add too much. I think, Ben, that was an excellent explanation, and you articulated it perfectly. Maybe I'll just emphasize that I think in these kind of dominant responses after October 7th, not just to October 7th itself, but even in the aftermath where we see this genocide unfolding and all of the effects on the population in Gaza and displaced people and all of that, that there's either a refusal to acknowledge Palestinian agency or a refusal to grant Palestinians agency. And I think that has a lot to do with the way people see Palestinians, the way people see colonized people, And it reflects in their analysis, whether they're willing to admit it or not, whether they understand it or not. And it's really interesting because, you know, for Good Shepherd Collective, as Banna was discussing, a lot of our conversations are happening with folks in the Global North, and we're sort of like, you know, responding to these conversations and watching how they unfold. And there are so many of these liberal Zionist tropes where you see that folks are Let's say before October 7th, they're willing to reject the idea of home demolitions. They're willing to fight against settlements in the West Bank. They're denouncing Netanyahu. They're talking about all of these systemic problems of Zionist settler colonialism as it's ongoing in the West Bank, and maybe in Jerusalem, and maybe in Gaza sometimes. But Despite seeing, and sometimes, you know, in Palestine, it's the liberal Zionist groups that have access to the most data and have access to the publications about settlements and violence and violence in prisons a lot of the times, not always. But despite having this information, they can't imagine that Palestinians would exercise their agency and respond in ways that might not be always nonviolent. You know, protest. So it's really interesting. I think it's really interesting to see— interesting and horrifying, because the refusal to grant Palestinians agency is something different than a rejection of violence, right? They're not equally rejecting the 2 forms of violence. We can talk about that more when we talk about international law. But it's also like a denial of personhood. An inability to see Palestinians in Gaza as equal people to themselves who also have agency and desire the ability to enact agency over their daily lives. So I think that's just, uh, sometimes, you know, we look at this broad picture, but there's also this very personal level where, you know, you have to think about what would it be like to be in that position? What would I do?

Jared: And, and how can I understand others' actions through Yeah, I mean, this is something that comes up a lot. I mean, it's not just something that you all, as you all said, that started with October 7th, right? I mean, there's a long discourse among Palestinians of the idea that Palestinians can only be understood as victims. Right. And that any expression of Palestinian agency just sort of is not allowed or is not recognized or is then pathologized, right, is, I guess, most likely the response, especially if people consider it violent, right? But that preceded also moves to more militant resistance or more violent resistance because—

Lara Kilani: Right.

Jared: Also, we could talk about the Great March of Return or all these other instances in which Palestinians sought nonviolent protest or action, and these things were met with violence. And so, yeah, I remember early on people talking, early on after October 7th, and maybe you all even probably talked about it in our discussion to some degree, You know, just that idea of, you know, people only solidarity— solidarity is only with our, you know, our body, our dead bodies, but not with our resistance. Or, you know, also this idea that— I'm not articulating this well, but maybe we'll get to it through the conversation. But I just think this is a common issue, is just sort of like, because once you start recognizing the agency of Palestinian self-determination and resistance, then you have to question the entire order that has subjugated that and think about what actually transforming that order looks like, rather than just how do we make it a little bit milder. I think the other thing that people have said is that people just want Palestinians to die peacefully, that Palestinian death is a quotidian, everyday thing, and what they would prefer is that it not be on their TV screens and their smartphones. And like, you know, that— so anyways, those are the thoughts that come to mind partly on what you just shared there, Lara.

Lara Kilani: No, absolutely. And Jared, maybe I can just add one bit, because I was thinking about it as I was talking. And then what you said, I think relates to it so much, that people want Palestinians to die quietly, away— like, I almost want to say peacefully, away from their screens. They don't want to be subjected to the horror, because like, I think when you really imagine Palestinian agency and you really take the time to think about what's happening here, it is horrific and it is deeply disturbing. So it just, when I was speaking before, reminded me of this email that I got before October 7th about Palestinians organizing a— oh, what's the word? Palestinian prisoners. Oh, they had declared a hunger strike and it was an organized hunger strike. It wasn't just one or two people doing it at Yeah. And somebody replied to that. We sent out an email about it calling for support for these Palestinian prisoners being held in occupation military prisons, often without charge. We'll get into the whole charge thing later, but often without even charge, without being sentenced, being held for months and months and months at a time under horrific conditions. And somebody responded to the email saying, I'm actually opposed to hunger strikes. I think this is really grotesque and I wish they wouldn't do it. That's not the best way to do it. And now we're talking like, here's this person emailing maybe from Canada or the United States, and they're telling me, a person who's not in prison, that these prisoners who don't have access to cell phones often don't have regular access to their families, to their lawyers. You know, we're not even talking about armed resistance. They are refusing to eat and drink, right? And that's somehow violent and grotesque because instead of dying quietly or being imprisoned endlessly, they're making it the rest of the world's problem. So I think it just really embodies and illustrates exactly what you're saying, that people kind of seem to wish Palestinians would die a little bit more quietly sometimes.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Yeah, I just—

Jared: I think that's a great example. Go ahead.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Yeah, I just wanted to add that nobody really wants to be reminded of their complicity. Nobody wants to be reminded that they're responsible. I think that's what it is. It's that once they see that sort of horrifying image, they have to be reminded that they do have responsibility. Nobody wants to be reminded of that. And I think they want us to actually return to that sort of, what do you call it, like the violent, what do you call it, the violent status quo, right? So one of the movements, like the ceasefire movement we call, that want the ceasefire to happen, not because they feel like Palestinians don't deserve to be under genocide or anything, it's because, well, We wanted to go back to before October 7th, right? Let's move back to how it happened. Because for them, that is the peace, right?

Speaker 4: That's peace.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: But for us, it's obviously the violent status quo, right? So that's what they want us to return to, right? The ceasefire mode that no firing, no arms, no weapons. But Gaza could be colonized. Yes, maybe also Gazans could also be forcibly displaced. Maybe also never mind about the thousands and thousands who were killed, but let's just go back to the status quo, right? And we have to be critical towards that. We can't, and I understand that a lot of people are critical towards the ceasefire sort of ask, but also there's an extra element of, well, what about the forced displacement that has happened so far? What about what happened to the Palestinians that— what about justice for Palestinians that were killed? What about all these other questions of the fact that now the Zionists are militarily occupying Gaza? Are you saying that they should still remain there as long as they're not actively and visibly to you massacring people? So these conversations, nobody wants to have these conversations. It's just that The most brutal element for them, the genocide, needs to just be away from their minds and away from their TV. And in fact, it's our job to actually, in fact, push it even more in front of their faces. I think we should constantly show them nobody has the right to sort of have a peaceful, what do you call it, healthy mindset, or there's this discourse about keeping your mental health or whatever when Palestinians are being massacred. No, you know, why should we be massacred while you keep your mental health, you know, instead of actually doing something? Every single person in the world has an obligation towards people who are being, you know, massacred and enduring genocide. It's just how it is. Otherwise, you know, you lose your humanity. It's a simple question.

Jared: I agree, and I appreciate that a lot. So you both, I know you both have, I don't want to out you here, but some background here in terms of international law, from my understanding, studying it, thinking about it as a terrain of potential struggle, which I always find Palestinians to be some of the strongest critics, understandably. I think we all can see why now, as we're 6 months into this, of international law, and of its power or authority or ability to deliver upon its so-called principles. And yet, it also is a space in which a lot of Palestinians do look at it as this terrain of struggle and this space where, okay, we're going to fight for these things within these international law institutions, even if we don't necessarily believe that they operate by these liberal, I don't know, principles of justice that are just the 2 scales. And so what are your thoughts now that we've gotten to a point where we've now had a ceasefire that has been so-called imposed by the UN Security Council, that was supposed to take place over the last 2 weeks plus of Ramadan, uh, that didn't happen at all. Um, and there have been no consequences. And as far as I know, there hasn't even been very significant discussions of consequences. Maybe there are some and I'm not in, you know, involved in paying attention to those conversations enough. Um, but I'm just interested in how you all— and I know we're going to talk a little bit of But does the inadequacy of these international law frameworks for you, does it further the necessity of resistance? Because I think for some folks they would say yes, but I know that's probably not the dominant position. But I'm interested in how you all are thinking about both— actually, sorry, that's the second question. So the first question is just, what are your thoughts that you've had on the, you know, these discussions and the consequences of international law frameworks? And then we'll have a second question about resistance. Sorry, I messed that up.

Lara Kilani: No, that's great. That's fine. I was laughing. I was muted, but I was laughing when you said you didn't want to out us, because honestly, that's really how it feels. And especially being in Palestine, Because I studied international law. I think Banna did as well, right? But I studied international law. And so for a long time, when people would ask me what I was studying, I would tell them human rights. Or I would say international law. It was more broad than that. But sometimes I would say that specifically because that's what we are referring to most of the time when we're talking about the context of Palestine. And people would laugh at me. And so I finally stopped saying it because it just feels embarrassing to be talking to another Palestinian and they're like, ha, yeah. Yeah. What do you really do? You know, so yeah, I mean for for you know, so GSC hasn't been around for a long time. When we first started, we sort of relied more on these international law frameworks more, and then in the last few years, we've shifted more to like a critical stance and trying to explain to folks the limitations of these. I think we always like understood the limitations of them, but you know when When you're trying to explain some of the things that are happening on the ground, these are still useful tools sometimes, right? Because international law, I think the way it's understood by normal people, they're like ideals of things that we expect to be promised, right? Like a right to your house, a right to education, to freedom, liberties, like the basic things that we imagine when we think of human rights. And so I think they can still be useful tools in that sense. But thinking about— I was thinking about this Security Council resolution. And I think that with this resolution in particular, we can see really clearly the complete falling apart of any utility of international law and of the mechanisms that it's created and the facade behind them. And so, and I think this is maybe clearer than ever. I mean, I haven't been around for so many of these conversations around international law, you know, in other geographies. But for me, this, I don't know what could be more obvious than this. And so with the UN Security Council resolution, just for anyone who doesn't have it in front of them or didn't care to look it up, it was passed a couple of weeks ago. This is after the US had vetoed a number of of other resolutions, and it called for a ceasefire for the remaining days of Ramadan. At that time, I believe there were about 2 weeks left of Ramadan, and called for a release of the Israeli soldiers, Israeli hostages, whatever you want to call them, that are still being held in Gaza. And it was dead on arrival because there wasn't— we could see there wasn't going to be a mechanism for forcing it to happen. And also it didn't respond. I mean, resistance forces, the coalition of resistance forces since October 7th have been very clear that any ceasefire, any negotiation of the remaining hostages are going to be On the basis of a permanent ceasefire and a withdrawal of Israeli forces, so a temporary pausing of hostilities in order to you know release these Israelis was never going to happen. And I think the fact that the you know the U.S. didn't even vote to support it, by the way, for anyone who doesn't know, they just I think voted absent or I mean not absent sorry present or. They didn't vote against it.

