October 7, 2023 Hamas executed a surprise attack on military and civilian Israeli targets, killing over 1200 people and taking around 200 hostages. Israel’s response to Hamas’s horrific actions has once again been disproportionate and genocidal. We demand a ceasefire and condemn any attacks on civilians.
In recent years DSA has made solidarity with Palestine a priority. We already had plans to do an episode on Palestine soon, but due to recent events we wanted to provide historical context as soon as possible, context that is rarely provided by the mainstream media in America.
We will have more on this topic in the future. The DSA National Political Education Committee is working on additional educational materials, including training material on how to talk to non-socialistists on Palestine. This material will be available to everyone, but will be especially designed for local DSA chapters to facilitate their own trainings.
In this episode we interview Sumaya Awad and Daphna Thier. Sumaya Awad is the Adalah Justice Project's director of strategy and communications, and coeditor of Palestine: A Socialist Introduction (Haymarket Books). You’ll recognize Daphna from a number of our previous episodes. She was previously the chair of the DSA National Political Education Committee, and is now the Labor Education Coordinator for Emergency Workplace Organizing Committee (EWOC). Sumaya and Daphna have published multiple articles together in Jacobin on Palestine (see below).
Note that Sumaya and Daphna both make reference to the number of Palestinian children that have died in the current conflict. According to the Washington Post as of yesterday, October 22, 1,873 children have died.
DSA Members and U.S. Representatives Cori Bush and Rashida Tlaib submitted a resolution to Congress titled “Ceasefire NOW”. The NPC Steering Committee officially endorsed the resolution and is calling for all DSA members to send an email to their elected representatives demanding they sign on as co-sponsors of this resolution and end the genocide.
October 7, 2023 Hamas executed a surprise attack on military and civilian Israeli targets, killing over 1200 people and taking around 200 hostages. Israel’s response to Hamas’s horrific actions has once again been disproportionate and genocidal. We demand a ceasefire and condemn any attacks on civilians.
In recent years DSA has made solidarity with Palestine a priority. We already had plans to do an episode on Palestine soon, but due to recent events we wanted to provide historical context as soon as possible, context that is rarely provided by the mainstream media in America.
We will have more on this topic in the future. The DSA National Political Education Committee is working on additional educational materials, including training material on how to talk to non-socialistists on Palestine. This material will be available to everyone, but will be especially designed for local DSA chapters to facilitate their own trainings.
In this episode we interview Sumaya Awad and Daphna Thier. Sumaya Awad is the Adalah Justice Project's director of strategy and communications, and coeditor of Palestine: A Socialist Introduction (Haymarket Books). You’ll recognize Daphna from a number of our previous episodes. She was previously the chair of the DSA National Political Education Committee, and is now the Labor Education Coordinator for Emergency Workplace Organizing Committee (EWOC). Sumaya and Daphna have published multiple articles together in Jacobin on Palestine (see below).
Note that Sumaya and Daphna both make reference to the number of Palestinian children that have died in the current conflict. According to the Washington Post as of yesterday, October 22, 1,873 children have died.
DSA Members and U.S. Representatives Cori Bush and Rashida Tlaib submitted a resolution to Congress titled “Ceasefire NOW”. The NPC Steering Committee officially endorsed the resolution and is calling for all DSA members to send an email to their elected representatives demanding they sign on as co-sponsors of this resolution and end the genocide.
You are listening to Class, an official podcast of the Democratic Socialists of America National Political Education Committee. My name is Elton lk. October 7th, 2023, Hamas executed a surprise attack on military and civilian Israeli targets killing over 1200 people and taking around 200 hostages. Israel's response to Hamas' horrific actions has once again been disproportionate and genocidal. We demand a ceasefire and condemn any attacks on civilians. In recent years, DSA has made solidarity with Palestine a priority. We already had plans to do an episode on Palestine soon, but due to recent events, we wanted to provide historical context as soon as possible. Context that is rarely provided by the mainstream media in America. We will have more on this topic in the future. The DSA National Political Education Committee is working on additional educational materials, including training materials on how to talk to non socialists on Palestine. Because we wanted to get this bonus episode out quickly. The sound quality does not match our other episodes. We apologize, but I think it still sounds good and the content is the important part. You'll just hear some extra noises from the streets of New York City. In this episode, we interview Samaya Awad and Daphna Thier samaya Awad is the Adalah Justice Project's Director of Strategy and Communications, and co-editor of the book Palestine, A Socialist Introduction out by Haymarket Books. The link is in the show notes. You'll recognize Daphna from a number of our previous episodes. She was previously the chair of the d S a National Political Education Committee and is now the Labor Education Coordinator at the Emergency Workplace Organizing Committee, also known as EWOC. Samaya and Daphna have published multiple articles together in Jacobin on Palestine, which you will find in the show notes. One last thing before we go to our guests, if you would like to take action, we have links in the show notes to DSA's website. You can send an email to Congress demanding a ceasefire now, or participate in a phone bank calling people about what is happening right now in Palestine, there's a link to a Palestine Solidarity National Toolkit to learn more about joining the Struggle for#NoMoneyForMassacres.
