Avi Melamed: Session 6. The Israeli-palestinian conflict, a view from the region, and I will guest educator today.
Avi Melamed: Dahlia Ziade is always, of course, we will do it.
Avi Melamed: Formal introduction of the our guest speaker.
Avi Melamed: So I want to start this conversation
Avi Melamed: briefly, starting somewhere at the end of the 1,800, the 19th century. We have been talking about that issue in the context of the rise of nationalism and the emergence or the percolation of nationalism ideas into the region into the Middle East. You may remember we talked about it in previous sessions in different aspects.
Avi Melamed: Now we are going to focus a little bit, much more talking about specific arena. And this is
Avi Melamed: the arena that has been known. Back then, by the name of Palestine, slash the land of Israel.
Avi Melamed: and towards the late in 1,800 Palestine they slashed the land of Israel
Avi Melamed: is a part, of course, of the Turkish Ottoman Empire, and it has been very neglected, very poor area populated by, according to the best of estimation, something like around. Roughly speaking, maybe 100,000 people. Most of them are Arabs, Muslims. Some of them are Jews, and that have been kind of like scattered in different communities. Most of the population was enormously poor
Avi Melamed: people basically made their living either the kind of like small farming or peddling, or living in a kind of like. It's kind of like. It sounds like a little bit too presumptuous to say, but they kind of like lived in a in a urban area. So to speaking, when I'm talking about like places like Jerusalem or Hebron or Svat in other places. But there should be no mistake about it. It was very neglected and poor area.
Avi Melamed: and so, towards the end of the 18 hundreds, inspired by the issue of nationalism in Central Europe and Eastern Europe as well.
Avi Melamed: We are witnessing the formation of the the Zionist movement, the Zionist movement, actually
Avi Melamed: the core element of the return of the people, the Jewish people to the homeland Zion
Avi Melamed: that has been mentioned, of course, in the Bible and the re-establishing of Jewish sovereignty.
Avi Melamed: because in the past there used to be, of course, Jewish sovereignty on this piece of land, Judea in Samaria
Avi Melamed: and the coast area. This is a Jewish sovereignty that was erased by the Roman Empire, following a Jewish rebellion in the beginning of the second century, and actually since then, there was no Jewish sovereignty on this piece of land. So by the end of the 18 hundreds, Zionist movement
Avi Melamed: are inspired by this idea, is starting to initiate the moving of particularly young people from Central Europe, from Eastern Europe, and they are making their way to this piece of land. Palestine slash the land of Israel.
Avi Melamed: They are forming communities, particularly agricultural communities on the ground because one of the things that was inspiring. Romantically speaking, those young people, many of whom, by the way, more or less in your age.
Avi Melamed: it was the whole idea of like creating a new kind of like
Avi Melamed: Jewish communities that will be centered around agriculture and farming, something that was relatively less characteristic of at least the Jewish communities in Western and Central Europe. It was more characteristic of the eastern part of Europe.
Avi Melamed: and and that was part of this large ideology of creating a sort of like a new kind of Jewish people in the new renewing sovereignty of this piece of land. And so they are
Avi Melamed: purchasing lands in different parts of this area Palestine is less the land of years, but particularly purchasing lands in the area of
Avi Melamed: the Galilee, the eastern Galilee, the area next to the Sea of Galilee, and they are purchasing those lands and those lands they are purchasing are basically owned by an Arab landlord that used to have huge amount of those lands. In most cases the Arab landlords did not live
Avi Melamed: in Palestine, slash the land of Israel. They lived back then in centers of culture and politics, in the region like Damascus, like Beirut, like Cairo.
Avi Melamed: and and and they sold those pieces of lands to these new coming pioneers, the the Zionist.
Avi Melamed: The issue is that large parts of those lens have been also co-used sort of speaking
Avi Melamed: by particularly Bedouin tribes.
Avi Melamed: nomadic tribes that have been passing by seasonally from East Jordan, which is Jordan today, or from South Syria, and and seasonally they used to graze their cattle, their sheep, in those specific same lands that were bought by the
Avi Melamed: Zionist pioneers, and basically they got used in nomadic tribes. They got used that in course of time there has been an established system that basically enabled them to
Avi Melamed: during the seasons, to go to these areas, to graze their cows or or sheeps.
Avi Melamed: sometimes to grow some agricultural crops, and and that was kind of like sort of there, I would say.
Avi Melamed: a circle of life or routine, so to speak.
Avi Melamed: Now there is an interesting situation on the ground, because on the ground, all of the sudden they are coming across this
Avi Melamed: communities.
