How to Fight the Zionist Backlash

which airs at 9pm. Every Thursday night, Eastern Time.

Please hit us back in the chat, we'll be interacting, we'll be taking questions, let us know where you're viewing from today. Last week, we we took a little break, I was traveling in Washington DC, for Dawa, and things have been heating up

some in good ways and, and in some challenging ways, when it comes to the increased backlash that many people are facing for speaking out against Palestine. So when it comes to this week, and next week, we're going to be talking about how to face this backlash. Whether you're a student on college campuses, whether you are somebody who is in the workforce, right, and you have you're an employee, at a certain position, you're going to have to navigate, maybe your company is issuing statements in support of what Israel is doing in Palestine, to our brothers and sisters. Maybe your school has disbanded, the organization that you're a part of, whereas disinviting speakers,

this is something that all of us face, especially if we live here, in the West, it's a very trying time, everybody is expected and challenged, I think, to find their courage and to find their voice.

But the fact of the matter is that it can be very intimidating, especially when there is millions of dollars, that is put behind silencing your voice and silencing my voice and silencing people who speak up about everything that's going on. So let us know where you're watching from today. And if you've had any sort of experience like this, if you have any sort of

interaction with your employer, with your school with your professors, or your teachers,

there was a comment, you know,

comment from from someone who's a national figure here in the United States, where they told a story they told a story of I think it was on on Twitter earlier today about how they, even when they were in kindergarten or first grade, that they had a teacher that attempted to hold them back for voicing out their concern about the Palestinians and the Palestinian plight. And it really touched me this story, first of all, because the person who mentioned it, you know, they were talking about, they were just a kindergartener, but even myself, as someone who was raised, not a Muslim, I also have encountered throughout my life resistance and sometimes the heavy handedness of teachers and

administrators for speaking up about things that are true, even if they're not popular. I'm seeing some people who are telling us people from Virginia watching and people from Boston, Missouri, Indonesia, set them at the tongue. We have Illinois, the Netherlands, Maryland, mashallah we always have an amazing audience from all over the world. Springfield, Virginia, Houston, Texas. I still haven't been to Houston yet. Can you believe that? Australia? Mashallah, Alabama? Malaysia? Very good.

I had the pleasure of visiting Malaysia for the first time this past year and it was absolutely amazing. I hope to go back soon. South Africa in the house the 315 why they come to Saddam and the House New York in the house. Pakistan is in the bad right we have Chicago we have more people from Malaysia if you're in Malaysia, you're you're in the AM. Alright, so good morning. Good morning to everybody who's viewing from Malaysian and Indonesia, US Austria, North Carolina, the Bronx, Miami, Masha, Allah, India. Well, well done. We have we have people from everywhere.

So, you know, I'd like to share just a couple personal stories that I have. Oregon, New Jersey, I'm from New Jersey, mashallah Oregon, a place where I was able to visit hamdulillah Canada just got back from Canada that ago. Yes, insha. Allah would like to come back to Malaysia as soon as I can. Inshallah. Tada. So I'd like to share some of my own personal stories, because

everybody needs courage. Everybody needs courage in this time. And what's scary is when we stand up to authority, when we speak out, because part of what the shaytaan does is the shaytaan tries to get us to fixate and think about every bad thing that can happen. And we are tempted to think well, this is going to be the end of my life, the end of my career, right, the end of everything for me, and that's not necessarily the case, you know, and and we discount the ways that Allah subhanaw taala can support us and aid us in unpredictable ways. So I was a young person I was in eighth grade when 911 happened. Um,

And that was a big shock for me and a big sort of awakening, I started sort of trying to pay attention and understand current events and understand what was going on. I took some, some stands I after sort of educating myself, and I was just a teenager, you know, I came to be critical of the foreign policy of the United States when it came to its actions in Afghanistan, and Iraq. And I actually did some things and took some stands and took some risks.

Within my, my high school, so one of the things that I did is I stopped standing for the Pledge of Allegiance. This was something that everybody did every day in homeroom, right? The recited it, and so out of protest, I sat down, I sat during the Pledge of Allegiance. And this was sort of why when BLM and sort of picked up and taking a Neve during the football games, you know, this was something that was very familiar to me, because people vilified me for just doing a little symbolic protest, in opposition to what my, what the government of my nation was doing, why they consider I'm gonna have to luck. So that was just one thing we had. Another thing that we that used to happen in my

school that I disagreed with, and this was when Iraq was about to be invaded was that different branches of the armed forces would actually run gym classes. So there was an agreement between the school and say, the Army, for example, they would come in and they would run gym class for a day, they do have everybody do push ups and sit ups and things like that. And so I actually, when the Iraq war started, I refuse to participate in gym class, when these sorts of days would happen, like once a month or once every other month. And I had teachers threaten me with failing, threaten me to hold me back threatened me with this and that and the other. But it was something that I believed

that I was doing what was right, that I didn't have a voice I didn't have, you know, very much that I could do. I didn't even have a license to drive at that point. But even my small sort of protest was something that forced a conversation to happen, it forced awareness for people, it started some conversations and it took risk. It took risk. I risked sort of reprimand, it was very uncomfortable. Some people tried to punish me in certain ways. This is only something that, you know, continued throughout my life at various points in college and afterwards, where, you know, sometimes you have to take a stand for what is right, why they come sit down and have to Allah, it's morning in

Pakistan. Mashallah. Very good? Yes. So every single one of us has a different level of responsibility, right? You know, if you can't, maybe you're not somebody with a lot of political power, maybe you're someone that doesn't have a lot of money. But maybe the one thing that you can do the one conversation that you can have the one sort of stand that you can make, to start a conversation to change someone's mind, it might have enormous consequences that you don't even foresee that only Allah subhanaw taala knows. So these are days for courage. And everywhere I go, and I've talked to a lot of students and a lot of college students and anybody who will listen, I

tried to explain that these are times for courage that we have to absolutely be courageous, we have to be brave. We have to, we have to speak the truth, we have to bring awareness to the truth. And we can't fear, the blame of the blamers. We can't fear people who are who are counting on our silence, they're counting on intimidating us in order to silence us so that they can do things that are wrong, and that are untrue, and that are false. So with that, we have a very, very special guest today. And

he needs no introduction, but we'll introduce him anyway, when he comes on and that guest is Dr. Hatem Bazian.

