VOMENA at KPFA

Tensions between Israel and Hezbollah are at all-time high. Israel and Lebenese Hezbollah have been exchanging fire since October 8 the, when Israel launched its devastating war on Gaza, but the conflict between the two archenemies escalated after one of Hezbollah's most senior commanders was killed in an Israeli strike in southern Lebanon, on June 11the. Hezbollah retaliated by launching a large volley of rockets and attack drones at Israel. Concurrently, both sides have stepped up their rhetoric. Are Israel and Hezbollah on the brink of an all-out war? What will the implications of such a war be for Lebanon, Israel and the region? And what is the nexus between Israeli-Hezbollah conflict and Israel's colonization of Palestine and its ongoing genocidal war in Gaza? Shahram Aghamir put these questions to Karim Makdisi. He is an associate Professor of international politics and founding director of the Graduate Program in Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut – Professor Makdisi is also the co-host of Makdisi Street podcast

Hossam el-Hamalawy on Egypt's role in Israel's war on Gaza by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Students face backlash for supporting Palestinian rights, Stage reading of Woman Life Freedom by VOMENA Team at KPFA

What does it take to end the war on the Palestinians in Gaza? by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Gaza: Besieged since 2007, now under Israel's “total blockade” by VOMENA Team at KPFA

American Anthropologist Association voted in favour of boycotting Israeli academic institutions by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Making sense of the devastating floods in Libya by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Israeli' assault on Jenin refugee camp & 'Sinbad Voyage' mural in Berkeley by VOMENA Team at KPFA

In recent months, Fondomonte Arizona, a subsidiary of Saudi Arabia-based Almarai dairy Company has been getting renewed attention for growing alfalfa in drought-prone Arizona, and sending it to Saudi Arabia to feed the country's cows. Despite a worsening drought, several factors including Political influence and lack of regulations have allowed the company to draw an unlimited amount of groundwater from the wells it operates in the area. According to the Associated Press, the two new wells would have pumped in just three minutes what a family of four uses in a month. Why did Saudi Arabia choose Arizona for its crop production? In her new book Arid Empire: The Entangled Fates of Arabia and Arizona. University of Syracuse political geographer professor Natalie Koch explores the exchange of colonial technologies between the Arabian Peninsula and the United States over the last two centuries,

On May 28th, Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was re-elected for a third term by winning 52% of the popular vote- His main rival Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu garnered 48%. Two weeks earlier, the right wing islamist-nationalist coalition consisting of Erdogan's rullingJustice and development party AKP and its allies had won the majority in the parliamentary election. we spend the hour discussing how and why Erdogan was able to secure a third term in office despite a worsening economy and now chronic hyperinflation, the government's disastrous response to the deadly earthquakes, as well as his increasingly authoritarian rule. What happened? In his new article in the new left review, our today's guest, UC Berkeley sociologist Cihan Tugal writes “There are obvious institutional reasons for the resilience of Erdoğanism. The government has spent years monopolizing the mainstream media and judiciary. Prisons are overflowing with activists, journalists and politicians. The Kurdish opposition, the only truly organized non-right-wing force in the country, has seen its democratically elected mayors replaced with state-appointed officials, who have consolidated the government's rule over the eastern and southeastern provinces. Yet this is only the tip of the iceberg. The regime's endurance is not simply a result of its authoritarianism; its popularity runs much deeper than that. Shahram Aghamir spoke with professor Tugal about the outcome of the recent general election in turkey

Part 1- Professor Kahlid Medani discusses the root cause of the ongoing crisis in Sudan by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Why did the US invade Iraq, 20 years ago? A conversation with Sinan Antoon+Omar Sirri by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Ilan Pappe on the latest developments in Israel by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Guest: Cihan tugal, professor of sociology at the University of California, Berkeley. He is the author The Fall of the Turkish Model: How the Arab Uprisings Brought Down Islamic Liberalism, and Passive Revolution: Absorbing the Islamic Challenge to Capitalism

Guest: shahrazad Mojab, professor of Adult Education and Community Development and Women and Gender Studies at the University of Toronto Her most recent books are Marxism & Migration; Women of Kurdistan: A Historical and Bibliographical Study; and Revolutionary Learning: Marxism, Feminism and Knowledge.

Guest: Bruce Whitehouse, associate professor of anthropology at Lehigh University

Guest: Rayan El- Amine, activist and scholar

Ilan Pappe on Israel's new government, Laura Albast on the media coverage of Palestine by VOMENA Team at KPFA

The plight of imprisoned environmentalists in Iran & refugees in Europe by VOMENA Team at KPFA

What explains the dangerous levels of air pollution In Iran's main cities? by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Political prisoners in Iran & Amir Rashidi discusses internet restrictions in Iran by VOMENA Team at KPFA

The toxic legacies of the U.S. war in Iraq: A conversation with Kali Rubaii by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Guest: Arang Keshavarzian

History of student movement in Iran- Part 2 by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Guests Dr Kaveh Abbasian, former student activist, filmmaker, researcher, and lecturer in Film and Media Practice at the University of Kent in Britain Hamza Hamouchene, London-based Algerian researcher-activist, commentator and a founding member of Algeria Solidarity Campaign (ASC), and Environmental Justice North Africa (EJNA). He previously worked for War on Want, Global Justice Now and Platform London on issues of extractivism, resources, land and food sovereignty as well as climate, environmental, and trade justice.

