Podcasts about palestinian canadian

Donate to fundrive.ckuw.ca So on this week's episode, we are putting the focus on the work we do along side numerous people attempting to speak the unspoken truth of war. In the first half hour, we spend time talking to Yusuf Omar of Seen.tv. He is a former war correspondent working for CNN who came to understand the unique contributions that Palestinians can make in Gaza by telling their own stories with a cell phone camera, and at a time when Palestinian journalists are dying by the scores in order to communicate to the outside world. He is to present films by Bisan Owda and Ahmad Ghunaim to audiences across Canada and the United States in the coming week. This interview is followed by one with Ramsey Zeid, a Palestinian-Canadian activist in Winnipeg, talking about aspects of the Genocide in Palestine not spoken about in mainstream media outlets, including the challenges and the rewards of activism. Finally, two former guests, Canadian peace activists, Glenn Michalchuk and Tamara Lorincz, speak about some of the more persistent lies and persistent activism to turn the tide toward a more stable and just world. This show is part of radio station CKUW's Fundrive, encouraging listeners to contribute what they can to keep an island of truth-telling less isolated in an ocean of propaganda.

This interview was recorded before the Palestinian reconciliation in Jenin and before the latest Israeli military invasion of Jenin. In this episode of the Sumud Podcast, we are proud to feature Diana Buttu, a prominent Palestinian-Canadian lawyer, negotiator, and activist. Diana shares her journey from being the first female negotiator during the Second Intifada to her continued advocacy for justice and human rights. Diana's experiences shed light on the harsh realities of life under occupation, the challenges of international negotiations, and the systemic injustices faced by Palestinians. She recounts her family's history, shaped by the Nakba, and her father's struggle for justice in a deeply discriminatory system. Diana reflects on the lessons she learned from her time negotiating with Israel, the importance of grassroots movements, and the resilience of the Palestinian people. Our hosts, Ed and Zeina, delve into the following topics with Diana: ➡️ Her family's journey through the Nakba and survival under Israeli military rule. ➡️ The systemic discrimination and dehumanization faced by Palestinians. ➡️ Behind-the-scenes insights from her time as a legal advisor during negotiations. ➡️ The enduring spirit of Palestinians resisting displacement and erasure. ➡️ Why she remains hopeful for liberation despite immense challenges.

A ceasefire between Israel and Hamas is expected to go into effect Sunday, with the phased release of hostages and an end to 15 months of Israel's bombardment in Gaza. Matt Galloway discusses what it will take to sustain the ceasefire with Israeli journalist Amir Tibon and Palestinian-Canadian lawyer Diana Buttu.

This episode was originally published on November 21st 2023. Israel's war on Gaza has brought catastrophe to 2.3 million Palestinians. Hundreds of thousands have been forced from their homes, some left with just a plastic tent for shelter. Already weakened by war, what fresh dangers does winter bring for the people of Gaza? In this Episode: Mansour Shouman, A Palestinian-Canadian in Gaza. Marwan Jilani, Director General, Palestine Red Crescent Society. Dr Mads Gilbert, Doctor and activist - in solidarity with Palestinians. Host: Folly Bah Thibault Connect with us:@AJEPodcasts on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook At Al Jazeera Podcasts, we want to hear from you, our listeners. So, please head to https://www.aljazeera.com/survey and tell us your thoughts about this show and other Al Jazeera podcasts. It only takes a few minutes!

President-elect Donald Trump is assembling his inner circle and making some cabinet nominations that are sending shockwaves around the world. As officials here prepare for tough talks on trade and border security – what could those picks mean for Canada? Two journalists in Washington and Ottawa to weigh in. Then, Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew joins the program to talk U.S. trade, tariffs and the border.Plus, Palestinian Canadians who are trying to bring family members from Gaza into Canada explain why they're frustrated – and losing hope – over a special visa program. An immigration and refugee lawyer also details what she sees as the program's main problems.Finally, former B.C. premier John Horgan died this week at the age of 65. A former colleague shares memories of his leadership and kindness.This episode features the voices of: Alex Panetta, CBC WashingtonRob Russo, Canadian correspondent for The EconomistWab Kinew, Premier of ManitobaOmar Omar, Palestinian CanadianAhmed Badah, Palestinian CanadianDebbie Rachlis, immigration and refugee lawyerRavi Kahlon, B.C. Minister of Housing

Welcome to the Monday Breakfast show for October 21st, 2024.On todays show:Interview with Sue-Ann Hunter on Yoorook Justice Commission - Marisa speaks to Sue-Ann Hunter, Deputy Chair & Commissioner of Yoorrook Justice Commission, to provide updates on Victoria's Truth-Telling process and the land injustice inquiryAudio from the Public Forum for CFMEU Solidarity, hosted by the Migrant Workers' Federation last Wednesday October 10th at Democritus [pron. deh-moh-kritess] House in Thornbury.We hear some opening comments from Agapi Pashos, secretary of the Greek Democritus Workers' League & Renata Musolino, longtime OH&S officer at Victorian Trades Hall Council (Renata discussing 54th anniversary of Westgate bridge collapse: Tues Oct 15th).Interview with Kalyani Inpakumar, NSW Tamil Refugee Council coordinator and an organiser of the Sydney camp outside Minister for Home Affairs Tony Burke's. Interview with Marissa on the Refugee encampments and encouraging listeners to attend the encampment leading up to the 100th day of protest Songs:Cremsian, Alabaster DePlume, Laith Albandak 7:18DePlume's new digital EP titled Cremisan: Prologue to a Blade; The EP features two tracks recorded earlier this year in Bethlehem, Palestine with pianist Sami El Enaniand Qanoun player Laith Albandak, and a third track inspired by the experience of living insolidarity with the people of Palestine.Canto de Ossanha, Baden Powel 04:15minsBaden Powell, was a Brazilian guitarist. He combined classical techniques with popular harmony and swing.He performed in many styles, including bossa nova, samba, Brazilian jazz, and Latin jazz coloured concrete, Nemaphsis 3:09minsNemah Hasan, known professionally as Nemahsis,is a Palestinian Canadian singer-songwriter from Toronto, OntarioCase of You, Joni Mitchell

It's been a year since Hamas fighters attacked civilian targets in Israel, killing more than 1,400 people and kidnapping 200+ more. Israel's large-scale military response has killed at least 41,870 Palestinians including 16,756 children. The conflict has spread regionally, with Hezbollah engaging Israeli forces along its northern border with Lebanon. Tensions with Iran, a Hamas supporter, remain high. Efforts to mediate peace have largely stalled despite global protests calling for a ceasefire and an end to the occupation. Is there any reason for optimism there could one day be peace in the Middle East?  2:20 | Meytal Novidomsky and Miri Armon join us from their homes in northern Israel.  35:00 | Mousa Qasqas shares his perspective as a Palestinian-Canadian. 1:00:10 | Real Talker "Boyd from Saskatchewan" shares the wonderful story of Scout, a dog who found his forever home by developing skills as an escape artist! Positive Reflections is presented weekly on Real Talk by Kuby Renewable Energy.  SUBMIT YOUR POSITIVE REFLECTION: talk@ryanjespersen.com  GET A FREE SOLAR QUOTE TODAY: https://kubyenergy.ca/ FOLLOW US ON TIKTOK, TWITTER, & INSTAGRAM: @realtalkrj  REAL TALK MUGS, SNAPBACKS, and TEES: https://ryanjespersen.com/merch RECEIVE EXCLUSIVE PERKS - BECOME A REAL TALK PATRON:   / ryanjespersen   THANK YOU FOR SUPPORTING OUR SPONSORS! https://ryanjespersen.com/sponsors The views and opinions expressed in this show are those of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Relay Communications Group Inc. or any affiliates.