Dr. hatom, as he's entering the program now

is a legend. He's a legend. He's the author of many very important books.

He is somebody who is a founder of multiple organizations zaytuna College, which you're probably familiar with a MP and many others. He's an author. He is a columnist. Occasionally he is a thinker and a public intellectual. He is a professor activist. And I'm ashamed to say on a personal note, I'm ashamed to say that this is the first time that we're meeting virtually and I'm sharing a screen but I am a huge admirer of your work. And I pray that Allah Spano Tata protects you and increases your work and spark in it and accepts it. So thank you so much for joining us today and welcome to the program.

You Salam aleikum,

Rahim, thank you for the invitation and for being with you. So hopefully that our virtual meeting will end up us actually meeting in person in sha Allah. That's it. Thank you.

gratitude for this conversation about a coffee come. You know, I had to drive up to Utica today to do this. And one thing that I do when I'm driving is I catch up on all the YouTube things that I've missed. And the one that one of the two things that I watched on the way was the house congressional presentation, or the hearing, rather, of the of the means and ways committee.

And I got through probably three quarters of it. And this was a committee for people who are unaware, that has to do with

tax exempt status, it has to do with sort of where money in the United States is allocated to, there was a lot of talk. It was frustrating, let's just put it that way. It was a very, very frustrating thing to watch. It was very one sided, one could say it was, it was a circus. And

you were presented, unfortunately, you were maligned,

as somebody who has founded and runs organizations, and they're attempting to tar you and to smear you with accusations that you are tied to groups that support Hamas, and support terrorism. Now, this is a generational thing that's happening, where we have a new generation of activists that are passionate about this issue. A lot of people maybe they're not aware of the Holyland case of the climate that existed after 911. All the sorts of pieces that were in play when it came to setting the stage for today. Would you be able to walk us through a little bit of the history about maybe the Holy Land foundation or the trial? Or how are they trying to make this claim and basically shut

down

Muslim organizations and charity organizations that are in any way critical of Israel?

Thank you for the question. And

for people who are coming into the Palestine work now,

if I want to position what we are experiencing over a 30 year trajectory, I would say the critical moment really comes to us in the early 90s. As the end of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union,

the end of apartheid South Africa, the victories in ending apartheid and Central American solidarity movement, what we found is is needed to reposition itself. 1993 is very important. This is also the time where we get the book from Huntington, clash of civilization, actually, initially, a an article in Foreign Affairs, and then it later on makes it into a book.

The Clash of Civilizations thesis is Bernard Lewis's thesis. And it was in search of a post cold war, framing for US foreign policy, we need to know that these are individuals that cut their teeth on the Cold War on anti communism. And now they need to position themselves in the positioning of themselves, both the clash of civilization as well as Israel. Islam became the focus point of trying to rally US foreign policy, establishment thinkers and so on. People think it's 911 that begins the process of demonization of Muslims Islamophobia, I need to remind people that Clinton passed the 1996 and take terrorism and effective death penalty act.

That law that the Clinton pass was based on the events that took place in Alfa Lille in 1994, where Baruch Goldstein walks into

Ibrahimi mosque in Al Khalil and shoots 29 Muslims who were praying fajr prayer during Ramadan and injures 125 of them.

That was a response to the Israeli right wing attempting to torpedo to derail the Oslo peace process. A year later.

An Israeli a right winger also killed Rabin, who was part of the Oslo peace process. As a result, a number of a number of attacks takes place in Tel Aviv, Clinton declares a state of emergency in the United States. Still, this is one of the unique circumstances in that legal history of the United States that events taking place in Palestine results in the US declaring a state

to emergency in the US. And we get the beginning of the process of designating terrorist organization and freezing accounts of people move forward to 911. As soon as 911 took place, the pro Israel organization groups that were will positions with the Neo cons, immediately targeted the

Muslim charities, organizations, individuals, Holy Land, current hearts, and others. And also individuals, I had an individual that gave a paper here at UC Berkeley, who was an ex CIA agent, he said, post 911, he estimated 93% Of all the legal cases in the United States, targeted pro Palestine activist organization in individuals who had nothing to do nor any connections to 911. This where we get the material support prosecution, we get the entrapment cases from the government, we get pre emptive prosecution that was used against individuals. And now, literally the legal system shifts, Muslims are guilty that they have to prove their innocence, rather than actually being innocent

having to be proven guilty. So this is the 2000, post 2000 and continues to accelerate and unfold in this way. And now we're getting another moment, both of 1906 and 911, where you see the apparatus of the government being directed to implement Israel foreign policy objectives in the United States. So that's in terms of just looking at the long history of what happened.