Guest: Amir Rashidi, the director of digital rights and security at Miaan Group

Guest: Hossam el-Hamalawy is an Egyptian journalist, photographer and socialist activist

Guest: Nima Tootkaboni is a former student activist, and a Ph.D. student in sociology at the Johns Hopkins University

nationwide protests continue in Iran - What is next? by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Women, Life, Freedom. Women are leading Iran protests by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Victors write history, as the old cliché goes. Over the past 5 centuries, European powers have fanned out across the world, conquering entire continents and writing self-serving accounts of those conquests while diminishing the merits of the conquered civilizations in order to justify their own depredations. Palestine has been no exception to that rule. Today we speak with Professor Salim Tamari, a Palestinian historian based in Ramallah, whose trailblazing work has illuminated the history of Palestine and the Levant prior to British and Zionist occupations from a perspective that is largely absent from western narratives. More specifically, we discuss his book The Year of the Locust, an eloquent chronicle of the transition period that saw the end of the Ottoman empire in the Levant and the arrival of western occupiers through the revealing lens of a rare personal diary kept by a young soldier fighting in the ranks of the Ottoman army. Guest: Salim Tamari, Salim Tamari is IPS senior fellow and the former director of the IPS-affiliated Institute of Jerusalem Studies. He is editor of Jerusalem Quarterly and Hawliyyat al Quds.

Neda semnani tells the story of her parents in"They Said They Wanted Revolution" by VOMENA Team at KPFA

France, a Settler Postcolony? A conversation with professor Olivia Harrison by VOMENA Team at KPFA

we speak with Palestinian-American journalist and media analyst Laura Albast about coverage of Palestine in the US media- In a recent Washington Post Op-Ed, she argues that By neglecting to contextualize Israeli state violence, the media has given the Israeli government a free pass, enabling it to continue ethnically cleansing the Palestinian people with impunity. It is time for outlets to address the harm they have done. They should make an effort to hire Palestinian journalists and center Palestinian voices, instead of consistently erasing them from their own stories. The endless footage of documented violence against Palestinians should not remain confined to social media feeds (which face a different form of censorship). Read her op-ed: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/04/28/jerusalem-al-aqsa-media-coverage-israeli-violence-palestinians/

we speak with award winning journalist and author Neda Toloui semnani about her new book, "They Said They Wanted Revolution: A Memoir of My Parents." Neda Touli Semnani's father was executed by the Iranian regime in January of 1983, when she was only 3 years old, Neda was just thirty when she lost her mother to cancer, the other half of her Iranian revolutionary bloodline. In the wake of her mother's death, she embarks on a journey to uncover the hidden truths in her parents' life before their marriage and their impact as leftist political activists- Neda has pieced together the extraordinary life of her parents in her new book, "They Said They Wanted Revolution: A Memoir of My Parents." Neda Toloui-Semnani is an Emmy Award-winning writer and producer -

**Boycott, is screened on this year's DocLands on Sunday, May 8 at 4 PM at SMITH RAFAEL FILM CENTER in San Rafael- For more information please visit, doclands.com** The freedom to refuse to buy a product at any time from anyone you want, which has historically been used by oppressed minorities throughout the world, witness the bus boycotts of the 50s, the grape boycotts of the 60s or the anti-Apartheid campaign of the 80s, is now at the heart of the struggle for Palestinian rights. The new documentary film "Boycott," examines the heroic plight of three individual Americans in three different states who rejected the dictate of anti-BDS laws surreptitiously passed by 31 states of the union, challenged that ban in court and prevailed in the head. BOYCOTT chronicles the stories of three everyday Americans -- a speech pathologist, a public defender, and a newspaper publisher -- who take the extraordinary step of suing their states after new laws require them to sign a pledge saying they won't participate in boycotts of Israel in order to receive a government contract. VOMENA's Khalil Bendib spoke with the film's producer Suhad Babaa. Palestinian American journalist Laura Albast says the media must stop giving reign to Israeli aggression & begin telling the full story of Palestine. Recently- Ms Albast and Cat Knar coauthored an opinion piece in the Washington Post on the biased & inaccurate coverage of the Israeli Occupation of Palestine- they write, we have seen the same patterns over and over again in media coverage of Palestine. Palestinians are not killed; we simply die. When Israeli forces raid our neighborhoods in the middle of the night, bomb our children, demolish our homes, colonize our land and kill our people, we are somehow equal instigators. Media descriptions regularly imply a false symmetry between occupier and occupied, propping up anti-Palestinian and Islamophobic narratives that blame the Palestinian people for Israeli aggression.” Malihe Razazan spoke with Laura about the media coverage of Palestine in the US media and Why the media fails to cover Palestine with accuracy and empathy. Laura Albast, a Palestinian American journalist and translator, is senior editor of digital strategy and communications at the Institute for Palestine Studies-USA.