Elton LK:
First question, so for some context, can you please just describe the current moment in brief?
Sumaya:
Sure. Um, so we're now entering day 14. Um,.Of Israel's onslaught on Gaza. Um, it's been 14 days of constant indiscriminate bombing of 2.2 million Palestinians who are living under a suffocating Israeli blockade. Um, there's no electricity. There's no fuel. They have officially run out of water. Um, And all access to water has been turned off. The only sewage treatment facility is no longer running. Um, and, uh, medical supplies and, and food supplies, um, are dwindling very, very quickly. Um, and Israel's not is slowing down. In fact, it's ramping up its attack. Um, and nothing is off limits. You know, they've bombed. Roads, they've bombed the roads that lead from northern Gaza to southern Gaza after telling Palestinians in the north to move south. And then they bombed convoys of Palestinians trying to move south. They've bombed hospitals, they bombed schools, they bombed places of worship, including a church that's 500 years old. Um, and. The death toll is very quickly rising. It's over 4,000 Palestinians, over 1500 of them children. Um, and that's, that's not a surprise that there are so many children being killed because 50% of Gaza's population is under 18 years old. 43% of them under 14 years old. Um, and Israel knows what it's doing. It's been very clear about its intentions from the beginning. When the Israeli defense Minister, Netanyahu and other Israeli officials made it clear that they want to flatten Gaza, that they want to make Gaza into a parking lot, um, and that all Palestinians are responsible for the actions of October 7th, um, that there is no innocent Palestinian. Um, and we expect this to continue. We don't expect this to slow down. And of course, during the last 14 days, the US government. President Biden, numerous, um, elected officials in Congress and also on local and state levels have stood by Israel and have made it clear that they will continue to support Israel politically and financially no matter what. Um, and that no matter what is, is now experts are saying is is a genocide that is unfolding, um, genocide unfolding in 2023 with the backing of the major. World powers.
Daphna:
Yeah, I think the backing of our, uh, of our government for this. Indiscriminate bombing has been the most kind of shocking thing to see.'cause it's just like really? We are gonna throw our support behind this obviously evil thing. And I think that's what's driving so many people out into rallies and protests and marches and phone banking and writing Congress. And I think there's like very clear support for a ceasefire. In fact, 65% of Americans support a ceasefire. So it's clear that what Biden is doing is extremely unpopular and um, Just sort of obvious to people that the ceasefire call is the most humanitarian thing, um, to be calling for right now. And I would just add that like, you know, I'm Israeli, uh, or formally Israeli, and I, uh, was very. Sad by what happened on the seventh. Um, you know, I knew from my friends and family that they were scared and terrified and it's totally, totally, inexcusable to turn around and indiscriminately bomb civilians. It's actually considered a war crime. So I just wanna be like totally clear that even if you're grieving for what happened, what we're not saying is like that a child on the Israeli side doesn't matter. What we're saying is that that doesn't justify the 1700, uh, children in, in Gaza that has so far died. Like there's nothing, no justification. There is no Way that that would ever, uh, be anything other than criminal. And they have been very clear that they like, like Samaya was just saying like that, that is actually part of the plan.
Elton LK:
So, Can you talk about the historical context? Um, how did we get to this place?