n this hard-hitting episode of Connecting the Dots, I reveal the shocking truth behind Israel's Mossad planting deadly devices in pagers ordered by Hezbollah. Joined by lawyer and journalist Dimitry Lascaris, we expose the dangerous global implications—this isn't just espionage, it's terrorism and a war crime, all ignored by Western media. We uncover the sinister connections between Zionist ideology, Christian nationalism, and neoliberal politics, showing how civilians are left to suffer while world powers look the other way. Our political system is failing, and bold, principled leadership is more urgent than ever. Don't miss this eye-opening truth they don't want you to know.   Find me and the show on social media. Click the following links or search @DrWilmerLeon on X/Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Patreon and YouTube!   Hey everyone, Dr. Wilmer here! If you've been enjoying my deep dives into the real stories behind the headlines and appreciate the balanced perspective I bring, I'd love your support on my Patreon channel. Your contribution helps me keep "Connecting the Dots" alive, revealing the truth behind the news. Join our community, and together, let's keep uncovering the hidden truths and making sense of the world. Thank you for being a part of this journey!   Wilmer Leon (00:00): Reuters reports. Israel's Mossad spy agency planted a small amount of explosives inside as many as 5,000. Taiwan made pagers ordered by the Lebanese group Hezbollah months before they were detonated. Is anyone safe? Let's talk. Announcer (00:27): Connecting the dots with Dr. Wilmer Leon, where the analysis of politics, culture, and history converge. Wilmer Leon (00:34): Welcome to the Connecting the Dots podcast with Dr. Wilmer Leon and I am Wilmer Leon. Here's the point. We have a tendency to view current events as though they happen in a vacuum, failing to understand the broader historic context in which most of these events take place. During each episode, my guests and I have probing, provocative, and in-depth discussions that connect the dots between these events in the broader historic context in which they occur. This enables you to better understand and analyze the events that impact the global village in which we live on today's episode. The issue before us is, as I said earlier, is anyone safe? Israel's consumer tech terrorism across Lebanon signals a terrifying new threat raising urgent concerns about the security of international supply chains and the growing insecurity of civilians worldwide. For insight into this, let's turn to my guest. He's a lawyer and journalist. He's based in Montreal, Canada and Kalama Greece. In fact, he joins us from Ada Greece. Dimitry Lascaris, Dmitri, welcome to the show. Dimitry Lascaris  (01:48): Thank you, Wilmer. It's a pleasure to be here. Wilmer Leon (01:51): So I thought that this most recent act of terrorism in a spate of acts of terrorism would be a great place to start the conversation. The cradle reports that this brutal attack should serve as a dire warning to the world. A stark reminder that the occupation states criminal actions, no, no limits indiscriminately targeting those who challenge its interest or those of its Western allies. Dmitri, your thoughts? Dimitry Lascaris  (02:24): Well, for really decades, but particularly the last 11 months, the West and particularly the major Western powers, the governments of the United States, Britain, Germany, and France, have sent an unequivocal message to Israel. And that message is you can do whatever you want. There's no red line From our perspective, we will continue to shovel weapons your way, even if that involves the depletion of our own weapon stocks. We will continue to exercise vetoes or abstentions at United Nations. We will continue to repeat your lies and support you rhetorically and from a propagandistic perspective. We'll continue to give you trade benefits under free trade agreements. So-called free trade agreements between our countries and yours. We will not impose any sanctions on you, even though we've imposed sanctions on states that were far less violative of international law and human rights than you. That's the message. They got the message very loudly and clearly, and I fear, I hope I'm wrong, Wilmer, I really do. (03:31): But I fear that this pager, walkie talkie terrorist attack is just a harbinger of things to come. Who knows what dirty, nasty, terroristic tricks Israel has up its sleeve, and it is not used up until this point in time because frankly before the genocide began in Gaza, there was some restraint being imposed upon Israel. It wasn't much, but there was some, so occasionally you would get leaders of the United States or other western countries signaling to Israel that their appetite for the depravity of this genocidal regime was not unlimited, but that's gone away now. And so everything that Israel is capable of doing from the perspective of violence, terror, oppression, we are now going to see it's all going to come out. And I think that this is just an indication of what is coming. What we saw in Lebanon last week, and it was as the former head of the CIA Leon Panetta said to a national audience on CBS last week, it was unquestionably a form of terrorism. Wilmer Leon (04:38): When someone in the position and former positions such as Leon Panetta makes a statement like that, what does that signal to you? Former head of the CIA, he's from the Clinton camp and advisors advisor Conti to the biggest and the best, and I put that in quotes. What does that signal to you? He definitely went off script on that one. Dimitry Lascaris  (05:16): Yeah, I don't think that Leon Panetta has had a come to Jesus moment. I think he's still the self-interested war monger, (05:27): Neoliberal that he always was. So when I saw this statement, which was startling, it was quite something to see the former head of the CIA. And by the way, this was not surprisingly, I guess picked up by the Israeli press. The Times of Israel had an article yesterday which was expressing its chagrin that Leon Panetta said this. So what's going on here? I can only hazard a guess Wilmer because I'm not in the man's mind and nor do I have any desire to be. But the first thing that popped into my head was this guy has some connection to a major technology company, and he's doing this because his boss or his benefactors in the technology industry are alarmed. They're alarmed about the fact that their business model is being threatened by Israel's latest technological terrorist gimmick. And sure enough, I didn't know this before I learned of the Panetta statement to CBS, but I discovered that he is on the board of Oracle, one of the most important, significant, powerful and influential technology companies in the world based in the United States. (06:30): Of course, whether this is influencing him, I can't say for sure, but the best guess that I can hazard based on the limited information available to me is that his colleagues in the technology industry are very upset about this and so should they be. If they're not, they aren't nearly the wizards and geniuses that they claim to be. If I were in their position, I'd be saying already the public has serious doubts. Thanks, for example, to the heroic revelations from Edward Snowden about the devices we sell to them, the technologies we sell to them, they already suspecting that this is a means whereby we can engage in mass surveillance, destroy their privacy, but never before have they thought that these devices that we sell to them are potentially bombs that could blind them, dismember them, kill them, or their children. Now everybody, any rational human being out there who knows about this terrorist attack has that thought in their mind, and that is a serious threat to the profitability of the Western technology industry. Wilmer Leon (07:40): One of the things that really, I use the word surprise, but I use it guardedly, is how little follow up there has been with Western media in terms of how horrific these actions by Israel have been. I remember reading a story, I think the young girl's name was Fatima, she was maybe five or six years old. Her father's pager was on the kitchen table. The pager goes off, she picks up the pager to take it to her father, and before she can get to him, the pager explodes. And I think the story said blowing off half of her face. And this happened all over Lebanon and it was reported on, but the context in which it was reported on was solely, solely lacking. Dimitry Lascaris  (08:38): I am going to plug two outlets right now, and I want be clear before I do that, that I have absolutely no connection to them. None whatsoever. And they are two telegram channels. One of them is called the Military Media Channel and the other is called the Resistance News Network. These were brought to my attention a few months ago by people in Lebanon who are sympathetic to the resistance. And every single day Wilmer, I spend, I devote an hour to two hours to reviewing what they put out, not because I believe everything that they say they're engaged in a war and information is part of warfare. So I'm cognizant of that, but they're giving us, they offer to us another perspective. So one of the things that I've learned by following the military media channel and the Rise News Network is that an extraordinary number of people, and they've offered gruesome video evidence and photographic evidence to back this up in Lebanon, were blinded by these devices. (09:42): People lost their hands. There are people with holes in their pelvises, in their abdomens, and I'm talking about children, women, elderly men, and of course military aged men. A cross section of Lebanese society was basically maimed, wounded and killed massed by these attacks. You're not going to find this information in the Western media, nor would you find information in the western media about the retaliation that Hezbollah has engaged in since then. It's amazing the disparity of the information you see from them and what you're seeing from the Western media. All of these sources I counsel, everybody who's listening to our conversation should be approached with a healthy degree of skepticism. You should believe nothing on its face, always exercise your own independent thinking, your capacity for critical thought, but do not confine yourselves to Western media because if you do that, you're going to end up supporting a diabolical, genocidal regime. That's what's going to happen to you. You need to have access to all sources of information and think critically. Wilmer Leon (10:48): Another source that I go to is Laith maros free Palestine tv. For me, that's another invaluable source for getting an alternative perspective. I'm glad that you framed it in the manner in which you did, because one of the elements of the so-called analysis is October 7th. It says, though this conflict started on October 7th, ignoring the decades of oppression that Palestinians have been subjected to. When I listen to whether it's Kamala Harris, when I listen to former President Donald Trump, if they make reference to the conflict at some point in their dialogue, it's going to be October 7th. Look what Hamas did on October 7th, totally ignoring 70 years of oppression. And so how this gets framed is very, very important. Dimitry Lascaris  (12:01): Oh, 100% Wilmer. And I think that the answer that Kamala Harris gave in the debate with Trump to the question of how to deal with the human tragedy as they call it, it's not really a human tragedy, it's much more than that. It is a genocide. In Gaza, the way she responded, Wilmer Leon (12:21): The earthquake in Haiti was a human tragedy. Correct. Dimitry Lascaris  (12:28): Humans did not cause the earthquake. You're right. Absolutely. Wilmer Leon (12:31): Exactly. And so I made that point again because how these things get framed is incredibly, famine is a human tragedy. Floods are human. So go ahead. Dimitry Lascaris  (12:45): So the first thing out of her mouth, and I'm sure you know this Wilmer, probably many of the people listening us know this. Kamala Harris went into that debate with extensive training from public relations professionals. And she was told, when you get the question about Israel, because she knew there, they all knew a question about Israel was coming. This is how you start your answer. Wilmer Leon (13:09): Wait a minute, wait minute, wait minute, wait a minute, minute, wait a minute. Lemme see if I can channel my inner Dmitri Karus. Israel has a right to defend itself. Dimitry Lascaris  (13:20): That was actually the second thing mouth, the first thing out of her mouth. There was no question. You're absolutely right. That was going to be front and center in her answer to any question about Israel and Gaza. But the first thing out of her mouth was, let's remember when this all began. October 7th, right? A colossal lie, A stupendous lie. And of course, the moderators who in my opinion were extraordinarily biased in favor of Kamala Harris, they didn't do any fact checking of her. They said nothing at this point. It might've been the most audacious lie during the entire debate, the one that certainly has the most impact on actual human lives. This did not start on October 7th. This started decades ago when the Palestinian people were dispossessed of their land forcibly by Zionist militias in the nakba. And even before then, (14:16): And it has continued year after year after year, you can go and consult the casualty figures from any independent reputable source like the United Nations. And you will find that year after year after year for decades, the Palestinian people have suffered far more civilian casualties than Israelis every year. And it's a multiple. We're talking about a ratio 10 to one, 15 to 1...21. How the hell can you say in good conscience that all of this began what we're seeing today in Gaza and now in the West Bank, that this began on October 7th. It takes a colossal act of self-deception and mendacity to say such a thing. And she was prepared to say exactly that, and it was the first thing that came out of her mouth. This is the peculiar expertise that sort of the propaganda system part excellence that we have in the West is they always start history on the date that is most advantageous to their narrative always. And we always fall for this like suckers, like chumps, like as Malcolm X said many times, you're a sucker, you're a chump. That's exactly what we are when we believe this crap, that history starts on the date that's most advantageous to our government's narrative. So Wilmer Leon (15:33): Article 51 of additional protocol one to the Geneva Convention from 1949, it prohibits the indiscriminate attacks on civilians and Article 85 lists attacks on civilians as grave breaches, that amount to war crimes, still talking about these pagers in these walkie talkies, you have to identify who qualifies as a combatant under international humanitarian law when analyzing the pager detonations, and this is from the cradle, when analyzing the pager detonations from a legal standpoint, it becomes clear that Israel's killing spree in Lebanon lies somewhere between a war crime and an act of terrorism. And they say the classification depends on the current state of affairs. Your thoughts, because one of the things to your point about, we have to look at this in the context of October 7th, a lot of this depends on how it gets classified. But as a former prosecutor, if she does not realize when she makes the statement about October 7th, when she makes the statement about Israel has the right to defend itself based upon international law, that's just flat out wrong. Dimitry Lascaris  (17:10): Yeah, I need to address this whole thing about a former prosecutor. Okay? And I know you're entirely right to bring this up, that that's what she is, Kamala Harris, and that's what people constantly point out about her. Let's just start by acknowledging that the US justice system is rigged. It's rigged against people of color, the poor, minorities, workers. It always has been, and it arguably is worse now that it has been at any time in the post World War II history. And so Kamala Harris, the fact that she was a prosecutor, nobody should think that that for one moment has conferred upon her any expertise in of the rule of law. Prosecutors in the United States are basically instruments of oppression, and that's what she was when she was a prosecutor. In any event, it's important to know that something can be a war crime in an act of terrorism. (18:05): At the same time, these concepts are not mutually exclusive and in my opinion, as a capacity as a lawyer, these fall squarely within the definition of a war crime. And within the classical conventional definition of terrorism in the West, which is the use of violence or threats of violence against civilians or civilian infrastructure in order to achieve a political objective. Clearly the political objective here is to terrorize the Lebanese population into either turning against Hezbollah or if you're already a supportive of Hezbollah, to demanding that Hezbollah stand down and allow Israel to complete the genocide without any armed resistance from outside of occupied Palestine. That's the political objective. And clearly this was going to have a massive and unknowable impact on the civilian population because nobody can know where a pager is going to be at any time. If you just think about, I don't know if you've used a pager before or some other electronic, Wilmer Leon (19:09): I'm old enough, I'm pre-cell phone. You can tell by the gray. Dimitry Lascaris  (19:12): I'm pre too. In days bygone, I too used a pager. So I used many different, I used a Blackberry, I used a Motorola phone back in the nineties. And think about what you did with that device when it was in your possession. Oftentimes you put it down in the kitchen. Sometimes your children would play with it, sometimes you would leave it in your car, you'd forget it in your car, or sometimes you'd have it on you while you're driving your car. Or you might just be a civilian who is or is not sympathetic to Hezbollah like a doctor and you use this device. There is absolutely no way Wilmer, absolutely no way that the Israeli military could have made a confident assessment of who was going to be killed and maimed directly and indirectly by the explosion of these devices, by the detonation of these devices that is both a war crime and an act of terrorism. Wilmer Leon (20:13): A minute there's, there's another element to this as well. I believe there's a cultural element in the West, the cell phone, the pager is a very personal item. I don't give my cell phone, I don't even give my cell phone to my son. He has his own phone. I don't give my cell phone to my wife. She has her own phone. In many African countries and middle Eastern countries, there may be one cell phone in a family, and so it gets or pager, it gets distributed and used, I'll say indiscriminately within a family. It could be within a neighborhood. So you don't even really know at any given time who's going to be to your point. But I also wanted to add the cultural aspect of this. You have no idea whether the person whose name is on the contract is going to be the sole user of that device. Dimitry Lascaris  (21:24): I think that's an excellent point. The only modification I would add to it is that I wouldn't say it's so much cultural as it is socioeconomic. Wilmer Leon (21:34): Okay, I got it. Dimitry Lascaris  (21:35): But at the end of the day, it's a distinction without difference Wil. But I think what, from my perspective, why your point is so powerful is because people living in West Asia generally don't have ordinary citizens. The economic means that we have. Wilmer Leon (21:51): Correct, correct. Good point. Dimitry Lascaris  (21:52): You can't have multiple devices in a family. Absolutely. That is a very important consideration. But also another consideration is that a pager, one of the reasons why we want to have our own cell phones is because there's a lot of stuff in there that's personal to us. Emails, there's text messages and so forth. The page is different. A pager just makes a noise when somebody wants to draw your attention to something. (22:17): So people are much more, I think, willing to share pagers with others, leave them in the possession of others. Then they might be with a cell phone, for example, or a tablet. So this is a particularly dangerous device. And if you're going to use it as an explosive for all of the reasons that you and I have been discussing, there is a very high potential that you are going to maim or kill innocent bystanders. And you have no way, no way of accurately assessing what the damage is going to be to the people in those categories. Wilmer Leon (22:52): And that is considered by international standards, collective punishment of civilians. And that is illegal. And I understand your point about being a prosecutor, but she was a prosecutor. And I go back to that because that's a point that her campaign and that she loves to make, that is a point of validation of her and for her. So since they want to use that point, then I'll use the point. Dimitry Lascaris  (23:24): Totally, totally. You're absolutely right. Absolutely. Wilmer Leon (23:28): It's just wrong. The world isn't flat, the sun doesn't revolve around the earth, and one plus one does not equal 17. I want to go back to something else that Joe Biden has said on more than one occasion that he is a Zionist. In fact, the last maybe it wasn't the, yeah, I think it was the last time Netanyahu was at the White House, sitting next to Joe Biden, he turned to Joe Biden and said, you are a Zionist. In fact, he said, you are a Irish Zionist. That spoke volumes to me. It took me back to the Secretary of State saying, when he first got to the region in October, I'm not only here as the American secretary, Tony Blink said, I'm not only here as a Secretary of state, I'm here as a Jew. What does that say to you about the mindset and how do statements like that resonate within the region when the United States continues to try to hold itself out as some unbiased arbiter of this conflict? Is that a valid question to ask? Dimitry Lascaris  (25:01): Well, first of all, let me say that in defense of our brothers and sisters in Ireland, most of them are not Zionists. In fact, in Europe, the Irish people, I'm not talking about the political elite Ireland, the Irish people are amongst the most principled and courageous and sympathetic when it comes to the Palestinian cause, number one. Number two, I think what Anthony Blinken said was antisemitic because he was implying that if you're a Jew, you support this genocidal regime and all of the crimes that's committed over decades. But you and I both know that all around the world, there are conscientious members of the Jewish community, people who identify as Jews and who have always identified as Jews, who are adamantly opposed to Israel with every fiber of their being. So when Anthony Blinken goes to Israel and he says, I come to you as a Jew, he's implying that if you're a Jew, you support this monstrosity. (26:03): That's antisemitic fundamentally, in my opinion. But at the end of the day, and I'll tell you on a personal level, Wilmer, I've had to deal with this issue in a painful way. And the painful way in which I had to deal with it was about six years ago, there were two members of the Liberal Party caucus, the governing party in Canada who are Zionist and who happened to be Jewish as well. And I'll tell you their names. Their names are Anthony HouseFather and Michael Levitt. And at the time, Michael Levitt was the chairman of the Canada Israel Parliamentary Friendship Group. And Anthony Housefather was the vice chair, and they were the two most outspoken, aggressive defenders of Israel in the governing party's caucus. And just to give you an example of how aggressive they were in supporting Israel in 2018, a friend of mine who's a Palestinian Canadian doctor, his name is Ek Banani, he was shot by an Israeli sniper in Gaza while he was wearing medical garb. (27:10): And he was out in the field during the great march of return tending to civilians who were being shot by Israeli snipers. He himself took a bullet to each leg. And the liberal government, Justin Trudeau, on a rare occasion, condemned Israel for this. And these two characters, Michael Levitt and Anthony Housefather put out their own statement, even though they came from the same party as Justin Trudeau, and even though their boss was Justin Trudeau and defended what Israel did, and I pointed out, in my opinion, they were showing more devotion to Israel's apartheid regime than they were to Canada, which they took an oath to defend as parliamentarians. And for this, I was accused by the Prime Minister of antisemitism. I didn't say what I said because they were Jewish. I said, what I said, because they're radical Zionists. It's as simple as that. So we have to recognize, I think today that there are people in Western politics, some of whom are Jewish, but not all of whom are Jewish by any means, who place Zionist ideology over the interests of their own country. (28:23): And by the way, I saw this myself when I was a child of Greek immigrants growing up in Canada. My parents told me when I was a kid, they came from Greece. They had a nationalistic orientation, and they said, you are a Greek first and a Canadian second. They told me that when I was a little boy, they were putting the homeland where their country of origin, ahead of the country, where I, myself, their child was born. So this is not a phenomenon that's peculiar to the Jewish community. It's one that you see in all kinds of the Asdas, including my