tv Going Underground RT February 9, 2025 8:30pm-9:01pm EST
8:30 pm
the the time action or tenancy and welcome to going underground, broadcasting all around the world for the whole lot of them, at least with tomorrow. the u. a propensity has global leaders of the world government summit, 2025. like out. the gcc countries view a condemn what's out of the crown prince. mom had been sounding cold, a genocide in gaza, widely seen as a tactical and strategic moral and military defeat design is a israel is u. s. u k u um genocide, architect netanyahu is actually due back in court today for corruption, not genocide, just days after sitting beside trump in washington. when the us president propose the ethnic cleansing of gaza. that's when they go back to violence. they've
8:31 pm
continues in this region with israel's mass, killing and 11 in the west bank loan and syria. now in the throes of partition between turkey, israel and l kindly groups. but while most of the world sees israel is actions of what they are, it's not so in the countries arming is ro, decreases eyes. israel and nato countries, as seen as anti semitic. even if you are jewish and jews around the world have been at the forefront of opposition to the genocide, being jewish off to the destruction of gaza, a reckoning is a new volume from professor peter by not editor at large of jewish car. and so you joins me now from new york professor by not to thank you so much for coming on. you say in the new book, it's about the storage use, tell themselves to block out the screens. we're in the week of a jewish holiday to be sure that if i pronounced that correctly one month from something go pour him. tell me why you write about the program and it's a relevance to the gaza genocide. sure, so i'm pulling the edges,
8:32 pm
read the book of esther from the hebrew bible and the book of esther is the same story. it's the story of the story and in in persia, in which a, this figure called haman tries to organize the genocide of destruction, of the, of the jews. and that's usually the way the story is told. certainly in the united states, the story of a kind of an attempt to genocide against the jews and survival enforce given that jews not so long ago indeed were the victims of genocide in europe. the story is very, very resident for many people. the point i try to making the book is that the story is more complicated than that because it ends in fact, with the power dynamic being reversed and that the jewish liter modify overseeing. i'm or i'm kind of massacre of that use adversaries. and the point i try to make is it's jewish state, good text actually betrayed use in a whole range of different ways in the full complexity of it. we have as human beings as victimizers and as victims we can be in both roles like any other group
8:33 pm
of human beings can be. but i think this part of our own tradition is often actually kind of blocked out in contemporary discourse, which i think is related to the fact that in much us discourse the story is real. palestine is put within this framework of the historic oppression of the jewish people, which makes it harder for us to see some of the realities that actually exist. yeah, i mean we, we've had the ministers in these really cabinets. we've had the former, is there any prime minister on this road? i think we walked out. they usually walk out for some reason. if we had that who'd brock on, why do you think they don't see that the most dangerous place in the world to be a jew now, is israel as well? i, i think that the trauma of jewish history leading to the idea that as a jewish state, a state in which use whole power,
8:34 pm
the jews rule would be a response that would keep you safe after the holocaust was i think in some ways and understandable impulse even though even someone like edwards a be great policy and intellectual who was a fierce critic of sign is a said he could understand the experience and the impulse from which this movement came. the problem is that when you deny people basic human rights as israel does towards the palestinian people in a variety of different ways, holding them under military rule in the west bank holding them under blockades, in, in, in guys, out in the mass. all of the refugees were expelled in 19481967. that is a system of structural violence. and when you impose that violence on people, we know from political science literature that actually makes a country less safe for everybody. so the core contention in my book is that jews are safer under conditions of legal equality,
8:35 pm
then we are under conditions of legal supremacy. yeah. and other people do make that point, but perhaps a new book is more dangerous designs is choose than you. hopefully because you use scripture, historical scripted to show how it is being manipulated in seeing the synagogues, if i'm getting that right to kind of create an idea of what being a jew is to help the conflation between being a jew and being someone who's able to commit genocide as well. i think that judaism is a vast religious tradition. so like christianity and islam, it speaks in many, many different voices. right. um, but i think that what has happened in recent decades is the best as no nationalist project in some ways has swallowed up in, in many jewish communities. so some of judaism is more universal istic message about the universal infinite dignity of all people. i think this is something that
8:36 pm
