On this edition of Parallax Views, ReThinking Foreign Policy’s Mitchell Plitnick returns to the program to discuss the FBI’s probe into the death of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh as well as his thoughts on the Biden administration’s policy towards Israel, AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) launching of a super PAC and entrance into direct campaign spending, and the recent Israeli elections that have emboldened Israel’s far-right.
Among the topics discussed in this conversation
– The death of Shireen Abu Akleh while she was covering as Israeli raid of a Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank; Abu Akleh was wearing full body armor when she was fatally shot; Israel’s internal army investigation of Abu Akleh’s death; Abu Akleh worked for Al Jazeera and her death reverberated throughout the Arab world
– The FBI’s investigation into Abu Akleh’s death and the Biden White house administration’s response to it; the Israeli objection to the FBI investigation
– The investigation will go nowhere without Israeli cooperation
– Comparing/contrasting the death of activist Rachel Corrie, ran over by an Israeli bulldozer in 2003, to the death of Shireen Abu Akleh
– What approach should the U.S. foreign policy approach be when it comes to Israel?
– Military aid and arms sales to Israel
– The rise of the Israeli far-right; the Israeli elections; Benjamin Netanyahu and the Likud Party; the Religious Zionism coalition; Bezaleel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir; Smotrich’s homophobia and anti-LGBTQ stances; how did the rise of Israel’s far-right happen?
– Human rights and foreign policy
– Noam, the far-right Orthodox Jewish political party in Israel that is part of the Religious Zionism coalition
– Smotrich and Israel’s Finance Ministry; Ben-Gvir and the Ministry of National Security ; policing in Israel; the strong right-wing majority in the Knesset
– Combating antisemitism while also being critical of Israeli policies as a nation-state
– U.S. Christian Nationalist, the antisemitic right, and the Israeli far-right
– And much, much more!