own, the Greek, the Aspera. We need to be honest and say there are people in this community and other communities who put the interests of a foreign state ahead of the country that they have sworn to represent. This is absolutely the case. And Anthony Blinken is a classic example of this. I mean, my God, he's basically telling people, he telegraphed from the outset that I'm going to prioritize the agenda of the Israeli government over that of the United States. And that's exactly what he has done every single day of this conflict. That man is unfit to be the Secretary of state of the United States. He is not serving the national interest. He is undermining the national interest. People need to be honest about that. Wilmer Leon (29:41): When you have, I think people, because of how events have unfolded, whether it be with the Ukraine, Russia conflict, whether it be with the United States trying to pick a fight with China over Taiwan, folks need to remember that the Department of State, the Secretary of State, is supposed to be the chief diplomat in the United States. When I say chief diplomat, that means using diplomacy, not militarism to solve conflict. But you have people in the Pentagon, which used to be known as the Department of War. You have people in the Pentagon looking at Tony Blink and saying, no, no, no, no, sir, no man, no, you're you. You're traversing down the wrong road here in a number of instances saying, we don't have the capability to engage in the level of militarism that you are invoking or trying to get us into. People need to understand this man is not doing his job, even though he's following in the steps of Hillary Clinton, even though he's following in the steps of Madeline Albright, he's not doing his job. Dimitry Lascaris  (31:05): Wilmer, I'm going to make a strong statement, and I'm going to go on a limb here. I think that pretty much every leader of every western country, every foreign minister of every Western country day, certainly the major ones, they're traitors, in my opinion, they're traitors. They are all betraying the interests of the people they have sworn to represent. This is true in Canada, the United States, Greece, where I'm currently situated, I believe this government as a moral matter. I don't know whether it's true from a legal perspective. I'm not offering a legal opinion here. I'm talking about ethics, morality, the moral matter. The Greek government is a traitor. They have sold us out to Brussels and Washington. They're looking out for the agenda of a narrow elite based in Brussels in Washington to the detriment of the Greek people. The same is happening in Canada. It's happening in France. (31:56): It's happening in Britain. And we as people need to rise up and put into power those who actually represent our interests right across the west. We are governed by vassals. Even the United States is governed by vassals. They're vassals of a US-based oligarchy and the military industrial complex. I cannot stress enough that incredible speech that Dwight d Eisenhower gave at the very end of his presidency. We don't talk about that enough. When he warned of the dangers of the military industrial complex, he was very clear. It was a very, very ominous warning that it was going to destroy American democracy. What happened within the next 10 years? JFK is assassinated. Malcolm X is assassinated, MLK is assassinated. Bobby Kennedy is assassinated. And from then, it's been downhill ever since, (32:47): Downhill, ever since. And we've moved gradually, incrementally towards fascism, an oligarchic led fascism. That's where we find ourselves today. People need to rise up. I'm not suggesting that people engage in violence. We can do this in a way that is nonviolent against the elites who claim to represent us and remove them from power as quickly as possible before we are all taken down by their depravity. Whatever you may think of the Palestinian cause, whatever you may think about Israel, this may not be something. This entire region may not be something that matters to you, but the implications of this go, they're global. They're global. If this stays out of control, we are all going to be devastated and impacted by it in a profoundly negative way. And ultimately, we may find ourselves in a nuclear Armageddon. Wilmer Leon (33:35): In fact, that right there, and you went down this litany of domestic assassinations, you didn't even go down the litany of African assassinations. That's a whole nother show. I just wanted to make that point. And this could also be, excuse me, a whole nother show. But I want you just to quickly, you mentioned you're in Greece. You mentioned the traitorous action of leadership. Greece has been subjected to an incredible amount of neoliberal policy and privatization, which has not, through machinations by the World Bank and the IMF and Greece has been suffering with this, I want to say it's one of the first European countries to find itself. If my memory serves me correctly involved in these practices, am I right to make that assessment? And I bring that up in validation of your point of how leadership has sold out the Greek people to oligarchs. Dimitry Lascaris  (34:47): Oh, it's so true of this country. Wilmer starting in 2010, a financial crisis that was precipitated not by the ordinary Greek workers. It was precipitated by the fraudsters, the liars, the cheats in the banking industry in Greece and beyond Greece. And so in order to bail out the banking industry, the Greek people were made to pay ordinary workers, citizens the most vulnerable. They imposed upon Greece starting in about 2010, a neoliberal austerity program, the likes of which no country in Europe had ever seen in the post World War II period. And the country suffered an economic contraction in excess of 25%, which is I think the height of the economic contraction in the United States during the Great Depression. That's how severe it was. And it was totally engineered by Washington, Brussels and Mario Draghi, who at that time was the president of UCB, was entirely avoidable. And the unemployment rate soared to something like 27, 28%. The youth unemployment rate was nexus of 50%. The suicide rate soared, the poverty rate soared, the lifespan of Greeks fell. This was all engineered by Neoliberals and in Washington and Brussels, and I think in many ways it was an experiment and they (36:10): Found out that they could get away with it. And now we're seeing this transported exported to the rest of Europe. We're seeing this done in Germany. We're seeing this done in Britain, and they just elected Keir Starmer, who's supposed to be a Labor party leader, who's supposed to be prioritizing the interests of workers. And one of the first things Keir Starmer government does, it comes out and says, oh, we're going to have to deliver some very tough medicine to you. We have some real budgetary difficulties, Wilmer Leon (36:38): Austerity measures. Dimitry Lascaris  (36:40): Absolutely. Absolutely. They don't represent us. This goes back to the question of treason. They do not represent us. They represent a neoliberal oligarchic elite whose appetite for wealth is insatiable. It's never enough. Wilmer, I got $500 billion. Ain't enough. I got a trillion dollars. Ain't enough. There's never enough money for these people. The Elon Musks of the world, the Jeff Bezos of the world, Larry Ellison, Warren Buffett. These people have an insatiable appetite for money, and they are ruling us. They are the true rulers of our societies. I'm sorry to say, this is not a conspiracy theory. This is just reality by now. We should be able to recognize this. Wilmer Leon (37:23): It started in Greece in two. Who would've thought they were talking about privatizing the Parthenon. They were talking about privatizing Greek antiquity. I said, what? They were going to sell the coliseum to private interests, to raise money to pay the debt. And so you've seen it in Greece, you've seen it in Italy. You've we're seeing it now play itself out in Germany. It's playing all over Europe. It's playing itself out in France. I just wanted to quickly hit on that point. So now getting back to the conversation that all of this is inextricably linked, but wanted to get back to the point of the expansion of the conflict. You now have Hezbollah sending missiles into Israel. You have Israel increasing its attack on Southern Lebanon. Talk about how dangerous it is becoming even more dangerous if that's even imaginable, that this conflict is escalating. And what I think a lot of people are mistaking, they are mistaking restraint on behalf of the resistance for weakness. Dimitry Lascaris  (38:48): Absolutely. And when the contrary is true, restraint is a sign of strength. When you were able to control your emotions in situations where most people would feel their passions being inflamed and would act in ways that are contrary to their own interests, that's strength. That's an inner strength that we should commend and admire, and whatever we may think of, the politics of these resistance organizations in the government that we're in that particular aspect of their conduct deserves to be commended. They have shown a tremendous amount of restraint, but that doesn't mean they aren't escalating the Islamic resistance in Lebanon. The armed wing of Hezbollah has now expanded the zone of attack well beyond the 20 kilometers or so to which they can find themselves during the first 11 months. They are now attacking areas outside of Haifa. I think they've quite consciously said, we aren't going to attack the center of Haifa, yet. (39:45): We are going to attack the outline areas to give the Israelis an opportunity to retreat from the precipice to which they have brought us. There are reports that they fired, that they hit areas outside of Tel Aviv. Again, not inside the heart of Tel Aviv, but outside, I think this is a message. We can hit Tel Aviv, we can hit Haifa, draw back from the precipice to which you have brought us. They have hit the Ramat David Airbase for the first time. They hit Raphael facilities, which this is a major military contractor in Israel, which produces their obviously inadequate air defense systems in its facilities. I think it's the largest production facility they have in Israel is just outside of Haifa. So they're sending a message in a very disciplined manner despite the suffering that they have incurred over the last 10 days, and really the last 11 months that civilian casualties on the Lebanese side have been much higher from day one of this war. (40:46): The destruction to civilian infrastructure has been much higher on the Lebanese side from day one of this war. And now the disparity between what the Israelis are suffering and what the Lebanese are suffering is growing even wider. And yet we are seeing this very calculated, measured response and let us hope that there are some adults in the room somewhere in the west who will get the message. So far, there is nobody, I mean, the speech that Biden gave, I didn't have the opportunity to watch it, but I read reports about it and I saw a couple of excerpts from it suggest to me that there is no one getting the message in Washington. No one. These people are as arrogant as ever. They're as determined as ever to support this regime until it takes down the entirety of West Asia with it. Wilmer Leon (41:32): Two quick points I want to get to before we get to Biden's speech, and we'll wrap up with that. One is I think when we talk about restraint, there are some practical elements of this restraint, because Iran has been very, very clear. They don't want a war. Hezbollah has been very clear. They don't want a war. The only ones that seem to be encouraging this are Ansar, Allah in Yemen. They're saying, oh, United States wants to attack us. Please, please do that. They're the only ones that really seem to be saying, Dimitry Lascaris  (42:13): Someone's got to be the Bad cop. Wilmer. Ansar Allah is the bad cop. Wilmer Leon (42:18): And folks need to understand that's a fight you don't want. I don't know if you ever saw the story about Mike Tyson on the airplane coming across the top of his seat to beat up the guy that was kicking his seat behind him, but imagine Mike Tyson coming across the top of his seat in an airplane. You don't want that smoke quickly, though I think this is another very important aspect of this that doesn't get a whole lot of articulation or explanation. The impact that Christian nationalism is a lot of people are just attributing this to mistakenly Judaism, Zionism. They're trying to conflate the two. They are not anywhere near being the same, but Christian nationalism gets left out of this analysis. Dimitry Lascaris  (43:09): Oh, that's so true, and it's so important. The first time I went to Israel or occupied Palestine, as I prefer to call it, was when I was 21 years old. So this would've been back in the eighties. And at that point, I was basically incapable of seeing through the propaganda narrative about Israel, I believed it was assigning island of democracy in the sea of barbarism, and we had shared values, and the Israelis were just trying to live their lives in peace. But there were people in the region who were determined to destroy them for antisemitic reasons. I believed all of that. I went to Jerusalem, and I don't even remember how I found out about it, but there was this huge gathering of evangelical Christians from the United States in an outdoor stadium to which Shiman Perez, who I think at the time he was the prime minister of Israel, I think delivered the most really, it was a tremendously racist, anti-Arab racist propagandistic speech about the Zionist agenda, and they were wildly supportive of him. I saw a level of fanaticism I'd never experienced in my life sitting that Audience. Wilmer Leon (44:32): Wow, okay. Dimitry Lascaris  (44:32): These were American evangelical Christians, thousands upon thousands of them. It only was later in life that I realized as I came to study this conflict more closely that there are lots of reasons to believe that the most fanatical Zionists in the world are, in fact, Christian. Some of them are not even Christian or Jewish. They're secular. They described to this ideology for reasons that are completely non-religious. Wilmer Leon (44:58): Wasn't Theodore Herzl an atheist. Dimitry Lascaris  (45:00): I believe he was. That's my understanding. Absolutely. Yeah. (45:04): So this is a non religious ideology. It is an ideology of imperialism and colonialism and racism, and we shouldn't be shy about saying that, and never ever conflate that ideology with any particular religion or ethnic group, whether it be Judaism or Christianity, or of course there are many wonderful Christians who are adamantly opposed to what Israel is doing to the Palestinian people. There's a segment of self-professed Christians. I dispute whether they're Christians at all, just as I dispute whether Jewish Zionists are actually Jews. I have serious doubts about that. But they call themselves Jews. They call themselves Christians. They do not represent the Christian community. They do not represent the Jewish community. They represent an ideology that is racist and colonial. Wilmer Leon (45:50): In fact, to that point, Benjamin Netanyahu, his last name, his family last name isn't really Netanyahu. It's like WojaKowski, Mil Mil Milakowski, Milakowski. His grandfather immigrated from Poland to the region in 1920 and Arabis the family last. And there are a number of those who now are proclaiming their rights to that land, when in fact they are European immigrants. That that's hence the whole thing in terms of it's a settler colonial project. And people and settler colonial projects don't go nicely. They don't go quietly when you invade somebody else's land. The people that are there, the indigenous population usually wants to resist. But I make the point that so many of these people that are proclaiming a heritage to the space are actually parts of a settler colonial project. Dimitry Lascaris  (47:13): Absolutely, and you reminded me. So it's something I got. It's a be on my mind. And I got to say, does everybody notice when Netanyahu speaks? He sounds like he comes from the streets of New York because Wilmer Leon (47:23): He does, or Philly. Dimitry Lascaris  (47:25): Philly, yeah. Or Philly. Sure. I lived in New York for six years, and if I ran into that dude in the street and didn't know who he was, I'd say he was in New York or he is a Philly. He's from the northeast of the United States. Why does he speak that way? Because fundamentally, he is an American and he's speaking to an American audience. He's not from the region, he's not indigenous the region. I mean, come on, man. Benjamin Netanyahu, that man is indigenous to the region of West Asia. He's an alien in the region of West Asia, and he's treating people in the region like he's an alien. And why does he speak that way? He speaks that way because ultimately the very existence of Israel depends upon the sport of the United States people, the Society of the United States. Without that support, Israel would not exist in its current form. Impossible. Wilmer Leon (48:15): Final point here, and you mentioned Joe Biden's speech at the un. I want to read two short excerpts, which I think speak volumes from a couple of perspectives. The Washington Post reported Biden points to the relative success of his administration's efforts to rally western support for Ukraine, coordinating a robust response with European partners to the Russian invasion and reinvigorating the transatlantic alliance. He stressed, he didn't want to see a full scale war between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon. He called for the war to end. Innocent civilians in Gaza are also going through hell. Thousands and thousands killed including aid workers. Too many families dislocated crowding into tents facing a dire humanitarian situation. They didn't ask for this war. Hamas started. (49:16): So a couple of things. One, I'm looking at what he said, and I'm looking at how the Washington Post has reported. I go back to the question we talked about earlier. When we hear Vice President Harris, secretary of State, Blinken Biden and others say that Israel has the right to defend itself, then you hear Biden say, this war has to stop. Well, the conflict in Ukraine started under his administration, and the United States started the conflict again, talking about restraint being mistaken for weakness. And in terms of what he sees in Gaza, if he truly wants it to stop, all he has to do is pick up the phone. Tell Netanyahu you don't get another artillery shell. You don't get another tank, you don't get another dime, and the war stops in two days. Is that too simplistic, Dmitri Karus? Dimitry Lascaris  (50:23): No, there's absolutely not. It is absolutely the reality, and I'm as hostile to the Israel lobby as anybody, so please don't mistake me as an apologist for the Israel lobby. But I think that people like John Meir shier, for example, all my respect a lot are grossly overestimating the power of the Israel lobby. I don't think that, sure, the Israel lobby can take out people who don't have a lot of power. (50:56): They can take out like Val Bowman, they can take out Cori Bush, and maybe people are somewhat more powerful, but the president of the United States states, the sitting president of the United States, what are they going to remove him from office? No, they're not going to be able to remove him from office. If he wanted to actually stop the war in Gaza, he could stop the war in Gaza with a phone call. It is that simple. He doesn't do it because as he told us, he's a Zionist. I mean, he told us, and he's also said repeatedly, Wilmer, as I'm sure you know, if Israel didn't exist, we would have to invent it in order to protect America's, what he calls, not really, but what he calls America's strategic interest in the region. What that really means is the interest of the US oligarchy, not the American. (51:39): The unsinkable aircraft carrier in the region. (51:44): A hundred percent. A hundred percent. So all of this is Kabuki theater. Joe Biden wants Israel to achieve the agenda that Netanyahu is set for it, which is to destroy by any and all means necessary any resistance to Western slash Israeli hegemony in West Asia. He wants them to achieve that objective. That should be our operating assumption. And just because from time to time, he or Blinken or anonymous sources go to the press and say, oh, we're frustrated with Benjamin Netanyahu and we really want to cease fire, and man, we feel so terrible about what's happening to those civilians, too many are dying. Nobody should buy any of this crap. Watch what they do. Don't listen to what they say, watch what they do. And what they're doing is enabling a genocide that is unequivocal. Wilmer Leon (52:37): And you mentioned the power of APAC, and we will wrap up with this. And folks, those of you that are listening to this, that are rolling your eyes and saying, oh, this is propaganda. Look it up. I mean, there's hardly anything that's been said here that you can't research and find to be true. APAC boasted back, I want to say it was in April in the New York Times, you mentioned Jamal Bowman and Cori Bush. They touted, they bragged in the New York Times and the Washington Post that they were going to spend $100 million in the US election to unseat Democrats that they deemed to be anti Zionist. And Jamal Bowman and Cori Bush were victims of that. And I put that in quotes because at the time that that story was released, I didn't hear anybody in the Democratic Party come out and challenge APAC for making that statement. (53:46): It was only after Cori Bush lost that. She then came out and said, APAC, I'm coming after your village. Well, if you'd have said that on the front end, you'd probably still be in office because that could have been used as a rallying point. If they're going to spend a hundred million dollars, we need a hundred million votes. That to me, would've been the line that would've made the difference. And Kamala Harris finds herself in the same position. When you look at the data, over 70% of Americans want this thing ended and they want it ended. Now, she would gain votes outside of the money she would lose from APAC funding. If she were truly looking at this from an electoral politics perspective, she would gain votes. The race wouldn't even be close if she erred on the side of Wright. And on the right side of history with that, Dimitri Lascaris, I'll let you take us home, what you got, Dimitry Lascaris  (55:02): You can get elected in the United States, despite all the obstacles by running as a principled candidate committed to the wishes and the priorities of the people, you can absolutely get elected. The problem Wilmer is that the system is constructed in such a way as to squash anybody who actually has a commitment to justice and to representing the wishes of the people. There are a series of filters that have been set up. So for example, you're seeing now, I'm actually working on Jill Stein's campaign. (55:33): They're waging, and I don't think any candidate is perfect, and I don't have an expectation that Jill is going to win. I certainly would love for that to happen. But the Democratic Party is waging war against the Green Party candidacy in every single state, a legal warfare. And they have enormous resources at their disposal to do that because the oligarchy is funneling massive amounts of money to them, to squash candidates like Jill Stein. If we had a system where it was a level playing field, so people who were truly committed to the wishes of the people and were able to, they were given an equal amount of airtime to other candidates who favored the wealthy, for example, you would see principled, honorable, decent people being elected to public office over and over and over again. But we have a political system throughout the west. This is not peculiar to the us, although I think the US is a bit of an extreme case. It's also true in Canada, it's also true in Western European countries, a series of filters that have been established to squash candidates before they get an opportunity to present their case to the people. If we could get them before the people on an equal playing field, the best candidates would win time and again, the problem is the system is designed to defeat them before they even get out of the gate. Wilmer Leon (56:55): And to that, I say, dare to be moral, dare to stand on the side of right. Dare to be on the right side of history. With that, let me say Dimitri Lascaris, I want to thank you so much for giving me the time that you've given me today. I greatly, greatly appreciate it. Thank you so much for joining the show. Dimitry Lascaris  (57:16): Great pleasure, Wilmer. As always. We've had opportunity to speak before and it's the first time we had to meet today, and I love what you do and keep doing it. Wilmer Leon (57:25): Well, thank you. Thank you. Without guests like you, I'd just be sitting here talking to myself. Folks, thank you all so much for listening to the Connecting the Dots podcast with me, Dr. Wilmer Leon. Stay tuned for new episodes every week. Also, please follow and subscribe. Leave a review, share the show, follow on social media. You can find all the links below in the show description. Remember, this is where the analysis of politics, culture, and history converge because talk without analysis is just chatter, and we don't chatter here on connecting the dots. See you again next time. Until then, I'm Dr. Wilmer Leon. Have a great one. Peace and blessings. I'm out Announcer (58:10): Connecting the dots with Dr. Wilmer Leon, where the analysis of politics, culture, and history converge.  