Avi Melamed: The word communities is, of course, misleading because we are looking at a very small, you know, group of sheds or shacks, or whatever it was. Sometimes it is fenced in, sometimes it's not fenced in. Sometimes there is some sort of a
Avi Melamed: wood tower that basically is supposed to provide some sort of like a security or defense, because there are robbers in the in the region.
Avi Melamed: and to the surprise of those nomadic tribes, they find that the very same lands that they used to graze
Avi Melamed: are now taken by other people
Avi Melamed: and those other people are saying to them, well, we bought those lands, and now we are farming those lands.
Avi Melamed: In other words, what I'm describing to you is a very interesting, the very, very early phase of what is going later on to result in the story of the Israeli Arab conflict and the Israeli-palestinian conflict. But in the very, very, very early phase, actually, what we are looking at
Avi Melamed: in is, it's something that I could call a an agriculture agricultural background conflict
Avi Melamed: that way. Very simple. To put it this way.
Avi Melamed: meaning you got these groups on the ground. You got the Bedouin tribes. They are basically are not happy with the fact that they cannot any longer continue to graze the ships as they used to be, or to grow crops, and very quickly what you find there is a lot of documentation in those years. In the end of the 18 hundreds of frictions between the new
Avi Melamed: communities on the ground, the Zionist and the Bedouin tribes. And you find many times reports about, you know, cows that have been stolen or slaughtered, or barns that have been burned up, and and so very quickly. One of the immediate things that happens before, because of that is that those pioneers are now forming themselves
Avi Melamed: in this very early stage also is a military power.
Avi Melamed: and the the picture that you see to the left hand side. Interesting enough, you may notice that you know they could be viewed as like
Avi Melamed: people from the region like Arabs. But actually these are pioneers. These are early pioneers that came as part of the Zionist movement. The people that you see in the picture didn't speak one word in Arabic. They spoke Hebrew, and and basically they came from either Russia or Central Europe and other places, but they were the early early and the 1st pioneers coming into the world. So
Avi Melamed: When we are looking at the 1st phase of this
Avi Melamed: conflict. We are looking at something that was very domestically oriented. You can't really back, then, really talk about percolation of nationalistic or even religious
Avi Melamed: elements, of the conflict that are going to emerge later on.
Avi Melamed: So now we are in the 20th century, the end of the 1st World War. We talked about it the downfall of the Turkish Ottoman Empire. And now one of the things that we have talked about was that the people of the region are introduced to this whole new system. You got the Western powers, the British mandate, the French mandate. You got the whole issue of nationalism that is introduced to the people in the region.
Avi Melamed: and very quickly there is a hustle, bustle, and increasing discussions, and very loaded discussions, politically and emotionally and culturally vis-a-vis. This whole new structured region that has been for hundreds of years under the rule of an Islamic entity. In our case the Turkish Ottoman Empire.
Avi Melamed: and very quickly one of the very 1st things that happened in the context of the political reconfiguration of this specific part of this region, meaning the area that is known by the name of the Levant, or Sham.
Avi Melamed: which is today what we call Syria and Lebanon, and Israel and Palestinian territories in Jordan.
Avi Melamed: One of the interesting thing that happened is that there is a towards the 1919 20.
Avi Melamed: There is a dominant political idea or structure that is offered, known by the name of Great Syria.
Avi Melamed: The concept of Great Syria basically
Avi Melamed: says that there is going to be a political entity that will be established and include area that is today Syria, Lebanon Transjordan, meaning back, then, Jordan of our times, and what is going to become Israel in the Palestinian territory. This whole area will be great Syria, and it will be ruled
Avi Melamed: by the Hashemite monarchy.
Avi Melamed: The Hashim family are coming originally from the Arab peninsula. They have been for centuries a center of power in the Arab peninsula until they have been defeated by their rivals, the Saud, the Ibn Saud dynasty.
Avi Melamed: So during the 1st World War the Hashemite family basically played a very instrumental and significant role in cooperating with the Western powers, pushing out the Turkish influence from the area of the Arab peninsula, and in return they have been offered or granted or promised that the rule of this great Syria will be handed over to the sons of this dynasty. The older son.
Avi Melamed: Faisal, that you see in this picture to the right hand side was supposed to be. According to this outlook, the King
Avi Melamed: of Great Syria, of which
Avi Melamed: the area that is known as Palestine. Back then, and the land of Israel was supposed to be what is known as South Syria.
Avi Melamed: That has been a concept that has been for some time kind of like, very popular
Avi Melamed: among some circles in the region, including not only the elite circles, but also the popular circles.