Fantastic. That's a very, very impressive summary of a long spirit of period of time, just within a short a short bit. And I think it's worthy also pointing out how much money is to be made from warfare, right? Because when when people are saying, Okay, well, how, you know, without an enemy, okay, we're saying coming out of the Cold War, okay. Oh, what reason is there for people to want to pivot to find a new enemy to these things Eisenhower warned about the military, industrial complex, contracts, contractors, this, these things entered into some people's vocabulary only after the invasion of Iraq. But there's enormous amounts of money to make to be made in war, and defense

contracts and this sort of thing. And so it's very difficult to separate the interests between law and war and profit.

So let's go into now, specifically, the Holyland case, which is just you know, has been described by neutral observers as a show trial, something where there was secret, secret evidence admitted and a retrial in which new witnesses were allowed to anonymous witnesses were allowed to speak. And basically, I think, what most impartial observers would call a travesty of or a miscarriage of justice. So what specifically happened with the Holy Land Foundation? And how does that set us up now where we've got people that are putting your name and your face up on a diagram, trying to link you to Hamas?

Well, let's say the following

911 made it possible to get the Patriot Act passed, and begin to target individuals on this whole concept of material support, which is not only extending financial support, but now it's also in the area of having or sharing content, ideas and so on. Now, the key is that in here, it allowed the government to use its long hand to target Muslims in a structural way. Important law is born out of social conditions. Law is born out of so we are living since 1996, in what I call the Islamophobic. Social imaginary.

It is not what you have done. It's basically because we have an illegal legal framework that is originated in the social imaginary. It is not what Holy Land Foundation did is who they are, is the primer so the government wanted to go after them, because Prime Minister Ariel Sharon at the time in the White House, as President George Bush took laws and shut down the Holy Land foundation. So that

process has to be understood. Now the government has to find the mechanism in order to actually prosecute individuals because of a request from a foreign government or prime minister in the White House. So as such, we need to understand that these relationships that targeted 93% of the cases targeted Palestina Holyland SAML Ariana and others, really was an attempt to undermine pro Palestine advocacy, pro Palestine positioning in the US. Let me go back again to Huntington and page 20 of his book, he says, unless we hate what we are not, we can love who we are.

Which I actually argue that they actually put Christian theology on its head because if understood Christian theology is but one aspect of it is love, that God loves his human being so much that He sent His Son Jesus. Again, that's not our belief. I'm just talking about Christian theology to be sacrificed for the sins of mankind. But what Huntington is saying is that the only way for me to realize self love as a western society for me is I need to find an object for my hate. The object of Huntington here is basically the Muslim he also add the Chinese in there. So that becomes the foreign policy that is to be implemented. And the government rolls out all of its infrastructure,

political, legal, media, in order to bring about the demonization and positioning the Muslims, as the go to Target for terrorism, prosecution, and so on, including secret evidence, including manufacturing, evidence altogether, entrapment,

having crawlers in mosque in order to actually create that we have a amaze of massive threat, domestically, sleeper cells and so on, even though the FBI own study in 2009, says that the primary domestic threat in America comes from white supremacist, white nationalists that are heavily armed and so on. Yet, the FBI that hired many agents and many

informants, almost 14,000 in terms of what figure that was, all were deployed against the Muslim community in a massive way. So that's where some of those, you know, dynamics that govern some of these cases that we have Holy Land, Holy Land case and others. Now, I never go back to the military industrial complex, because I think it's very important for us as the Cold War ended.

It is very difficult for a bureaucracy that has suckled itself on a massive military contract to unwind that process. So rather than change our economy into a peace economy, into a live giving, and sustaining economy, I say that we reward ourselves to find a new enemy, in order for us to continue producing that's that machines. We are a death, machine making economy, including GI and I'm at UC Berkeley, and the UC system we have that we run not we're again, I'm on the opposition. We run the two US military lab last almost a Livermore Lab. And estimate again is in the hundreds of millions that come through the university system in order to be literally invested in a debt economy and in

the depth of producing process altogether. So from 1993 Onward, if we look at the military budget, it's actually just mushroomed. I think if I'm my figures correct, this coming year is $845 billion that are there. Lastly, on this question, Muslims should actually be courageous, and honestly should remind people the following.

We said, post 911, that the United States should not invade Afghanistan, literally, I said we should send them food rather than actually bombs. They laughed at us. They dehumanize us, they continue to put our names all over it. In the 2003, we mobilize against the Iraq War. Some of the largest demonstration, we said that it's an illegal war is a manufactured War, the United States and I would say the pro Israeli pro Israeli I remember Netanyahu coming and testifying in the white in the Congress, urging the United States to invade Iraq. We said it will be a mistake that disaster, so on. So I would say the Muslims who stood on that position and really made the argument. We were

actually the ones that have identified the wrongness of the foreign policy, rather than those who were celebrated and began to be really as soon as they left their govern.

My job began to take positions in academia, think tanks and so on. So I would say the Muslim community in America should celebrate that they were on the side of justice and on the correct side of history, and the United States, the Neo cons, the pro Israel, sports people, the those who celebrated Netanyahu coming in giving talks around the country urging the US to intervene, right. They have to be held responsible and actually articulate the fact that they took the country with $8 trillion since 2001 Till now, so I think we need to remind people because now it's another cycle of demonization, because people don't want to listen to both our

advice or counsel and to point that this is the wrongheaded approach for the United States. And President Biden is committing a, almost a, an atrocious, deliberate effort by being on the sides of genocide. And I think what we need is to remind people of those issues as we speak. Excellent. So much comes to mind, through your reflections, one thing is how how this works with the sort of conflict of interest that is inherent to having your best customers have an incentive to go to war, right. So if we were to imagine that the United States, you would probably know the numbers better than me, but the last time I checked that the United States is the largest supplier of weapons, the

world only 6% of the global trade of weapons is the United States, we have 56%. Well, last year is about $1.84 trillion. So they're literally we have 56% of that. Yeah, subhanAllah, right, not something that we would really take pride in or hope that, you know, the average person would not take pride in. And so then, if this is big business, if you say the number one industry, right of the United States economy is, quote, unquote, we euphemized it and call it defense, it's really supplying the world with with weapons. Now, the clients and the customers that we sell those weapons to now, what's going to stop them from coming and having, you know, they're in the ear of

congressmen, they're in the ear of presidents, they're in the ear of the government,

with false stories, false flag operations with whatever it is, in order to keep this sort of lucrative business transaction going more targets, more weapons, more money, etc, etc.