Back in July, the Palestinian Canadian singer-songwriter Nemah Hasan, a.k.a. Nemahsis, sat down with Tom to talk about her forthcoming debut album, “Verbathim.” The record was originally supposed to come out last year, but then she says her label unexpectedly dropped her. Now, with “Verbathim” finally out in the world, we revisit Nemah's conversation with Tom where she explains exactly what happened in her own words.

Our guest this week was Richard Fung. Richard is a Trinidadian born, Toronto-based documentary filmmaker, artist and cultural critic, whose films not only explore the lives of LGBTQ+ pan-Asian Canadians but also the subject of identity when it comes to being multiracial. If you haven't joined us for The Filmmaker's Life before, please register at https://www.filmmakersuccess.com/The-Filmmakers-Life-Home for the Zoom link. Richard Fung is an award-winning video artist, cultural critic, and a professor emeritus at Ontario College of Art and Design University (OCADU). Born in Trinidad and based in Toronto, most of his work springs from his formation as a gay man of Chinese descent growing up at the cusp of independence from colonial Britain and immigrating to Canada in his late teens. Navigating geopolitical space is at the heart of Richard's practice, whether it's documenting the lives of LGBTQ+ pan-Asian Canadians, retracing the evolution of the recipe for West Indian roti, exploring the roots and branches of his multiracial family, or following a Palestinian Canadian friend as he negotiates his two home cities of Toronto and Hebron. 

My guest on this episode is Jackie Khalilieh. Jackie is a writer and former teacher whose first book, the YA novel Something More, was published by Tundra Books in 2023. That novel was shortlisted for the Ruth & Sylvia Shwartz Award, as well as the Snow Willow Award, and was selected for several Best of the year lists, including by the New York Public Library and Audible Books Canada. Publishers Weekly called Something More a “thought-provoking and thoroughly entertaining debut that centers questions of identity via a fresh lens." Jackie and I talk about how her identities as a person with autism and a Palestinian-Canadian inform the kinds of stories she wants to tell, about some of the negative response her book has received from readers who perhaps wanted its autistic main character to conform to a particular ideal, and about how she can't on GoodReads without stripmining the site for data and projections about her own writing career.   This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus. Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.

In Toronto author Aaron Kreuter's linked story collection Rubble Children, he's provided a stirring and provocative portrait of a Jewish community in Toronto struggling with the difficult choices they must face as their core beliefs are called into question. Palestinian-Canadian author Saeed Teebi, author of Her First Palestinian, is the guest interviewer for this episode. We read "The Krasners" from Rubble Children. https://aaronkreuter.com/ Support the Show.