Jared: They abstained. Right.

Lara Kilani: They abstained. Thank you. Yeah. And so, yeah, it was really dead on arrival. I mean, there was no way that it was going to happen. And I think this really shows the duplicity of the way that the US, and not just the US, but primarily in this case, has operated, especially in the last few months where there's always these comments from journalists or on social media, oh, Biden is really disturbed about what's going on. He's, you know, telling Netanyahu he can't do this or he can do that. And I think this Security Council resolution was sort of like a useful way for the U.S. to boost its PR a little bit by not vetoing this. And at the same time, it was really clear to anyone who was watching that it wasn't going to be carried out. That there was no mechanism to make it happen, and at the same time, as Biden has been doing over six months, he continued Biden, and I should say Congress, right? All of Congress, and also far beyond the U.S., the context of the of the West. The support has continued. The the flow of of weapons and ammunition has continued. The flow of money has continued, and there was not even an attempt by the Security Council to sort of leverage any. Support to get this 2-week pause to happen. But I think— so that's just about the Security Council resolution. But I think in general, when we're thinking about international law, something that's been really interesting in the last few months is, I think, you know, we talked about this sort of in our piece. I think we talked about it in the last podcast, and we talk about it online all the time. These limitations of international law and NGOs' deep attachment to them. And it's not just NGOs, it's intellectuals in Palestine, outside of Palestine, the foreign experts, the journalists, whatever. They have this deep attachment to talking about Palestine in the framework of international humanitarian law and human rights, And this is sort of a way of getting around talking about settler colonialism, addressing complicity, like Banna said earlier. And it also isn't political, right? It's not political to say, oh, Palestinians deserve their human rights, because technically Palestinians can have human rights in a future framework that is not decolonization, right? Especially the way we see human rights being defined these days. Yeah. So we've been critical of this for a long time, and we've come into these like very uncomfortable tensions with folks who, like folks listening, might think would be natural allies or natural organizational partners, which are NGOs, because we'll say, well, we will do this. But we insist that it has to be within the framework of settler colonialism and decolonization. We're not, you know, it's okay to use human rights as sort of supplementary material or refer to them here and there, but the dominant framework has to be the settler colonial framework. We have to address Zionism. And by and large, there's a refusal to do that. And so in the last few months, something that's been really interesting is that people— and I won't name names because I think it's a positive shift, but I think we have to keep our eye on it— is that people who have totally made their names and careers off of referencing the occupation of 1967 and all of the, you know, expectations and references that go along with that have been shifting to this idea of, oh, we need to talk about decolonization. And I'm not talking about people who stopped talking about that 2 years ago. I'm Like people who were referencing the 50-year-long occupation in November are now saying, "Well, I'm gonna help lead us into decolonization." And I think it's really interesting because you can see how the rhetoric is shifting, and that I think more and more people are coming into an understanding of what's going on and seeing what justice could look like, and having their imaginations challenged. But it's also it's also a little bit. Concerning because how many times have we seen liberal voices shift to use the language, you know, this kind of radical language or whatever you want to call it, for like liberal ends. So that's something that I just wanted to raise because, because so many people have made their names off of this kind of like, you know, being the expert in the room. And the last thing that I wanted to raise around international law and is, you know, we were talking about agency, we were talking about the violence of the colonizer and the resistance of the colonized. And implicit within international law is the understanding that the monopoly of violence belongs to the state. That's like a fundamental concept, right, of international law. And so When you look at armed resistance in service of decolonization, the common framework, as we've seen, is terrorism. And so there's almost something within international law— and of course, it doesn't have to be that way— that treats resistance as not just parallel, but worse than the violence of the colonizer. And this kind of goes back to what we were already talking about, right? That that, like, we wish you would just die quietly, because it's— when you disrupt the status quo, it's much more violent for the rest of us. And so, I think that's something that people are maybe grappling with or should grapple with more as we see the international law kind of falling apart and all of the things that have come out of it falling apart or not being useful, is what are the assumptions within international law, and what do they practically do on the ground? And I'll stop there.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Yeah, I'd actually like to add a few things to what you said, but like, I think what you mentioned was quite important about international law having no teeth. I think that's a very like important element for why we see international law as somewhat useless. Like, we obviously don't— we can go ahead and obviously discuss the history of international law and And its connection to colonialism and imperialism and all of that and its legacies. But we actually, we don't really need to do that. We can just simply look at how international law addressed the Palestine question and how it ended up actually legitimizing Israeli colonization. And as Lara said, the 1967 occupation being sort of central and basically saying that, well, that's when sort of international law can interfere or international humanitarian law can interfere only when things in the occupied territories, but anything else is considered the, quote unquote, the state of Israel. And so that's what it is, that the framework is constantly going to remain in that parameters. And we're dictated by that if we remain to use that sort of framework, right? But we also have to maybe sit back a little bit and acknowledge that there are a lot of people that sort of now, after the ICJ case specifically, see some sort of new sort of discovery of the importance of international law. And we can acknowledge that there's a bit of sort of also even Palestinians as well that might share that sort of view. Palestinians who would be lawyers who have worked on documenting human rights abuses that feel that maybe now, maybe it's the time that they could utilize international law tool. But we have to be here. I mean, as the Good Shepherd Collective, as people that believe in decolonization, we have to be realistic. Here and look at that, any supposed win, that sort of international law or victory that international law would have will be simply symbolic vis-à-vis Palestinian decolonial aspirations, right? It will never really reach that part where we're talking about decolonization from the river to the sea, anti-Zionism, right of return, and all of that, right? So the question is really, can those legal institutions that so many people are praising, can they really reclaim land back for Palestinians? Is that possible? Is that something that people believe can be done through legal institutions? If not, then maybe that's not what people are aiming for. Then maybe it's just simply rights under, securing rights under the colonial violent system, right? But also generally, these are big questions of can international law be emancipatory for people who are colonized? This is a big question for people. Can we see international law being emancipatory or an emancipatory tool, right? We here at the Good Shepherd Collective, we don't see that. It's not just about the legacy, it's about how it addressed the Palestine questions, how it will continuously address the Palestine question. We understand and we really respect all of the work that different Global South countries and states have been doing to support Palestinians. That is obviously genuine solidarity, but we also have to be realistic that there's all of this effort that's being done for the symbolic And the real, actual, real-life praxis of decolonization has happened and started on October 7th and now is being left sort of to, you know, to, I don't know, to, you know, go in a sort of unknown area. Nobody wants to talk about it or to become taboo as we've previously discussed. So international law is tricky. And I'm very like, you know, even if I study international And even Lara, as she said, she studied international law. We're very, very critical of it, you know, and its usability and utility in the Palestine question.

Jared: Much appreciated. Yeah, so I think that, you know, and I messed this up and started to say this earlier, but, you know, understanding this inadequacy of international law frameworks, The fact that they can't deliver even upon the rights that they uphold as principles for Palestinian people. Does this lead to— I mean, you hinted at it right there, Bena, I think, but the necessity of resistance, right? As the— not just, I guess, the necessity of it, but even in this current moment, Understanding that the resistance are still the Palestinian forces that are in some ways negotiating and dictating terms in this discussion in ways that other groups are not able to because they're sort of forced through these kind of civil or international law institutions that are not able to deliver.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Yeah, I mean, it's obviously a very difficult realization for people to make is that maybe these institutions and international law is not the way. Maybe the only answer that we have for any form of justice is through resistance, right? Resistance could be collective mass national liberation movement that could engage all the layers of Palestine, including the working class, the Palestine armed fronts, the civil disobedience and dismantling of CPA, and of course dismantling of all of the collaborative security regimes that we have and all of that. This is the only really form of justice really available for Palestinians. And we've constantly said that this is the form of accountability and justice mechanisms that we feel is most viable. One where where people decide by themselves to reach for justice as opposed to asking or deferring to institutions that don't recognize their humanity or resistance as such as being humane. And anything really else, anything that really demonizes, and this is why we think the question of October 7th is central today in understanding where people sit on the solidarity sort of limbo between being softly or justifying softly some forms of Zionism and being true genuine pro-Palestinians that believe in Palestinian liberation is whether they, or where they sit actually within the question of resistance, really. So we do see that resistance is the answer and we think it's an important answer. Obviously, like Lara and us in the Good Shepherd Collective, we also believe in that there are different other material ways people can also contribute to sort of dismantling settler colonialism. Maybe Lara, you can add a little bit on that. Yeah, sure.

Speaker 4: Yeah.

Lara Kilani: I mean, just like Banna said, Jared, I mean, I think we have seen through the inadequacy of international law, and then also through just how the last months have played out, that there's no— no one is coming to save Palestine or Palestinians, and resistance is essential. And so I think we know what that means in Palestine, you know. But for folks, because a big portion of our audience is maybe, I mean, the vast majority of our audience is outside of Palestine. And I think for the folks listening, they really need to think about how they can shift gears and think very strategically about materially disrupting the flow of resources that support settler colonialism and Zionism and how it's continuing. And this is something, you know, we're not the only ones speaking about this online. I think there are a lot of important ways that people do that. And that's not to say that, you know, efforts until now haven't done that, or that they're not meaningful acts of support. You know, when you see these massive protests happening throughout the week and throughout the world, that is also incredibly important. But one of the things that we've tried to do at GSC is really, you know, quite a while before October 7th, is show folks that there are more material ways that they can disrupt what's going on. Because a lot of times, like my background and the background of other folks at GSC is related to bringing folks here to see what's going on, right? So a lot of time folks, foreigners will come here and they'll see what's going on and they'll see the most horrific things that are going on. Like they'll see home demolitions, They'll see arrests. They'll see families torn apart, displaced from their lands, you know, already living like in very difficult situations with settler violence around them, and they'll leave and they'll say, "What can I do?" And a lot of times they get plugged into these campaigns that last a really long time and don't have a material result in the sense that they either don't win because they can't because the ask is too big. It's too disruptive of other. Large systems like the military-industrial complex in the United States, for example, or they don't have a clear enough goal, or their victory is sort of symbolic. And so we, a few years ago, put together the Defund Racism campaign alongside a number of Palestinian activists On the ground here. And we talked about this in the last podcast, so I won't get too far into it, but just the value of the campaign. I mean, the intention of the campaign was to disrupt the millions of dollars, and it's millions of dollars a year, tax-deductible donations flowing into settler organizations that are doing settler colonialism, not just in the West Bank or in Jerusalem, but across all of Palestine.

Speaker 4: Yeah.