seems to be happening more broadly around the world. when i look at white, many white christians in united states, i'm really struck in the trump era by how they seem to think that the only human beings who have any value in the world are people who have american passports. as i understand christianity, that's really not christianity's message at all. right. but it's a kind of way in which christianity has been swallowed by a kind of s no nationalism. and i think we see in judaism, tragically, in certain jewish communities, a similar dynamic in which allegiance to this state and its project of jewish domination over palestinian is actually considered to be more important than certain core principles of judaism itself. again. and the core principle that all human beings are created in the age of god. and there are therefore, all human beings have inherent value and dignity. yeah. and, and going back to what you said about poor him, the moral you say is that it's not just the danger of ginger as did use is the danger of the jews bose to gentiles. but as you write about this,
8:37 pm
you had to preface the book with the threats range against you for thinking the way you do about the goals and genocide as well. i wouldn't say threats. i mean, i, i live compared to certainly people in guys a and many other people around the world and even towards compared to really do is i live a very, very safe and privileged life in united, in united states. so i, i wouldn't say that i face threats. i do think that there are, when you strongly criticized around and raised questions about the very legitimacy of a states that privileges use or palestinians in, in, in jewish communities in united states and around the world. you're likely to get very, very fierce push back and i think you know, there, nobody likes a turn coat a traitor, right? there is a sense in jewish tradition that we imagined ourselves use as a kind of a family. and people tend not to light. the person in the family who is accusing others in the family of doing really bad things, but to me and this is
8:38 pm
a tradition of descent, but it's a necessary in any society in any community. and that we'd use also have this tradition of descent in our own tradition and is one that i think it must be continued because what he's real is doing is for family morally wrong seems to me by universal moral standards. but also by, according to what i consider to be judy is own best traditions. and why do you think uh, for the most part, watching all the goc run the media or in your country and in other nato countries. the countries supplying the weapons for the genocide, people like you don't seem to really exist apart from the old protest because of course it must be made. can the jews have been in the forefront of protests in the united states and in britain and european countries against once we napping and gaza? yeah, i mean look, i don't think i, i don't think unfortunately. oh, the guards controlling medias is usually is it only a nato phenomena. i think that sadly that exists all over the world. and i think that the, the discourse about israel in the united states has, generally, um, uh,
8:39 pm
you know, it has generally been a discourse and was palestinians have not had what said famously called permission to now. right. and which policies have not really been full full as members the bottom? no, even talking about palestinians. i mean on reuben meadow fox news, which trump apparently which is daily then. oh gee, is that or and design is on fox news. no, that's true. i mean, i think it part of the way one need to understand this, i think, is that israel's founding miss a very similar to america's founding. that these are both nations that can think of themselves as kind of promised lands fords on a hostile frontier. so if you're talking about fox news and the american rights which are deeply invested in americans founding this and would seriously resist any effort to reckon with what the united states did in the 19th century to its native population. it's not surprising that they would also be very sympathetic to
8:40 pm
israel's pat, missed founding mist as well, and very hostile to any critical interrogation of that. and would you go so far as to say that supporting what israel did is to be empty jewish in a way? no, i don't think so. i wouldn't say that because i don't think that 110, a centralized what it means to be jewish, or to be just like or any other religious tradition, never the truth is that these religious traditions have always spoken in a multiplicity of voices. and different people have interpreted those traditions in different ways. what i would say is that my understanding of being jewish is one that emphasizes the ethical message within judaism of q, of, of human dignity and edi. i believe that what israel has done isn't a front to that. yeah, i mean, i mean to tyra is a big jewish. yeah. there's quite a jewish community, entire run. they oppose israel, the 91 that has not one that has not that one, that not one that has freedom because nobody in iran has has to freedom. well,
8:41 pm
what could happen? i got given a rep and it was gonna have a big argument about what freedom means, of course. but in a run, the very at this point of, if you want to protest against the government, right? actually talking about protests against the government, what have you made of the fact that the whole visas, full protest is for foreign students who are going to be it may affect your university. they're going to be deployed. and of course the use of tear gas and violence against protest is in your country. about god's yes, i mean it, that there's no question that there's been growing amounts of repression even under started under vitamin. but it's escalated under trump of protestors who support policy and rights and um, and so its gotten worse and, and the people who are most vulnerable to this are not are, those were not us citizens. and of course, were part of the eliza part of trump larger crack down against americans who are not us citizens. but this excuse that, that pro policy and protesters are, are crow hamas is it is a, is