For $6 a month, become a Useful Idiot! Get extended interviews, Thursday Throwdowns, and bonus content at www.usefulidiotspodcast.com Watch this week's Thursday Throwdown: CNN compares Keffiyehs to Confederate Flags https://www.usefulidiotspodcast.com/p/cnn-compares-keffiyehs-to-confederate?r=je5va&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web Join us LIVE on Youtube every Monday at 10am EST for Monday Mourning, where we watch the Sunday morning news shows so that you don't have to. 265 days into Israel's mass assault on Gaza, Palestinian-Canadian lawyer and former spokesperson for the Palestine Liberation Organization Diana Buttu joins us from Haifa, Israel with a stark warning: Things are going to get worse. “For Netanyahu,” she explains, “he needs to open up another front in order to maintain his power. He's made it clear that he's not going to push for a ceasefire. He doesn't care about the Israeli captives. And so it's pretty clear to me that he's going to go ahead and attack Lebanon.” Israel has no aim to rescue its hostages. It never did. “If they actually cared about them, they would have done what should have been done very early on, which is negotiate a ceasefire. Instead, they've done the opposite. And this is why you can look at these ceasefire proposals with such skepticism. Because instead, what they've done is bombed Gaza to virtual smithereens.” Diana, whose father survived the Nakba in 1948, moved to Haifa in 2000. And like many others, she believed what the media told everyone to believe: that with a simple peace plan, Palestine would be fixed. Then she arrived in Palestine and saw the true reality. “All of the things that had been dismissed by the mainstream media,” she says, “I had dismissed too. I had dismissed this idea of settlements and the impact of settlements. And I kept thinking, it'll be undone. It'll all be undone. I dismissed the harm of what it means to be a Palestinian political prisoner, to be somebody who's abducted in the middle of the night. I dismissed the harm of the checkpoints. I dismissed a lot of things. And so when I arrived here, it was the first time that I had to confront the reality that this political process was not going to undo any of those harms.” Stopping the bombs is one thing. Stopping settlements, returning land, granting rights to Palestinians, and removing the literal wall that cages them is another. “They talk about reconfiguring the prison, reconfiguring the occupation, but they never talk about ending the occupation because this mentality of control permeates deep inside Israel.” There's only one way this ends, Diana says. “It's going to end when the world says that it's enough. And that's it.” Diana also shares haunting stories of Palestinian children who were kept in Israeli torture prisons for months, and the ways that western corporate media has worked to cover it up. This week's interview with Diana Buttu will not be paywalled. We hope you'll listen to and share her important perspective. Plus, catch this week's Thursday Throwdown: CNN compares Keffiyehs to Confederate Flags, where Van Jones claims that wearing a keffiyeh around Israeli government supporters is as much a call for violence as waving a confederate flag in Harlem. And we celebrate the freedom of Julian Assange, a rare victory that couldn't have happened without supporters of independent media like you. Thanks for your support, we'll see you next time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Billie Eilish's new album Hit Me Hard and Soft has been hailed by critics as her best album yet. She describes it as an “album-ass album”, meant to be listened to in its entirety, but it's also provocative: it takes on fame and body-shaming ("People say I look happy just because I got skinny") and women she wants to please (“I could eat that girl for lunch, she dances on my tongue”). So what do we think? Lilah is joined by two experts, the FT's music writer Arwa Haider and US media business correspondent Anna Nicolaou, to discuss the role Billie plays in our pop pantheon.-------We love hearing from you. Lilah is on Instagram @lilahrap. We're on X @lifeandartpod and on email at lifeandart@ft.com. We are grateful for reviews on Apple and Spotify. And please share this episode with your friends!-------Links (all FT links get you past the paywall): – The FT's four-star review of Hit Me Hard and Soft, by Ludo Hunter-Tilney: https://on.ft.com/4bP4rWH – Arwa's latest review is of the album A La Sala by Khruangbin, a mash-up of “Iranian rock, Jamaican dub and Thai folk”: https://on.ft.com/4dPdFnN – For more from Anna, listen to our recent episode ‘Why Olivia Rodrigo might be our last pop star'. Search where you get your podcasts or click here– Arwa is on X @arwahaider. Anna is @annaknicolaouMore or less: – Arwa wants more Arabic diaspora voices. She recommends British-Lebanese DJ Salia (here's Habibi Riddim), Lebanese singer songwriter Yasmine Hamdan and Palestinian-Canadian artist Nemahsis– Lilah wants to see people use more stuff in your home: read your books, eat your food, wear your clothes. The book she picked up, which she recommends, is called Subway Lives: 24 Hours in the Life of the New York City Subway, by Jim Dwyer– Anna wants less social media, especially around oat milk bashing. For more on oat milk, here's a great recent FT Weekend magazine piece, ‘Vegan foods and the wild west of wackaging': https://on.ft.com/451dn9q -------Special FT subscription offers for Life and Art podcast listeners, from 50% off a digital subscription to a $1/£1/€1 trial, are here: http://ft.com/lifeandart-------Original music by Metaphor Music. Mixing and sound design by Breen Turner and Sam Giovinco. Clips this week are courtesy of Interscope Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

PLUS: Poet Gary Geddes on the anniversary of Kent State; how a Chinese restaurant in Toronto is benefitting from the Kendrick-Drake beef; how Baby Reindeer unleashed an online sleuthing nightmare; an exiled journalist explains why the Taliban's social media strategy is key to its rule; five pioneering Black ballerinas from a Harlem ballet school are reclaiming the spotlight more than 50 years later; and Riffed from the Headlines, our weekly musical news quiz.

Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish comes on for a remarkable episode of The Pakistan Experience on Israel, Palestine and hatred. Dr. Izzeldin talks about Israel killing his daughters, his niece, and 22 of his family members but still vowing not to let hatred consume him. We discuss Gaza, Resilience, Belief, Faith, the Nakbah, the Cruelty of the World, Hatred, Loss and the Current Situation in Gaza. Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish, an esteemed Palestinian-Canadian physician and humanitarian, was born in the Jabalia refugee camp in Gaza on August 15, 1958. He is renowned for his unwavering commitment to peace, education, and women's empowerment, particularly following the tragic loss of three daughters during Israel's Operation Cast Lead in January 2009. Abuelaish studied medicine at Cairo University before moving to Canada in 1987 to pursue further training as a gynecologist. In addition to being a respected medical professional, he has dedicated himself to promoting cross-border understanding between Palestinians and Israelis through various initiatives such as the Daughters for Life Foundation (DFLF), which provides scholarships to young female students from conflict zones around the world. His work with DFLF led him to be named one of Time Magazine's “100 Most Influential People” in 2010. The foundation also inspired his bestselling memoir, “I Shall Not Hate,” published in 2010, which chronicles his personal journey towards forgiveness after losing his family members. In recognition of his efforts, Abuelaish received numerous awards, including the Order of Ontario, the United Nations Prize in Field Support, and the Right Livelihood Award, often referred to as the Alternative Nobel Prize. His advocacy for peace and justice continues to inspire people worldwide, making him a prominent figure in global discussions about conflict resolution and reconciliation. The Pakistan Experience is an independently produced podcast looking to tell stories about Pakistan through conversations. Please consider supporting us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thepakistanexperience To support the channel: Jazzcash/Easypaisa - 0325 -2982912 Patreon.com/thepakistanexperience And Please stay in touch: https://twitter.com/ThePakistanExp1 https://www.facebook.com/thepakistanexperience https://instagram.com/thepakistanexpeperience The podcast is hosted by comedian and writer, Shehzad Ghias Shaikh. Shehzad is a Fulbright scholar with a Masters in Theatre from Brooklyn College. He is also one of the foremost Stand-up comedians in Pakistan and frequently writes for numerous publications. Instagram.com/shehzadghiasshaikh Facebook.com/Shehzadghias/ Twitter.com/shehzad89 Chapters: 0:00 Introduction 1:30 Gratitude, Strength and Belief in God 8:50 The experience and memory of Nakbah 14:00 Losing my daughters and losing faith in humanity 26:00 Gaza Strip, Never Again and the Cruelty of the World 38:30 Hatred and choosing not to hate 47:30 Current Situation in Gaza and Accountability of the World

John is a Palestinian-Canadian composer, pianist and electronic musician based between Toronto and Berlin, who creates what he calls "Baroque-Middle-Eastern-Cyberpunk". We talk about the process behind his commission for the National Arts Centre orchestra, why he feels more free in his visual arts practice, how he uses his concerts to address what is happening in Palestine, the various complexities of Palestinian identity, and nocturnally creating his album “Time Sketches” in three weeks. Connect with John: Instagram Website YouTube References to check out: Ernst Fuchs "Art & Fear" by David Bayles and Ted Orland --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/bri-clarke/message

The federal government created a temporary visa program for Palestinians with family in Canada. The program aimed to bring 1,000 people to Canada, but only 14 have been approved so far. We hear from a Palestinian Canadian about the difficulty he's experienced in getting his family to Canada, and from retired Canadian ambassador Gar Pardy about the challenges facing the government.

With the crisis in Gaza right now we are hearing many different voices. One voice I wanted to hear was from Palestinian Canadians. In this episode I share an interview I made with Ehab Mustapha, a Palestinian Canadian from Mississauga, Ontario.

Guests: Maryam Affana, Mirvat Al-Sharafi and immigration lawyer Aidan Simardone  Last month, Canada launched a new emergency program permitting up to 1,000 Palestinians who are extended family members of Canadian citizens or permanent residents to apply to come to Canada. Members of the Palestinian-Canadian community say they are struggling with delays, logistical issues and what some experts say is an unprecedented and invasive level of personal information requirements. They wait with the clock ticking for their trapped loved ones in a four-month war that has ravaged Gaza, with more than 27,000 people killed in Israeli airstrikes, thousands more displaced and almost half the population at risk of starvation according to the United Nations. Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada says that the multi-stage screening approach was developed to protect the safety of Canadians and is part of a standard practice where IRCC doesn't have presence on ground to conduct the initial screening and biometrics. In an emailed response to the Star, it has also shared that as of January 29, more than 900 applications are already being reviewed. IRCC confirmed they're all still in the preliminary stages and not approved. We speak to Palestinian-Canadians impacted by this and later, an immigration lawyer helps us break down the new immigration measures and their implications.  This episode was produced by Saba Eitizaz and Paulo Marques, with additional support from Ben Cohen.  What you would like to hear on Toronto Star podcasts? Let us know in this survey and you can enter to win a $100 gift card.

Diana Buttu is a Palestinian-Canadian lawyer, former spokesperson for the Palestine Liberation Organization, who served as a Palestinian peace negotiator. Here we discuss Israel's undisguised ethnic cleansing, why this is an Israeli-American assault on Gaza, the forgotten horror in the West Bank - and why this won't end well for Israel.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/the-owen-jones-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Palestinian-Canadian journalist, Yara Jamal, was terminated from a major Canadian media network due to her pro-Palestine stance, highlighting tensions around media freedom and impartiality in the Israel-Palestine conflict.

An increase in anti-Palestinian and anti-Muslim hate crimes has taken place in Canada since Israel declared war on Hamas in early October. Matt Galloway discusses living in the shadow of Islamophobia and anti-Palestinian racism with Jasmin Zine, a professor of Sociology and Religion and Culture at Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ont.; and Dalia El Farra, a Palestinian-Canadian who works in human rights and equity, diversity and inclusion at the post-secondary level.

Come along for the big moments Canadians are experiencing around the world right now. He used to be a DJ at The Moose radio station in small-town Smithers, BC. Today, Dancin' Wayne hypes up tens of thousands of soccer fans as a World Cup stadium host, energizing crowds with his breakdancing, chanting, and hot-pink suits. When Stephen and Sara Cole decided to sell their home in Fergus, Ontario, they knew they wanted something different -- but they never dreamed they'd end up with an 11-bedroom, 6300 square foot chateau in Southwestern France. Or the upkeep that comes along with it. #chateauproblems News headlines, social media posts, and messages in the family group chat carry Lima Al-Azzeh, a Palestinian-Canadian living in Vancouver, straight into Gaza. What do you pack to take to space? How do you handle the fear? And how do you prepare your family to watch you blast off? Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen gets personal ahead of his moon mission next November. And ten years after a life-changing car accident left Jen Schuringa with a traumatic brain injury that impacts her ability to move voluntarily and speak, she and a group of family and friends take on Spain's Camino de Santiago.

Guests in order of appearance: Youth Palestinian-Canadian activist calling for #Ceasefire after losing dozens of family members since October 7 in Gaza, Hala Alshaer Managing editor of The Breach, author of The Trudeau Formula, and a Jew opposed to Israeli apartheid, Martin Lukacs Palestinian-Canadian equity consultant, former federal candidate for the New Democratic Party of Canada, and first generation Palestinian-Canadian, Beisan Zubi⁠ Sources and further reading: Ottawa woman says she's lost dozens of family members in Gaza (Power & Politics, CBC News Network) Ottawa's Palestinian community rallies after deadly blast at Gaza hospital (CBC Ottawa) CTV reports on Gaza with anti-Palestinian double standard, data shows (The Breach) Palestinian Ambassador to the United Nations Riyad Mansour Get this straight, Western media: Palestinians aren't sub-human (Andrew Mitrovica, Al Jazeera) How Israeli Apartheid destroyed my hometown (Dena Takruri, AJ+) Michael Moore on Gaza: 'We need to stop the slaughter' (Al Jazeera) 9/11 a defining moment in the childhoods of Muslim millennials (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution) Hamilton-Centre MPP Sarah Jama vows to fight on, braces for legal battle with Premier Ford as an independent MPP (Grant LaFleche, Hamilton Spectator) Hamilton MPP Sarah Jama says NDP removal was due to her 'early' call for ceasefire in Gaza Texans fill downtown Austin streets to demand ceasefire in Gaza (Texas Tribune) Biggest pro-Palestine protest in British history as hundreds of thousands pour into London streets (Middle East Eye) 87yo holocaust survivor condemns Israeli assault and calls for peace (Democracy Now) ‘I will not be silenced': Rashida Tlaib won't stop fighting for Palestinian rights (The Guardian) Music featured in this episode: Can I Live by MC Abdul City and Nuuchimii is an independent, non-partisan podcast produced and co-hosted by Maïtée Saganash (in nuuchimii) and Jenn Jefferys (in the city). Reach us at citynuuchimii@gmail.com or @citynuuchimii.

The conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas continues to escalate day by day despite calls for a humanitarian pause from major world leaders.With no end to hostilities in sight, Kieran was joined again by Ibrahim Alagha an Irish Citizen on the ground in Gaza to give us an update on the situation. He was also by joined Prof. Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish. A Palestinian Canadian physician, born and raised in Jabalia Refugee Camp in the Gaza Strip and author of ‘I Shall Not Hate: A Gaza Doctor's Journey on the Road to Peace and Human Dignity'

A month ago, we weren't talking about the Israelis-Palestinian conflict. The world's attention was elsewhere, on Ukraine and Russia, on China. But on October 7, all that changed. Hamas' brutality — the hunting of young adults at a music festival, the burning of homes, shooting of grandmothers, allegations of rape of women and girls, and the kidnapping of more than 200 Israelis and foreigners — placed the question of Israel and the occupied territories back on the front burner. And there are many questions. How should Israel respond to an event that shocked the nation's psyche? Can it pursue Hamas without triggering a wider conflict in the region? Is it justifiable to kill so many civilians in an attempt to neutralize a terrorism threat? This week on ‘It's Political,' we take a look at the war between Israel and Hamas through a Canadian lens. First, we'll review how we got to the current conflict with the aid of Canada's former representative in the West Bank, Douglas Scott Proudfoot. Then, we'll hear from two families, a Israeli-Canadian man from Toronto and a Palestinian-Canadian couple from Ottawa, whose families have been deeply affected by Hamas' attack and Israel's bombing in response. This is a political show, and we'll sit down with two Liberal MPs from two different communities — Mount Royal MP Anthony Housefather and Scarborough Centre MP Salma Zahid — to discuss what they want to hear from their government and what their constituents want to hear from them. Finally, we'll have a fascinating conversation with two Middle East experts, Carleton University Political Science Professor Mira Sucharov and University of Ottawa Graduate School of Public and International Affairs Associate Professor Thomas Juneau, about Canada's policy in the Middle East, how it's changed over time, what impedes Canada from playing a larger role, and how diaspora politics guide Canadian foreign policy. 4:37 - Douglas Scott Proudfoot 22:36 - Aharon Brodutch 31:12 - Israa Alsaafin and Ahmed Alsaafin 42:05 - Salma Zahid and Anthony Housefather 56:07 - Mira Sucharov and Thomas Juneau Some of the clips this week were sourced from CPAC, Global News, CTV, Al Jazeera, Fox News, the BBC, CBS, the United Nations, the History Channel, France 24, CBC, CNN, Reuters, and Atlas Aware. This episode of “It's Political” was produced by Althia Raj and Michal Stein. Kevin Sexton mixed the program. Our theme music is by Isaac Joel.

Vassy speaks with former human rights commissioner Heather Kuttai about her decision to step down.  On today's show:  A conversation with Noor Hamdalla, a Palestinian-Canadian from Ottawa who has been trying to escape the West Bank. Canada's inflation rate has slowed to 3.8 per cent. Pedro Antunes, Chief Economist at  The Conference Board of Canada, joins the show.  The Daily Debrief panel with Laura Stone, Shakir Chambers and Elliot Hughes.   Florence Budden, co-chair of the Canadian Alliance on Mental Illness and Mental Health, and Glenn Brimacombe, Public Affairs lead for the Canadian Alliance on Mental Illness and Mental Health, on their demands to the federal government. 

On today's show: we speak with a Palestinian Canadian here in Calgary about the conflict between Israel and Hamas; we connect with Calgary's Inclusive Hockey Association after the NHL banned rainbow coloured hockey tape; we meet the Calgary illustrator behind a new graphic novel getting lots of buzz.

The world watched in horror as Hamas fighters inflicted the deadliest attack in Israel's history over the weekend. An unimaginable assault on innocent civilians, including babies and the elderly, leading Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to declare that his country was “at a war”.  1:30 | Ryan opens the show with a few observations about what's happening in Israel in Gaza as well as here in Canada and elsewhere around the world.  4:10 | Kinneret Ozeri spent the weekend in and out of bomb shelters with her husband and their three daughters. She joins us live from their home in Harish, Israel, to try to explain the toll the terror attack has taken on their family and friends.  24:15 | We revisit our May 11 interview with Mousa Qasqas, a Palestinian-Canadian activist from Edmonton.  FULL INTERVIEW WITH MOUSA: https://www.youtube.com/live/h_uEsAc2SYg?si=YMuSzDi2YLAE5cRy&t=450 26:12 | We ask Charles Adler what he thinks about pro-Palestine rallies held in Canada as terror attacks were still being carried out in Israel. Ryan and Charles also touch on Premier-elect Wab Kinew's historic victory in Manitoba last week.  1:00:00 | Helen Naslund is serving an 18-year sentence for killing her husband, after enduring horrific abuse for more than 30 years. Her story is the subject of a new podcast, In Her Defence, hosted by The Globe & Mail's Jana Pruden, who joins Ryan in studio.  CHECK OUT THE PODCAST: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/in-her-defence/id1707875517?i=1000628278975 LEARN MORE ABOUT AB COUNCIL OF WOMEN'S SHELTERS: https://acws.ca/ 1:28:15 | Have you ever thought about your legacy one hundred years from now? This week's Positive Reflections presented by Kuby Renewable Energy is dedicated to all of us who might benefit from stepping away from the rat race from time to time.  GET A FREE SOLAR QUOTE: https://kubyenergy.ca/ BECOME A REAL TALK PATRON: https://www.patreon.com/ryanjespersen WEBSITE: https://ryanjespersen.com/ TIKTOK: https://www.tiktok.com/@realtalkrj TWITTER: https://twitter.com/RealTalkRJ INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/RealTalkRJ/ THANK YOU FOR SUPPORTING OUR SPONSORS! https://ryanjespersen.com/sponsors The views and opinions expressed in this show are those of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Relay Communications Group Inc. or any affiliates.

We had the absolute honor of getting to chat with debut author, Jackie Khalilieh— ⁠@jackiekhalilieh⁠ 

Violence is escalating again in the Gaza Strip, as Israel airstrikes target the militant Islamic Jihad group. UN Secretary-General António Guterres condemned civilian loss of life, saying the deaths of the women and children were “unacceptable and must stop immediately”. 7:30 | Mousa Qasqas has been advocating for peace in the Middle East his entire adult life. The Palestinian Canadian organizer shares his thoughts on why the fighting continues, and why it's not "anti-Semitic" to criticize Israel.  CANADA PALESTINE CULTURAL ASSOCIATION: https://cpcayeg.ca/ MOUSA'S EVENT ON SUNDAY: https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/palestinian-day-at-the-park-tickets-626747186707 36:15 | With wildfires burning across Alberta, violent crime on the rise in both rural and urban communities, and the opioid crisis continuing to claim lives, it's no wonder the average Canadian might tell you they don't feel safe. Public Safety Minister Bill Blair explains how Ottawa's helping the wildfire fight, and the best ways to cut down on crime.  WEBSITE: https://ryanjespersen.com/ TWITTER: https://twitter.com/RealTalkRJ INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/RealTalkRJ/ TIKTOK: https://www.tiktok.com/@realtalkrj PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/ryanjespersen THANK YOU FOR SUPPORTING OUR SPONSORS! https://ryanjespersen.com/sponsors The views and opinions expressed in this show are those of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Relay Communications Group Inc. or any affiliates.

Today Women's Magazine we talk about the situation in Israel -Palestine where the right wing governemt of Netanyahu is  still in power despite a month of protests in the streets by Israeli's opposed to this right wing or as some say fascist government.   The Israeli news paper Haaertz magazine wrote “In this short time, Netanyahu's government has caused Israel's senior economists and the international credit-rating agencies to warn of significant damage to the local economy, in the wake of the judicial overhaul. High-tech companies have threatened to move their money out of the country and even relocate. For the first time in Israel's history, thousands of reservists have threatened not to report for their voluntary service if the “legal reform” legislation is passed. They go on to say “Israel is facing its most prolonged period of mass protests, with hundreds of thousands taking to the streets weekly. Uniquely, the protests are being backed by many of the major Jewish Diaspora organizations.   And yet in all of this the question remains what is really being challenged in these protests in the street of Israel and what do Palestinians in Israel think of what is going on .  To answer some of these questions Dov Baum and I talk to Diana Buttu who lives in Israel-Palestine   Diana Buttu is a Palestinian-Canadian lawyer and a former spokesperson for the Palestine Liberation Organization. Diana Buttu  previously served as a legal advisor to the Palestinian negotiating team and was part of the team that assisted in the successful litigation of the Wall before the International Court of Justice.  She frequently comments on Palestine for international news media outlets such as CNN and BBC; is a political analyst for Al Jazeera International and is a regular contributor to The Middle East magazine.  She maintains a law practice inPalestine, focusing on international human rights law. And to help me with  this interview I am joined by Dov Baum, who is an Israeli  feminist activist and scholar who has taught about militarism and the global economy from a feminist perspective in Israeli and U.S. universities, and is currently the director of American friends service committee's Economic Activism Program here in the Bay Area which supports investor and activist efforts to expose, challenge, and isolate corporate involvement in state violence and human rights violations.. Dov is the co-founder of Who Profits from the Occupation and of the Coalition of Women for Peace in Israel. The post Israel-Palestine with Diana Buttu appeared first on KPFA.

In this episode, we're joined by Najat El-Taji El-Khairy, a Palestinian-Canadian artist who has created a unique art form combining her interests in both embroidery and porcelain painting.  Najat's art has been exhibited in various venues throughout North America, the Middle East and Europe.  Najat has made it her mission to immortalise, protect and preserve the art of Palestinian embroidery.  As she describes it, she's, ‘Painting her way home, one stitch at a time.' Links: Find Najat's Website here and her Instagram account here; and see a collection of Najat's amazing artwork here.  Order Najat's book, Palestinian Heritage … Worth Celebrating!, from the Musée des métiers d'art du Québec (MUMAQ) here.See Najat's full written responses to CJPME's podcast questions.Subscribe to this podcast, and donate to CJPME to support the work that we do.

In this episode, we're joined by Rana Nazzal, a Palestinian-Canadian artist living between Palestine, Ottawa and Toronto. Among other things, Rana's powerful art explores Palestinians' relationship with the land, and the themes of Palestinian memory and loss.  In addition to her art, she is also an activist and campaigner on grassroots issues including not only Palestinian human rights, but also climate change, Indigenous rights, and more. Join us as we talk to Rana about her art, and how it's an expression and extension of her activist roots and passion.  And Rafeef Dajani joins ATPC to co-host her first podcast.  Links: See Rana Nazzal's Website, https://www.rananazzal.com/ See a photo tour of Nazzal's exhibition, 1/1000th of a DunamSubscribe to this podcast, and donate to CJPME to support the work that we do.

International Arrivals speaks with Palestinian-Canadian artist Rana Nazzal Hamadeh (https://www.rananazzal.com/) about the idea of home, loss and the power of imagination. 

In today's episode, we welcome the well recognized Palestinian Canadian lawyer, activist, analyst and former spokesperson to the Palestine Liberation Organization, and discuss the newly elected Israeli far right extremist government, entrenchment of the illegal Israeli occupation, worsening conditions in the occupied West Bank, Israeli settler violence, the crippling blockade of the Gaza Strip, BDS, the Palestinian Authority,  Palestinian solidarity and activism. 

In this episode, we are joined by Dalia Elcharbini, Palestinian-Canadian contemporary artist and international exhibitor based in Toronto. While Dalia's artistic style is distinct and unique, she frequently infuses it with symbolism and memories of Palestine.  Listen in as we discuss her art, her inspiration, her Palestinian identity and her efforts to use art to help children impacted by war.  Links:  Dalia Elcharbini's InstagramDalia Elcharbini's WebsiteOur Stars School Foundation WebsiteSubscribe to this podcast, and donate to CJPME to support the work that we do.

Author and playwright Tomson Highway talks about his new memoir, Permanent Astonishment, and shares how his childhood was "uniquely Canadian." Writer Saeed Teebi discusses his debut story collection, Her First Palestinian, which shines a light on the varied experiences of Palestinian Canadian characters navigating their way through life in their new home country. Music journalist Sharine Taylor and entertainment editor Morgan Mullen react to the pending sale of Toronto's Now magazine, plus the larger repercussions the changing media landscape is having on arts and entertainment coverage in Canada. Show business legend Barbra Streisand explains why after nearly 60 years in music, she decided to revisit her personal archives and share unreleased songs on a new compilation album, Release Me 2.

How do you escape from violence and poverty? Where do you go for refuge and the chance to have a better future?  Welcome to another episode of The Gift of Failure Podcast. Today we have Ahmad Balshe, professionally known as Belly. He is a Palestinian-Canadian rapper, singer, songwriter, and record producer. His family migrated to Canada to seek opportunities for a better life. But it's not that easy, as many immigrants would attest. At first, Belly expressed anger over his situation by rapping, which sparked the beginning of his career. However, over the years, his negative emotions drifted away. Ari refers to Belly as "The Walt Whitman of Rap." Tune in to this episode to understand why and to draw inspiration from Belly's exciting journey and transformation to the man he is now. “Your ego is your worst enemy.” - Belly In This Episode: - Meet Belly, “The Walt Whitman of Rap” - How Belly crafts his music and the source of his inspiration - Belly talks about his fondest memories and other issues like mental health, cultural pressure, etc. - If there's one thing you wish everyone knew, what would it be? Belly shares his thoughts… And more… Connect with Belly: - https://www.bellylive.com/ (Website) - https://www.instagram.com/belly/ (Instagram) - https://twitter.com/rebellyus (Twitter) Connect with Ari: -https://rastegarproperty.com/ ( Website) - https://www.instagram.com/rastegar/ (Instagram) - https://web.facebook.com/rastegarproperty/ (Facebook) - https://www.linkedin.com/company/rastegarproperty/ (LinkedIn)

Shawky Fahel came to Canada in the 1960's and started his first business in 1979 with a $1000 loan and nothing more than a few carpet and paint supplies.  Based in Waterloo, ON, Shawky became successful businessman, political activist and philanthropist who has received innumerable awards over the years, both at the local and national level, for his various contributions.  Yet amidst all this busyness and success, he has remained committed to improving the lives of Palestinians, both in Palestine and in the diaspora in Canada.  His most recent philanthropic gesture – one that we'll discuss during our conversation – was a donation of $100,000 to launch a Foundation for Palestinian Studies at the University of Waterloo.   Learn more:Foundation for Palestinian Studies WebsiteFoundation for Palestinian Studies at the University of Waterloo WebsiteSubscribe to this podcast, and donate to CJPME to support the work that we do.

