the conflict between the palestinians and israel, which has reached a terrifying crochendo with the assault on gaza is the outcome of a 100-year. colonial occupation by jewish zionists in israel backed by major imperial powers, starting with the british and a century later with the united states. this century long assault by israel has one objective, force and indigenous people from their land. the historian rasheid breaks what he calls the hundred years of war on palestine into six periods. the first is the british support for jewish. zionist during

the british occupation of palestine from 1917 until 1939. the second declaration of war is the 1947 to 1948 nakba or catastrophe that saw zionist militias ethnically cleansed 750,000 palestinians from historic palestine and carry out series of massacres. the third is the 19. 67 war when israel seized the west bank, east jerusalem and gaza and expelled roughly another 25000 palestinians. the fourth declaration of war on palestine was ariel sharone's invasion of lebanon and the siege of beirot, followed by the departure of the palestinian liberation organization fighters to tunisia and other parts of the arab world and the 1982 massacre at the sovereign shatilla refugee camps. the fourth war again. the palestinians began with the

first intada or uprising in 1987, continued of with the second intada and is taking place of with the israeli assault on gaza. the backdrop to this century of war by israel and the palestinians is the failure by arab leaders to offer meaningful support to the palestinian people. in fact, these leaders often colluded with israel to weaken the palestinian resistant resistance movement. join. me to discuss israel's settler colonial project, how it is being played out in gaza and its consequences is rasheid, the edward said, professor of modern arab studies at colombia university and the author of the hundred years war on palestein a history of settler colonialization and resistance 1917, 2017. first i just have to say that for anyone who wants to put what's happening in gaza in... context, i can't think of better of

book, um, you make the argument correctly, of course that we see variations in scale and savagery and tactics, but not in intent. um, let's begin with on the eve of the balfore declaration, only 6% of the residents of historic palestine are jewish, and and i think uh... "if you can lay out the importance of the backing of superpowers, of first britain and the united states in pushing through this zionist project. well, i choose to start, thanks for having me, chris, i, i choose to start this this narrative with the balford declaration of 1917, because i think that the the framing of the conflict as one just between zionism and the palestinians or between israel and the palestinians, is is of basically false, um, of course..." 'there is

national conflict there and that's central to it, but without the external support that zionism received from the british, none of what we have seen in the past century and more would have happened as it did. um, british and later american and other external support were absolutely essential to the success of the ziest project from the very beginning, so i start this 100 years war, this tale of hundred years, what i call hundred years war, with the balford declaration of 1917'. which gives the power of the greatest empire of its day, the support of the power of the greatest empire of its day to the zinist project, calling for, in the words of the balfor declaration, the establishment of a jewish national home in palestine, now the balford declaration and the mandate that follows it never mentioned the palestinians and i think that's essential, removing the palestinians e lighting the palestinians is is and has always been part of not only design. but of

the project of the great powers that supported. you right, the british empire was never motivated by ulturism. britain strategic interests were perfectly served by its sponsorship of the zionist project. just as they were served by range of regional wartime undertakings explain exactly. um, there are many motivations for the british issuing the bel for declaration, and some of them that have been induced are phylosemitism or christian zionism, the belief in the 19th century among protestant evangelicals in britain that the return of the jewish people to the holy land was a christian duty. these are minor, in my view, minor elements in the motivation. for the british, the essential motivation for the british was imperial and strategic. britain wanted to create buffer to defend the eastern frontier of egypt under british control. they wanted to do this 10, 11 years before the balfor declaration. they

also wanted to control the mediterranean terminus of the shortest land route between the mediterranean and the gulf, thinking at that time of railway and later on creating in that space. that runs from uh haifa through what is now jordan to iraq, the creating a road system, creating a pipeline, oil pipeline and creating a series of airbases, so the british had these objectives in mind, protecting egypt's defenses from the east by controlling palestine and controlling the mediterranean terminus of this short this shortest land route between these two bodies of water, which was essential obviously to their connection to their indian empire, that's what motivated britain and "that's what motiv strategic motivations were also what led them to change their policy at the end of the 1930s. you talk about the rise of nationalism, the in historic palestine, they had been ruled by the ottoman empire for 20 centuries from the 7th century until 1948,