Avi Melamed: and in fact, one interesting aspect that is less known is that there was an agreement signed between Faisal and the Zionist leader, Haim Weizmann, who is later on going to be the 1st president of the State of Israel.
Avi Melamed: And and that agreement you see in front of you, a quote from this agreement basically is talking about
Avi Melamed: inhabitating this piece of land, slash Palestine, the land of Israel, as soon as possible, with large number of Jews
Avi Melamed: to create this entity, and the Jews will actually, according to that outlook, will be playing a very significant role in the developing
Avi Melamed: of this piece of land where the Arab inhabitants of this piece of land will benefit
Avi Melamed: from from that. So this is a very interesting episode in the history of the conflict. Going back already to the end of the 1919 twenties. Later on it's very quickly sinked and declined. There was some attempts to renew that in the mid thirties, but it was already a totally new environment. And this whole story of Great Syria and the kingdom and monarchy of Hashemites over Great Syria.
Avi Melamed: This story basically disappeared in the pages of time.
Avi Melamed: And so we are now in the Post World War one, and the region is introduced to the issue of the nationalism, and, as you may recall, and I think it was in the 1st session we we talked already about the fact that very quickly. Once introduced to this concept of nationalism.
Avi Melamed: it's going to result in an enormous and enduring and increasing
Avi Melamed: a political, cultural, emotional power struggle among the people of the region.
Avi Melamed: Regarding this whole thing of the national statehood and the concept of an independent national state.
Avi Melamed: and that, as you may recall in one of the sessions, I think it was in the beginning we talked about the fact that that power struggle basically resulted in a couple of camps that were going to play during the 20th century. Some of them part of the 20th century, some of them all along the 20th century into our time, playing a very significant role in this whole evolving power struggle over the issue of statehood and independent State.
Avi Melamed: We mentioned those camps previously. We talked about the Islamic Caliphate camp. We talked about Pan Arabism. We talked about the camp of national statehood
Avi Melamed: and the camp. And basically the feature that has been playing a very dominant role in the shaping and the trajectory of the concept of nationalism in the Middle East
Avi Melamed: in the 20th century. And this is the whole religious, ethnic and tribal sectarianism.
Avi Melamed: Those ideologies, or those outlooks, basically have different names. The Pan-arabism has been known by the name of Qaun. The particularistic independent statehood model has been known by the name of Watania, and the Islamist has been kind of like, titled as the Caliphate
Avi Melamed: moderate.
Avi Melamed: And so in our
Avi Melamed: a session today, with our distinguished guest educator, Miss Dalia Ziad, we are going to try and to explore
Avi Melamed: how this inner power struggle of the region over the issue of statehood, how those camps impacted and shaped
Avi Melamed: the trajectory of the Israeli-palestinian conflict.
Avi Melamed: So we are very, very honored to have with us today Miss Dalia Ziade as the guest educator.
Avi Melamed: Dalia Ziada is an award-winning Egyptian writer and political analyst, specializing in governance, geopolitics and defense policy in the Middle East and the Eastern Mediterranean.
Avi Melamed: With nearly 2 decades of experience she held leadership roles at the prominent think tank and civil society organizations publishing extensively on political conflicts, power dynamics, and the region's evolving, evolving, geopolitical landscape.
Avi Melamed: She has co-founded and directed multiple research institutions, including the Liberal Democracy Institute and the Center for Middle East and Eastern Mediterranean studies.
Avi Melamed: and has served as the executive director of the Ibn Khaldun Center for Development studies.
Avi Melamed: Dalia is currently a senior fellow for research and diplomacy at the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs, and collaborates with hillel internationals to lecture on Middle East Geopolitics across American University campuses. She is also engaged in research on radical Islamism in the Us. And Europe, with the Institute for study of global anti-semitism and policy.
Avi Melamed: Dalia has earned international recognition for her activism, particularly for her role in the Arab Spring and her outspoken stance against political Islamism, Hamas and Iran-backed proxies. She has been an active voice in Muslim, Jewish, and Arab-israeli dialogue for over 16 years.
Avi Melamed: and has participated in numerous regional and global initiatives advocating for peace and freedom.
Avi Melamed: is a best-selling author. She has written extensively on Egypt's political landscape, military and Liberal Democracy.
Avi Melamed: Dalia Ziade, welcome to itme fellowship. Program.
Dalia Ziada: Thank you so much, Avi, and I'm thank you also for the introduction, and these guys don't use the word, miss, just Dahlia's Yada directly or Dahlia.
Dalia Ziada: it's it's bitter and makes me feel still young as well.
