Geopolitics, power, and the messy reality of it all. Independent analysis with occasional raw and emotional takes. ðŸ§
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"OUR LIFE, OUR SOCIETY WAS SHATTERED IN ORDER THAT ISRAEL BE ESTABLISHED"
Edward Said, in an archival interview. He died in 2003.
"1948, we lost everything. Every single member of my family was made a refugee in 1948. Not a single member of my family remained in Palestine. My birthplace is now inaccessible to me."
"For many hundreds of thousands of my fellow Palestinians, their native towns, villages, farms are inaccessible to them."
Then the line that explains why he spent his life writing:
"The one thing that is still missing, in my opinion, is that there's a Palestinian story. We're not just the people who happen now to be in exile. Our life, our society was shattered in order that Israel be established."
And his own accounting:
"As a Palestinian born in Jerusalem, my national history and the society of my forebears were shattered in 1948 when Israel was established. Since that time, the better part of my own life, I have participated in the struggle not just to bring justice and restitution to my people, but also to keep the hope for self-determination alive."
He kept that hope alive until 2003. The Nakba he described in 1948 is still being carried out.
Twenty-three years after his death, the camps are still there. The villages are still gone. And the story he said was missing is finally being told. ðŸ§
"I DON'T REALLY WANT MY HOUSE BACK. WHAT I WANT IS A SIGN THAT YOU DID WRONG TO ME."
Edward Said, dismantling the "tragedy of right versus right" narrative.
"I'm convinced that there is justice and there is injustice, and they're really quite different."
He strips away the diplomatic excuses and asks the simplest question: "Would you like it done to you?"
He points out the absolute essence of the issue, the willful transport of one people's history to another people's land, resulting in dispossession.
"It wasn't that we were exploited, it was that we were excluded."
They call it a complex, tragic conflict where both sides share the blame. He calls it a profound, irreducible injustice that demands institutional acknowledgment.
When you refuse to admit a wrong was done, you aren't looking for peace. You're just managing the crime scene. ðŸ§
Source and context for the clip above:
This is from a 1986 public conversation between Edward Said and Salman Rushdie at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London. The event was the launch of Said's book After the Last Sky: Palestinian Lives.
Rushdie was the moderator. Said was responding to an audience question framing the conflict as "two conflicting histories" — what he calls the "tragedy of right versus right."
He rejected that moral equivalence entirely.
The full recording (about 1 hour 17 minutes) is available on the ICA's YouTube channel under the title "Edward Said & Salman Rushdie [1986]."
NETANYAHU IS NOW CAMPAIGNING FOR TRUMP ON AMERICAN GAS PRICES
Speaking directly to the American people:
"If you're worried about today's gas prices, think of what will happen if Iran gets nuclear weapons... when that regime disappears, gas prices will go down. And how? But only under Trump."
A foreign leader is telling American voters that their economic pain is tied to his war, and the only way to fix it is to elect his preferred candidate.
Meanwhile, Trump just published an open letter threatening Israelis that if they pick the "wrong Leader," America might stop doing the "work" for them.
Two leaders, openly holding each other's elections hostage. Pitching endless war as the cure for an economy it already broke. ðŸ§
"A GOVERNMENT THAT WILL CANCEL ALL OUR GREAT ACHIEVEMENTS."
Netanyahu on i24NEWS, warning that if he loses, the opposition will establish a Palestinian state, withdraw from the security zones, and fail to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon.
"Either the government of Eisenkot, Mansour Abbas, and Yair Golan... or us."
Notice what he's actually asking voters to do.
He's been in power for most of the last two decades. The "great achievements" he's protecting are the current reality: active fronts in Gaza and Lebanon, an ICC arrest warrant, a fractured international standing, and the hostages still home as bodies.
After twenty years of this exact pitch, vote for me or the state is lost, the bill for his security is already on the table. ðŸ§
"IF ISRAEL HAS THE WRONG LEADER... AMERICA WILL HAVE TO DO THIS WORK OURSELVES."
A US president just published an open letter to the Israeli public, explicitly telling them who to vote for.
Trump's message is blunt: anyone other than Netanyahu is the "wrong Leader." And if Israelis make the wrong choice, America might stop doing the "work" for them.
What work? The bombs, the vetoes, the military cover.