Lara Kilani: And basically functioning as if they're charities in the United States. I mean, they're registered here, but they get a lot of money from the United States, also from the UK, Canada. And we were trying to show folks that not only that, you know, you can have— if we were successful in this campaign, and if we could disrupt even a sliver of the funds coming into these organizations every year, that would have a material— Impact. Disruption on the ground tomorrow, because some of these organizations like Regavim is a good one to name because it was co-founded by Bezalel Smotrich, who listeners might have heard of. He's a Knesset member now, says some of the most vile things you're going to hear or read. And so, yeah, the organizations like Regavim are bringing these vulnerable Palestinian communities to court to destroy their homes, to displace them forcibly from their lands, to encourage the state to to do that more aggressively, to destroy access to things like solar panels, wells, trees, you know, the most basic needs. And we were just trying to show, like, how direct folks could be in disrupting this violence. And I think that it doesn't have to be through that campaign. Right now, that campaign's sort of taken a backseat in the sense that we can't be uplift—

Jared: Oh, yeah.

Lara Kilani: Thank you. Thanks, Jared. Of course, the focus is on Gaza right now, and it's important that it is. But folks can look at this campaign and see how they can do it in their own local area and have a really powerful impact beyond even the organizations that we name here. But I think another big part of it was to try to show folks that we need to move away from campaigns that are symbolic. Campaigns that lead us with that leave us with victories that are sort of like okay well now we can say this or you know we can do this without actually disrupting the process of colonization that's happening on the ground against the most vulnerable people here right yeah that folks should move toward things that are winnable and impactful so that Palestinians who are the most vulnerable can feel. the, you know, results of that success. So I just wanted to bring that up as one example, but that's also a shift that we've tried to do over the last few months of trying to— I mean, more than that, but, you know, specifically trying to encourage folks about how they can get in the way of the genocide machine and try to stop some of what's happening. Thank you.

Jared: Yeah, I don't know if you wanted to add anything onto that, Banna, but I just say, like, I've seen a little bit more of that since October 7th, where I have seen people in the US being a little bit more conscious of, like, oh, these people are hosting a fundraiser for the IOF, or these people are hosting a fundraiser for an organization that builds settlements, or, you know, and so, like, I appreciate that work that you all have done, and I think folks should definitely check out that report.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Yeah.

Jared: And of course, check out the resources on your website. But I think that that is going on, and it's good to see more folks starting to make those connections and realizing that there are places that are ways that they can act locally, whether it's through divestment campaigns at universities or what kind of— Yeah. Exchange programs does their local sheriff's department or city hall or police department or whatever engage in that are ways that actually you can limit the flow, the flow of millions and millions and really billions if we think on, you know, if we're thinking in terms of all the money that the US government and corporations and stuff like that send into Israel. I think that's extremely important, as we're also seeing, I think, that this is underdiscussed in the US left, but this war has been also very difficult for Israel to wage. And if it didn't have the United States just funneling so many weapons, so much money, they wouldn't have been able to do what they've done. And I think that people need to really understand that, of that if you're horrified by the tens of thousands of people that have been killed, the tens of thousands of children that have been killed as well, there are very material ways that we can work and we can think strategically on a local level about what those are. And so I appreciate you all kind of pointing that out and lifting that up. So you had this recent thread that I did want to bring you all on to also talk about, which was about Israeli allies and anti-occupation activists in Israel. And so for one, I wanted you to kind of explain those dynamics a little bit, because I think in the United States, not only most people not have a great handle on nuances within Palestinians, society. We also have very poor understanding of, I think, Israeli society. And I think there's even, I hear people say things of like, oh, well, a lot of Israelis oppose what's happening. And I'm like, no. As I understand it, the majority of Israelis actually think that Netanyahu, for instance, is not fighting this war harshly enough, that there needs to be an even harder line taken on Gaza. And so I think that's obviously not the whole of society, but it does represent a large percentage of Israeli society. But you're speaking about some different segments, which are segments that might see themselves as so-called allies, which we have ally politics in the United States too. So people understand that concept, I think.

Lara Kilani: Yeah.

Jared: And so, yes, say a little bit about what you were directly addressing, and also just help people understand a little bit about who these people are, how significant are they within Israeli society as well?

Lara Kilani: Yeah. I wanted to say thanks so much for this question, Jared, because I think we can't say enough about it. I think it's really important. And I think we started to get into it a little bit in the last interview, but I'm always happy to talk about it because it's such a prevalent problem. So just like first, because you brought up the bit about like that there's a large percentage of Israeli society that approves of what's going on or wants it to be even more aggressive, so I got some statistics up. This is— there was a poll in January at the time the official number of martyrs that was being reported was 25,000. 88% of Jewish Israelis polled in January believed that the number of deaths was justified, is justified. And then in February, there was a poll by the Israel Democracy Institute in which 63% of the respondents opposed a proposal for the state to agree in principle to the establishment of an independent demilitarized Palestinian state. So I'm not going to go into the, you know, what even we could imagine would be an independent demilitarized Palestinian state at this point, or what Israelis might imagine that to be. But I think it's really important because I think there are folks that believe like, oh, Netanyahu is this fringe, violent, horrible person, and so are the people we named like Smotrich and Ben-Gvir. And yeah, we can see how Israelis really think because they show us all the time. And I think they don't just show us all the time in these kinds of polls, right? I mean, one of the things that I think even for me and people around me that was surprising maybe is kind of realizing how deeply entrenched all Israelis are, you know, in their connections to the genocide machine that's ongoing. Because even if you yourself— obviously not you— but even if an Israeli themselves is not, you know, in Gaza or part of the machinery or in the military, everyone has a family member who is in the military, was in the military, they were in the military. Or in another way, in civil society, they're supporting what's happening. You know, so even for the folks who we might consider like the fringe left, there are all of these structural connections and folks that are not going out of their way to distance themselves from that, to condemn that, to express, you know, aggressively or, you know, I don't want to say aggressively, but to express very clearly their opposition to that, are not opposed to it in practice. So I think that's just important to say. But the thread itself was in response to a post, a really long post by an Israeli journalist who's reached some prominence before October 7th, but especially in the last few months. About, it was on the, I think it was on the 7th. And so they were reflecting on what's happened since then and started off by making it about themselves and the people they knew who had been personally affected and condemning Palestinian armed resistance. And we're 6 months into a genocide. I think the number is 34,000 Palestinian martyrs at this point that's confirmed. We know thousands more that just haven't made it to a hospital, bodies haven't been discovered. I think a lot of people were really upset by the framing to begin with, but also this equation of Palestinian resistance and Israeli genocide was just really jarring. And so sort of the background behind that is that There's this idea that there are Israeli leftists or Israeli non-Zionists or anti-occupation activists or whatever. And it's not just here, but I like— because you said a lot of folks aren't familiar with the context, I think it's important to talk about here. And it's also not just Israelis. I mean, we're using the term Israeli loosely because it includes Americans and other Westerners, mostly Americans, Canadians, people from the UK, Australia, who come here and take take citizenship yesterday and now they're Israelis today, that are part of this mechanism of peacebuilding and solidarity and co-resistance on the ground. And in principle, they might provide some material value in terms of journalism about villages that are going to be displaced or are displaced, about settler violence. Of course, they always differentiate between what is settler violence in the West Bank And themselves, who reside in stolen Palestinian homes in Haifa, in Tel Aviv, in Jerusalem. And so they create this binary of like good Israeli, bad Israeli, which we talked about in that Ebb article. You know that that I can be a settler and at the same time be on the side of Palestinians. And not address any of the material resources that I'm personally benefiting from through theft, that my family has been benefiting from through violence. And there are a number of organizations. So, like just to name some of these organizations, there are organizations on the ground like the Center for Jewish Nonviolence, like Ahvat Amim. But there are other like normalization organizations that benefit from these interactions, like. Combatants for Peace, Seeds of Peace. I'm trying to think if there are any others that I really want to name at this moment. I'm sure they'll come to me. But so, you know, there's a whole funding scheme around these folks, and they're always engaged in normalization, and they're always— Peace Now, thank you, Banna. Peace Now, and they're always— B'Tselem. And they're always engaged in this funding scheme where they have to have Palestinians, right, because they're peace organizations. So they have to have Palestinians. They find vulnerable Palestinians who they can, you know, who are willing to say things for protection, for funding, for all of these different material resources. And then they get to, you know, come online and have clout or, you know, publish articles, and they build their brand off of these connections. You know, a lot of these journalists who benefit from this role as like Israeli leftist or whatever and get to travel and get to make a lot of money and get to make documentaries and get to, have their name in fancy magazines and newspapers, they're only able to do that because they are associated with Palestinians. And so they create this career very much off of the back of Palestinians, off of the violence that's imposed upon us. Well, it's not just that they're not personally targets of violence on the structural level, But they are actually receiving privileges from this violence as settlers, right? And so they build these careers, and then they build this clout, and then they go on to say things like this. And it's not just this journalist, I'll just say his name, Yuval Abraham, who made this tweet, but it's a number of people. And it's not just Israelis, because other organizations in the United States and the UK, for example, If not now, breaking the silence is another good one. Naamod in the UK. You know they use these same figures as like redemptive Israeli leftists or whatever, and like place their voices, their narrative on the same level with Palestinians, even though Palestinians are the the colonized party, the oppressed party, the party. That is seeking liberation. So it's really very upsetting, not only because it's built off of this violence of like stealing wealth, stealing privileges, stealing resources, but it also is maintained, like maintaining this theft because they personally become wealthy and voices that are privileged and that get to then In the case of Yuval, condemn Palestinian resistance. Now, yeah, I think I'll end it there because I just want to emphasize that this violence is not just on the level of really building careers, cultivating resources, cultivating a name for yourself, really becoming a person with material wealth off of this violence, But that then that is used to delegitimize, to destroy, to tear down Palestinian meaningful engagement towards decolonization.