Dalia Ziada: So so 1st of all, thank you, Avi, for hosting me on this interesting fellowship program. It's it's amazing. And I'm so happy to see some of the some of the familiar faces people I knew from before, either from my campus visits or connected with online.
Dalia Ziada: And and yes, we have a big discussion today about about one, I believe.
Dalia Ziada: like the core, one of the most complicated issues on in our, in our
Dalia Ziada: modern day, in today, in our wallet today, actually, not only in the Middle East. So where should we start? Avi.
Avi Melamed: So great.
Avi Melamed: I would like to start with the camp of
Avi Melamed: Pan Arabism. The calm I just show briefly a picture or a photo of its most well-known leader.
Avi Melamed: Gamal, Abdel Nasser, the President of Egypt, and
Avi Melamed: I would like to start with very short explanation if you can, about what is the major ideology of calm.
Avi Melamed: All of these.
Dalia Ziada: Okay, interesting in order to understand that and understand why Pan Arabism has become actually one of the 1st steps towards globalizing the Israeli-palestinian conflict that started as just a territorial conflict. I would like to start by sharing a theory. I call it the 3 layers theory of the Israeli-palestinian conflict.
Dalia Ziada: which actually, if you understand the theory, you will understand why things are happening this way right now. So briefly, the theory speaks about how the
Dalia Ziada: how the conflict moved from being a territorial conflict, just like any other conflict. We're seeing around us into what we are seeing today becoming a global conflict over an issue that even some of the people involved in the debate about it don't know much about.
Dalia Ziada: So the Israeli-palestinian conflict, as Avi was just explaining started in the 1920 s. As
Dalia Ziada: sorry long even before that, like a few years before that. But it reached a peak point in the 19 twenties between the Arabs and Israelis who lived on this territory, this piece of land. You know that that we refer to today as Israel and its surroundings, the greater Syria region.
Dalia Ziada: What happened at that time? If you look at the rest of the region, the rest of the Arab countries in the region who come from Arab countries who compromised the majority of the region. If you look at the rest of the region, Arabs and Jews were living so peacefully with each other at the time when Arabs and Jews were killing each other at, you know, engaged in fights, and there were horrific things happening, especially in the 19 twenties.
Dalia Ziada: almost massacres, you know, against the Jewish people there. At that time Arabs
Dalia Ziada: and Jews in other Arab countries were living so peacefully in Egypt as one example, that is. And it's actually the most interesting example, because it's very close to this territory we are talking about in Egypt.
Dalia Ziada: The the we had like we were having at exactly this time, like the sober stars, rock stars in cinema, in movies, important singers, important businessmen in the community were Jewish people, and nobody like heard them, or thought about fighting against them, or so. On the contrary, people were living together so peacefully. The same thing in Iraq and other places.
Dalia Ziada: So what happened is that in the 19 fifties Egypt got a new President, and this new President was the 1st Egyptian President to rule Egypt after what's known as
Dalia Ziada: Officers Revolution, the Free Officers Revolution. Actually it was a coup led by the Egyptian military against them
Dalia Ziada: Muhammad Ali Dynasty, that was ruling Egypt at that time, you know, over time Egypt was governed by the Ottomans, by the Muhammad Ali dynasty, which was an extension to the Ottomans, and then by the and before that I mean, or in parallel, was that by the British, before that by the French, the Germans. So we were governed by all types of people except Egyptians.
Dalia Ziada: For the 1st time in the 1950 SA guy called Gamal Abdel Nasser, and you have to remember his name very, very well. Gamal. Abdel Nasser is a he was not technically the first.st
Dalia Ziada: His general in the army was the first, st but he only remained for 2 years, but he was the actual 1st President Egyptian President of Egypt, and of course he came to power with a Communist ideology which was very trendy at that time worldwide.
Dalia Ziada: and he wanted to extend this
Dalia Ziada: feeling of nationalism, of Egyptian nationalism to become Arab nationalism. And this is what Avi just asked me about. What is
Dalia Ziada: Pan Arabism than Arabism, is simply looking at the Arab world as one unified whole.
Dalia Ziada: All Arabs are just under one umbrella and or under one nation, and this nation is going to work in solidarity on all levels, either on economic cooperation or even fighting against an enemy. And to unify all these Arabs.
Dalia Ziada: And actually, if you know Arabs well, I'm not sure how many of you encountered Arabs or studied Arabic Arab culture. You will know that Arabs are not. All the same, there are so many differences. We are very diverse communities. I like always to make the joke that if you bring someone from Morocco to speak with someone in the Gulf.
Dalia Ziada: you will discover that they will not understand each other. They speak different dialects, that they don't understand each other, and, of course, different cultures. And so so to bring all these Arabs together, you needed to find a common enemy.
