On this edition of Parallax Views, we discuss the latest violence in Israel/Palestine. On February 23, 2023 the Israeli conducted a fatal raid in the Palestinian city of Nablus. The raid is reported to have resulted in the 11 deaths and 102 injuries. In retaliation, a Palestinian gunmen killed two Israeli settler outside of the Palestinian village Huwara on February 26, 2023. Israeli settlers responded with vigilante violence, described as a rampage in the Washington Post and Times of Israel, in Huwara that saw the burning of houses, cars, and casualties.
Tikun Olam’s Richard Silverstein returns to discuss these events, with a focus on the settler violence in Huwara, as explored in his recent Middle East Eye article “Israel: Settler terrorism is now the law”.
Among the topics covered in this conversation:
– Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel senior ministerial figures Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, the dehumanization of Palestinians by the Israel’s far-right, and the Israeli political figures who have said that Huwara must be “erased”
– The case of Jonathan Pollack, a pro-Palestinian Israeli who was arrested by the Israeli government; the Israeli right’s clampdown on Israeli leftists
– The Israel Lobby (AIPAC or the American-Public Affairs Commitee) and the discourse in the U.S. around Israel/Palestine
– How the Democratic Party in the U.S. approaches the subject of Israel/Palestine; the international communities approach to Israel with a focus on the UN (United Nations)
– The violence in Huwara and “peering into the heart of darkness”
-Journalist Josh Breiner of Israeli’s Haaretz paper and his experience of reporting the Huwara settler violence; Breiner was shot at
– The history of the Israeli settlers in the West Bank going back to 1967; settlements have been encouraged by the state of Israel
– Can the rampage in Huwara be described as a “pogrom”?
– And more!