Jared: Yeah, thank you.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Yeah, I'll add just something really quick, just on the epistemic or the narrative thing of using the token Palestinian. I thought that was quite quite interesting. What you said is that a lot of the times, you have these sort of Palestinians that kind of function as tokens in those spaces. They're just used by institutions, whether Israeli institutions or Western institutions, to sort of solidify an idea, usually an idea that is anti-Palestinian. And there's a really good piece by Ramzy Baroud who talks about this idea of 2 types of Palestinians that are asked by media sources or just asked to speak on Palestine. And usually it's the status quo Palestinian and the adversarial Palestinian. So the status quo Palestinian would be mainly the Palestinian that would be supportive or backed by the Palestinian Authority, would somehow belong to a Washington think tank and some other US think tank, and would have the moderate line on Palestine. Palestinians are suffering so much, but that's it. But I believe in equality and this is apartheid, so we need equality and whatnot. And then you have the other Palestinian, the adversarial someone who ultimately has really antagonistic views, or framed as having really antagonistic views, really strong, radical, non-moderate views. And then obviously they get asked to come in and talk about Palestine, to be really shunned by the media, to be made to look out to look like the dogmatic other opinion, right? Because you want to sort of make the moderate line look really nice and polished, but you want to make the other person, adversarial Palestinian, look violent and make that look sort of unpleasant, that opinion or idea that they have, right? And so he writes, Ramzy, like Baroud writes that this is all made to really solidify and consolidate and legitimize the platform. The idea is not that they want to give Palestinians or those who have dissenting ideas a space to talk. It's really about basically legitimizing this idea of we bring the space for the other debate, this liberal or neo- neoliberal idea of providing space for the one that we don't agree with or the other. But it's really meant to sort of make the other look even worse. And you have this in so many spaces. Until today, I cannot find any example of someone being invited to speak on Palestine unless they're representing each. You have to think about it. They're either going to make them be either the adversarial or they're going to be some sort of a person who just speaks about international law or have some moderate line and really be like sort of in relation or in connection to some international institution that is respectable or in conformity with international law. So all of these are quite very interesting dynamics that end up— what they end up doing is that Palestinians don't really get to say what they want to say because this is part of the process where there is a real epistemic exclusion there, right? When we're speaking also of the settler as well, there's 2 levels. Of course, there's the epistemic one that the settlers can, the sort of Israeli left can have sort of epistemic kind of hierarchy where they can just dictate what Palestinians want because they have the sort of some type of authority. But they can also have another type of violence against Palestinians, which is the violence of settler colonialism, of them being or belonging to the settler class. So it's quite interesting.

Lara Kilani: I just wanted to add one last thing, which I think is that, like, this is specific to the— I think it relates to what Bana was saying about this epistemic violence that kind of translates into material violence. It's not exclusive to Yuval's tweet, but it's like inherent in a lot of these normalization groups, where they say things like, oh, we just want peace. And I mean, that is so insulting. Banna said something about it earlier where, you know, you said, like, of course, peace, you know, when we're talking about the ceasefire movement, they just want an end to the genocide. They just don't want to be seeing it on their screen anymore. But it also creates the suggestion that we're equally impacted by what's going on. And we're not. It's very much an inverse impact, right? Palestinians are having things stolen from them on a daily basis, are having things refused to them that they very much deserve. And it happens for the sake of privileging Israelis. So to suggest that we want peace, to suggest that there, you know, in this case, I think he said 3 people he knew had been affected on October 7th. And I think we can talk about this more in a bit, but every Palestinian knows a martyr. Every Palestinian knows someone imprisoned, right? So to suggest that there's any parallel, I mean, especially now, everyone knows someone who has been directly affected by settler violence or is directly affected every single day. So to suggest that there's some sort of parallel, that we both need peace, completely denies the reality That right now, Palestinians in the West Bank, for example, of course, it's nothing like the situation in Gaza, but Palestinians in the West Bank have been imprisoned in the number of over 8,000 arbitrarily, of course. We'll talk about more later, but in huge numbers. Different areas, like in Area A, for example, all of the different towns have been shut off from the rest of the West Bank for periods at a time. Transportation is much like— there's much more monitoring, there's much more violence, the levels of killings, the levels of raids and attacks in the refugee camps we've seen every night, how they destroy infrastructure. Sorry, this was supposed to be a short comment, but just my point is that Israelis right now are going to the cafes, they're eating outside, even if they didn't have They have their places to hide from the rockets or whatever. They're very much living in peace, and they're living in a peace that was stolen from Palestinians. So to suggest that we both need peace, Kwame Ture was the one who said, we don't need peace, we need liberation. We see they're living in peace right now while we're going through a genocide. So it's not peace. That's not the thing. And anyone who tries to suggest to you that it's peace and not decolonization to make the rest of us who are looking for liberation into these radical, wild people that just simply can't be dealt with, like Vanna was talking about, is intentionally trying to maintain the situation of violence.

Jared: Right on. And please don't apologize to me for taking time with your responses or saying things that you want to say. That's what this whole— the whole purpose of this this is for. So, um, and M was thinking about Kwame Ture as you were talking just before you, you said that too, Lara. So, um, so just moving on in the conversation a little bit. So, um, and I hope I— please correct me if I mispronounce this martyr's name, but Walid, uh, Dhaka succumbed to medical neglect on Sunday. Um, you know, he was held captive by Zion until his death. He was only 62 years old, had spent, as I understand, about 40 years of his life incarcerated. One of the most interesting aspects of, for me, Western media amid this is that I don't think at any point on any sort of mainstream or corporate news, at any point, I've heard people talk about people held in Israeli prisons. Probably the most mainstreamish conversation of that that I've seen is maybe on Democracy Now!, which is on PBS and things like that in certain places. But this discourse is just not allowed, and it's not that surprising. The United States does not talk about its own political prisoners. It doesn't talk about the conditions of prisoners very often in the United States unless it can sort of— it's kind of similar to the discussion of Palestinians around victimhood. If they can kind of, you know, certain stories, right, of people who are unjustly imprisoned or things like that, right, there can be stories about this. But it's very limited the ways that the United States, that we cover our own prisons, which of course are the largest in the world. But this was a very famous political prisoner as one who many had been fighting for his release for a number of years. He had clear medical issues that warranted his release beyond the question of justice, but also on humanitarian grounds, which does happen sometimes. And obviously, he's somebody who could have been freed by a prisoner exchange Also months ago, if Zionists had been actually to the table negotiating on that, which is something that the resistance factions have been trying to negotiate. And yet, he dies a captive, and obviously, we mourn the loss of this martyr. What do you want to say in this conversation about Palestinian prisoners? And also, or sorry, what do you Why do you think the conversation on Palestinian prisoners and hostages is a conversation? Why do you think this is a conversation that can be had in so few spaces? Why isn't this discussed more, in your opinion?

Lara Kilani: Thank you for this great question, Jared. I think it's really important. I think that this is one of talking about the different forms of violence and the way we see it from the outside of Palestine. I think this is one of the quiet horrors of colonialism that happens behind closed doors. And there's not a lot of— it's not that there's not a lot of access, but just, you're right, there's not a lot of conversation outside of Palestine about it, despite the fact that, like I said, everyone knows someone Who is imprisoned or has been imprisoned. I just pulled the statistic up before we got on this call, that since 1967, the occupation of the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem, about 100 Palestinians have been imprisoned at some point in occupation prisons. Sorry, did I say 1 million? What'd I say, 100?

Jared: You said 100.

Lara Kilani: Sorry, 1 million, not 100. 1 million Palestinians. Palestinians have been held in occupation prisons. So that's a massive number. We're talking about, what, 57 years? I shouldn't have chose to do math on the spot, but—

Jared: That's all right.

Lara Kilani: That's a massive number in a captive population. I think part of the reason that— I've seen folks online, and we've done it ourselves, trying to reverse this narrative and explain to folks that Palestinians are very much hostages in these prisons all the time, long before October 7th. But I think part of the reason that this conversation doesn't happen in a more mainstream way is because even folks who understand that there is an inherent racism to the state of Israel, maybe they don't understand or they don't think a lot about settler colonialism or they don't understand Zionism as settler colonialism. But even people who understand that, or people who do critique Zionism, I think there is this assumption that there is a rational framework, that maybe Palestinians somehow deserve to be in prison, that they've done something, that, you know, that every prisoner has done something to end up in prison. And so there's like this legitimization of the idea that these people who came to Palestine, colonized the land, built these systems to maintain that colonization and keep themselves in positions of privilege and eliminate Palestinians, that it's legitimate and that there is some right to try, torture, or imprison indigenous Palestinians. And so even when we talk about, I think it was Lana Tattour who brought this up the other day, that we shouldn't say, that Palestinian prisoner, you know, there's like, I don't have the number off the top of my head, but there are lots of Palestinian prisoners, especially now, but always being held in occupation prisons who have neither been tried nor charged with anything. So they're just being held sometimes for years without being found guilty of a crime. But Lana Ratatour was saying we should even question the idea, you know, we shouldn't suggest that there's any legitimacy to the idea that the Zionist state has the right to try Palestinians or charge them with anything. And I think that's a really important point, so I just wanted to raise it. But specifically about Walid Dacca, you mentioned that he was refused to be released in a prisoner exchange. And from what I read, this was an intentional decision that happened over the I think 38 years that he was in prison. So he was in prison since he was 24, the vast majority of his life. And I think the state intentionally kept his name off of those lists so that he could not be released. But I think that one thing that's really important to talk about in his case that I haven't seen folks bring up is that he had Israeli citizenship. So we're not talking— this isn't like, you know, a lot of times Sometimes we think about Palestine, or maybe we don't think about Palestinians in '48 enough. We talk about Palestinians who are being held in military prisons, and we're talking about Palestinians from the West Bank a lot of the times, maybe from Gaza, maybe from Jerusalem, but we don't talk about Palestinians with Israeli citizenship because we think that they're more privileged. And of course, in a lot of ways they are. They have more mobility, they have more passports. I mean, there's lots of discussion about, or they have a There's discussion about it, but I think by and large that's how we think of them. And so I wanted to raise this because I think a lot of folks don't realize he was a citizen of the state that was imprisoning him, that denied him access to medical care. You know, he could have had a bone marrow transplant, but they refused to transfer to him— transfer him to a civilian hospital. Right. And he was a citizen of the state. And so it's important because the Israelis of all stripes, but especially liberal Zionists, like to create this division that, oh, well, the state is a liberal democracy. We do have a Palestinian minority and they're equal citizens. Well, no, because they're Palestinians. And so the bottom line is that they're still treated like Palestinians, which means Yeah. It means theft of resources and elimination. And so this is a really important example, thinking about this. And you could see it as well. We posted a video— I don't remember if it was yesterday or the day before— from his hometown of Baqal Gharbieh, where there was like a funeral tent for his family to receive visitors, and the Israeli border police came and beat people and arrested people and tore down the tent so they couldn't even mourn him. And by the way, they were mourning him in absentia because his body is still going to be held by occupation prison, by the Israeli state, until March of next year so that his body will carry out the rest of his sentence or however you want to put it. So I think this really, his case in particular, illustrates the horror, like some of the worst horrors outside of this genocide of the Israeli state. Because, I mean, just imagine, like, not only denying the family the opportunity to mourn his death, but holding his dead body in prison, essentially, so he can't even be buried, after denying him, like, stealing the vast majority of his life. But also, there was a quote going around, and I just want to mention it by Ben Gvir, who said people were sharing as sort of like this horrendous thing where Ben Gvir said something to the effect of you know he died a natural death and he should have been executed by the state, which is horrific enough in itself. Okay, but it's also a misrepresentation of reality because this man had cancer. He had the opportunity to be treated. And he was denied access to treatment either here in occupied Palestine or elsewhere in the world. And so maybe they didn't shoot him or beat him or torture him to death in the same way that they do with so many others, but they very much killed him and stole his life. And we can see that, right? And so I think that's also an important shift that we need to have in that discussion. Thank you.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Yeah, I'd just like to add, just rolling back on Palestinian prisoners, because now we're obviously approaching Palestinian Prisoners' Day, April 17th. And I remember just on a personal level, that was the sort of day that I would join a protest in Ramallah asking for the release of Walid Daka and George Abdallah, who's held in France currently. So it's just, Palestinian prisoners are really central for Palestinian liberation. So we really think a lot about them and they're really central in the conversations in Palestine. Unfortunately, that's not the case abroad. But there's also another element here about the sort of connection between, I Al-Aqsa Flood operation and Palestinian prisoners is that one of the most important goals of Al-Aqsa Flood operation on October 7th was actually securing a prisoner exchange deal, right? So now, of course, there's a huge disregard for that element, just as there is disregard for any sort of political or some sort of formal reasoning for Al-Aqsa Flood because this is denied for Palestinians. But then there's this idea that resistance actually understood the importance of liberating Palestinians captive in Zionist prisons. And they calculated a plan ultimately to demand the release of all Palestinians in a prisoners exchange. So the question of Palestinian prisoners still remains central for our national liberation struggle. So the resistance forces in Gaza, they knew that. And then we see this sort of Al-Aqsa Flood operation as sort of a proof of that sort of dignity and love and bond the resistance have with the Palestinian people and Palestinian prisoners, including as well in the general respect of Palestinian people. So through Al-Aqsa Flood, really, the resistance really declared that they will not neglect Palestinian prisoners as so many have done throughout the years. And so now we're coming to the Palestinian Prisoners' Day. Now that we're thinking about it, we've obviously lost Walid Daka, which is rest in power with this. Walid Daka has been quite central for a lot of raising of the consciousness of Palestinian youth around prisoners, prisons, and torture in prisons. And his writings have been of extreme help to form principles for people, including myself, including others, but also We should be reminded of the certain sacrifice that Al-Aqsa Flood operation and resistance fighters have done for Palestinian prisoners. That needs to be central on that day that is coming up. What they have done is that they've tried to, the resistance have tried to not only save Palestinian prisoners from the tyrannies of Zionism, they tried to save all of Palestine. From the tears and news of Zionism. They tried to envision what is usually considered the sort of unimaginable, the idea of breaking out of Zionism and settler colonialism or decolonization, breaking out of that siege and open-air concentration camp that Palestinians have been captive in. This is something that we need to be reminded of. This is the type of connection that is often forgotten, the connection that we have with Palestinian prisoners and what we owe Palestinian prisoners as well, that we're now very much neglecting. And the numbers are rising every day. Every single day you're having all these reports of people being arrested and imprisoned. And that's the reality of being occupied. The fact that people in the ceasefire movement don't really talk about the occupation in Gaza. They're setting up Gaza to become the same way. And to be honest, even the Gazans that I'm hearing, they speak and talk and they tweet. And that's why as well, knowing the language of Arabic is very important. It's because they're saying, we would rather die than have to go through what people in the West Bank and people where are under fully Israeli control endure with imprisonment, because it is a filthy, filthy, filthy, and very horrific time. Not just the torture, the humiliation, the type of indignity of being in prison, but also not having— first of all, there's no reason for you to be in prison, but also spending all of your life in Yeah.