Dalia Ziada: and who was the easiest enemy to find at that time in the 19 fifties and sixties. It's the newborn state of Israel.
Dalia Ziada: It's it's it it. And then at that moment the Pan Arabism movement started to promote Israel as
Dalia Ziada: the representation of Western Imperialism in the region. I'm sure you've heard this term so many times in the recent month by the free Palestine protesters, who like tried to convince you that you know they are fighting against an occupation or so. So this was the 1st time this term was coined in order to empower the Pan Arabism movement. Then, as we will explain later, in our presentation, avi.
Dalia Ziada: this.
Dalia Ziada: this, this was the second layer that took the territorial conflict between Israelis and Palestinians into Arab Israeli conflict into a regional conflict.
Dalia Ziada: Then the 3rd layer that we will talk more on detail about later is the religious layer that took the region into that took the territorial conflict into a Muslim Jewish conflict, leading actually to all what we are seeing worldwide today with Muslims, supporting the so-called Palestinian cause, without really knowing what it means.
Avi Melamed: So, Dala, we are still at the phase of the Pan Arabism, the calm. We are, as you said, like this is a doctrine that has become very common and spread within the fifties and the sixties.
Avi Melamed: And actually, as you mentioned before, it's very interesting, because it kind of like draws very significant ideas or concepts from the world of Socialism, Communism basically forming what is going to be known by the term of the BA'ath, the sort of like Arab style, Socialist ideology.
Avi Melamed: But to one Congo was very appealing to the masses in the Arab world.
Avi Melamed: and during those years, even though again, the the ideological impact of Socialism and Communism, I will guess, was not very much understood, let alone accepted by the masses.
Avi Melamed: So what was the secret of this?
Avi Melamed: I would even say romantic perspective of Pan-harabism that was so appealing to the masses in the Arab world during those years, resulting, among other things, the creation of a big political entity, the United Arab Republic
Avi Melamed: between 1958 and 1961 including Egypt, Syria, and Yemen. So what was the secret of this ideology? Why was it so appealing to the masses.
Dalia Ziada: It's interesting. You mentioned the United Arab Republic. It was so short lived, which is also a proof on how this whole Pan Arabism concept was just a fraud was nothing other than just a tool that was meant to empower the newly emerging dictators or military dictators
Dalia Ziada: that were ruling or wanted to rule the region at that time with, you know, the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, and new States and new powers are now taking over, especially the militaries in these countries, either, including in Syria, in Iraq, in Egypt, in Libya, and other places so and other, I mean Arab countries. So it's
Dalia Ziada: this concept was so popular at that time, because
Dalia Ziada: it it built on the Nationalist senses that the people had. Actually, if you
Dalia Ziada: if you understand, if you look at the region. It's mostly a tribal region, tribal, either in the places where tribes do really exist, like there are really Arab tribes like in the Hejaz area which today we call the Gulf region.
Dalia Ziada: So it's either very tribal as we know it, or even the States that used to be national states were also tribal in their ideology. They always looked at themselves as unique, as important, as you know, unparalleled. And so, and they always tended to defend this identity. What happened that Pan Arabism offered the option that
Dalia Ziada: you can take these strong sentiments of pride into your national identity and scaling it into a bigger identity of Arabism, of being a national Arab. Why, it was important at that time, because the wallet at that time was very polarized between the West, the United States and some European countries that are taking the side or the western side, Russia
Dalia Ziada: allying some of the Eastern European countries and most of the Arab countries, and also like dividing the world into another side and the global South, which is mainly the people in in the south of the world, ranging from the Arab region up to Asia, like Western Asian countries and Southwest Asia, countries like India. And so these countries have had big wealth.
Dalia Ziada: huge populations, and they did not want to be part of this division between Russia on one side and the United States on the other side or part of this competition. They wanted to have their own thing. So this was the time when, in the Arab world we saw the Pan Arabism movement being born, India, uniting with Egypt on the non-aligned movement which was the 1st seeds of what we know today as the
Dalia Ziada: mobile cells
Dalia Ziada: of Southern, the countries in the south of the world, coming together to form a new identity, new ways of cooperation, regardless of the great power competitions. Which is, it was interesting. It was Trendy at that time, also
Dalia Ziada: the project that Pan Arabism provided was very much appealing to the very poor people who lived who lived very bad life circumstances under the Ottoman Empire, and under, I mean, under all the international powers that ruled the region before its own people, or the Arab people ruled their own Arab countries.