They spend years talking about Israel’s sovereignty and democracy. But the moment an election comes up, the patron reminds the client exactly who pays the bills. The letter is an endorsement for Bibi. The threat is for the voters. ðŸ§
"Not a failure of the government, it is the government's policy."
Yair Lapid just said the quiet part out loud.
The opposition leader isn't blaming a "few extremists" or "fringe youth." He's saying the violence is the strategy. Ben-Gvir funds and encourages it. Netanyahu stays silent.
He calls it a disgrace to the Jewish people.
For Palestinians, it's just another Friday. The only reason it's an international crisis today is because the victim was an American journalist with a press pass. ðŸ§
64 YEARS OLD. WEARING A VEST MARKED PRESS. KICKED ABOUT 50 TIMES.
Heidi Levine, Washington Post photojournalist, covering the olive harvest near Abu Falah.
"They just kept kicking me and kicking me, like probably 50 times." Broken rib. Lacerations. A hand injury needing surgery. Her cameras and phone taken.
The Washington Post says it's "outraged by this unwarranted attack on a journalist doing her job."
Nothing here needs explaining away. She was marked as press, on the ground, and they kept going. ðŸ§
Watch how quickly the Israeli government tries to spin it.
The Prime Minister's Office already issued a statement calling it a "disputed incident." They claimed footage showed her being "immediately helped to her feet."
Heidi Levine says she was kicked about 50 times, suffered a broken rib, and needed surgery on her hand.
They don't deny that settlers attacked a journalist. They just want to debate the exact number of kicks.
"A GOVERNMENT THAT WILL CANCEL ALL OUR GREAT ACHIEVEMENTS."
Netanyahu on i24NEWS, warning that if he loses, the opposition will establish a Palestinian state, withdraw from the security zones, and fail to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon.
"Either the government of Eisenkot, Mansour Abbas, and Yair Golan... or us."
Notice what he's actually asking voters to do.
He's been in power for most of the last two decades. The "great achievements" he's protecting are the current reality: active fronts in Gaza and Lebanon, an ICC arrest warrant, a fractured international standing, and the hostages still home as bodies.
After twenty years of this exact pitch, vote for me or the state is lost, the bill for his security is already on the table. ðŸ§
Let's look at the scoreboard of those "great achievements."
Netanyahu has been Prime Minister for over 17 years.
During that time: the worst intelligence failure in Israel’s history on October 7th. Repeated wars in Gaza. An ICC arrest warrant. Unprecedented settler violence in the West Bank. A nation so deeply divided over judicial overhaul that its military reservists were refusing to show up.
He isn't warning voters about what the opposition will destroy. He's describing the reality he already built.
ISRAELI SETTLERS PUT A FRENCH MAYOR ON THE GROUND
Bernard Baudoux, mayor of Aulnoye-Aymeries, was visiting Taybeh, a Christian Palestinian village, for the olive harvest.
Seven masked settlers on ATVs surrounded the European delegation from France, Belgium, and Poland. They demanded the diplomats' IDs, threw stones, and smashed the window of a Belgian consular vehicle.
If they treat European officials this way in broad daylight, imagine what the Palestinian farmers face every single day. ðŸ§
Context worth adding:
Taybeh is the last predominantly Christian village in the West Bank. The olive harvest is the economic lifeline for families there.
Settler violence spikes every year during the harvest. UN OCHA has documented hundreds of attacks on Palestinian farmers and their groves, with indictments in only a tiny fraction of cases.
Hitting a European delegation and smashing a Belgian consular vehicle turns this into a diplomatic incident. Belgium summoned the Israeli ambassador. The EU issued a condemnation.
But for the Palestinian farmers in those groves, this isn't a diplomatic incident. It's just another day of the harvest.
"SAUDI ARABIA IS VERY HAPPY TO HAVE ISRAEL'S SUPPORT."
Trump, asked if the Abraham Accords are back on the table with Riyadh.
The deal on offer: normalization with Israel. What it costs the Palestinians, a state, a capital, a right of return, isn't in the sentence. Just Saudi happiness, Israeli support, American blessing.
MBS has publicly demanded an "irreversible pathway" to a Palestinian state. Israel's government has ruled that out. So the two positions haven't moved, only the sales pitch has.