8:42 pm
a way of stripping them of their rights. and i think it's a, we're going to look at this period as one of the periodic and, and, and terrible periods of the repression of american civil liberties. there were the palmer raids and the early 19 twenty's the mccarthy period of the 1950s. and now i think sadly, we're entering into another year, i like that. although it was that during the by d blinking, we call them genocide. joe, but you're blinking air a to it was trump of that stuff, the aerial bombardment of guys that we must, right? investment repression of pro palestinian protesters is now getting worse under the fonts are biding and blinking. although i think their policies, uh where, where, where, where horrify in terms of the, you know, unconditional support, military support for israel, they did not threaten to deport student students on the, on visa that american universities who were protesting against is or of the destruction of god. o, b is doing that all be at the lack of faith 1st amendment rights that happened
8:43 pm
during the bible ministration, facebook posts, and so on. does it, does it affect it hasn't affected you that when you talk about god with facebook, both those before, you know and know it has it look, i mean that the, the united states under donald trump is becoming a less free society. and for, for people who wanted to protest for palestinians they've always been, they have always been greater restrictions been on people who wanted to protest skin some other ways. but it's also still the case that it was possible for people, you know, over the last year and a half and took to, to organize mass protest in the united states against this war. and, and, um, you know, and for the most part, people were able to do that without being locked up. quite a few people that looked up though be to buy that out. so i'll style, maybe i'll stop by that. but they know not, not in the way you would do, right? not in the way you would be in a truly authoritarian regime where you would be put in some prison for, for,
8:44 pm
8:45 pm
what does your mind picture the landscapes open up before your eyes? the last one does the, the discounts dodge the journey. the, the you ready to come to the welcome back to the guy that was still here with peter buying or the editor at lodge of jewish cards and professor of journalism and political science at the city university of new york. the professor i was interrupting you there when you were defending your free rights and freedom in the united states. something that we very examined on this program in great detail and i don't know i can be,
8:46 pm
it's not the good quite as free as you suggest or nor is it has been but a cause. another criticism viewable could be that why do you blame israel? which as you said before, has some kind of excuse because the jews who inhabited the descendants of those yourself with the all the cause in your know so much blame of the nato countries arming israel. does knowing that and, you know, and those idea of soldiers could have done what they did without the weapons that came from your country and nato countries. you don't think that you're putting too much of the blame on these a zionist settlers and the jews in israel when they couldn't have done anything like the like what they did do without the bible obviously. and your opinion, british governments showing no, i've been very critical of united states government for its unconditional military support and diplomatic support for israel in polluting during this,
8:47 pm
this goes to destruction. so i, i entirely agree the part of my argument, especially made to choose united states is that we need to act in the united states to try to be part of the movement to change us policy. and what do you think has happened with this? obviously it is the worst, the genocide of our century. it's being called all requests. what is it? what effect as it had on the jewish americans? because the poles of showed the jews in the united states do sympathize with some of the issues in your book which wears before we would never seen anything like that. yeah, i think the, i think the term genocide is i think there's, there's good reason to believe this from genocide apply like i would resist the term holocaust because i think that suggests and i kind of it, did they the genocide of use that took place in nazi germany was, was very different in many ways from what's happening to policy is as in gaza as car finding the house is, i don't think i don't,
8:48 pm
i don't think that i don't think it. does anyone any good to, to, to try to make those historical equivalencies? the point is that genocide has an international legal definition. so we can apply it to what we've done and rolanda we've been, we're required to what's being done and change on. we can apply it to us, be that the guys that we can, the, i know it's very much anything we can do. people can watch. i are a show. imagine jag and how usa i the manufactured that, right. you know, to know, i know that the chinese, i know that there are people who want it to defend the chinese government's human rights abuses as well, just like that. people defend human rights if he's, i'm not, i'm, i'm understanding the job. he's gone by and on that, but i think that what you see among americans use is that is a division of opinion in which the instances they've kind of jewish institutions that have the most power tend to support israel unconditionally, but that there is a growing group of jews, particularly younger americans use. so i think see, what is what i was doing as an affront to their basic values, the values of that kind of progressive values that they hold as, as american as progressive americans. and as progressive use,