Dalia Ziada: So, for example, I mean, see how the Pan, Arabism movement and nasser ideology in Egypt give a lot of rights to poor people and farmers. They even gave them pieces of land for free. After they were serving in this land of the rich people, they took it from the rich people and give it to the poor people. So it's somehow, of course it's not fair. I'm completely against that. But somehow
Dalia Ziada: it provided a new hope for the people. So they that's perhaps why they liked it so much, this new national identity. But over time also, and also yes. Another aspect is that it empowered
Dalia Ziada: a new elite
Dalia Ziada: in Arab societies, ban Arabism, culture that's built on Communism actually give power to a new level, or a new group of intellectuals who come from grassroots community who come from the bottom of the society. If we can say, to rise up and become the elite in contrast to the liberal
Dalia Ziada: elite that existed before, that is adopting maybe a more Westernized lifestyle. So this, all this, all combined together, made what we see.
Dalia Ziada: explains why Pan-adabism or Arab nationalism, Al-qaumel Arabia was a big deal at that time.
Avi Melamed: So to conclude the chapter of the Pan Arabism. And now we understand better their sources, the ideological, and why it was so appealing. Now we are focusing that in the context of the Israeli-palestinian conflict.
Avi Melamed: what we see on the ground is that actually, between the late 1940 s.
Avi Melamed: The war of 1948, it is known in the Israeli terminology is the Independence War, and in the Arab terminology is known as the Harb Tamani War of 1948, and the Nakba.
Avi Melamed: From that period of time until 1973,
Avi Melamed: we are looking at some 25 years period of time, actually the Arab world, and particularly Egypt, and particularly under the dominancy of Gamal, Abdel Nasser, and Parabism. The Arab world is the custodian
Avi Melamed: of the Israeli-palestinian conflict, and the Arab world is waging wars.
Avi Melamed: During that period of time you got 48, you got 56, you got 67, and you got 73.
Avi Melamed: The 3 1st war that I mentioned 48, 56, and 67 are done in the name of liberating Palestine.
Avi Melamed: But there is an interesting aspect to that which kind of like will connect us to the next phase, and that is when you look at the rhetoric that was used by the Arab nations that time, that period of time, and, as I said, they were kind of like custodians of this conflict. They took it as their own burden, as in the old mask.
Avi Melamed: Relatively speaking, you identify the lack of the religious component.
Avi Melamed: And that brings me actually to the next phase when we are going to talk about. And now we are going to turn into the Islamic camp.
Avi Melamed: and I want to for the next couple of minutes to explore with you first, st the major ideological identity of that Islamic camp.
Avi Melamed: and then to try to understand how, in course of time
Avi Melamed: it became more and more influential in the context of shaping the trajectory of the conflict, and particularly, I would say, starting as of the second half of the seventies and onwards. So let us go and explore a little bit. This Islamic camp and start with, I would say, the significant milestone of the establishing of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt in 1928.
Avi Melamed: So can you provide us with some major Id. Of the Muslim Brotherhood?
Dalia Ziada: Good. So let's go back just one moment to the end of this Pan-arabism era. So we can connect to the Muslim Brotherhood and how they have risen after the collapse of the pan-arabism era or the retreat, they have not entirely collapsed. Unfortunately, the retreat of the Pan Arabism ideology.
Dalia Ziada: So what happened at the end of the very at the very end of Pan Arabism era, especially after several defeats by Israel to Arab forces that came together trying to fight against Israel.
Dalia Ziada: the Palestinian cause, the so-called Palestinian cause I call it the so-called, because it has different meanings for different people, but the Palestinian cause which means destroying Israel, has become central to the ideology of Arabs already, including the Arab League, the Arab armies, and even ordinary people in the Arab streets, especially in countries like Egypt, which viewed
Dalia Ziada: Palestine, which at that time was only Gaza, the Gaza Strip. They called it Palestine, which viewed Palestine as the extension of Egypt, and that Egypt is responsible for protecting it. And the reason why Egyptians built this connection with Gaza or Palestine as they were calling at that time
Dalia Ziada: is that Egypt actually occupied Gaza for almost 20 years, from 1949 up to 1967, when it was taken from Egypt during the 6 Days war, I mean. Israel at that time took the Palestine or the Gaza Strip, and also Sinai
Dalia Ziada: from Egypt amid this war. So what happened at that time for those 20 years. Actually, this
Dalia Ziada: so-called Palestinian state in Gaza was not ruled by Gazans. It was ruled by Egyptians in Cairo.
Dalia Ziada: so that also may explain to you the connection why so many Egyptians are taking the Gaza issue so seriously until today, and why Arabs take the Gaza issue so seriously until today, simply because they feel responsible for it.