And the point I'd like maybe you to elaborate on is how ransom or how held hostage the United States government is to this whole paradigm of foreign policy and interacting with the rest of the world. One thing that you've shown us and that the world has seen, I think, in the last, you know, three to four weeks, has been how the interests of foreign nations are actually dictating the policy of the United States and the things that the President and the congressional representatives say.

Maybe I could,

in my thinking, focus on both colonialism, decolonization, I think we'll be in error. If we think that this is Israel war against the Palestinians.

It is not surprising that all the colonial powers of the past

have stood behind Israel with supplies, weapons, political protections, and so on. And we need also to remember that the creation of Israel predates Second World War.

At the time of the thinking of the creation of Israel.

You could say some of the early Christian theologians that began to argue for

it was at the at the intersection of dismantling the Ottoman Empire.

At the French The British also the Russians had handled so on so it was how to dismember the Ottomans. And for the British in particular, how to actually guaranteed their trade that was passing through the Suez Canal. The British occupied colonized Egypt in 1882. But 1882 is not the period of their control domination, they actually began in 1807 1869. The Suez Canal opens up as a way to move European Trade specially the British and the French.

India was the critical piece for Great Britain they took out of India close to $45 trillion worth of material and wealth. When they colonized India, India was about 23 to 24% of the global GDP. When the British left it was three point

So,

Palestine was The Last Supper colonial project to be commissioned by European powers. And actually, in my book, Palestine, something colonial document how the British in their arrival to Palestine, in December 10 1917, prior and during that campaign, they articulated the campaign as a continuation or coming to an end of the crusades, and literally the, in their propaganda material in their front page and say, we'll return to Palestine after 607 to two years of Muslim control.

This gets us into the dispensationalist theology that is still dominant within the Evangelicals with certain segments who believe that the reconstituting of Israel is the stepping stone to the Second Coming of Jesus.

That tends to be used as a cover to continue the military industrial complex to Western intervention in the region. And this gets me to the second, our second major point, the Middle East and Africa are the richest regions in the world.

At bar none the resource material concentrations that Europe has no resources whatsoever if we read even Pope Urban the Second discourse for launching the Crusades, he says we don't have any resources. This land of ours is literally

covered by mountain peaks and valleys that we don't have resorted. That's why we fight one another. So lets our fight stop and go down on a crusade to the Muslim world. So it was a resource base, and that resource base is still there. Second is the network of waterways. You cannot move any products around the globe without actually passing the critical choke points, Suez Canal, Bab el Mandeb strait of Hormuz Strait of Malacca, and then you also

Gibraltar therefore the Western world in utilizes Israel in a in a constant divide and conquer. And then they come appear. On the one hand, they sell weapons, so we kill one another. On the other, they send us the diploma that trying to actually negotiate peace, peace is not something that is inherent in Western European policies. And they have been added for quite some time. And therefore I'm always when somebody says why Muslims are violent, I said, we don't even qualify to the Sweet 16 of violence, because all the sweet 16 spots are taken by Western world whether you're talking about literally today I was talking about my lecture I said, Let's just maybe remind remind people about

because they had the graph about who's violence is violent. I said, let me remind people, what World War One is that belongs to us for to those who project themselves as the peaceful World War Two, Vietnam, right. Vietnam was so the bulk of that we actually,

through agent orange on our own truth, the United States on truth that they came back with cancer. Then we talked about colonization, we talk about the Congo 50% of the population of Congo wiped wiped out

the colonization of the Americas close to 20 20 million. The dismemberment to Africa, the

death and destruction within India, some estimates about 30 to 14 million. But that gets to be again, if you are engaging in the contemporary world literally have to go into a mental lobotomy to discuss history, because the assumption is that history begins with the morning with materials, and therefore we have no discussions whatsoever. So you need to constantly remind people as a as a matter of historical record, because we often get into apologetic Well, Islam is peace, I am huggable, if you tickle me a laugh, like you, those discourses basically assumes, right, that there is such thing as a

global world community, which for me, and again, when the United States and the J six means they don't represent the word community, they represent a small minority of the world community, yet they project power, and continue to do so. So for me the war, Israel's war on Gaza and the Palestinians, I do believe that President Biden can pick up the phone, and literally in less than half an hour can stop the war. I know for a fact because the way that they reacted to Russia's invasion of Ukraine showed us what is a US with its allied, the NATO and so on what they could accomplish. But in here, is rarely seen as the favorite child as a success project for Western, the Western world,

theologically and politically. And we often don't understand this as we speak, because we

assume that propaganda to be the firm basis of the policy, rather than to understand the policy and

counter or discuss the propaganda but not actually based on analysis on the propaganda. So we often actually follow the propaganda rather than the sound analysis of Apollo's excellent, excellent analysis. And I love that you approach it from a decolonial angle and your work approaches it from a decolonial angle, a story for an in person meeting, you know, that's actually what led me to Islam was my study of, of colonization, European colonization, and post colonial theory.