In a bold and historic step backwards for the cause of peace in the Middle East last Sunday, Morocco was one of four Arab countries meeting in a special summit with Israel and the US. Although distant Iran was central to the discussions held during this meeting, the central issue of Palestine never broached during this summit, which took place in the heart of historic Palestine. Khalil spoke with Samia Errazouki, a journalist formerly based in Morocco and a PhD candidate in early modern Northwest African history at UC Davis, about Morocco's participation in this summit and what might be motivating the Moroccan regime to go against the wishes of its own people,

March 9, 2022- Amany Khalifa on forced evictions and the ethnic cleansing of Palestine by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Feb 18, 2022 VOMENA- Dr. Utku Balaban on industrialization and 'Islamic revivalism' in Turkey by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Today Tunisian president Kaies Saied dissolved the parliament after parliament members challenged the autocratic powers he has exercised since his self-coup last July. Last Wednesday, lawmakers held an online meeting, defying Mr. Saied's warning that the session was illegal, and a majority voted against his power grab, which they said violated the country's Constitution. Elected in a landslide in 2019, the president has been ruling by decree since July, jailing opponents, suspending parts of the Constitution, dismissing the Supreme Judicial Council and restricting press freedom. Khalil Bendib spoke with our Tunisian correspondent Mohammed-Dhia Hemmami about the current political situation in Tunis. To commemorate Palestinian Land Day, an annual event dating back to March 30, 1976, when six unarmed Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces during protests against the Israeli government's expropriation of large tracts of Palestinian land for Jewish settlers, we also bring back a 2014 conversation with UC Berkeley Professor Samera Esmair about the return of some of the Palestinian refugees to their village Kafr Bir`im, located in northern Palestine in the Galilee, whose residents were expelled in 1948. Mohamed-Dhia Hammami is an independent researcher and analyst and a PhD Student at Syracuse University. Samera Esmeir is Assistant Professor of Rhetoric at the University of California, Berkeley.

This week, we speak with Jody Sokolower about her new book Determined to Stay: Palestinian Youth Fight for Their Village. Later in the program, Madhdis Keshavarz of the Arab and Middle Eastern Journalists Association joins us to talk about the organization's recent statement in response to the biased coverage of the Ukraine crisis.

The second part of our conversation with Natasha Iskandar about migrant labor and the World Cup in Qatar.

We discuss green energy and its relationship to colonialism in North Africa with Hamza Hamochin

February 4, 2022: Natasha Iskandar on migrant workers in Qatar by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Jan 12 2022 VOMENA- Desmond Tutu's solidarity with Palestine and political prisoners in Iran by VOMENA Team at KPFA

VOMENA Dec 20, 2021- Mona Halaby's ''In My Mother's Footsteps: A Palestinian Refugee Returns Home'' by VOMENA Team at KPFA

VOMENA Dec 20, 2021-- Mohamed-Dhia Hammami on the latest political developments in Tunisia by VOMENA Team at KPFA

VOMENA Dec 20, 2021-- elections in Libya by VOMENA Team at KPFA

VOMENA Nov 17 2021- Megan Mylan's SIMPLE AS WATER doc and Laila Lalami's Conditional Citizens by VOMENA Team at KPFA

vomena nov 15, 2021- the protests against the coup in Sudan- part 2 by VOMENA Team at KPFA

Last month, a military coup took place in the Sudan, barely two years after a popular uprising forced the removal of dictator, Omar al-Bashir, who had ruled the country for 30 years with an iron grip with the support of the military and Sudanese Islamists. The 2019 protest movement was not able to exclude the military from national politics entirely. In August of that year, a power sharing arrangement was reached among the military leaders, a coalition of groups and organizations called the Forces for Freedom and Change and a joint ruling body, named the sovereign Council, which was established to govern the Sudan for a little over three years until elections could be held. Following last month's overthrow, coup leader, Gen Burhan, declared the dissolution of the Sovereign Council as well as that of the transitional government of Prime Minister Hamdok. Meanwhile, across the Sudan, millions of people have engaged in protests, acts of civil disobedience and strikes to denounce the military's power grab at the peril of their lives. GUESTS Khalid Medani is an associate professor of political science and Islamic studies at McGill University and author of the new book Black Markets and Militants: Informal Networks in the Middle East and Africa. In this book, Khalid Mustafa Medani explains why youth are attracted to militant organizations, examining the specific role economic globalization, in the form of outmigration and expatriate remittance inflows, plays in determining how and why militant activists emerge. The study challenges existing accounts that rely primarily on ideology to explain militant recruitment. Based on extensive fieldwork, Medani offers an in-depth analysis of the impact of globalization, neoliberal reforms and informal economic networks as a conduit for the rise and evolution of moderate and militant Islamist movement Elsadig Elsheikh is the Director of the Global Justice Program at the Othering & Belonging Institute, where he oversees the program's projects on corporate power, food systems, forced migration, inclusiveness index, Islamophobia, and human rights mechanisms; and manages the Shahidi Project, and the Nile Project.