Jared: Thank you for all of that. And I'd just say, just a clarifying thing for folks who don't understand this. We've talked to this a little bit with Abdaljawad Omar, for folks who don't understand. And so they could look at some of the discussions we've had with him about the West Bank. But in the West Bank, there's essentially 2 systems of incarceration, because you have the Palestinian Authority system, and then you have the Israeli system too. And Israelis have of access to be able to detain and imprison folks from the West Bank. In Gaza, post, what is it, '07, thereabouts, since basically Hamas expelled the settlements that were in Gaza at that time and the siege was started, but Israelis haven't had the ability to incarcerate Palestinians within Gaza in that time because even though So we can talk about how the siege is this humanitarian horror, which it is. But at the same time, there's this interesting interplay, of course, where there is a bit of sovereignty as well within the space, because the Israeli forces are not able to directly just go into Gaza and arrest people and scoop them up from their houses and things like that. Now, of course, currently, because of the occupation that's going on right now as they're engaging in the genocide in Gaza, there are Israeli troops there. And that's been one of the central demands, by the way, of the resistance, is they have to leave. Our people have to be allowed to return to their homes. We need assistance to rebuild things as they are and prisoner exchange. And there's other things as well, but those are central demands right now of the resistance. You know, at this point, you know, is to ensure that one of them is that they regain that security sovereignty over, you know, so anyways, feel free to correct any of that that I misstated, but I just wanted to make that point for folks if they didn't really understand those distinctions. So another thing that I do want to just mention, because I appreciate it, so you all do a lot of lifting up of GoFundMe Of people in Gaza. And I want to direct people to that too, and just note that, I think I said it. Where did I put my comment? Now I can't find it. This is your handle on Twitter, and then I think you're just Good Shepherd Collective on Instagram. But they're good places. People sometimes don't know who— it's hard to know who to support sometimes because GoFundMe also has a lot A lot of different people that will use it. And obviously this is not enough. Like, we're not suggesting— and I'll be interested to hear your kind of thoughts on this. This is the question that I'm going to work my way to here, is how you all feel about supporting GoFundMes. Because obviously, you know, we could make an argument that we need to all give money to UNRWA, or we need to support larger humanitarian organizations and get more aid in and things like that.

Lara Kilani: Yeah.

Jared: I'm not telling people to do against that, but I think that it is also this idea of also directly giving when you can and the meaning of it, and also building connections with the families and things like that. And so I was interested in just your thoughts on direct aid and lifting up these GoFundMes. And again, I do encourage folks, if they're looking to give directly to folks, that you all are a good place of seeing different examples where people can do that. So yeah, go ahead.

Lara Kilani: Yeah, thanks, Jared. I just want to say at the top, well, 2 things. One, sorry, I'm so glad, Banna, that you talked about the centrality of prisoners in the Al-Aqsa Flood, because when I was listing the demands of the resistance coalition, I think I left that out. So sorry for that, everyone, and thank you so much, Banna, for that emphasis. But yeah, also I just want to say that I think one of the other more central and very useful, if folks are on Twitter or if they want to use PayPal, there's Care for Gaza, which I've seen passed around as a trustworthy resource. Banna, I don't know if there's another one that you want to uplift, but that's the one that I've seen. It's just @CareForGaza.

Speaker 4: Yeah.

Lara Kilani: Folks want to look for other ways they can support. But yeah, I mean, about uplifting the GoFundMes, you know, DSC started a few years ago as really an attempt to meet the communities on the ground beyond humanitarian needs, because, you know, there's a lot of funding that can provide things like water, shelter after home demolitions, medical aid, things for education after home demolitions, killings, things like that. But there's not a lot, I don't know if there's really any financial support for supporting struggle on the ground for communities to really not only stay in their land, but organize to resist colonization and violence from Israeli forces. And things like that. So that was really part of the foundational ideology behind creating GSC, because that didn't really exist, and in a lot of ways still doesn't. And so I think it's important to put ourselves in the shoes of the people who are in Gaza right now, because they are are making some of the most, I mean, the most, I think, horrific decisions of their lives, I'm sure, whether to leave or stay. And they don't know, you know, if they leave, will they be able to return? And if they stay, will they survive? And it's one thing for those of us outside or even people in Gaza to think, well, You know, I as an individual would choose to do this, you know, or I as an individual think that this is the right thing to do. But for those of us who care for small children, or those are for children at all, right, or those of us who are responsible for our family members or for our community, it's another thing entirely to say, well, I'm gonna stay, or we're gonna stay, not knowing if you're gonna live to see the next And so I think, you know, under these horrific circumstances, even though we know individual GoFundMes aren't an institutional response, they're not going to meet the needs of every— I mean, they're not even going to meet the needs of the majority of people. They're not really equitable or accessible. We've also seen the shortcomings in the way that, like, At least I know of one example where people have set up GoFundMes, like people in America have set up GoFundMes for people in Gaza and then ended up stealing the money. So there are all kinds of problems with it, but I think it's essential because people are really struggling to survive now. And a lot of the people aren't, you know, they're not struggling to survive just for themselves. They're struggling to support themselves, their families, their communities, and also to imagine a day after.

Jared: Mm-hmm.

Lara Kilani: Which is something that Ghassan Abu Sittah has made a point to say repeatedly. We need to— those of us outside really need to be thinking about what we're going to do the day after, when there is an eventual ceasefire. It's also part of our duty to be thinking about what does Palestine look like tomorrow, because that's part of maintaining our dignity and moving towards decolonization and rejecting this, like, I don't know what the word, like despair of coloniality. And I just want to say, like, part of that despair is wrapped up in a lot of these, in a lot of the, like, critique without meaningful contribution of people who like to present themselves as on the side of Palestinians, But like throw us under the bus, and we can like Naomi Klein, Judith Butler, you know, who reject armed resistance, and then at the same time are like, "Oh, what a horrific humanitarian disaster this is right now!" Right? And and don't think about well what is tomorrow because tomorrow needs to be dignity and decolonization, not not genocide or or settler colonialism or.

Speaker 4: Peace.

