The Palestine Pod

This week Lara and Michael cover the Israeli continued forced starvation campaign against the Palestinian people for the last two months which serves as an escalation of its ongoing genocidal campaign.

This week Lara and Michael discuss the unilateral breakdown of the ceasefire by the zionist entity. We cover the Israeli massacres on the Palestinian people during Eid, and how it's all connected to the state-sponsored disappearances of students protesting the genocide in Turtle Island.

This week, we discuss the bizarre declaration by Milekowsky (aka Netanyahu) that he is proudly committing war crimes by imposing a total siege on the Gaza Strip cutting of all food, medication, fuel, and other aid from entering the besieged territory. We also refer to a number of the Israeli violations of Phase 1 of the ceasefire and cover the onslaught of colonial violence in the West Bank dubbed Operation Iron Wall as well as other stories from the last few weeks.

This week, Lara and Michael do a deep dive into the kidnapping and torture of Dr. Husam Abu Safiya, Director of Kamal Edwan Hospital, and a Pediatrician by Israeli occupation forces starting in late December 2024, following months of steadfastness and advocacy aimed at stopping Israeli attacks on the hospital and ending Israel's siege on the Northern part of Gaza. Lara critiques mainstream media's reporting of his abduction and Michael reminds that mainstream media has been used as a tool to whitewash the crimes of the Global North, by providing historical and contemporary examples. Lara and Michael call for the urgent release of Dr. Abu Safiya, all healthcare workers, and the thousands of Palestinian political prisoners held unjustly by Israel.

This week Lara and Michael cover the new lawsuit brought by Palestinian-Americans and DAWN against the U.S. State Department under the Administrative Procedure Act seeking to oblige the U.S. government to comply with the Leahy law and cease military assistance to Israel which is involved in grave violations of human rights through the conduct of its occupation forces in Gaza and the West Bank. Michael comments on Israel’s occupation of hundreds of square kilometers of Syrian land in the aftermath of the vacuum created by the fall of Bashar Al-Assad and Lara characterizes this as an act of aggression under international law which has hardly been described as such by mainstream corporate media. Lara refers to the latest reports from international organizations characterizing Israel’s conduct as genocide including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. Lara mentions an Israeli massacre of seven children from the same family in the Northern Part of Gaza and the frustration that accompanies the lack of policy change in the face of the most horrific admissions by Israeli soldiers of their crimes reported by the leading Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz.

This week, Lara and Michael sit down with Damia Taharraoui, a lawyer at the Paris bar, who recently filed a criminal complaint for complicity with genocide and incitement to genocide in Paris against an NGO whose members blocked the entrance of humanitarian aid into Gaza and posted about it on social media, calling on others to join them in their efforts. Damia explains the importance of holding perpetrators of atrocity crimes accountable, how open source investigation was facilitated in this case because of the individuals’ brazenness, the difference between extraterritorial and universal jurisdiction, and the political context and public discourse in France when it comes to struggling for Palestinian rights. Lara contextualizes this case as part of a pattern of emboldened perpetrators of the Gaza Genocide gleefully posting their crimes on social media noting that the Hind Rajab Foundation recently filed a submission before the ICC with evidence connecting 1000 Israeli soldiers to crimes in Gaza.

This week Lara and Michael cover the formal announcement by Apartheid Israel of the plan to not allow for the return of Palestinians to the Northern part of Gaza while it continues to ethnically cleanse Palestinians from there towards the center and southern part of Gaza. Michael comments on the recent fiasco in Amsterdam where Israeli hooligans chanted genocidal songs celebrating that there were no schools in Gaza because there were no children left, while committing acts of violence and destruction of property. Predictably, the Global North's politicians and media painted the incident, whereby genocide apologists were confronted by locals for their anti-Palestinian threats as "anti-semitic" and a "pogrom". Michael explains his theory as to why it happened, namely to strike fear into Jewish communities in Europe for the purpose of recruiting more people to settle in Israel and the OPT. Lara references Professor Avi Schlaim's findings that Iraqi Jews left their homelands after Mossad orchestrated terrorist attacks in Baghdad in the 1950s.

This week Lara and Michael sit down with the one and only Amanda Seales. Amanda shares her path to learning about and speaking up for Palestine as an artist, explaining that it takes about seven minutes to figure out what is going on, especially if one is armed with knowledge and understanding of white supremacy and colonialism. She invites listeners to check out her latest project, “What would the ancestors say” which explores Black-Palestinian solidarity amongst other social justice issues through a comedic and artistic intellectual lens. Amanda understandably reminds us of George Bernard Shaw’s saying that “if you’re going to tell people the truth, make them laugh them or else they’ll kill you.” Lara teaches Amanda Arabic. Michael wonders why Amanda still moves her own boxes.