Malak El Batroukh, a Palestinian-Canadian based in Waterloo has just launched an exciting new community project called Sporas (Scattered.) Through this project, Malak aims to make Palestinian culture and tradition more accessible to diaspora youth.  In this episode, we talk to Malak about her vision for Sporas, and her broader work as a activist for Palestinian rights and freedom. Learn more: Sporas Instagram page Announcement of Malak's undergraduate fellowship from CJPMESubscribe to this podcast, and donate to CJPME to support the work that we do.

Khaled Barakat is a Palestinian-Canadian activist and writer, currently based in Vancouver, who was recently subjected to a media and political campaign aimed at silencing him and those fighting for Palestinian rights in Canada. Attempts to criminalize Barakat originated in an article published in the right-wing newspaper The National Post, and quickly became subject of debate in the Canadian Senate, with a conservative senator going so far as to asking the government to expel Barakat, a Canadian citizen, from the country. The campaign against Khaled Barakat is one of many smear campaigns being launched against pro-Palestinian voices, a phenomenon that seems to be increasing nowadays. Security in Context is a podcast project from the research network of the same name, aimed at promoting new thinking on security from a global perspective. The Security in Context podcast features discussions about key questions on peace and conflict, the political economy of security and insecurity, militarism, and geopolitics particularly as they intersect with the processes of climate change, population movement, and the reorganization of global powers. In order to delve into these topics, we interview writers, researchers, activists and professionals from inside and outside the Security in Context network. Our ultimate goal is to provide a critical representation of security related issues, paying special attention to the Global South, often misrepresented in mainstream media coverage.

Khaled Barakat is a Palestinian-Canadian activist and writer, currently based in Vancouver, who was recently subjected to a media and political campaign aimed at silencing him and those fighting for Palestinian rights in Canada. Attempts to criminalize Barakat originated in an article published in the right-wing newspaper The National Post, and quickly became subject of debate in the Canadian Senate, with a conservative senator going so far as to asking the government to expel Barakat, a Canadian citizen, from the country. The campaign against Khaled Barakat is one of many smear campaigns being launched against pro-Palestinian voices, a phenomenon that seems to be increasing nowadays.

In this episode, we are joined by Nur Watad, a Palestinian Canadian living in London Ontario who is also the host of the brand new CJPME podcast “All Things Palestinian Canadian.” Tom and Michael speak to Nur about her vision for ATPC, and why it is important to provide a platform for discussions of Palestinian-Canadian identity, history, and culture. We also hear about Nur's experiences growing up in Jerusalem on both sides of the Green Line, and discuss why Palestinian culture can't be separated from politics.  Links from this podcast:Podcast: All Things Palestinian Canadian Subscribe to this podcast, and donate to CJPME to support the work that we do.

In 2021, Sarah El Naffar, social media content creator on Instagram and Tik Tok, started using her lifestyle platform to raise awareness on what's going on in Palestine. She took it upon herself to make her younger audience understand the challenges faced by her country of origin, especially in light of Israel's ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Sheikh Jarrah and the events that followed in May, 2021.   Sarah joins Nur and Tom to talk about her experience as a Palestinian Canadian influencer speaking about Palestine on her social platform, and what she encountered along her journey. Links from this podcast: Sarah El Naffar on Instagram  Sarah El Naffar on TiktokSubscribe to this podcast, and donate to CJPME to support the work that we do.

Surprising and inspiring. thoughtful and profane: This episode with rapper Belly is an education for anyone who doesn't know the Palestinian-Canadian rapper's story. If that describes you, check it, because this episode is a great intro to a rapper who has built a rabid fanbase over the past two decades. If you love hip-hop, it's time you got Belly on your radar. His depth and playfulness, expressed in equal measure. make him a talent to be reckoned with.

On Sunday, Benjamin Netanyahu lost the prime minister's post after opponents in the Knesset, Israel's parliament, approved a coalition government led, for now, by his one-time protege, Naftali Bennett. Netanyahu will now serve as leader of the opposition.  The new government is an unlikely group of politicians and parties from the left, right and center, united only by their opposition to Netanyahu. The vote to oust him may prove easier than the next part: What happens now? Today, we speak to L.A. Times global affairs correspondent Laura King about Netanyahu's legacy and his downfall, and whether the new government can bring any peace to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. We'll also hear from Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish, a Palestinian Canadian who lost family members to an Israeli attack, yet has emerged as a leading advocate for ... peace.More reading:Benjamin Netanyahu ruled Israel as a man of many faces He ‘won the lottery' of Israeli politics. But Naftali Bennett remains an enigmaFirst priority for anti-Netanyahu coalition: Stay united long enough to get sworn in

Carol (@caroleugenepark) & Rumneek (@rumneeek) speak to Palestinian-Canadian journalist Haneen Al-Hassoun (@haneenalhassoun) about the Canadian media's coverage of Israel & Palestine.Psst! We also have a daily newsletter, which you can sign up for at www.decomplicated.com!Follow us on Twitter (@decomplicatedca) & Instagram (@decomplicatednews).

In this episode I spoke to Tarek Loubani, a Palestinian-Canadian doctor who unfortunately was shot in both legs by Israeli soldiers during the Great March of Return in 2018. His story is incredible, enjoy the episode!

Get your boots and your coat, for this Canadian mischief. Join us as we desperately seek a quiet space to conduct an interview in Toronto’s Museum of Contemporary Art with Palestinian-Canadian artist Samar Hejazi. Hejazi is game for anything, which is probably why she’s so good at conceptual, installation, and sculptural arts. Hejazi is working on a commission that involved making a live cast of someone’s face, stitching onto dissolvable fabric (and then dissolving it), and making abstract marks for literally no reason at all. We are besotted. Visual tour: https://artcrushinternational.com/samar-hejazi.html Samar on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/samarhejazi/?hl=en Samar’s website: https://www.samarhejazi.com/ Akin, the arts organisation: https://www.akincollective.com/ Museum of Contemporary Art, Toronto: https://moca.ca/ Follow ART CRUSH INTERNATIONAL on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/artcrush_international/ Love letters: contact@artcrushinternational Website: https://artcrushinternational.com/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcIyQdD132sdIc23PO8k0vA Beautiful Online Thing: Rijksmuseum’s ‘Beleef de Nachtwacht’ (https://beleefdenachtwacht.nl/)

Sarrah Ghadeer Malek is a Palestinian poet, writer, editor and spoken word performer living in the diaspora. She currently writes poetry in Toronto, Canada which is the traditional land of the Anishinaabe, Mississaugas and Haudenosaunee. She is co-editor of an anthology of Arab feminist writings called Min Fami: Arab feminist reflections on identity, space and resistance published by Inanna Publications in 2015, and 4 print zines called AQSAZine showcasing Muslim young women voices in Toronto, Canada. Sarrah G. is also a creative writing educator, workshop facilitator, and spoken word poet and band member of Haneen Biladi, along with other Palestinian-Canadian musicians. She is currently writing a fiction novel called Al-Watan about young Palestinian woman, Areen, who is on the search for the meaning of home after being displaced from her grandfather’s house in Nablus in the West Bank. She is also working on compiling her spoken word poetry in a collection called Poetical Thawra. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/gazaguy/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/gazaguy/support

The Palestine Podcast showcases a selection of lectures, talks and interviews featuring leading experts and social justice activists active on the Palestine-Israel issue. Brought to you by the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Click here to view all podcasts. Subscribe on your favourite platform! Apple PodcastsGoogle PodcastsSpotifyStitcherAcastYouTubeDeezerTuneInPlayer.fmPocketCastsCastroRadio PublicBreakerBlubrryPodcast AddictPodbeanPodcast RepubliciHeartRadio jQuery(document).ready(function($) { 'use strict'; $('#podcast-subscribe-button-11212 .podcast-subscribe-button.modal-632417ae7170d').on("click", function() { $("#secondline-psb-subs-modal.modal-632417ae7170d.modal.secondline-modal-632417ae7170d").modal({ fadeDuration: 250, closeText: '', }); return false; }); }); ===== PP#46 - ‘Systemic Racism in the US and Israel' with Nadia Abu El-Haj, Johanna Fernández, Maha Nassar and Nahla Abdo  [2020-07-14] - (Download here) INFO: In this episode of The Palestine Podcast we hear an urgent, informative and disturbing discussion between Nadia Abu El-Haj, Johanna Fernández, Maha Nassar and Nahla Abdo about racial policing, systemic racism and settler-colonial repression in the United States and the Apartheid state of Israel.   Recent police violence in the US has sparked anti-racism protests around the world and ignited a discussion of systemic racism within many societies and political systems. Despite major differences in the regimes of oppression and discrimination in the US and Israel, certain parallels exist and serve to shed light on both systems. In the case of the US and Israel, the connections go beyond analogies and extend to material links between the respective security states and policing practices, including what has been called the "Israelization" of policing. About the speakers Nadia Abu El-Haj is the Ann Olin Whitney Professor in the Department of Anthropology, Chair of the BoD, SOF/Heyman Center for the Humanities, and Co-Director of the Center for Palestine Studies at Columbia University. She is the author of two books and several journal articles published on topics ranging from the history of archaeology in Palestine to the question of race and genomics today. Johanna Fernández teaches at the Department of History at Baruch College (CUNY). She is the writer, producer of the film, Justice on Trial: the Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal. Her Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) lawsuit against the NYPD, led to the recovery of the largest repository of police surveillance records in the country. Maha Nassar is an Associate Professor in the School of Middle Eastern and North African Studies at the University of Arizona and the author of Brothers Apart: Palestinian Citizens of Israel and the Arab World (Stanford University Press, 2017). Nahla Abdo is a Palestinian-Canadian political activist and Professor of Sociology at Carleton University. She is the author of several publications, most recently Captive Revolution: Palestinian women's Anti-Colonial Struggle Within the Israeli Prison System. This event was co-hosted wonderful folks at the Center of Palestine Studies at Columbia University and the Institute of Palestine Studies, and we thank them for allowing us to use the audio of this webinar. Disclaimer: The views expressed in this podcast reflect the opinions of the speaker(s) only and do not reflect the views of the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign unless otherwise explicitly stated. If you like this podcast please visit our website for many more great episodes: https://www.ipsc.ie/the-palestine-podcast You can also find us at the following locations: Website: https://www.ipsc.ie/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/IrelandPSC Twitter: https://twitter.com/ipsc48 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/irelandpsc/ YouTube: http://www.youtube.

In this Episode, Moe Moussa and Abeer Aloul; a Palestinian-Canadian Poet chatting about Abeer's upcoming book, discussing Social Justice Issues and Societal Norms in Poetry. Abeer Aloul Abeer Alaloul is an international educator and a passionate writer. She has a taste of adventure as she travels the world drawing inspiration from nature and various cultures. Abeer was born in Palestine and grew up in Canada. She graduated with a Bachelors in English language and literature and completed her post graduate in education in the university of Toronto. She uses the arts as a medium to raise awareness for social justice issues and to voice the narrative of marginalised communities. She is currently working as an educator and currently living in Dubai. She conducts poetry workshops and poetry cafés in schools. Abeer is an active member of the Spoken Word scene in the UAE appearing as a regular participant at The NYU Rooftop Rhythms poetry slams, the Dubai Poetics and Blank Space community and London poetry slam. She has completed her manuscript of her novel which will be published end of 2020. Her poetry has been published on several online journals world wide. She uses her Instagram as a platform to share poetry and to connect with other poets around the globe. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/gazaguy/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/gazaguy/support

Palestinian-Canadian physician Dr. @DrAbuelaish speaks to writer and journalist @MarieBrenner about his autobiography, a saga of hatred and love, loss and forgiveness, despair and hope, on #JLFBraveNewWorldSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Chaker Khazaal is a Palestinian-Canadian author and reporter. He talks about why he loves living in hotels, releasing his new book 'Life Dice' during COVID-19 and how he's incorporated UPC codes that link to real video footage of the US invasion in Iraq. He also reveals the next step for his celebrity-endorsed app, Candle of Hope.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Chaker Khazaal is a Palestinian-Canadian author and reporter. He talks about why he loves living in hotels, releasing his new book 'Life Dice' during COVID-19 and how he's incorporated UPC codes that link to real video footage of the US invasion in Iraq. He also reveals the next step for his celebrity-endorsed app, Candle of Hope.