8:49 pm
of course the book clearly states comparisons, as you've said earlier in part one about the, about what the united states, for instance did to native americans. but you compare directly palestinian resistance to the i r a and island and the a n c. in the south africa, of course, that that's a case for violence clearly, i mean, i've interviewed nelson mandela, mandela clearly supported against the views of the south african communist party, the killing of civilians and restaurants. what do you think the impact of your book is for or do they live in israel? a, in the, in the sense that violence must be part of the struggle. if indeed it can be compared, right? i like the life or guy. i think that there is a very important distinction between violence against military targets and, and violence against civilians. i think that's a very important distinction in international law. i think it's a very important moral distinction. is that why do you think demand gallery was
8:50 pm
successful in the i ray with success mondale of mando adults? i'm adela and amc actually worked quite hard to maintain that distinction even going so far as apologizing for attacks against the villian sites. the pan african is congress and other the and seized arrivals were more open to, to, to attacks on civilians. but i think one of the things that the and see deserves a lot of credit for was, it makes me i wrong. but later on it may be said, i mean no further, some of the current as far as the violence in the 1950. if want to watch the and see was far, far more scrupulous about us attacks on civilians than homos has been a mass going back to the 1990 with his continued attack on, on pizza re is on, on buses and now on october 7th has been far as been far more willing to attack and target civilians, which i think is deeply unfortunate in to me in my mind to an asset on tomorrow. yeah, i think violence, political violence is always a up for that debate,
8:51 pm
but it's, it's way you show in the book in great detail that kind of magic is of a good in colonial struggles. why do you see it as a colonial settler struggle? like ma'am, i'll the mama movement in can hear against the british for instance, are right. i mean, it's colonial in a very simple sense in the palestinians. are subjects, policies in the west bank and gaza and most policies in east jerusalem on subjects of the state. but not citizens, they are under the control of the state, but they are not represented in its government. and i think that's a very simple definition of what of what colonialism needs. do you think? what's most moving about the book to many people or could be the most moving to some jews in israel is the fact that you didn't think like this before. your thirty's. just tell me a little bit about that. who and whether israel is a kind of totalitarian colonial set to a state as well, or as elements of it to be able to make someone like you not realize the everyday existence of palestinians, even though you were there in israel round the way i don't know that i would,
8:52 pm
i don't know that i would use the term to tell a terry. and it's certainly, it's certainly not a, but it is a state that palestinians do live under military law in the west bank, which means they lack the most basic freedoms. the freedom to move, move the freedom of movement of freedom, right to due process, the right to vote. and it's true that i think like many other jews and united states and elsewhere, a is my, my understanding of these around my relationship to israel was seen through the press, the prism of what is around meant to jews within the framework of jewish history. especially modern jewish history and holocaust is a sense of kind of security knowing that there was a country in the world that always would take use in if use were in danger. and that was the way that they kind of israel with narrative to me growing up. i think it took a long time, much, much longer than i wish it had for me to actually begin to really wrap up with what israel met for palestinians. what as edward said,
8:53 pm
called zion is there from the standpoint of its victims that and, and, and um, it was really only in the 1st time that i, you know, we'd only my thirty's better for the 1st time. spent time with policies in the west bank and realize that this system, this state was much more brutal than i had recognized um and that um that the palestinian experience was one that really forced me to rethink the way i thought about the state. as you mentioned, edward say the great palestinian christian school, or do you think you'd be allowed to teach in the united states today in the united states because i keep getting reports of all sorts of the mccarthy style antics in academia or in your country? no, i think so, you wouldn't be allowed to, you know, i wouldn't be allowed to teach. i mean, his rations khalidi of columbia, who is, has a hold of the edwards, a chair and has views which are not so different was as now just taking a mirror to status but was still teaching at columbia. but i do think that it's
