Advertise on podcast: The Palestine Pod

This week Lara and Michael sit down with one of the world's most renowned Palestinian authors Susan Abulhawa. We discuss her trips to Gaza the writing workshops she organized and the subsequent compilation of stories from people in Gaza that became Every Moment Is a Life: Gaza in the Time of Genocide. We talk about the time spent in Gaza, the horrors she witnessed, and the community she built. Susan tells us about her children's book Palestine On the Moon which is available to purchase (within the US) from her website.

This week Lara and Michael sit down with Dr. Mimi Syed a brave medical professional who went on two medical missions to Gaza before being banned by Israel on her third attempt. During her time in Gaza she documented numerous occasions where babies were murdered by the Israeli occupation forces with single bullets to the head and chest. We talk about the horrors she saw that Palestinians live every day during her time as an eyewitness to the ongoing genocide against the Palestinian people.

This week Lara and Michael reconnect with artistic intellectual Amanda Seales to talk about the release of her book What Would the Ancestors Say. We dive into the attempts to cancel Amanda from performing standup, how recommitting to the written word is revolutionary in a time when everything is controlled by crypto-fascist oligarchs, and Amanda calls Lara jolly.

This week Lara and Michael sit down with Omar Zahzah the author of the recent book on big tech censorship called, Terms of Servitude Zionism, Silicon Valley, and Digital Settler Colonialism in the Palestinian Liberation Struggle. Omar has written for the Electronic Intifada, Mondoweiss, and other publications. He covered the story of Michael's Instagram being deleted by Jordana Cutler, and is a strong advocate for Palestinian liberation.

This week Lara and Michael sit down with Jenin, the Palestine representative of CODEPINK to discuss Francesca Albanese's report "From economy of occupation to economy of genocide." We talk about how Airbnb and other corporations profit from the forced displacement of Palestinians. The company has over 300 listings in illegal settlements in the West Bank and we chat about the upcoming litigation against the company, as well as the campaigns spearheaded by CODEPINK to encourage people to boycott Airbnb.

This week, Lara and Michael sit down with Abdulrahim Harara, owner of Jerusalem Coffee House in Oakland, California. They explore Abdulrahim’s family history in Palestine and his vision for the café as a space for community organizing and connection. The conversation reflects on the importance of building community in the face of state violence designed to isolate and fragment. The episode concludes with Abdulrahim’s account of the incident that led to Jerusalem Coffee House becoming a target of the latest wave of lawfare, involving the DOJ, the ADL, and other Zionist organizations.

This week, Lara and Michael speak with Palestinian-American comedian Sammy Obeid. They discuss the ups and downs of working in comedy as a Palestinian in this current moment and critique how complicit media narratives distort reporting on those killed by Israel as part of the ongoing genocide, for example by making it seem like such individuals died of "natural causes" as opposed to as a result of targeted state violence. Sammy also shares an anecdote involving a stay at Michael’s apartment.

This week Lara and Michael cover Israel's forced starvation of the Palestinian people in Gaza, which has reached Stage 5 for many people in the besieged territory, the US sanctions levied against United Nations Special Rapporteur on the oPt, Francesca Albanese, and the odd resignation of all members of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the oPt in the days that followed.

This week Lara and Michael discuss the uprisings in LA and the solidarity seen at the protests. They also cover updates around the groundbreaking lawsuit brought by Palestine Pod alum Damia Taharraoui which seeks to hold Israeli/French citizens accountable for complicity in genocide and incitement to genocide before French courts.

Lara and Michael sit down separately this week. Lara reads from her submission on the political economy of the Gaza Genocide prepared as part of her work for the Gaza People's Tribunal's Sarajevo session and Michael talks about being digitally disappeared from Instagram by one of Meta's main executives who used to work for the Israeli government as part of an application-wide sweep of several accounts advocating for Palestinian rights.

This week Lara and Michael cover the Israeli continued forced starvation campaign against the Palestinian people for the last two months which serves as an escalation of its ongoing genocidal campaign.

This week Lara and Michael sit down with Professor Maura Finkelstein, a formerly tenured professor who was one of the first people targeted in academics after the Al Aqsa Flood. Maura is one of the many Jewish antizionist voices that rejects normalization. We discuss academic repression, the disappearance of students for political affiliations, and the horrors we see coming out of the genocide in Palestine every single day.

This week Lara and Michael discuss the unilateral breakdown of the ceasefire by the zionist entity. We cover the Israeli massacres on the Palestinian people during Eid, and how it's all connected to the state-sponsored disappearances of students protesting the genocide in Turtle Island.

This week Lara and Michael sit down with the acclaimed Palestinian researcher, Dr. Salman Abu Sitta, a Nakba survivor who has dedicated his life to the Palestinian liberation struggle. Dr. Salman Abu Sitta is the founder and President of the Palestine Land Society in London, dedicated to the documentation of Palestine’s land and people. He is the author of over 400 articles and papers on Palestine, as well as several books. Notable among them is a series of atlases documenting Palestine at different time periods including Atlas of Palestine 1948, Atlas of Palestine 1917-1966, Atlas of Palestine 1871-1877, The Return Journey Atlas, and the Atlas of Palestine; Land Theft by the Jewish National Fund. He is most known for mapping Palestine and developing a practical plan for implementing the right of return for Palestinian refugees. More details about Dr. Abu Sitta's work can be found at www.plands.org.

This week, we discuss the bizarre declaration by Milekowsky (aka Netanyahu) that he is proudly committing war crimes by imposing a total siege on the Gaza Strip cutting of all food, medication, fuel, and other aid from entering the besieged territory. We also refer to a number of the Israeli violations of Phase 1 of the ceasefire and cover the onslaught of colonial violence in the West Bank dubbed Operation Iron Wall as well as other stories from the last few weeks.