Lara Kilani: So I think that's, I think that's really important. And then I also think, of course, there are emotional struggles with this. But I think at the bottom of it, you know, like none of us are better or different than people in Gaza. And any of us could find ourselves desperately in need of the support of others. And so it's really important that we that we're there for people, you know, in the way that we can be, in whatever ways we can be right now. And I also think that, you know, I just want to say because I think I know people who give to GoFundMes. You know, they're in the United States; they can't afford healthcare, but they're giving to GoFundMes as well. And sometimes when they don't really have the money to be doing that, and so I just want to say. Like solidarity is like sacrifice is inherent to solidarity, right? But there are lots of different ways that folks sacrifice, and sometimes that's time, sometimes that's freedom, sometimes that's money, sometimes it's—I don't know—I'm trying to think of another thing. But there are lots of ways that people sacrifice, right? So I think that's one important way to uplift, but it doesn't—it's not always going to be the way that somebody can can do it in the.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Yeah, I would just like to add quickly, is that just a few observations from friends in Ramallah in the West Bank, that they had one of those kind of, what do you call it? It's a type of helicopter that kind of makes a really loud noise and it's supposed to be You know, for, to sort of like kind of look, you know, visibly and take, you know, pictures to see the sort of, to take like aerial photos of the town. And they were saying that it was only there for 2 hours, but it was just, the sound was horrific. And that specific, you know, tool is still every single day, nonstop, over Gaza, and then the sound is just unlivable. And just that, and if we begin with just that, that's the smallest thing for people. Right now, people are thinking about the possibility of them dying or not making it, or one part of their family dying. Some people have lost family members and have nobody else. So who are we really from the outside to really seek people in Gaza to be resilient in the face of that if we haven't on the outside made our most effort to stop the genocide from happening, right? So I think there's a dynamic, there's a dilemma I would say there is that we obviously don't want people to leave because there's an active element of forced displacement that the Zionists want to happen. There's a case of Yeah. Of colonization for Gaza that they want to happen. And we don't want that. Of course, we don't want to support that. But at the same time, these people are fleeing genocide. I would not be able to tolerate that personally. I would not ask somebody else to tolerate that. That is a dilemma that we have to deal with. But also, I must also add that if you are one of those people that really want to support and you invest sort of by giving out to GoFundMe only, I think I would just like to kind of kindly mention that GoFundMe is not the only way. There are several other ways that you can support. There are other organizing spaces that you can attend. You can go out in a teach-in, You can also, when there are protests, when there are direct action, there are plenty of ways that you can help support. But just to view GoFundMe as the only material way to support people flee genocide, I think it's problematic. I think we need to couple this idea of we need to fight against the genocide and we need Gazans to win against, and basically the defeat of the Zionist troops is very important for us. And we need to prevent the forced displacement of Palestinians and we need the right of return for the ones that were already now displaced. And at the same time, yes, we should support the ones that want to flee from genocide. We should absolutely Donate to their GoFundMe. When they reach to us, we are happy at the Good Shepherd Collective to uplift their campaigns. And we're always aware, of course, there are sometimes, for us, that people ask us that there are sometimes sources where people pretend to be Gazans. And we're very aware that the ones we uplift are ones that we are aware that they're trustworthy. So that's something that people and folks that want to donate and want to support can be sure of. But just to emphasize that we need to be mindful of those 2 dynamics and to constantly uplift the idea that no, we do not support forced displacement of Palestinians and we want to support the right of return and Gazans shouldn't have to endure genocide, nor should the troops be in Gaza whatsoever.

Jared: I love that. I think, because I think it's— I mean, one, to be clear to folks, I was not suggesting at all that GoFundMe is like the only way that people can support. I do appreciate you all like doing that work too, because I think that's one of the things too, is I get hit up by folks a decent amount for GoFundMes, and I'm always like, I don't have a way to even really know whether this is actually legitimate. And so I think that that's— and And I get— I feel guilty sometimes by raising, you know, not knowing how to kind of deal with that question. So I appreciate you all going through processes also to try to kind of like verify, you know, not because obviously, you know, but just it's more that what you laid out is that the fact that people would impersonate and take advantage of the situation is really, you know, kind of, you know, just, I don't know, it's pretty awful.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Yeah.

Jared: And so, but I do appreciate all of the other means of resistance and support for Palestinians that you raise up and think it's really important to be able to hold both of those things of, you said, of resistance to genocide, yes, and all the ways that we can think about that. And also that the goal is decolonization, that there's a bigger arc there and you can't lose sight of one for the other. Because I think that our humanity demands both of those things to be struggled over simultaneously. And so thinking along those lines, say a little bit about how you all are thinking about your work within Good Shepherd Collective, as Good Shepherd Collective, amid a struggle like this. Obviously, there's probably 2 elements of it that you might be able to say something to. One is, what has it actually looked But 2 is, has it shifted things at all for you as you think about what the future of it is? I'm interested in any thoughts that either of you have on those questions.

Lara Kilani: Sure. Yeah, thanks, Jared. I think for sure, definitely over the last few years, There's been like a big shift in our work and a lot of internal discussion about the scope of our work and how to bring the most value and kind of meet the moment of what what we see the needs are. I think like as we already talked about a little bit that folks are realizing. I mean, I think I think in this moment there's been. A really optimistic shift in the discussion where I see folks talking about Zionism in a way that definitely I didn't see before October 7th, as well as, like you said, material solidarity and disrupting the resources funding settler colonialism. I think those shifts are beginning and people are realizing the limits of the solidarity work that we've seen up until now, which has really been at least like in the last 10 years, let's say, dominated by NGOs and large funders and campaigns focused on international law or lobbying, like in the context of the US, lobbying senators and representatives and da da da. And I think also in this moment, people are seeing much, like in much sharper relief, something that we've been trying to bring up in the last few years, which is that we can see what the stakes are because on the one hand you have people, and I'm mostly talking about these larger NGOs that have kind of like fueled and directed the conversation or the advocacy attempts over the last years. You know, the people inside of them are making very comfortable livings. They're taking large grants from a lot of problematic donors, silencing Palestinian anti-Zionist critique, or the critique of allied anti-Zionists. And on the other hand, we see people being murdered, imprisoned, tortured, robbed of their families, of their life and their property, and all of these different things. So we can really see these distinctions, and I think people are beginning to challenge them, and that is really heartening to see and also is influencing how we move forward. So since October 7th, on a very personal level, we've been much more limited in our mobility because, like I said, there have been like sort of increased closures, increased surveillance and violence and limits on mobility and things like that. So a lot of the communities that we would have otherwise been more connected to, either physically or otherwise, you know, some of those connections have been disrupted just because it's not as easy to make it out there, but also I think because Because we've tried to really, since October 7th, we really tried to keep up as much reporting as we could and give people analysis about what was happening immediately. Because it's not just folks on social media who follow us and who can see our analysis, but on email and with these different reports and things like that. And it's really important because immediately on October 7th, it was really clear what the Zionist line was going to be and has been since then. And there are a lot of folks who, you know, needed to hear a different analysis immediately. So we've tried to do that. And then at the same time, we've tried to really like maintain at least some reporting on Zionist violence in the West Bank and Jerusalem, especially because it's kicked up like in a much more aggressive pace since October 7th. And then, you know, something that's kind of fallen outside of the spectrum of what we've been reporting on, just because, you know, there are a lot of— it's not new forms of violence, but like new, like, what's the word? Like examples of the way that the violence is being exerted. So for example, in the Last, you know, in the last month we had Ramadan. A lot of people who otherwise would have had permits to travel into Jerusalem were denied those permits and couldn't travel. At the same time, we also had Easter, and the Christian community was divided in the sense that in in the past Christians have been able to Christians of different like sects or like You know, within the like the Greek Orthodox or the Bana. What am I? You can hear my words are going, but thank you, Catholic. Yes, we're divided, and so people weren't given permits to travel together to celebrate both holidays. And so you can see these like different divisions right along age lines, for example, where Muslim or like some Muslim worshippers who otherwise would have had permits to go to Al-Aqsa were denied. Them, or maybe even along family lines. And then even within the Christian community here, which is tiny, dividing along these— sectarian isn't the right word, I know that, but I can't think of what it is. Anyway, you understand what I mean, these lines of these churches. So there are these new kinds of violence that are happening that I think have sort of been left out, and that's been frustrating to try to hold All of these things. Um, but I think, you know, that, that's been— it's sort of like an ongoing conversation of how do we try to, like, maintain this information flow of all of these different things that are going on and the way that they're changing and providing analysis at the same time, um, which folks don't always want.

Jared: Denominations.

Lara Kilani: Thank you, Ben. Not Yeah. You know, just to kind of keep this up and keep folks up with what's going on. So it's not only the genocide, because there are other elements of things that are changing that are going to have long-term impact and are important to talk about. And I think we're still sort of navigating that. And I think another— this is the last part that I'll say, but I think— or maybe second to last— but I think another really important thing that JSC has tried to do maybe not since its inception, but since pretty close, is maintain some sort of archive of the history of organizations and individuals who either, you know, NGOs or people who are making careers out of Palestine, and there's no shortage of them. And I've named already a few during— and organizations during this. Just to have, like, of course Palestinians remember, But not everyone who's in this exact line of work is following all of these different things, especially in English. And there are a lot of different ways that people have leveraged their access to Palestinians and their popularity to engage in violence. And I think it's really important that we remember that. I saw somebody wrote an article about Naomi Klein from Middle At least I, yesterday, or I don't know when, but it was going around, and people were saying, what are you doing? You know, this person threw us under the bus, and she still hasn't apologized. And people were telling us who she was early on. So let's not, you know, forget that. Let's not have such a short memory. And I think that's really important. So I wrote this part down. I mean, I just finished reading First of all, I'm catching up on all of your lives because I— yeah, but sorry, Banna mentioned Refaat Alareer mentioned Naomi Klein at the time that she published her article. But I wanted to mention Stephen Salaita, who has been your guest a couple of times, and I think all of us at DiETC are big fans and we draw on his work a lot. And I, you know, he published a memoir, he came on your— Yeah. On your live to talk about it. And I just finished reading it the other day with my partner, and we both enjoyed it. And I think one of the reasons that we reference his work and relate to it and sort of relate to him as well is that GSE has this connection in trying to keep these archives of this behavior. And in doing so, I think we've created these tensions between ourselves and other organizations by bringing up uncomfortable uncomfortable topics, by having these memories that we do of individual and institutional betrayals of Palestinians and our principles and anti-Zionism. And so I think in some way, part of our work is being this agitating force and raising questions like, what are you doing doing this? What are you doing saying that? Can we talk about these people's history? Can we talk about the ways that they've impacted Palestinians on the ground materially? Because that's the only way. I mean, I know we did that on the last interview we had here, and people had responses to it. I think they were largely positive because the intention isn't to tear down, but it's to think as a movement, how can we be better in the future? And so moving forward, one of the other elements of our work, I think, is going to be trying to continue to uplift and support anti-Zionist organized Also outside of Palestine. And I've already kind of started to have some of those conversations with folks. I know Banna has as well, and our other colleagues, about how to support those efforts and the explicit turn. So folks are having these conversations in their own communities and thinking about how to materially disrupt.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Yeah, thanks for that, Lara. I think I just I just wanted to add one more thing, because you said it really beautifully, especially about like Steven Salaita's work really becoming central to us because it's about also experiencing this type of feeling kind of outside, constantly on the outside, because, you know, you just simply feel like the people in the room just would dehumanize you the moment you'd raise your voice. And say that, you know, enough is enough and it doesn't suit them the way you talk or the way you express, you know, your humanity really. But also one of the things that we wanted to do at the GSC is really also centering this idea of that, you know, there's this difference between speaking in English and in Arabic, this idea that, you know, people who speak in English speak in a certain way, people who speak in Arabic are more likely in Palestine to kind of say what they want to say, but in English, they would probably cut a few things or limit a few things. And we want to say that, no, we want to sort of bridge the gap between what people are saying in Palestine in Arabic and what the conversations need to be had in English. So that's the type of thing that we want to do. Right? Especially when people in Palestine talk about anti-Zionism. So I think we're hoping that we're doing that with the GSC.