8:54 pm
when you go from scholarship and teaching to kind of openly confronting the university through activism for protests and even civil disobedience. then we've seen that the repression has been quite severe. i'm what i know you clearly don't like donald trump. i've had some why do you think it was that it was only donald trump, that stuff the aerial bombardment of god. so these horrific pictures of genocide and do you know how silly i'm sure you were looking at them to on our phones as a live streamed a continuous massacres. trump got it. stopped. not the democrats. yeah. i mean i, i think that i think lavinia was scared upfront in a way that he was not scared divided because trump is exceedingly erratic and vindictive and, and also that trump really cares. press primarily really about himself. and so i
8:55 pm
think trump saw that coming into office and having a hostage a deal, some kind of cease 5 deal would make him look good. and if and yeah, who want it to make trump look good in order to ingratiate himself withdrawn. and of course, he's allied to i don't know what you think your mike huckabee, your ambassador, the us investor to a israel. it just, uh, you know, it really talk about about it that much in the book with this alliance between christian zionism and, and zion is who, who anyway, believe that all the jews have to die anyway on the day of judgment. well yes, i mean that god get more, i do submitting than that. you know, i think that the position of the for the city is really government about the christian theology of n times would be we don't really need to worry about that. we don't think that's gonna happen. but i think that the, to me to understand chris white, christian zion is um, you can't see it only through a religious framework to me. it is very much the expression of america's own
8:56 pm
settler colonialism. these are people who are really mythologized and, and, and, and out, and, and, and defend from any criticism americans, genocide, that america committed in the 19th century. and have a very clear view of kind of hierarchy between different peoples of different races and religious groups. and so i think it's in that framework that one can understand, understand the kind of profoundly racist view that someone might, i might ought to be has towards the palestinians and towards most ones and towards many other people's that they never have to get to the know but the problem there between orange about judgment day and that. yeah, i mean because the text that's the head of the pentagon, of course. now. yeah. and jasmine doesn't, you know, not none of us have seen jasmine day. so it's a see a radical proposition. but do you think it probably is pretty decent medic, i mean i, i think there are there very there. there is anti semitism clearly among there's a strange combination of anti semitism on file of some of that. and that you find on the question, right,
8:57 pm
which i would say essentially use are really beloved when use participate in a project that these folks like, which is a project of kind of s no nationalist domination. they would use become a about com adversaries when use a pose that project. and just finally, how long do you think it'll take for the world to fully understand what this 15 months of genocide and gaza hasn't meant to the world? really? i mean, i think it's probably he looked at public opinion a great many people in the world already do recognize that this has been one of the great crimes of the 21st century. the question whether that will translate into paul into political action by governments that have power, i think, is very much an open question. especially because the many governments, including my own, are moving in, in the far attain direction in which they are less responsive to public opinion. if it happens again, you're right, is equal to being jewish. presumably in the next from us, god,
8:58 pm
god willing that won't be necessary, but we'll see, professor, be there by the thank you. thank you. that's it for the show. being jewish off to the destruction of guys i reckoning is out that will be back with the brand new episode on saturday until then keep in touch 5 or less social media. if it's not set to do a country and that to a channel going on are going to be hon. they'll come to a new and old episodes, i'm going undergoing. sadly, the, [000:00:00;00] the,
8:59 pm
[000:00:00;00] the despite everything re breeze go to the front lines with that eagerly awaited they pray in the trenches and bunkers and hospitals destroyed churches. they pray for peace thinking out of more turn, ask, what was the 1st or what kind of stuff specific, the loss of your students. so mutual secondary in the civil sleep and your last inspection from watch for discharge, or just try to bristol shape or gotcha. so the way i've been here, it's called the best i'm fish for the rest of the finish,
9:00 pm
the hold on all the sharon fish. just plug in this new to this joint. erica, the welcome to crossed eyeball horns. were all things are considered on peter level? are we finally getting a preview of the trump piece plan for ukraine? also is the trunk plan for guys or for wheel? or is it merely negotiating ploy to discuss these issues and more, i'm joined by my guess door to send me away in budapest, he's a pod, castro, at the gospel which can be found on youtube and locals. and here in moscow we cross the marks level that he has an international relations and security analyst, or
0 Views
Uploaded by TV Archive on
![](http://athena.archive.org/0.gif?kind=track_js&track_js_case=control&cache_bust=69905675)