Track 1:
like two, two levels of context. There's the context of how Gaza came to be, this besieged strip, you know, the size. Gaza is essentially the size of the city of Philadelphia, and there's 2.2 million people living there. With absolutely no control over any aspect of their lives. Um, so I'll start by talking about that context and then maybe Daphna can do the, the larger 75 year context. Um, but Gaza is so isolated from the rest of historic Palestine, you know, from the occupied West Bank by design. This was by Israel's design that it came to be this way. Um, and if we go back to, um, The, so the majority of Palestinians and Gaza refugees, they were refugees that became refugees in 1948 when Israel established itself as a state through the ethnic cleansing of Palestine. Um, many of them became refugees in 1967 when Israel occupied the West Bank, um, um, and took over much of Gaza. and, um, and others were internally displaced within Gaza again and again. Um, and hundreds, thousands of the Palestinians in Gaza live within walking distance of their original homes and lands. They're just a couple miles away, and of course, they've never been able to return or even see them, um, because of the blockade. Um, and so when the, when Israel Began the blockade in 2006 had established several policies leading up to that to alienate Gaza. Um, and there are many examples of these policies, and I don't have time to go through all of them, but I wanna mention one in particular, which is the family separation law, because I think it's a, it's a really. Brutal reflection of the types of policies that Israel, um, uses to fragment Palestinians, um, to fragment them, um, geographically. Um, and then their identity to fragment the Palestinian identity and the family separation law stipulated that if you're a Palestinian resident of Gaza, but you lived in the occupied West Bank because you, um, married someone who was a resident of the West Bank, or your children were residents of the West Bank or your parents, but you're a resident of Gaza. You have to move back to Gaza. You are not allowed to stay in occupied West Bank and vice versa. If you were a resident of the occupied West Bank, a resident of Jerusalem, but you, your spouse was a resident of Gaza, your children were residents of Gaza, your parents, et cetera, um, you had to make a choice. You're either separated from them, you stay in occupied with mek, they go back to Gaza, or you move with them to Gaza and you sign off. If you sign away, you're right. To live in the occupied West Bank, you sign away your right to be a resident of the city or the town or the village that you come from, and you move to Gaza and you're not allowed back. And this tore up thousands of families, um, families that have not been reunited since, um, and was part of this alienation in isolation of Gaza from the rest of, uh, from the rest of Palestine and the isolation of Palestinians and Gaza from Palestinians, um, elsewhere. Um, And so in 2006 when the blockade began, there was already this sense of fragmentation. Um, and then the blockade just continued to intensify. Um, and every couple of years, the bombing essentially never stopped, like every month or two. There would be some, some form of Israeli bombardment, but then every couple of years there would be a large scale assault bombing campaign on Gaza that would leave hundreds, often, thousands dead. And we saw that in 2008, 2009 and 2012. And 2014 in 2018 in 2021, and now we're in 2023. And no matter how Palestinians and Gaza attempted to resist the blockade, attempted to resist the fact that they had absolutely no control over their lives. You could not enter and leave Gaza no matter how dire your situation was if people were dying for medical conditions that needed. Like specialists and, and they needed to get out it with life and death. They wouldn't be allowed to because Israel needed to, to approve that permit. Um, and they, they tried to resist in many ways. And the, the, you know, the biggest and most important example of this was 2018, the great march of return when 40,000 Palestinians unarmed Palestinians peacefully marched to the militarized barrier between Gaza and Israel and sort of set up encampments and named them. Pitched up tents and named the different encampments there over their original Palestinian villages that they came from that were just a few miles away. Um, and they were met with bullets. They were met with snipers. Um, they killed medics, they killed Israel, killed medics, journalists, um, families that were just peacefully protesting against this blockade. Um, And that's really important to name because as we've seen in the last two weeks, Palestinians as a Palestinians as a whole are being smeared as the aggressors, as terrorists, as violent instigators. And when you actually look back at the history, it's so clear that that is just not the case. That no matter what Palestinians do, no matter how they protest, whether, whether it's through peaceful boycotts or Um, peaceful marches, doesn't matter. They're going to be shot at, they're going to be smeared, they're going to be dehumanized. Um, and that's the context that led us to the last two weeks.