and uh you deal with 16th from the 16th century, 16th century, sorry, sorry, 16th century, yes, um, uh, can you talk about that and and and how it affected palestinian identity? well, nationalism was developing all over the ottoman empire, not only among arabs, among turks, among armenians, among greeks, it was also developing among jewish communities in eastern europe, which is where zionism comes in, it is, it is in palestine settler colonial project, but it is also national movement among persecuted eastern european jews, in the case of palestine, you had local... patriotism which over time develops into palestinian nationalism as part of a broader movement towards nationalist identifications all over the colonized world um and all over much of europe. i mean you you have similar things happening in the balkans and in eastern europe, the rise of

national consciousness and demands for national independence and self-determination in the period before world war i during and after world war i, and that that's what happens in palestine as in other other parts the arab. so there is a clear understanding, it's one of the kind of nice layer textures of your book is that you your family was involved at very high levels with this zionist project, where we also see how they're saying one thing to the palestine leadership and quite another amongst themselves, right? um, but i want to talk about opposition uh, because initially the opposition is non-violent, democratic, uh, you uh they form congresses, they have leaders, and it goes nowhere. well, the opposition actually begins before world war one. the opposition is parliamentary, the opposition is in the press, there's a little bit of resistance by peasants to their their

their disposession in different parts of palestine, where zionist colonies are established, but essentially the opposition before and after world war one um is as you say, in the form of demonstrations or speeches or late after world war 1 congresses and delegations to london where the british government is obviously um and petitions to the high commissioner in palestine all of this as you say goes absolutely nowhere uh there are violent outbreaks in 1920 and 21 and again in 1929 but the thrust of the palestinian national movement up until 1936 is essentially demonstrations, strikes, boyots, petitions, congresses, newspaper articles and so forth, and it achieves absolutely nothing. the british are unyielding in their support for the zionist project, and mean in the meanwhile, jewish immigration is growing because of persecution in europe, the nazis come to power in germany

in 1933, and immigration shoots up, the jewish population is a proportion of the whole goes from 17% in 1930 and 31 to 31% by the end of the 30. as a result of people fleeing the nazis and not being allowed to go anywhere else, united states has shut its stores to immigration, britain has shut its doors to immigration, and so these persecuted, this persecuted population. coming out of eastern europe literally has nowhere to go, people who could and would certainly have been saved from the holocaust are basically shut out of most western democracies and that's part of the tragedy, these people are forced in the sense to go to palestine, whether they want to or not, because it's the only country where immigration is unlimited thanks to the british mandate, which says that there should be unlimited jewish immigration to palestine, and so this changes the the demographics of palestine in a period of six or... years and you point out that they come both with educational levels and resources that most

indigenous members of historic palestine do not have, exactly, through something called the transfer agreement that the zinust movement negotiates with the nazis, people are allowed to bring some of their capital and some of their property with them, and that leads to influx influx not only of german jewish population which is highly educated and skilled and motivated, but but also of lot of capital, and so the the economic balance in palestine shifts, even though the jewish population is under 35%, it controls more than half of the economy by 1935. i want to talk about the duplicity of the zionist leadership, heim weiceman, you write, for example, told several prominent arabs a dinner in jerusalem in march 1918, quote, to beware, treaches insinuations that zionists were seeking political power, um, and you write. the zionist movement leaders understood that, quote, under no circumstances should they talk, as though the

zionist program required the expulsion of the arabs, because that would cause the jews to lose the world's sympathy. this duplicity of course continues, this day as all of us who covered gaza in the west bank, we would file our reports and then watch the israelis reflexivelly lie, but talk about this duplicity and it's importance. yeah, i mean it goes right back to... incident that i detail in the very beginning of the book, where ancestor of mine who had been a member the ottoman parliament, the first ottoman parliament and who had been mayor of jerusalem and had lived in europe, he taught in vienna, he knew german, he knew about dianism, we know that from his papers and from the books and and and and vietnamese newspapers that he received that are kept in the family library to this day, he knew about scientism, he knew everything about science. so he writes to theodore hurzel in 1899, two years after the first dionist congress, with

a full knowledge that the objective is a jewish state in palestine, and he tells him that, we we respect the jews, they are our cousins, we understand your suffering, there's nothing more noble than the idea of the jewish people having a state, but not here, there's already a people here, and the the interesting thing is not only this letter from this ancestor of mine, a man named,

i think a constant ever since um the idea of ethnic cleansing which is something that was inherent and which was practiced again and again in 1948, 1967 is being practiced today in in gaza, pushing people into the south of the gaza strip was always inherent zionism because there's other way to as i've said create majority jewish state in a majority arab country. you quote the israeli sociologist baruk uh kimmerling. uh this term politicide of the palestinian people, what do