Normalization is being sold as peace. The party whose land is being traded isn't in the room. ðŸ§
"DO YOU TRUST NETANYAHU?"
"I don't trust anybody."
Trump, on Newsmax, declining to say he trusts the Israeli prime minister, the same man he's handed billions in weapons, backed through two wars, and defended against ICC arrest warrants.
He could have said yes. He chose not to.
Whatever the relationship looks like in public, the president just told you what it looks like in private. ðŸ§
Context worth remembering.
In 2002, the Arab Peace Initiative offered Israel full normalization with the entire Arab world in exchange for a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders.
The Abraham Accords did the opposite. Normalization first. No state, no withdrawal, no capital, no right of return.
UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, Sudan — all signed while settlement expansion continued unchecked.
Now the prize is Saudi Arabia. If Riyadh signs without a real path to statehood, it formalizes the end of land-for-peace as a concept.
The Palestinians aren't in the room because the deal was never about them.
64 YEARS OLD. WEARING A VEST MARKED PRESS. KICKED ABOUT 50 TIMES.
Heidi Levine, Washington Post photojournalist, covering the olive harvest near Abu Falah.
"They just kept kicking me and kicking me, like probably 50 times." Broken rib. Lacerations. A hand injury needing surgery. Her cameras and phone taken.
The Washington Post says it's "outraged by this unwarranted attack on a journalist doing her job."
Nothing here needs explaining away. She was marked as press, on the ground, and they kept going. ðŸ§
"DO YOU TRUST NETANYAHU?"
"I don't trust anybody."
Trump, on Newsmax, declining to say he trusts the Israeli prime minister, the same man he's handed billions in weapons, backed through two wars, and defended against ICC arrest warrants.
He could have said yes. He chose not to.
Whatever the relationship looks like in public, the president just told you what it looks like in private. ðŸ§
What Trump has done for Netanyahu.
Moved the US embassy to Jerusalem — May 2018.
Recognized Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights — March 2019.
Brokered the Abraham Accords, normalization with the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan, with no Palestinian state.
Withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal.
Launched the 2026 Iran campaign.
Approved a $2.8 billion sale of 2,000-pound bombs.
Sanctioned the ICC judges who indicted Netanyahu.
And after all of that, when asked if he trusts Netanyahu: "I don't trust anybody."
A US ENVOY JUST COMPARED GAZA TO DRESDEN, AND CALLED IT "HAVOC"
Rabbi Yehuda Kaploun, the US Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism, on JNS:
"How are people allowed to protest this massive, you know, what they want to call genocide of people in Gaza?!"
Then he explained why it's fine: "There are plenty of people in Hiroshima, Nagasaki, the bombing of Dresden. When you go to war, you create havoc. Unfortunately, that's what happens."
Havoc. Like weather. Like it just happens.
His job is fighting antisemitism. He's using it to argue that protesting a war shouldn't be allowed, and that mass civilian death is just the cost of doing business.
That's the whole pitch, in one minute, on camera.
Worth noting what he's actually comparing Gaza to.
Dresden: around 25,000 civilians killed in two days, a city with no significant military industry. Historians have debated for eighty years whether it was a war crime.
Hiroshima and Nagasaki: estimated 110,000 to 210,000 dead, overwhelmingly civilians. The only uses of nuclear weapons in history.
So a US envoy's defense of Gaza is: it's like the worst civilian bombings of the 20th century.
He said the quiet part out loud.
MORE THAN TEN DELEGATIONS WALKED OUT ON ISRAEL'S PRESIDENT IN BAKU
At the CICA summit in Azerbaijan, Isaac Herzog began his speech. Delegations from Iran, Türkiye, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the Palestinian Authority were among those who got up and left.
Saudi Arabia and Egypt included. That's the part that matters.
The summit was about Asian security and confidence-building. The room answered a question nobody asked.
It didn't hold. ðŸ§
On the numbers: Iranian media put the total at 13 delegations, and names Qatar among them. Turkish outlets say more than ten walked out, led by Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan.
Israeli and eyewitness accounts confirm Iran, Türkiye, Kuwait, Pakistan, and the Palestinian Authority, and say Qatar's Emir stayed seated. Bahrain and the UAE also stayed.
The walkout is consistently reported. The exact list isn't. I've named only the countries every source agrees on. ðŸ§