I want to ask, we see now, and I saw in the congressional hearing, so much of that sort of Islamophobic frame is assumed, right, when it comes to, you know, the, the discursive interventions that people are attempting to make, when they're trying to say that the violence of Palestinians is irrational violence, right, is that it hasn't, it's just pure evil, it's just completely and we're not justifying, obviously, you know, anything that is done necessarily wrong or, or incorrect. But to deprive it of rationality is to put it on this plane of just pure evil, that doesn't even make sense. This brings us back to the Bush era. They hate us because of our freedoms, that, you know,

they just hate our way of life. And that really, D intellectualize is, and decontextualize is, what are the legitimate grievances of the people that are living there in Palestine, for which they would perhaps resist in in whatever way? Right. Can you speak to a little bit how this sort of, you know, how people are trying to for people who didn't watch the hearing how people are trying to criminalize speaking out against this, how are they trying to criminalize critiquing a foreign nation, Israel in this case, and make it seem that even speaking against Zionism or speaking out against the Israeli government, is sympathy for terrorism.

We have to look at

some of the conversation that comes from Israel's Ministry of strategic affairs, Israel foreign ministry, and also the recent conversation that comes out from the ADL, and other groups that basically point that Israel standing in the US is no longer tenable that they have lost considerable ground, in particular, what he called Greenblatt is the Tick Tock generation, meaning the current generation that is no longer taking its news and its information from what we call the mainstream and the mainstream. I think the last four weeks, they have completely discredited themselves across the board. Even some of these mainstream news, their highest what you call rating programs might

have two and a half million, you have some social media influencers that are in the 30 million and more that are expressing the support and also the news and the information is coming to people unfiltered.

Israel is an inability to argue facts have made it shift to try to make the messengers, the speakers, as the object of is demonisation. And this starts much earlier than this. Again, if we remember there were 34 states that passed anti BDS legislation. So that's what a peaceful protest peaceful engagement. So they passed Resolution. Why? Because they cannot argue that Israel is an apartheid state. Because you cannot actually say that I am like Israel sports people that I am supportive, supporting 65 Different laws inside Israel the differentiate between the rights of a Palestinian Israeli citizen and a Jewish Israeli citizen. I cannot as a radio sport work and they

can't argue where they can answer law 2018 passed a law that says that sovereignty in Greater Israel, right, you're right, Israel only belongs to the Jewish people, which include the Gaza Strip, West Bank, Golan Heights and so on, is indefensible. How can you defend the constant expansion of settlements and settlers? So Israel's playbook? I would say it begins much earlier than 911. But definitely 911 is to utilize Islamophobia, demonization of Muslim individuals and activists and try to do what you call, I call it 99 degrees of separation because 99 divine names, they tried to do 99 degrees of separation to try to link organizations and individuals. Now we know for a fact this is

not theory that the Israeli government

does not have any in any evidence whatsoever that links, for example, Students for Justice in Palestine and Hamas, we know this why? Because the the Netanyahu office, the Prime Minister office sent an email to this character called Steven Emerson was a sorry excuse for a journalist is not a journalist. Right, he sends them an email to try to discover if he could find any evidence that links SJP. To to Hamas, that just is a is if you want to have a smoking gun, not that I want to maybe have a smoking cheese, right? That literally it says that the Israeli government itself does not have any evidence. But that should not dissuade anybody or anyone that wants to engage in

propaganda. So the hearing of ways and means literally, they

miss the way. And they have misplaced the means in order to actually have a sound discussion about Palestine, the Palestinians pro Palestinians at a time where the American public is being asked to fit the bill $14.5 billion,

it's then the two as well. So I'm not surprised that they're resorting to a McCarthyism strategy in order to muzzle that critique of Israel and model the critique of a genocide that is unfolding. To comfort people in this I will say it is no longer working, that the shift in public opinion across the grassroots across also certain segments of the society is no longer reversible. And you cannot throw money on what I consider it an epistemic shift that has occurred, both in the United States that we're not seeing yet in the various arenas of political influence. But across the world, there's a an epistemic shift, that even if Israel throws millions of dollars to try to change the

public opinion, that is no longer reversible. Second point. And I think we notice what is occurring, that people have become emboldened in their stand for justice. Right? Especially the young

students, the young crowd, people are coming in numbers and in ways that we have not seen since possibly the 2003 opposition to the Iraq war. That does not bode well, for a, I would say, a pro Zionist pro Israel organization that are accustomed to not actually confront such a massive transformation. I do think that as we move forward, there are going to be massive pressure taken place. I think there are more people are going to run for political office on this Palestine question, because they see the contradiction wide open, as we say, and the fact that AIPAC is going to put 100 million to try to defeat the 20 Plus, I think that shows how insecure and unable to

actually argue the point. So they think if they just can get rid of these individuals, then the platform or the arena will be open for us. And I think they are not realizing what is occurring not only in the US, but across the world that numbers that you're seeing the tab of political mobilization, you know, Belgium today, the Norway Norwegian parliament have has a resolution today to recognize Palestine as a state, the Belgium government wants to actually forward charter charges of war crimes. The prime minister of Spain, likewise is to forward claims of war crimes and possibly genocide to the International Criminal Court. Bolivia, Venezuela, Chile today, Belize also kick the