Jared: That's awesome. And it kind of— I'll give you space to say a little bit more about this in relation to a question that came up from the audience. So what this person is confused by is, who are honest partners? Because I see that ideally, no Israeli Jewish group is ideal, but don't want you— don't you want to have a broader partnership such as the anti-apartheid struggle or the civil rights struggle? I'm guessing that's in the United States they're referring to the civil rights struggle. And so I think one thing I did is I posted the thing that you all talked about last time, which is up on your website, which I know was co-authored by you all and I think M. Cohen. Which is a guide to— I'll actually share my screen so folks can just see what the document itself looks like, but it is on goodshepherdcollective.org. So this is a document that has been created to think about anti-Zionist politics and developing a real anti-Zionist politics. But maybe if you all want to say a little bit about that question, a little bit more about that question, about what is— I know this is the subject of our last conversation, so I also would say folks should go and listen to that conversation. But say a little bit about how you all think about anti-Zionism. And I don't think that you all are opposed to broader conditions, but on what terms and struggling Yeah, thanks so much for the question.

Lara Kilani: I want to say as well, just before I get into it, that I only discovered a few days ago, I finished the memoir by Stephen, and I happened to find that he published A Guide to Principled Anti-Zionism back in 2018. And you can imagine how I felt after We'd sort of written this chapter, then finding that. But folks can check it out if they're interested because that's another good read. And I'm sure there are others that I just haven't come across yet. But I think when it comes to this idea of like broad solidarity networks, I think it's just like what you said, Jared. I mean, in service of what? You know, sometimes there are. So for example, in the case of. I don't know if folks will remember this, but in 2018, summer 2018, there was a village in the West Bank near Jerusalem called Khan al-Ahmar. It still exists today, that was targeted by Regavim, the settler organization we named earlier, and the state for demolition. And I think I actually might've even talked about this in the podcast, the other one, so I'll keep it short. But no? Okay. Well, yeah, it was targeted for demolition.

Jared: You may— just sorry, just to clarify, you may have, but I'm saying go ahead and say what you want to say anyway.

Lara Kilani: Okay. Okay. Okay. Well, anyway, it's not that long of a story, but just the point was that it was settler organizations that were targeting it by, like, through the state, right? They were using the courts to pressure the state to demolish it more quickly, because the state had already said they want to demolish the community, and the court gave its approval to demolish the community. And they were going to displace something like 300 people. And basically what happened was there was a broad coalition of folks who came forward largely through liberal Zionist channels. But there was also support from the PA, there were other folks. Anyway, I don't want to be saying anything about Palestinian villages that use material support to prevent their displacement. But what I want to say is, that a lot of times these kind of broad coalitions will happen in response to emergency things where folks are willing to say, let's say, from Peace Now, from If Not Now, from J Street, actually J Street's a big one, where they'll be willing to say, well, these Palestinians deserve not to be displaced. And that's great. They don't deserve to be displaced. And I don't think anyone is going to criticize people who make those kinds of decisions to remain in their lands. I think, you know, but like, so we can see how at times they can be useful. But in terms of addressing settler colonialism, in terms of addressing the everyday issues of what's going on, no, they're not useful. Because what, on what basis are we in coalition? If we're on, if we're in coalition on the basis that you think settler colonialism today is wrong, but settler colonialism in 1948 and before isn't wrong, well, I don't want to be in coalition with someone like that, because what is the future going to look like? And I think that sometimes folks are tempted to get into those kinds of coalitions because they believe that they can move They can move these quote unquote like leftist Israelis. I've heard that even in recent months from Palestinian organizations. But I think the aftermath of October seventh showed us really clearly that no, you can't. Because what happened on October seventh? We saw people who have spent days, nights, you know, out in some of the most vulnerable communities. Trying to make coalitions or have allies with folks on the ground, turn around and parrot the mass rape, what we know now for sure is propaganda, the beheaded babies propaganda, that they— not only they uplifted this, but they used the opportunity to write about it, to write about how, oh, actually, I thought we were all humanitarians. No, we're not all humanitarians. Some of us are fighting for our lives, to be free, to have our homes back. And some of us are fighting to, I don't know, maintain our privileges and punish the settlers in the West Bank. I mean, I think there's also this element of it where it's illogical. These, I don't know, liberal Zionist groups or whatever you want to call them, are willing to concede to a certain extent, but it also doesn't even make sense. What is the reason that they decide that settlers after 1967 are wrong, but they're okay? I mean, we talk about it quite a bit in the article that it's important to understand that the rights of Israeli settlers come from the theft of resources and rights of Palestinians. So for example, my family originally is from Haifa, and they were forcibly displaced in 1948, and they're refugees. And so if I work with someone who believes that I can, I don't know, have a state in the West Bank, I mean, what does that mean? And they're going to maintain their privileges? So no, I guess the short answer to this question, I've gone a lot of different directions, but the short answer is no. I think when GSC started, we thought that there was some value in these sort of broad coalitions, that folks could be moved or that they could— I think especially we believed that if Palestinians in these more vulnerable positions were empowered by other Palestinians, that we could pressure folks to move, if not ideologically, then in their action. And I think what we found— no, I know what we found. Ground is that they can't be moved. And that folks that are unwilling to let go of Zionism at its core are never going to be able to see Palestinians as agents of the future or as their equals. And they're never going to be able to understand that the privileges of settler colonialism are stolen privileges, and equal rights for all in that sort of framework is not going to bring justice for Palestinians. I hope that answered the question.

Jared: Yeah.

Lara Kilani: Oh, sorry, Ben.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Yeah, I'll add just one thing on top of that. I feel like that is just a—

Speaker 4: I feel like there's a general debate about that, but it's not even about Palestine, but there's just general debate. It could be a Marxist even debate about this idea of building broader movements or keeping it kind of small and sweet and trying to win in more people. Into the ideas and the principles. And this idea that like the revolution versus reform thing of like, you know, broader movements will tend to kind of move into sort of, you know, reformist tradition or, and they would just sort of betray the principles.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: This is still the debate.

Speaker 4: Obviously some people will disagree with that, but often in the spaces in Palestine, It will, when it comes to organizing around Palestine, it becomes in a way reformist. And then the reform really becomes reforming Zionism, really. It becomes, instead of being really strictly anti-Zionist, decolonial, it starts becoming sort of liberal Zionist, reformist, wanting to reform Zionism to make it sort of more more appealing. So I think when we wanted to really build a coalition, that was one of the things that sort of the dynamic that we had to like, you know, grapple with because it was difficult to, you know, see how, you know, this could be like a movement built on the principles of anti-Zionism and decolonization because most of the institutions sort of had different view. And most of the bigger institutions that had a broader sort of element to them had a different idea, which is also connected to this idea of, well, we don't want to isolate. We want to bring in. We believe we can win people to the idea by building a broader movement. But oftentimes it ends up doing the opposite and becoming reformist.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: So I think That is one thing that we're cautious of.

Speaker 4: I think people need to sort of realize their connection to anti-Zionism, move into that direction, as opposed to sort of starting to normalize elements of Zionism and liberal Zionism. I think it needs to go that way, at least for us.

Lara Kilani: Can I just add one last thing? Sorry, Karen.

Jared: Yeah.

Lara Kilani: I just wanted to add one last thing because I kind of thought about it as Bana was speaking, which is that actually, like, we've seen in the last few months the sort of effects of this, like, large coalition building. Stephen Salaita has also written about, like— this is a little bit different, but— or maybe it's not, Yeah. The stuff around Bernie, the expectations that folks had or that we were willing to say, okay, well, he's not great on Palestine, but I'll support him anyway. We'll push him or whatever. And well, let's see what Bernie has actually done in the last few months. And we don't even need to look that far because more recently and supposedly more progressive than Bernie or whatever, have people like AOC, who were supposed to be these, like, democratic socialist kind of folks who were going to be progressive and who had the right stance on Palestine, supposedly. And that stance wasn't anti-Zionist, right? That stance was like liberal Zionist, but okay, big, big umbrella, we're thinking. But then you can Like look at the votes that AOC has made not only over the last six months, but over the years where she supported more funding for Israel, for the Iron Dome, da da da. But even in the last few months, I think even last month where she was making a speech or being interviewed or something and totally legitimizing the premise. Like we discussed earlier, of this genocide. So even if she's criticizing the way that the genocide is being carried out now, from the jump she was supporting this invasion of Gaza, the you know the destruction of families, and and and what turned out to be this genocide. And what Palestinians knew from the beginning was gonna like at least turn out maybe not exactly like this, but you know to. It was going to be something really big. So I think we can like trace what happens when you don't have this sort of principled alliance, and we don't need to keep making the same mistakes. It's okay for us to say it is a red line to support Zionism, and we are not going to support people who do it anymore. And I think that's important to say because folks are still thanking people like AOC, and not folks like J Street. Jewish Voice for Peace tweeted at her saying. Thank you, AOC, for something that she said. I don't know what. Meanwhile, there is material support, not only for additional funding, but for genocide and for legitimizing what's happening. So no, we don't want a big umbrella. We want folks to come to the principled side.

Jared: Yeah. And I think just to thread the needle of the comments that you all have said, said and proposed something, and y'all are welcome to disagree with me on this too, but I actually think that there are ways to build large movements where in some cases it may be that other people are able to involve themselves in them, but that don't fully share the politics. But let me give an example of divestment campaigns, right? Or Or even the work that you all are doing around targeting, what's it called, the Defund Racism, the REGAVIM. I probably mispronounced that, but I don't care. But anyway, there are ways where people can take actions, again, locally in their areas that may not require that everyone totally understands everything about it, but that the impact of it is actually material upon Zionism as a whole, or upon the sustenance of Zionism. And so I think there's probably some middle ground within there, but I do think that it's really important to bring more people to a fuller understanding of Zionism and not to confuse people about what Zionism is. And I think that's the part too where I appreciate the work you all have done of talking about so-called non-Zionism or liberal Zionism, these things where— and somebody had brought up the question of apartheid in the chat. And I think that's something where this comes up sometimes is that there has been this discussion of apartheid for a long time within Palestine because it resonates, and there is an apartheid system within. But at the same time, what would it mean to just address apartheid? How would that actually work for Palestinians and address some of the other concerns you all have raised about For instance, the '67 line of what constitutes settlement and which doesn't. So yeah, I don't know if y'all want to say more about those reflections, but those are some of the things that I was thinking about as you all were talking about that last question.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: Yeah, that's all.