you what what explain that? well, i mean, it was essential to argue that the only people with legitimate rights in this country were the jewish people. this is now part of the the israeli constitution uh as of a law that was passed in 2018, uh uh, only the jewish people have the right of self-determination uh, the land of israel, that's part of the platform of the liquid party from 1977, that's part of the program of the current israely government, but it's always been inherent in the zianis project. uh, if there were two peoples there, then why would the minority have a right to the entire or country or to most of it? um, and this approach is essentially adopted by the british and is incorporated not only into the balfar declaration, but into the mandate for palestine that the league of nations gives britain, which is the which is the charter for ruling palestine uh under under the

league of nations from 19 22 when the when the mandate is adopted until the british finally... believe in 1948 um, the idea being that there are no, there is no palestinian people, the palestinians are never mentioned in the balford declaration, except as the non- jewish population of palestine, they're never described as national entity, they're never described as having political rights, the only rights that are to be allowed to the overwhelming palestinian majority are civil and religious rights, and this approach, which is a british imperial approach as well as a zionist approach continues pretty... up to the present day, israel becomes a state is entitled to national self-determination, the rights that the nation state enjoys, the palestinians, if they are even to demand these things, do it on sufference and are only allowed basically a similcrum, a pale shadow of these things, mean you look at all the all the proposals made to the palestinians, they're never for sovereignty,

full sovereignty, therefore some form of autonomy under israeli sovereignty, and that approach has been central. not only to zionism and and the the diplomacy of the state of israel after 1948, but to the the approach of the great power, certainly of the united states and and before it of britain. let's talk about the 1936 to 1939 palestinian or arab revolt, it was, i didn't understand until i read your book how bloody it was, uh, the british, i think, if i remember correctly, sent in 100 thousand troops, they armed. jewish militias, but this came of course after decades of essentially non-violent tactics that had failed. well, the the the the spark for this is a growing militancy among young palestinians, among middle class palestinians, among palestinians who see the extraordinary rise in jewish immigration. in 1935, 60 thousand plus new

immigrants arrive in palestine, which is larger than the entire jewish population of the country in 1970. and there are articles in the papers saying at this rate we're going to become strangers in our own country uh and so in response to the to the ineffectual leadership of the palestinian elites that dominated the national movement and in response to this complete unwillingness of the british to respond to palestinian demands eventually a general strike breaks out in 1936 which is a grassroots effort. leadership had nothing to do with, the leadership was surprised by it, the the traditional elite leaders are taken by surprise, the general strike goes on for six months, it's ended by the intervention of the arab governments which are afraid that this would lead to instability and and which are trying to do the bidding of their british masters, so the king of egypt, the king of of of iraq and so

forth intervene, and the general strike ends and the british send out a commission of inquiry which decides to partition palestine, give a... of it over to a jewish state from which are to be transferred, the term is transferred, the arab population, because even in that tiny part of palestine there wasn't a jewish majority, and the rest of which is to be given to britain's client king their country, and what the british are offering them is insult, and so what starts is a general strike. and and unrest in the countryside turns into a general uh revolt, armed revolt, the british lose control of parts of most, much of the countryside, they lose briefly lose control of several cities, they're unable to bring in reinforcements in 1938 because of crises in europe and the need to tie down british troops in europe, and because they're afraid to send indian troops

because they're not sure of their loyalty because so many indians are exercised about british repression and palestine and so the revolt expands and by 1938 the british are in a desperate situation, they begin to arm and train auxiliaries from the designist militias whom they train in savage british counter insurgency tactics, shooting prisoners, blowing up houses over people's heads, large detention camps and so forth, all of which are the modus operandi of the israeli army going forward, the people who become the first generals in the israeli army are trained by these british counter insurgency experts in the late 1930s to help the british put down this revolt finally after the the... "crisis in europe is temporarily over with the munich agreement, the british have reserves that are freed and they come, they flood palestine with troops and the raf and

they bomb and and destroy their way to crushing the palestinian revolt, in the course of which something like 14 to 17% of the adult male palestinian population are either killed, wounded, imprisoned or exiled, so the revolt is crushed, the palestinians are broken." of weapons are confiscated, dozens and dozens of people are summarily executed, many more are shot in the course of operations after being taken prisoner, and the palestinians really suffer enormously, their leadership is exiled going into the 1940s in fact from from the effects of the of the repression by the british of this revolt. i want to go into the relationship between the british and the zionist changes on the eve. of world war ii because of course the british need arab support, although they form a british, the british form a jewish battalion or division, i can't brigade,