Israeli ambassador and cut diplomatic relations in Nigeria, likewise, South Africa, so we're dealing with not an isolated but rather a wide spectrum change at a global level 156 countries in the UN voted in support of Palestine, only five countries, two of them, you could say have standing. The other is basically the Marshall Islands and a couple of other islands that are literally US territories. So the the shift that is taking place is overwhelming. The use of the hearing is basically to try to see if they could demonize the individuals that are been very effective in speaking and advocating and working for Palestine but I do think that you know, not the train but

the Camel Caravan has left the train station way too, you know, for them to catch up with it. And they're,

you know, they're, I don't want I don't advise them but

If you have Netanyahu as your salesman, I'm sorry, no one would buy the cars from him. Now Netanyahu is the salesman that Israelis themselves don't want to buy the product between him small trades being a via, you have, again, a one of the worst type of sales team for

a bunch of lies, and a bunch of

propaganda that is not sticking people are instantaneously debunking every piece that's come out from the Israeli military or the Israeli government. And then we can see even the opposition saying to Netanyahu to step he needs to leave. So that's the dynamics that we're dealing with at this point. Excellent. We're gonna go to questions in just a minute. Anybody who's watching, you can type in your question in the chat and we'll take them. Inshallah. Tada SubhanAllah. One of the things that this reminds me of is the story of Iran and Masada, he said, about how every step that fit around took to avoid his fate, ended up being the step that would lead him to his fate. And we you

see the Government of Israel continue to lie, continue their attempt at institutional capture, continue with the fabrications. It makes them look worse and worse and worse and worse as the day goes on. And we see, you answered my other question. I think I was going to ask if you think that we have reached the point of no return. And it seems that you think that this is different. We're starting to see defectors even from that are more mainstream that you know, folks like Candace Owens, and Tucker Carlson and other people. There's an appetite, I think, for people in the United States, that they they want politicians that aren't going to be beholden to foreign interest and

beholden to the sorts of things they see the amount of money that's being spent, and they're taken aback. So inshallah I agree, I mean, you've been in much longer.

One, one also significant change that I forgot to add, is that a sizable segment of the young Jewish population 35 and below,

has departed Zionism they have already taken the position of being anti Zionist, and no longer see Israel, its policies, its approach is that this course is to be reflective of both their deep held Jewish faith and Jewish identity. In the past few weeks, if you notice, the sitting at the New York subway station, the central station, today, the the blockage of the Bay Bridge, the attempt to blockade the democratic central offices in the sea, we are seeing large numbers of Jewish Voice for Peace, if not now and others that are mobilizing, that is also a reversible, which means that a large segment of 35 and below are also conceptualizing and thinking of a different horizon, between

their relationship and their relationship with Israel on the one hand, but their relationship with the Palestinians, their relationship with the Muslims, which possibly also get us to understand I'm very critical of the so called interfaith dialogue, which I it's interfaith washing. And what we need is to specifically say we need interfaith work for justice. And we need to identify those individuals that come from a faith perspective, and understand the centrality of faith as a mobilizer for justice, rather than mobilizing for a public relations

discourse. So that's I think it's very significant change that we're witnessing in front of our eyes. Brilliant, brilliant. Other Rahim asks, how can students fight back against the special interests that keep attacking students and academics?

When I would say that, if you're on campus,

make sure to create a large class coalition that includes different student groups, not only Palestinian Muslim, but a large coalition, bringing the faculty bringing the staff you have on campus staff unions that are there that already can take a very strong position. And then also, I would urge you to make sure that you contact some of the legal help. I chaired the Muslim legal Fund of America and Milan MLFA. We have also extended our resources for this. You also have Palestine legal which we work with. You have care that also has a large number of legal team. The good thing is that we do have legal help for you. The university administration often acts we have checkpoints

in the law.

US Bank administration, I call them that they have checkpoints on campus, the checkpoints is to actually target students make their work difficult. Try to put impediments in such a way to make your life difficult. And then sometimes after they do this, or why don't we have a dialogue with you with design students. So our issue again, is not a miscommunication. We I don't have a miscommunication with somebody taking my lead. I don't have miscommunication with a settler coming in the middle of the night and throwing Palestinian out. I don't have miscommunication with Israel killing about 5000 Palestinians, Palestinian children, 70% of those who are being killed in Gaza are

women, women and children, I have no miscommunication. What you have is miscommunication relative that you're trying to act as if the university is it as of Israeli Foreign Minister. So you need to also navigate, not allow the university because of its own priorities, its own priorities have its own contract its own priorities with donors, its own priorities with upward mobility for politically positioned staff, especially at the administrative level, to use you as an instrument for that process. So again, seek make sure to call the legal help, if anything that is presented to you. It is an uphill battle, for sure. But I think it's a winnable battle, because you're actually defending

some of the most important values value of free speech, freedom of association, the ability to actually articulate your position at the universe, even sometimes people who might disagree with your position will actually support your right to express it. So I think what you need is to

approach it within that framework, and I think you will have success in pushing back. So I'm really very, very happy with what's taken place in even Columbia University. They shut down sdb. Now, for people who don't know, I was one of the founders of SJP in 1993, at UC Berkeley, right, so that was the first SJP. So they shut down as JP and Jewish Voice for Peace. But as a result for a student groups got together, and now you have a massive coalition that is putting divestment of Columbia University from having any relationship with the Israeli economy. So again, another misstep, right, trying to shut down to student organization resulted in the birth of a large 40, student,

organization coalition with faculty and staff. So, again, for me that organizing is a process is not a finality. And I would say you always have to look at all the different possibilities of positioning, student organizing. Excellent, excellent, very thorough. And just to reiterate, for the viewer, make sure that they don't deep politicize you. Right, you see a lot of times they want to have a a film screening, again, this sort of portrayal of Bush shot engagement. Exactly, exactly. That this is just an issue of hate. If we see this person can understand each other. And we have an Israeli and Palestinian be friends and many documentaries, many sort of movies, many films, many

things are along this line of D politicization, that is a trap to get you to give up the concrete issue of justice that's at stake here. So it's just an extension of everything you've already said. Doctor had to mail a bus you were getting short on time, but there's a lot of good questions. Let's see. Zuora F asks, how can we advocate for BDS in an organized and systematic way?

Yeah, that for me the PDS is we have to understand individually, you could make a choice about your money of what you want to buy. So individual, you could make the choice to look at what is Israeli product and so on and engage in PDS. But for a PDS campaign, we are for targeted campaigns of PDs because it actually can be the most impactful way to engage in the PDS I'm very hesitant and critical of sending like a 2000 list of companies and say engage in PDS. For many people that is an immobilizing tactic, because the person looks basically everything that they have is there. It will take somebody who's what you call a shopping specialist to go through that list. So follow the

organizations that engage in campaigns on the particular PDS and plug into it for example for us in the Muslim community, and a MP we have take the date boycott because it's very important during Ramadan

We want to make sure that our Muslim stores, groceries, mosques and so on do not buy dates that are coming from the Israeli settlers. Israeli settlements is a Palestinian land that is taken. And therefore, during Ramadan, that is our season during the year, we continue to work. So that is a very important way. So link up to an existing on the college campus. For people who are working on the college campus. One is you look at the university investment. Second, there are many different programs that are linked the university to Israeli academia. And what you need is to be very critical. I, you know, I saw that on November 3, Israeli military bombed us our university is flat

and the whole university, not a single academic institution in the United States, not a single us, president of a US university uttered a word. And therefore you need to go back to them and say, in here, academic freedom, you always told us that you can be engaged in PDS we have to academic freedom. So where is the academic freedom is well actually demolish it, and attack the academic institution. So this is where you say that

university in relations with Israel is at the expense of the Palestinians, including that Israeli universities are complicit in furthering the occupation in facilitating the research in also, literally, having their archives filled with Palestinian stolen books were literally whole archives, I know that the historian Muhammad Nimmer archive from Nablus were completely taken. And it's the Israeli University Archives, right. So make sure that your engagement with the PDS is very clear, and you understand the target. The second is that don't get caught that we need to completely eliminate the

either the companies and so on, what you need is to affect their bottom line, right. And the bottom line can be effected very, in a very, what you call effective way in certain markets. So they also have to examine what it is to understand also the financial picture, but also how to be effective in undermining or in understanding the effect of the bottom line of particular companies. And if there are competitive there actually wouldn't be very good. I remember, I wrote the resolution that launched the boycott of Coca Cola during the South Africa anti apartheid regime. And we created the process both at the United States Students Association, and I was the chair of the National students

of color coalition at the time, it literally in a short period, Pepsi began to put their proposals to universities that were not in South Africa. And they also included our social responsibility class. For me that was, Pepsi became the advertiser for our campaign. So you also have to be strategic in pairing various market forces against one another, to be effective as a strategy. Because you're organizing for success. You're not only organizing for self satisfaction, you have to organize with an eye of success, and what success looks like in both the short and the long term. Fantastic point. There's a lot of great questions. Unfortunately for time, we're only going to take

one more from Ibrahim Roble, who asks the million dollar question, he says there's an enormous global support for Palestinians. How can we channel the support into a Palestinian state without first undertaking a major reform of the UN Security Council?

Look,

I'd say politics is a contact sport. Right? Meaning that

for if you just realized the moment that the world was in complete, almost

silence, complete, heedlessness complete almost the most most important thing, which was what concert people want to go to. Right.

Literally in the last month, that transformation that has occurred across the globe, is the moment that will have what you call residents. What we need is to begin to actually what are the things that we can do, specifically that would bring to this transformation, the debate about the United Nations Security Council, I think the United the United Nation has become completely discredited as an institution. The fact that 114 of Andras the United Nation, staff has been killed, yet the United Nation still is ineffective. I would say it's a total collapse of the Western world exceptionalist history and so on. The Human Rights paradigm of the World War Two has completely been demolished.

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As to the poor Geneva Conventions demolished, so we have an opportunity to re articulate what the new world so this will require for us to actually host conferences symposium right, put out material and begin to re imagine a different world, the world majority is with Palestine, the American public is with the ceasefire. 68%. Don't allow the small talking heads with powdered face Fair and Lovely from TV give you the perception that you are in the minority, they want you to believe that you're in the mind you're not you're in the majority in here, you're actually in the majority globally, right? So act as if you are representing the majority in order to conceptualize a different world.

And I think that's part of the hard work that we need to engage because we're good at mobilizing numbers, but we're not good at translating the numbers into effective conceptions of ideas, and begin to implement programs. So I think that's where some of the heavy lifting in the next few weeks or months, possibly years for us to undertake. But I'm very comforted that the global community is shifting, that some major major openings are taking place. I think I'm confident with the development in Brazil, the development in South African development in Chile, even the development in Mexico, right. discussions here. You know, we had the Richmond City Council task was strong

resolution that was used immediately a week after in an arbor. Change comes back from the bottom up. And we also as Muslims, we have to change again, if you're alone with your minutes. We all say if Salahuddin can come right, but the thing is that Salahuddin comes right, he will find us all sitting at Starbucks, drinking lots of

change is from the bottom up is transformative. It's dialectic is congruent of both the circumstances that people have and their readiness to step out. This will be my last statement, the following. I want for every Muslim that is listening and understanding that you are on the side of the Divine, the Divine is Aladdin. Every time you step out, to take a position of justice, know that Allah is with you because he is Aladdin. He is not with Lauren because Allah subhanaw taala said he for hibbott dolomiten on himself. In the Haram tubal mal NFC, God prohibited law there's nothing can limit God God prohibited himself from engaging in injustice. So when you go out, don't think that

how mighty was in front of us think how mighty that which is behind you and with you, we often get to be weakened in that way. Because we think the odds are overwhelming. The odds are overwhelming to the other side, because they don't know the power of justice. They don't know the power of Moses walking into the court of Pharaoh, they don't know the power of every Boothferry figure, they don't know the power that is there. So we have to change conceptually, how we see ourselves walking with confidence and with