Dalia Ziada: That time when, you know, after several defeats and also the retreat of the Communist ideology worldwide in the 19 seventies. And so
Dalia Ziada: the Ban Arabism ideology also took a seat back. It's not interesting anymore. It's not something that can bring the Arabs a source of pride anymore. So they sought another source of pride in something else which is their religion.
Dalia Ziada: which, by the way, was something that groups like the Muslim brotherhood and the Islamic revolution in Iran, and so were building on for so long.
Dalia Ziada: even even long before the 19 seventies and eighties.
Dalia Ziada: and they were mostly active the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, for example, it started in the 19 twenties, and it did not start in the capital city, Cairo.
Dalia Ziada: It actually started in a very small city in Eastern Egypt. Why? Because they wanted to reach out to the population, to the people
Dalia Ziada: who feel marginalized by the modern liberal life in Cairo if they went to the Liberal elite in Cairo, to the people living well off, you know, living very nice life, and they have everything they want. You know they have theaters, music, cinema. They have access to politics and everything. They wouldn't listen to them.
Dalia Ziada: But the Muslim Brotherhood went to marginalized people, to the people like poor people who feel marginalized in rural areas and other places outside of of the capital cities
Dalia Ziada: of the capital city and the big cities like Alexandria, and so, and started to convince them that by being good Muslims.
Dalia Ziada: by being well extremist Muslims, they will gain an advantage over their
Dalia Ziada: liberal elite. Whom? Who are, you know, far from religion, far from God in Cairo, and actually many bought into this. And that's why the Muslim Brotherhood movement, and also like, if you look at it in the Shia community in the Shia, of course you know Egypt and most of Arab countries are Sunni, Iran, and some Arab countries around Iran
Dalia Ziada: are are majority share. But we will get into that detail later. I think Avi will explain it better.
Dalia Ziada: So so also in the Shia community. There were similar movements, however, in the Shia community the success was much faster.
Dalia Ziada: In 1979 the Islamic revolution in Iran succeeded in hijacking Iran, bringing down the Shah and taking over the political power. This inspired similar Islamist groups who were working on the grassroots level. In other Arab countries, including Sunni groups like the Muslim Brotherhood
Dalia Ziada: to do the same. They wanted to adopt a political role. They wanted to, not only working on Da'wah, not only working on Da'wa means preaching like religious preaching, recruiting people through telling them like, you know, Islam is good. If you hold on to Islam you will be better than the Liberals, they said, Okay, now it's time to change this narrative
Dalia Ziada: and to start to adopt a different narrative that can help us make political recruitment recruit people around a political cause at that time. Imagine in the 19 eighties what was the easiest cause they can build on. Actually, it's the Ban Arabism cause, but with a twist.
Dalia Ziada: The central ideology or the central issue for the Pan Arabism. Ideology, as I was just telling you, was the Palestinian cause, you know, defending the Palestinian cause.
Dalia Ziada: Now the Islamists want to hijack this
Dalia Ziada: and adopt to their own narrative Islamic narrative. They cannot say, you know we want to liberate a territory of land, because actually, they don't believe in this. It's not part of the Islamic belief to go and liberate a territory or a piece of land I mean. Nationalism is not an issue in Islam at all, or especially for Islamist groups. So they adopted it and changed the narrative to become. Let's liberate
Dalia Ziada: our Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem and its surroundings like Al Aqsa mosque. And so from the hands of the Jews.
Dalia Ziada: Exactly. This was the 1st time we saw in the 19 eighties the Israeli-palestinian conflict, moving from being a territorial conflict or an Arab-israeli conflict into a religious conflict. On the hands of these Islamists.
Avi Melamed: So at this point, which is kind of like a very interesting seam line sort of speaking between the 2 things, the pan-arabism, the declining of the pan-arabism in the late sixties and the beginning of the seventies and
Avi Melamed: the pan Islamism that is more and more stepping into the stage. And actually, as you. Very interesting is noted. They basically shift the language
Avi Melamed: from a from a sort of like Pan Arabism narratives that emphasize the Palestine issue. They shift the language into the more religious one. But here is something very interesting when I'm kind of like looking back a little bit in the context of the impact of the pan Islamism on the Israeli, Palestinian, or the Israeli Arab conflict
Avi Melamed: during that period of time, roughly speaking, from the forties to the seventies, whereupon Arabism is the one that is dictating the trajectory.
Avi Melamed: There was something very interesting about Pan-islamism. It was in the course of a collision
Avi Melamed: with span Arabism. I mean the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt find themselves in a collision track with the Egyptian rule. Islamists have been under Iran those that period of time there has been a sense of a growing challenge, and that sense of growing challenge
Avi Melamed: fueled the emergence of radicalism within the Islamic thought. Looking back at the fifties and sixties and onwards. And this is the emergence of what is known as Salafi jihadi.