jewish brigade brigade, jewish brigade, 1948, you have uh zionist terrorist groups, argun, sterng gang attacking the british, they blow up the hq of the british, the king david hotel, so 19. 48, the nakba um and uh and then i think you i want to end of course by talking about what's happening today, but let's talk a little bit about the knockb or the catastrophe. the british do, as you say, shift their position, and they drastically reduced their commitments to the zionists in 1939, because on the eve of world war ii, they realize they're going to have to fight that war in the middle east, and they need the support of the local populations, which... come to hate them for the repression the palestinians and this goes far beyond um uh palestine and the arab world, it goes to the rest of the muslim world and in fact to much of india, so you have the secretary of

state for india writing to the cabinet saying this has become an indian problem, we cannot continue this support for the zionists, this is going to hurt us here, they couldn't, they already in 1937 decided they couldn't send troops from india to put down the palestinian role because they weren't sure of their loyalty, and so britain does pivot. away from the zionist movement, its commitment, its commitments to the zionists and makes a bunch of promises, which of course they never keep to the palestinians. um, after world war ii, the situation is entirely changed. first of all, the zionist movement is now fighting british, as you say, um, and secondly, the zionists have pivoted themselves, having been in their view betrayed by the british, their previous patron, which had allied with them only for strategic reasons and which turned away from them for. other strategic reasons, um, the zionists very shrewedly are able to develop relations with uh washington and moscow, and these become their patrons uh for the period immediately after world war ii,

when the british finally decide they can't hang to palestine, they're leaving india at the same time, this is 1947, um, and they decide they're going to abandon palestine, and they toss it into the lap of the united nations, which creates a commission that has majority and a minority report, the majority report gives most of... palestine to the zianists, well at that time we're under 35% the population, the jewish population was about 33, 34%, the arab population is an overwhelming majority, and yet the palestinians are given just over 42% of palestine, the zientists are given 55%, and then there's supposed to be a internationalized corpus separatum in the middle, the palestinians say, this is our country, we are the majority, under the covenant of the league of nations and under the charter of the united nations, we're supposed to get self-determination. and so they reject the partition plan, which would have given most of their country, most of which they owned, zinis land ownership was only about 6% at this time, to putative

jewish state, with a small arab state in the 45 or 44, 43% of palestine remaining, um, the new, as soon as the the un partition resolution is adopted at the end of november 1947, war breaks out in palestine and and the superior military forces that the zionists have developed with british help during the arab revolt and through the folks who had been part of the jewish brigade coming back and joining into what becomes later on the israeli army, slowly maturely, inexorably starts to take over parts of palestine, by april and may this has become a route, the largest arab cities, largest cities with our populations, hifa and jafa, are ethnically cleansed, the populations are driven out. other cities are taken uh the western suburbs of jerusalem w which are the arab parts of the western suburbs of jerusalem are overrun in april and may of 1948 so by the time the

british leave on may 15th, 1948, 30000 palestinians have already been made refugee refugees, 70,00 from jafa, 70,00 from haifa, about 30,00 from the western neighborhoods of jerusalem, and tens and tens of thousands in villages up and down the country. at that point the arab army's interven, flooded by refugees, the arab countries are are initially were initially very reluctant to intervene, they're forced to do so, both by public opinion and by the rivalry between different arab governments. and you have what then becomes the so-called arab israel, the war between israel and the arab states in which israel defeats the arab states over a period of time, and another 400 thousand people are driven from their homes in ethnic cleansing operations in the south and the north of palestine. this is for palestine after elon musk bought twitter now known as

x. he promised to restore free speech to the platform, but the multi-billionaire is being squeezed by the zianist lobby to force him to re-impose censorship on commentary about palestine. the previous incumbants caved in to intense campaign by zionist extremists and imposed shadow bands on this show, professor david miller and myself. but after musk tocoba, the bands were lifted on us and on numerous other accounts too. but the billion-dollar question now is, will he succumbed to the pressure? we saw. essentially in that trip we saw him becoming an obvious and stated zionist, an example when elon musk came and and did this tour with benyamin netanyahu, and i think the approach or the general view of elon musk is like businessman selling his product.

pr headlines: the death though from the us is really genocide in gaza nears 19,000. palestinian fighters remain engaged in heavy fighting, inflicting heavy losses on the occupation forces. "pressure is mounting on the israeli prime minister as he fails to free the captives from gaza, while three of those held are killed by the regime's own forces. wemen's armed forces say that they have conducted new drone strike against israeli targets in the south of occupied palestine."