Today, we speak to Chaker Khazaal, a Palestinian-Canadian author and entrepreneur who opened the Startups Without Borders Summit and left the entire audience shocked: he presented the world’s first interactive silent speech.

Born as a Palestinian refugee in Lebanon, Chaker immigrated to Canada, being one of four recipients of the Global Leader of Tomorrow Award. Having graduated from York University in Toronto, Chaker quickly became a public figure as an author, a journalist, and an entrepreneur.
His trilogy, Confessions of a War child, was inspired by true narratives of war children. His new book — Tale of Tala — is a descriptive narrative of the plight of refugees that became a Best Seller in 2018.In this episode, Chaker talks about going from refugee to best-selling author, finding courage to venture into war zones, and deciding to do the world first silent speech.JOIN THE STARTUPS WITHOUT BORDERS GLOBAL FB COMMUNITY: https://www.facebook.com/groups/362573027500677/ JOIN OUR PODCAST FB GROUP: https://www.facebook.com/groups/314557545818551/ FOLLOW STARTUPS WITHOUT BORDERS: https://instagram.com/startupswithoutborders/ READ THE INSPIRING STARTUP STORIES OF MIGRANT ENTREPRENEURS: https://startupswb.com/VISIT ARCAST’S PODCAST HUB: www.arcast.fm Photo Credit: Ahmed Najeeb.Song by: Funky Music, by Dj Quads. Dj Quads:https://soundcloud.com/aka-dj-quadshttps://twitter.com/DjQuadshttps://www.instagram.com/djquadshttps://www.youtube.com/channel/UCusF...Music from SoundcloudMusic provided by RFM: https://youtu.be/lNrAAAb2JvI

Palestinian-Canadian lawyer, analyst and former PLO negotiator Diana Battu on the Israeli elections and her latest piece in The Nation "The Israeli Elections Are a Referendum on Who Can Treat Palestinians Most Harshly." Plus what it's like to raise a child in a country where he's told he doesn't belong. It's too important to be patreon only so it's for everyone! Stand by for some Patreon only eps dropping soon.

This month, my guest is Ayeda Ayed, a Palestinian-Canadian expert on the culture of the Arab-speaking world. A performer herself, she speaks to us from Toronto about the Palestinian music scene and introduces us to recordings from its most significant women … View full post →

Buckle Up is a series of interviews "On The Go" so, Buckle Up & join us for a drive. My 11th Guest is Palestinian/Canadian writer/journalist/speaker. His latest is "Tale Of Tala". We talk about his journey from refugee camp in Lebanon, life & journalism. https://www.instagram.com/chakerkhazaal/ Follow Me on https://www.instagram.com/big_hass/

In this week's episode, Ugo and Isabel interview Tarek Loubani, a Palestinian-Canadian doctor who has created low-cost 3D-printed medical devices to help with the lack of supply in Gaza. The post Restart Radio: 3D printing medical devices in Gaza appeared first on The Restart Project.

As the Syrian conflict enters its seventh year, almost half a million Syrians have been killed in the fighting, more than a million injured and nearly half the country's prewar population of 25 million have been displaced from their homes. What became known as the “Arab Spring” in 2011, toppled presidents of Tunisian, Egypt, Libya, Yemen and is ongoing. Peaceful protests also erupted in Syria, but the Syrian government, led by President Bashar al-Assad, responded to the protests by killing hundreds of demonstrators and imprisoning many more. In July 2011, defectors from the military announced the formation of the “Free Syrian Army”, a rebel group aiming to overthrow the government, and Syria began to slide into civil war. Since the Free Syrian Army formed, many new rebel groups have joined the fighting in Syria, including ISIL, Jabhat Fateh al Sham, Iran-backed Hezbollah, and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) dominated by the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG). Arguable, foreign involvement has played a very large role in the Syrian hostilities and the speaker will give perspective to the many factors that have been at play in the Middle East over the past several decades and eventually contributing to the carnage in Syria, Palestine and Iraq specifically, and the region in general. Speaker: Mohammad Abushaban Mohammed Abushaban is a Palestinian Canadian who immigrated to Ottawa to pursue higher education and opportunity. He is a Computer Science graduate with many years of global experience in the Information Technology and Telecommunication field; most recently, having founded his own company in the UAE, before deciding to return to Canada in 2015. Through personal experience, Mr. Abushaban is intimately familiar with life under occupation and war, as well as the refugee and immigration experience from the Middle East region. It is these experiences which have lent themselves to his heavy involvement with the current Syrian refugees. In supporting and facilitating the entry of these soon-to-be Canadians into a new, bright, but sometimes challenging experience, Mr. Abushaban believes he is giving back to Canada a little of all which it continues to give him and his family. Moderator:   Martin Heavy Head Date: Thursday, May 11, 2017 Time: Noon - 1:30 PM (30 minutes each for presentation, lunch and Q & A) Location: Country Kitchen Catering (Lower level of The Keg) 1715 Mayor Magrath Dr. S Cost: $12.00 (includes lunch) or $2.00 (includes coffee/tea)

As the Syrian conflict enters its seventh year, almost half a million Syrians have been killed in the fighting, more than a million injured and nearly half the country's prewar population of 25 million have been displaced from their homes. What became known as the “Arab Spring” in 2011, toppled presidents of Tunisian, Egypt, Libya, Yemen and is ongoing. Peaceful protests also erupted in Syria, but the Syrian government, led by President Bashar al-Assad, responded to the protests by killing hundreds of demonstrators and imprisoning many more. In July 2011, defectors from the military announced the formation of the “Free Syrian Army”, a rebel group aiming to overthrow the government, and Syria began to slide into civil war. Since the Free Syrian Army formed, many new rebel groups have joined the fighting in Syria, including ISIL, Jabhat Fateh al Sham, Iran-backed Hezbollah, and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) dominated by the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG). Arguable, foreign involvement has played a very large role in the Syrian hostilities and the speaker will give perspective to the many factors that have been at play in the Middle East over the past several decades and eventually contributing to the carnage in Syria, Palestine and Iraq specifically, and the region in general. Speaker: Mohammad Abushaban Mohammed Abushaban is a Palestinian Canadian who immigrated to Ottawa to pursue higher education and opportunity. He is a Computer Science graduate with many years of global experience in the Information Technology and Telecommunication field; most recently, having founded his own company in the UAE, before deciding to return to Canada in 2015. Through personal experience, Mr. Abushaban is intimately familiar with life under occupation and war, as well as the refugee and immigration experience from the Middle East region. It is these experiences which have lent themselves to his heavy involvement with the current Syrian refugees. In supporting and facilitating the entry of these soon-to-be Canadians into a new, bright, but sometimes challenging experience, Mr. Abushaban believes he is giving back to Canada a little of all which it continues to give him and his family. Moderator:   Martin Heavy Head Date: Thursday, May 11, 2017 Time: Noon - 1:30 PM (30 minutes each for presentation, lunch and Q & A) Location: Country Kitchen Catering (Lower level of The Keg) 1715 Mayor Magrath Dr. S Cost: $12.00 (includes lunch) or $2.00 (includes coffee/tea)

As the Syrian conflict enters its seventh year, almost half a million Syrians have been killed in the fighting, more than a million injured and nearly half the country's prewar population of 25 million have been displaced from their homes. What became known as the “Arab Spring” in 2011, toppled presidents of Tunisian, Egypt, Libya, Yemen and is ongoing. Peaceful protests also erupted in Syria, but the Syrian government, led by President Bashar al-Assad, responded to the protests by killing hundreds of demonstrators and imprisoning many more. In July 2011, defectors from the military announced the formation of the “Free Syrian Army”, a rebel group aiming to overthrow the government, and Syria began to slide into civil war. Since the Free Syrian Army formed, many new rebel groups have joined the fighting in Syria, including ISIL, Jabhat Fateh al Sham, Iran-backed Hezbollah, and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) dominated by the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG). Arguable, foreign involvement has played a very large role in the Syrian hostilities and the speaker will give perspective to the many factors that have been at play in the Middle East over the past several decades and eventually contributing to the carnage in Syria, Palestine and Iraq specifically, and the region in general. Speaker: Mohammad Abushaban Mohammed Abushaban is a Palestinian Canadian who immigrated to Ottawa to pursue higher education and opportunity. He is a Computer Science graduate with many years of global experience in the Information Technology and Telecommunication field; most recently, having founded his own company in the UAE, before deciding to return to Canada in 2015. Through personal experience, Mr. Abushaban is intimately familiar with life under occupation and war, as well as the refugee and immigration experience from the Middle East region. It is these experiences which have lent themselves to his heavy involvement with the current Syrian refugees. In supporting and facilitating the entry of these soon-to-be Canadians into a new, bright, but sometimes challenging experience, Mr. Abushaban believes he is giving back to Canada a little of all which it continues to give him and his family. Moderator:   Martin Heavy Head Date: Thursday, May 11, 2017 Time: Noon - 1:30 PM (30 minutes each for presentation, lunch and Q & A) Location: Country Kitchen Catering (Lower level of The Keg) 1715 Mayor Magrath Dr. S Cost: $12.00 (includes lunch) or $2.00 (includes coffee/tea)

Arab Talk Host Jess Ghannam interviews Diana Buttu about the Harvard 1-State Conference. http://onestateconference.org/ Diana Buttu is a Palestinian-Canadian lawyer and former spokesperson with the Negotiations Support Unit of the Palestine Liberation Organization. She has worked as a legal adviser and negotiator on peace negotiations between Israeli and Palestinian organizations and has appeared numerous times on Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC. Ms. Buttu received a B.A. in Middle East and Islamic Studies and an LL.M. from the University of Toronto, a J.D. from Queen's University Faculty of Law, a J.S.M. from Stanford Law School, and an M.B.A. from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. She is currently a fellow with the Middle East Initiative at the Belfer Center and an Eleanor Roosevelt visiting fellow at the Human Rights Program at Harvard Law School.

Ayeda Ayed is a Toronto-based Palestinian-Canadian expert on the culture of the Arab-speaking world.  A performer herself, she describes the Palestinian music scene and its most significant women musicians.

For $6 a month, become a Useful Idiot! Get extended interviews, Thursday Throwdowns, and bonus content at www.usefulidiotspodcast.com Watch this week's Thursday Throwdown: CNN compares Keffiyehs to Confederate Flags https://www.usefulidiotspodcast.com/p/cnn-compares-keffiyehs-to-confederate?r=je5va&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web Join us LIVE on Youtube every Monday at 10am EST for Monday Mourning, where we watch the Sunday morning news shows so that you don't have to. 265 days into Israel's mass assault on Gaza, Palestinian-Canadian lawyer and former spokesperson for the Palestine Liberation Organization Diana Buttu joins us from Haifa, Israel with a stark warning: Things are going to get worse. “For Netanyahu,” she explains, “he needs to open up another front in order to maintain his power. He's made it clear that he's not going to push for a ceasefire. He doesn't care about the Israeli captives. And so it's pretty clear to me that he's going to go ahead and attack Lebanon.” Israel has no aim to rescue its hostages. It never did. “If they actually cared about them, they would have done what should have been done very early on, which is negotiate a ceasefire. Instead, they've done the opposite. And this is why you can look at these ceasefire proposals with such skepticism. Because instead, what they've done is bombed Gaza to virtual smithereens.” Diana, whose father survived the Nakba in 1948, moved to Haifa in 2000. And like many others, she believed what the media told everyone to believe: that with a simple peace plan, Palestine would be fixed. Then she arrived in Palestine and saw the true reality. “All of the things that had been dismissed by the mainstream media,” she says, “I had dismissed too. I had dismissed this idea of settlements and the impact of settlements. And I kept thinking, it'll be undone. It'll all be undone. I dismissed the harm of what it means to be a Palestinian political prisoner, to be somebody who's abducted in the middle of the night. I dismissed the harm of the checkpoints. I dismissed a lot of things. And so when I arrived here, it was the first time that I had to confront the reality that this political process was not going to undo any of those harms.” Stopping the bombs is one thing. Stopping settlements, returning land, granting rights to Palestinians, and removing the literal wall that cages them is another. “They talk about reconfiguring the prison, reconfiguring the occupation, but they never talk about ending the occupation because this mentality of control permeates deep inside Israel.” There's only one way this ends, Diana says. “It's going to end when the world says that it's enough. And that's it.” Diana also shares haunting stories of Palestinian children who were kept in Israeli torture prisons for months, and the ways that western corporate media has worked to cover it up. This week's interview with Diana Buttu will not be paywalled. We hope you'll listen to and share her important perspective. Plus, catch this week's Thursday Throwdown: CNN compares Keffiyehs to Confederate Flags, where Van Jones claims that wearing a keffiyeh around Israeli government supporters is as much a call for violence as waving a confederate flag in Harlem. And we celebrate the freedom of Julian Assange, a rare victory that couldn't have happened without supporters of independent media like you. Thanks for your support, we'll see you next time. 00:00 Intro 00:37 The Four Food Groups of News 18:10 Diana Buttu interview 18:52 Will Netanyahu attack Lebanon? 23:17 Why Netanyahu needs the war 24:50 Does Israel care about the hostages? 28:24 Is the peace process bogus? 33:01 Responding to Israeli talking points 42:10 Israeli is torturing child prisoners 52:10 How does the occupation end? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices