Omar Suleiman
speaker
1,922 appearances
2 recordings
1 series
first heard Jan 2023
last heard Feb 2024
Omar Suleiman’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
Synagogues should be protected, and if a person is attacked for being Jewish, we will be the first to go and to stand with them and to reject that attack on them. And there has been, as I said, an inspiring, pronounced Jewish presence in the movement to end the occupation. And so we're being morally consistent here.
As far as the rise in Islamophobia, it is felt, it's underreported, and it is part of the same framing that has led to the devastation of our people overseas. So there's a rise in Islamophobia, there's a rise in antisemitism, there's a rise in hatred. All of that is true, but there's also an ongoing genocide, and that should be our priority right now to end.
Benjamin Netanyahu has committed himself to the erasure of Palestinian people and Palestinian symbols and Palestinian land from the very beginning of his political career. This is who he has been. We just haven't been listening to him. He campaigned on bigotry and racism and on the promise that there would never be a Palestinian state. He campaigned on the promise that Gaza would be wiped out.
He campaigned by saying the Arabs are rushing to the polls. We need to make sure that they don't infect our policy. He has always been this person. This has always been his policy. He has always indicated that genocide and ethnic cleansing is where he wants to go. So he's simply manifesting what his message has always been. And anyone that ignores that is being disingenuous.
You can find statements from Benjamin Netanyahu in the 80s, 90s, 2000s. You can find him talking about this prior to October 7th and after October 7th. He's definitely doing this now to save his political career. I think he wants to drive this as long as he possibly can because he knows that his days in office are numbered.
But let's also ask ourselves, why is it that Benjamin Netanyahu was able to rise to power in the first place? There's something deeply troubling about the fact that his messaging ever resonated and what the prospects are for peace if Benjamin Netanyahu is able to rise with such pronounced hateful messaging.
I think he's trying to secure his seat in office. He knows his days are numbered. This is not about Israel. This isn't about the hostages for him. This isn't about anything but Benjamin Netanyahu. He is a narcissist. He's a tyrant. He is despised around the world, and I think even amongst Israelis. I think there's a deep hatred for him.
I think the hostages' families know that he doesn't care about the families or about the hostages, but he's driving a political agenda that doesn't care about people. not Palestinian people or otherwise. However, the problem of the occupation is not Benjamin Netanyahu. The problem of the occupation is the occupation.
Yair Lapid was the progressive moderate alternative, and he drove just as bigoted of an agenda against the Palestinian people as possible. So to the Palestinian that's living in Gaza or the Palestinian in the West Bank, Whoever's sitting in that seat has meant the exact same thing to them. But Benjamin Netanyahu is certainly, I think, the loudest bigot that we have seen in that seat.
I think Israel has a responsibility to protect those that it occupies. I think you have to ask that question differently. Noura Arakat wrote a tremendous article on this from a legal perspective. When you talk about Israel defending itself, Israel is bound to occupation law. This is the problem all along.
When John Kerry said, of course, the US is great sometimes at issuing inconsequential statements that Israel has to choose whether or not it wants to be a Jewish or a democratic state, be a Jewish or a democratic state, but it can't be both.
israel wants to occupy and deny and at the same time not be held to the standards of being an occupier but be treated as if it's some normal state those borders were drawn across occupied land and have been expanding into palestinian territory and people have been thrown out of their homes systematically and transgressed upon even to the in the places that they fled to which is gaza right
So when you talk about Israel having a right to defend itself, you should be talking about Israel's duty to protect everyone under its occupation. Either lift the occupation or protect everyone under your occupation. Where are your borders, right? What is your responsibility? Who are you protecting? And I think that it speaks to the fact that Israeli policy considers Palestinians to be animals.
They say as much and they do as much. I've spoken about James Baldwin, and James Baldwin talked about this pious silence surrounding Israel that we're supposed to pretend like it's just another state and ignore how it came into being and what it functions as. And I think that pious silence has to be broken.
I remember Jon Stewart, when he had The Daily Show several years ago, and he talked about this policy of we have to defend ourselves. And if someone was attacking your home, what would you do? And the response was, well, why are you forcing people into a closet? So you force people into this desperate situation. You drive them out of their homes, claim their homes.
And then say that you're defending yourself against them. The default is that an occupied people have a right to defend themselves. The occupier is obligated to those that they occupy.
Israel doesn't get to set the terms and then define them. It is an occupation according to any legal standard, international legal standard. Israel controls the movement of everyone in Gaza. It controls the air and the seas. It controls the ability to import or export.
The people that live in Gaza and the people that live in the West Bank, the Palestinians have had their identity stolen from them. So there's the freedom of movement. There is the freedom of thriving. There is self-determination. All of that has been stolen from the people of Gaza. There's no airport in Gaza that was destroyed by Israel as well.
It is an occupation at every level and by any meaningful legal determination.
Yeah, I think that it's clear that the United States cares more about its shipping lanes than it does about Palestinian lives, and that actually has proved it. Look, I do not support the Houthis as Houthis or their policies in general.
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