I don't want to say that you are actually manifestation of Aladdin, as you work for causes of justice. So I never see myself that I am in the minority, because the minority of one with Allah is the majority at any given point. So that for me is the purpose when you are actually an injustice because that's what our tradition calls upon us. And what we need is to uphold the scales of justice at every moment, and Palestine is at the crux of this call for justice today.

Dr. hatom It was a pleasure and an honor to have you with us. We hope to see you again soon and keep the conversation going. May Allah bless you

can look at salaam aleikum wa rahmatullah. So we'll take a I'll take questions for the next five minutes about, but I wanted to extend one of the points that Dr. Hatem was making there at the end, when we're talking about the need to put all of our heads together, this is an all hands on deck moment, it's going to take us leveraging all of our skills, it's going to take all of our brainpower to even if as an OMA if we have differences to put aside our differences, and to think in a mature and exploratory way, how to chart a path forward. If you look at the different sort of the Dallas sphere, the different figures, the different organizations Hamdulillah, we have so much talent, we

need to make sure that we continue to enhance it. So there's been a lot of great synergy going on lately. People are uniting in a way that maybe we haven't seen before. We need to continue that unity and that cross pollination and talk to one another and figure out where to go from here. And so we ask Allah Subhana Allah to make us all

sincere, and especially to beware that the shaytaan and our enemies want us to fall into infighting, they want us to fall into bickering, they want us to get in our own way to fracture us in order so that we are ineffective. Right, Dr. Hudson was talking about being effective. And this is what we're after. If we put all of our skills and talents together, if we are completely sincere, to allow someone to audit and we do our best, then we can at least turn it over to we can turn it over to a loss from data and trust that He will deliver us victory

by His grace.

Last chance for any questions before we sign off here tonight, and then we went a little bit over, but there was so much to talk about. And at this moment, it's particularly important that everybody find their voice, and find their courage and find each other and find each other because I know many of the questions that came through are talking about facing oppression facing sort of being silenced, facing people who do not want us to, to use our voices. And one of the advantages of social media is that now we can see in real time, other people using their voices as well. If someone gets fired for taking a stand on Palestine, then 10s of 1000s of people, if not hundreds of

1000s of people get to know about it. If somebody tries to intimidate you, then you've got 100,000 people in a few hours that are on your side, maybe somebody who knows someone else, or can put you in touch with an organization that can assist you in order to in order to be able to protect yourself. So I don't see any sort of any other questions that are coming through the chat. So I guess we'll wrap it up here for the night. But I will say that we have some very, very exciting guests that will be coming on in the next few weeks. So I encourage you all to make sure that you tune in at 9pm New York time, that's 8pm Central Time, wherever it is, you are in the world, we have

people from all over, we have people future guests include, inshallah Tada, some of the college students or recently graduate graduated college students in New York City, that can are going to give us an on the ground view of the moves that some of the colleges have made to try to disband student organizations that have spoken out about Palestine, we'll also be talking about normalization and the role of sort of the

Arab states or the Arab governments or the Muslim rulers, whatever you want to talk about. And sort of

let's, I don't want to, to, to reveal everything. But we're going to have a thorough discussion on the specter of normalization and what it means and how it is a betrayal of our brothers and sisters in Palestine.

Let's see if I as a dean, say it as a commodity said, I'm off to La How do you cope with the pain that we are seeing and then find the strength to show courage to the Muslim community, you have to let it become your motivation? Right? For every word that you read, and writes, and every conversation that you have, you have to think of those little boys and girls, you have to think of the Shivering babies, you have to think of the people who have been martyred. It stops becoming about you. Right? The scarcity mentality that we get pushed into that stops us from courage and stops us from speaking the truth is one that's only concerned about us, what's my career? What's my

life path? What do I have to lose? When you realize that when you stand up, and when you speak up, and when you stand for the truth, you're not just speaking for yourself, you're actually becoming the voice of the voiceless, you're someone who's standing up for those other people. And that's the least that you can do for your brothers and sisters. So if it has to do with you taking a personal risk in your career, in your comfort, right? Then Then so be it really there's there's a greater cause. And this is what connects us all as an OMA is these feelings of, I guess, mutuality, this geography of affection that we have between us that when I'm acting, or I'm speaking up at a college

campus, or at a rally, or here on a live stream, I'm not doing it for me. I'm not doing it to hear my own voice. I'm hoping that I can push the conversation forward that just one person who's watching feels a little bit more courageous when they go and they have a conversation. And if everybody has that attitude and reaches somebody else and encourages somebody else, then collectively we can make a difference. Allah subhanaw taala can put baraka and it can put blessing in it, and it can have a huge effect and we ask Allah subhanaw taala for guidance for protection and for success. So with that, I think we're going to wrap it up for the night. Thank you everybody for

tuning in. Until next week, Sudan water

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