Speaker 4: There are things that we also dwelled on as the GSC, but one of the things that I think we have sort of reflected on with the BDS at least movement or the divestment movement is that now when there's a genocide, we believe that it's a little bit too late. I think that was— there are so many, so many things that, you know, so many movements of BDS and, you know, organizing, especially in the US, that's been, you know, quite good spaces in terms of boycott, in terms of divestment.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: But the problem is, is right now when we're thinking of what exactly is it that, what type of historical moment we are in, we are at a trajectory of understanding our sort of connection with, or not connection, our stance on the litmus test of resistance.

Speaker 4: And one of the things that people also sometimes forget is that the BDS movement has formulated itself, which is in a good way, obviously. It's formulated itself, obviously, as sort of one of the tactics of pressuring Israel to concede to and respect international law. So the framework is still limited. And also one of the things that, you know, the BNC also emphasizes is that they're a nonviolent tool, and they also do not believe in violence. That is something that is ultimately our difference, at least between, or a sort of what makes it very difficult to sort of relate to that as a very kind of important tool. Obviously, when you do boycott certain brands or certain divestments, could cost the state a lot of money. And that is obviously good. We don't encourage people to stop doing BDS. No, 100%, go and continue doing BDS. But currently, the litmus test is on decolonization and resistance. The litmus test is where do these organizing spaces? What do they— where do they sit? You know, what is their sort of conception on resistance? And right now, and so far, years and years, what we've seen is that this is an uncomfortable question.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: You have, you know, the bodies that sort of, you know, or institutions that—

Speaker 4: not institutions, more of like movements that, you know, support resistance in all of its ways, are shunned and demonized and whatnot. And they represent sort of the kind of minority voices in the spaces of organizing, at least in the West. And the majority ones are ones about like other type of, you know, feel-good activities of, you know, reading poetry teachings or, you know, the more active ones that are good for visibility, which is protesting. And then you have direct action that's really fruitful. And then you have BDS campaigns that do sometimes have wins, but not all of the time. But still, the element that remains there is the element of resistance. At the end of the day, where do they stand when Palestinians want to wage the national liberation struggle? Where do they stand there? And that's the limit here that we want to sort of uncover, the uncomfortable discussion between these organizations that do not want to mention, do not want to talk about October 7th, do not want to have this discussion at all. But this is the discussion that we want. We want land back. And how do we get land back? I'm pretty sure it's not going to happen through BDS, and I'm pretty sure it's not going to happen through international law. Law. And I'm very also sure that even campaigns that are even material campaigns that could disrupt the flow aren't by themselves able to liberate Palestine. It needs to be the question of where do they stand on anti-Zionism? And anti-Zionism, obviously, the active force of that is resistance that has happened. At least that's why we believe October 7th is central. And that's why, again, apartheid as a framework alone could be very problematic to just kind of focus on because it obviously denies the historical experience of settler colonialism for Palestinians. And that can be easily the main asks of so many organizing spaces about just this concept of equality for all. We've spoken about this in our piece. So again, resistance, that's the litmus test. October 7th, where you sit on that, that is the litmus test. And we want people to arrive at that because we're at the stage where people witness genocide. What more should people witness to stand up? Clearly on that, you know, on the question of anti-Zionism.

Jared: Sorry, I'm muted. I'm going to raise this question. You all, I don't know whether you all want to respond to this or not, and if you don't, I can say a couple of things. But Stay Balanced asks a quick question. What do guests think of the possibility of Iran responding to Israel? And whether you all think that would help the Palestinian cause.

Speaker 4: I mean, I suppose, like, if we were to be, like, kind of, in a very kind of bad way, political analysts, I would say that Iran has no interest in escalation, as in, like, to go directly into war. I don't believe that. And so many people, including, you know, Palestinian Analysts and you know kind of more regional well-known analysts have kind of you know mentioned that this is not sort of the interest of Iran to do so. Now, now if it if it does happen regionally, obviously that would be very difficult for them to you know you know for Israel sort of to win that war. You have to also understand that you know if Iran joins in. And you have Lebanon is now visibly engaging in resistance and so is Yemen. And then if that coupled with the revival of Palestinian resistance in Gaza, and now we also, we're seeing even more of resistance coming up in more softer ways, but still very kind of critical. Ways in Jordan and Egypt, you know, people are kind of very, you know, they're like, enough is enough. That is not going to be a sort of a war that Israel can win. That is simply something that, you know, that we're aware of.

Dana Abu-Zuluf: You know, it's not about the technological abilities of Israel.

Speaker 4: It's not about how much weapons or how much support it can have from the US and whether US can engage or join or whatnot. It is a war against really the spirit, the spirit of non-defeat. The undefeatable spirit really of the people of the region that experienced the tyranny of imperialism and the tyranny of Zionism for years and years. And I just don't really see that happening. I think there's more likely going to be a de-escalation as opposed to an escalation on the, like, in terms of like Iran. But I don't know how that will materialize in the north for like Lebanon and on the north part and section of the Israeli, of the Zionist entity. Maybe that would not be the same equation. Maybe they will go out and do something in Lebanon. I've not, you know, I've no answer for that. I'm not a political analyst myself, but I would say that there's more likely going to be a de-escalation on the front of Iran because there is no way, there's no way Israel would win that war. A regional war would completely defeat Israel. And in fact, actually, you know, some people in some Palestinian circles Palestinian voices believe that maybe now is the time that they join because it's how it is. If we don't get the support, at least of neighboring countries, including Jordan and Egypt, Palestinians will still be subjected. We have these 2 governments that are quite puppet regimes for the US and collaborate very openly with the Zionist state. So it will really cause a lot of kind of worry if that sort of escalates in Jordan, Egypt. And I think one of the reasons why, and I don't, maybe that's a bit too much to say, but I think one of the reasons why the ceasefire sort of thing, kind of the change of Biden's administration and the vote of, you know, to abstain was partially because they kind of now view it, you know, they view that type of protests that are happening in Jordan and Egypt as being quite very impactful. Because those are, you know, I would say 10 times more impactful than a Western protest. Because those actually have direct effect to threaten the Zionist state. So I think there's a general kind of move. Obviously, they want to blame it all on Netanyahu, which is the easiest way to save Zionism. But I think right now what's going to happen, most likely a de-escalation, blaming it all on Netanyahu and get him out of the equation and saving Zionism.

Jared: I think that's very well laid out. I'll just add, I follow Amal Saad on Twitter, and she gives really good analysis of the Axis of Resistance and Hezbollah and Iran's role and things like that as well. And I think that one of the points that she has made, and others have made it as well, is that right now is a very kind of tricky moment because obviously Israel has escalated with this attack on the Iranian government folks, the diplomats that were in the consulate in Syria. This is an egregious violation of international law. Well, that's not that surprising for Israel right now. But the You know, Iran has two sort of— there's sort of two options that people see for Iran. One is that— and one is there's a belief that Iran has been more involved in trying to get the ceasefire brokered, right? That Iran has basically told the United— you know, had discussions with the United States about their retaliation and that they don't— that if they retaliate against Israel, wants assurances from the United States the United States won't get involved, and allegedly, you know, that the United States has said that they wouldn't, right? But it seems that there's kind of 2 ways that Iran can approach this. One is to try to get that ceasefire and then to be able to take credit of, we didn't respond and retaliate to escalate this. Instead, we used our—

Speaker 4: Yeah.

Jared: Our authority, our power to use this moment to broker a ceasefire, to avoid a larger war in the region, and to bring the ceasefire to people in Gaza, et cetera. And it might be that that helps somewhat the leverage also that the Palestinian resistance factions is having, getting more of their demands met through a ceasefire right in this moment. So that could be seen as a win. The tricky part, I think, that has been posed is that if that doesn't happen, then many people think that Iran has to respond at that point because otherwise they lose face regionally with their own populations and things like that. Anyway, that's kind of just some Some thoughts that I would have that are mainly informed by like Amal Saad and other folks that I follow that are sort of been talking about this. Obviously, we'll see. You know, you can't you can't predict the future. That's just sort of some analysis. But Ben, I really appreciate the thoughts that you put forward. You know, I think those are those are good. And so I think let's see. Is there anything else? Let me look. Look at what else I saved from comments people had. Um, one, Samba Boy, just thank you for this. I will go ahead and forward this on to the Good Shepherd Collective. Um, appreciative of them for joining us and just want to note for folks that there is a place to give on their website. Actually, I'll let— if y'all want to say something a little bit about how your donation structure usually works, that is probably a good thing to just highlight for folks, too.

Lara Kilani: Yeah, sure. Thank you so much, Jared. And maybe I can just say really quickly that, like, per the earlier conversation, you know, you talked about sort of like broad-based organizing. And I just want to say that I think there's a really big difference between folks who are not engaging in anti-Zionism because because it's still early for them, they're still learning about anti-Zionism, and people who have made a career being Zionists. There's a big difference there. So we want to give educational materials and grace to people who are learning, and that's the distinction. Now, about the funding, GSC, like I said, we were founded to meet this opportunity of meet this moment of trying to provide material resources for folks who are organizing on the ground and kind of create these different advocacy tools and reports and analysis and things like that. And so we, like, on principle, do most of our— the vast majority of our work funded by individual donations. We don't take large grants and we don't apply for them. So all of our work is done by the donations of individuals of like $2, $5, $10, $15 a month, things like that. And that's really important because it allows us to do our work freely the way we want to do it, the way we see it as principled in connection and in community with the Palestinian communities around us, and that we're in solidarity with, and that we're sort of organizing alongside. It means that we're not beholden to large donors, that we talk about— I think we talked about that in the last podcast, but a lot of what happens, a lot of the problems that you'll see with some of these NGOs that we are criticizing, either the ones that work on a more data and humanitarian front here in Palestine, or Even the ones in the U.S. and elsewhere that work on like quote unquote advocacy, their funding is connected to international law, like contingent on international law, and also contingent on supporting the Oslo Accords a lot of the time. And that's part of what traps them into these traps them. But you know, they also make the decision to accept the money on those. On those— on that basis. So that's why they'll talk about, you know, two-state solution, apartheid, but not settler colonialism and things like that. And it really traps the type of analysis that they're willing to give. We weren't— we're not, and we weren't willing to give that kind of power up. And so that's why we do this work on that basis. And so if folks are interested in supporting our work, you know, that means a lot to us because every kind of person who gives a little bit, especially on a monthly basis, even if it's like a dollar, that, you know, that means something for how we're able to continue our work. So we really appreciate it.

Jared: Right on. Well, I encourage folks to do that. And thank you both for being in conversation with us this morning. This has been great. I realize we've been going for like 2 and a half hours. So thank you for for all of the contributions and things that you had to say and appreciate your work.

Lara Kilani: Thank you so much.

Speaker 4: Thank you.

Lara Kilani: Yeah, thanks so much.