Daphna:
Yeah. And I would add to that and say, you know, a lot of times people are like, well free Gaza from Hamas.'cause that's like the issue, right? But if you look at what's going on in the West Bank, there is no Hamas there. So why are hundreds of Palestinians killed in the West Bank too, all, you know, um, during the year? Like, what, what's, what's. Their crime, right? Their crime is that they're resisting, that they're protesting, or, uh, you know, that they're existing. Frankly, you know, night raids. No one, everyone's at home in their bed. They're not out in the street doing anything. They get raided at night. Um, and I, I saw, um, uh, one father was describing his two sons getting taken in a very recent night raid, and him saying, well, you know, worrying about the children, that they needed jackets and the soldier telling him, your children don't deserve to be alive. So it's really not about. Hamas, it's about Palestinians being Palestinians. Uh, there have also been a lot, there's been a lot of repression against Palestinian citizens of Israel, and we know that in Israeli society there's a whole. Web of dozens of laws that enshrine second grade citizenship. So it's very clear that apartheid runs deep in all the different settings and there's no like right way to be Palestinian. And I think that, you know, just if you look at the history, if you start from the kind of early inception, I'd say there's like a, a couple of things that, that I think would be important to know in. One thing is that the ethnic cleansing of Palestine was deeply and completely planned out. That they spent many, many months meeting every week planning out, and eventually they landed on what they called Plan Dalet which is, you know, maybe it was their fourth plan.'cause Dalet is the fourth letter. So they went through different iterations and they came to the decision to expel, you know, over 500 villages with close to a million Palestinians. And they did so at gunpoint and they did so by bombing people, families in their sleep at night. And they did so through, you know, acts of violence and murder and mass. Murders massacres Palestinians, blindfolded, hands tied behind their back shot or made to dig their own graves, and then shot into mass graves, uh, held in cages and then shot at, uh, children were killed. Women were raped and killed. The level of violence is. You know, just difficult to imagine. And yet it's been pretty well documented, not only by Palestinians voicing, you know, their own memories of this, but also because of. Some brave, uh, is Israeli historians that went into Ilan Pappe in particular. He went into the archives of the Israeli military and also Ben-Gurion's diary and looked through all of those things and mapped out. What happened, what was planned and what happened and how Ben-Gurion was pleased at every time they were able to clear out another area, and there was actually a decision that was made by the leadership at the time, the Zionist leadership, they said they couldn't actually. Get the whole land. They wanted all historic Palestine, but they couldn't. So they were gonna give up a couple of parts of it and just focus on what they could, and they agreed because of that to the UN partition. So there were before the UN partition already. Many ways in which the Zionist movement pushed Palestinians off of lands that they were living and working on, and boycotted Palestinian labor and brought in as much Jewish labor. And then as they encroached on that, you know, they, they went from having a very small percentage of the land to With the partition getting like, you know, half the land for a much smaller population and Palestinians rejected this. They said, well, what do you mean we we're gonna give half our land to this colonizing force that has come from Europe? Like, that's crazy. We wouldn't, why would anyone agree to giving half their land? And scientists use that as a lot, as a big talking point, right? Because they say, well, this is how they started it.'cause we offered them half their land, And uh, I think knowing some of that history and understanding that it was both forced, planned and totally unfair, um, gives you a little bit of a sense of like, okay, so that's where things started. It's basically an ongoing ethnic cleansing that has been going on since before even, uh, the establishment of the state before 75 years. But certainly with the establishment of the state, a great crime was committed and, um, I think that's one main thing. And then I also think that a lot, another big talking point that people point, point to is the fact is the Oslo accords and how Palestinians clearly like weren't, you know, I don't know. They weren't committed to peace and that's why the Oslo Accords failed, but the Oslo Accords took Palestinian land, took. The West Bank and divided it into three sections, and the idea was that Palestinians would have full control over one area. Half control over the next area and, uh, you know, no control over the, the final area. And basically what's happened is that over the years, up until the, up until 2000, up until the point when the second Intifada broke out, um, you Israel encroached and took. And didn't ever really give back any control it was supposed to, over time, move in more and more into Palestinian hands. Instead, what happened was that moved more and more into Israeli hands, and now there's almost no element of life in West, in the West Bank that isn't. Totally controlled by Israel and there are settlements all throughout it. And it's very clear that the intention is to get rid of Palestinian, um, autonomy and basically establish the Jewish state from the river to the sea. And that's why I think we, we chant from the river to to the sea Palestine will be free is because we're looking for freedom and democracy. All across the land and Right. Right now what we have is apartheid in every part of the country.
Elton LK:
I am sure you've had a lot a busy last couple weeks, so we can wrap up with one more question. Can you talk maybe what role we have as socialists in this current moment?
Sumaya:
Yeah, this is my favorite question because I think Palestine is so clearly, um, a socialist struggle, um, on like every conceivable level. And I wish I could talk about this for like 60 minutes, but instead I'll do my two minute spiel Um, I think there's, there's like two important things. Um, To mention the first is that Zionism, which is, you know, the political ideology that Israel is using to justify its its whole project. Um, Zionism at its core is an anti-war worker movement because it is based on an idea of like ethno-nationalism, ethno supremacy, and Jewish supremacy, meaning it's not extended to all people and certainly not Palestinians And that means if you're a Palestinian worker, sorry. No, you're not part of my union. No, you're not in the struggle with me. And I think that that is really, really important because as socialists, obviously what we're fighting for is working class power, and that means regardless of a person's identity, a person's religion, a person's culture, nationality, it doesn't matter. You're a worker. We're fighting with you, you're oppressed, we're fighting with you against your oppressor. Um, and we're, we're, and that's clear. That's clear for us. Plain and simple. Um, and the second level of this, especially here in the US is that we're not just bystanders in this. Our government is actually funding the oppression of Palestinians. Um, and in many ways funding it using our very own tax dollars. and right now the bombs falling on Gaza. Many of them are bombs that were manufactured here in the United States by US weapons manufacturers. Um, many of them are paid for by US military funding,$3.8 billion every year. And this new funding package that Biden just proposed would be another, I think it's$16 billion. And so this is. The US is complicit in what is happening. Um, and that means we have a responsibility to organize against this military funding to Israel. Um, and we also have a stake in this because these weapons manufacturers, these corporations, It's not just something happening over there across the Atlantic. It comes back here and it hurts us domestically as well. Um, and we, we know that there are so many parallels between oppressive policies that the US government is in enacting here domestically that Israel's also using there, or corporations that tie the two together. And the, I think the example that's most often used that I'll also use right now is Elbit Systems and G4S two. Um, uh, Uh, tech, military, tech companies. Um,.Both operate in Israel, in, um, the construction and the enforcement of the infrastructure of apartheid against Palestinians and at the US Mexico border. Both also work with oppressive regimes around the world, um, in Mexico, in the u a e in Saudi Arabia. And the list is long. And so there's like a very clear connection between what Israel is doing to Palestinians, um, What our own government is, is, is complicit in here at home and also elsewhere, um, certainly in the Middle East, whether it's in a Iraq or Syria, in Afghanistan. Um, and I think drawing those connections is really, really important. And drawing those connections also helps us reach the conclusion that one of the things that we should really uplift here in the US and that we should implement a socialist, um, is the boycott divestment sanctions movement. And I'll hand it over to Daphna.
Daphna:
I mean, that was really well put. I think there's lots of ways that socialists can bring These questions of like what our government is complicit in around the world and how that impacts us here locally and, um, how much money we're spending on one on war and occupation and killing, and how much money is spent on things that are life giving, like healthcare and, uh, We can, we can talk about those things and make those connections. I think that's important. I also think that there are ways to bring this struggle ultimately into our labor organizing, into our broader organizing. It's climate related, it's, it's people related. It's, there's so many different ways here and. The more that we can help build a powerful and strong and engaged working class movement in this country, the more that we will be able to stand up to our government when it enacts policies that we disagree with, and we will be able to Shut it down when we don't want them to be able to just conduct business as usual. And right now what we're seeing is that despite the popularity of the call for the ceasefire, our government feels that they can just carte blanche, they can do whatever they want and I think. I think that that's a testimony to all the work that we have cut out for us as socialists to organize ordinary people and to build a really powerful fighting movement in this country. I'm really grateful to everything that DSA members have been doing in the last couple of weeks. It's been extremely life giving and gives me so much hope. All the work, the hundreds of people that have showed up to phone bank, the thousands of people who've showed up to rallies across the, the country, and who've been organizing tirelessly and are tired. And ragged, but really, really believe in freedom for Palestine.