Avi Melamed: Could you shortly refer to the issue of Salafi Jihadi? What does it mean? And who are the major players?
Avi Melamed: And and of course, how that impact the trajectory of the Israeli-palestinian conflict.
Dalia Ziada: So 1st of all, Salafism, Salafism, as you may guess, it's mainly it has started in the most Salafist country in the region, which is Saudi Arabia. It started as a political movement that was meant to empower the Saudi family that.
Avi Melamed: What is the meaning of Salafi in our.
Dalia Ziada: Salafi. Actually, Salafi is is an ideal. It's like a branch of Islamist ideologies that calls for going back to the time of our Salaf predecessors. Salaf is predecessors. Salafist is the one who wants to attach themselves to the predecessors or the early Muslims, you know. So it's a movement saying that you know this modern life is nonsense is
Dalia Ziada: is not taking us to heaven. Eventually we have to go back and attach ourselves and copy the behaviors and traditions of the Salaf, and they even called it Al-salaf Asalah, his god predecessors, or the good early Muslims. So this is basically Salafism.
Dalia Ziada: It looks, I mean it looks ideal if you think about it like, okay, just a group of people who want just to remain in this era of like more than 1,500 years ago. But the issue is that over time.
Dalia Ziada: this Salafism, this Salafist movement. It started 1st of all as a political movement in Saudi Arabia. It was very local, very limited only in Saudi Arabia, its main goal through its founder, Mohammed, Abdel Wahab, and some people even call Salafism. After him Wahhabism.
Dalia Ziada: and it was. It was just meant to empower the Saudi families that that started to rule Saudi Arabia over other tribes at that time
Dalia Ziada: to empower them under the flag. That they came here from godly orders, in order to, you know, bring back the great tradition of Prophet Muhammad and the early Muslims to the Hijaz region. And so so this is how it started. It was very local, very limited, however, by time it started to spill over to other places in the world, especially in Arab countries, and also
Dalia Ziada: Southeast Asian countries, where today we have a huge number of Muslims, and how it is spilled over. It's very interesting. It did not spill over by, let's say, missions coming out of Saudi Arabia and going to these places to spread the Salafism. Unfortunately it was spilled over by Al-azhar
Dalia Ziada: and Al-azhar is based in Egypt. Also, again, I mean, Egypt has done a lot of problems to this region. So it's based in Egypt, and actually Al-azhar is the biggest Sunni scholarly institution in the Sunni Muslim world.
Dalia Ziada: So it has been there for over a thousand years. So the sheikhs who traveled the Sheikhs and Imams, who graduated from El Azhar, traveled to Saudi Arabia for a period of time in order to make money. It was a wealthy place at that time, and then
Dalia Ziada: they took, you know, Salafism to other places in the world. As the movement, as the movement started to expand
Dalia Ziada: it. Actually it needed protection because there were some some other forces, either within Islam, like other Islamist groups.
Dalia Ziada: or including Shia and Sunni, by the way, rejecting or pushing against this new Salafist movement, because it will take the spotlight from them, you know, and maybe weaken their ability to recruit people into their groups, and thus they needed to protect themselves, so how to protect themselves. They created their own militias and armies
Dalia Ziada: under the label that they are doing jihad. And this was the perhaps it was in the 19 eighties, and it reached a peak point in the 19 nineties and twenties when we started to hear about the Salafist jihadist groups in the form that we know today, like people who are dressed in the old style of early Muslims, like, you know, white Jalabaya long beard and maybe a turban.
Dalia Ziada: and they carry weapons, and they practice jihad. What is jihad for them? Jihad is a global war.
Dalia Ziada: It's actually the word jihad. If you look at its meaning in Islam, it's mainly about, you know, struggling against oneself in order to do good deeds. But they took this word to become a political struggle, an armed struggle, in order to promote the world of Islam from their version of Islam, Salafist, Islam.
Dalia Ziada: worldwide? And does the Salafist jihadist groups started to appear everywhere in Asia, in the Arab world, in the 19 eighties actually was a very, very big moment for them. Building also on the success of the Islamic revolution in Iran. We started, for example, in Gaza, to see in Gaza, and I mean in the Israeli territories in general.
Dalia Ziada: we started to see
Dalia Ziada: groups like Hamas was born at that time under under also this concept of Islamic jihad, Islamic resistance. And so Hamas, the Islamic jihad. They have this name, the Islamic Jihad, Al-jama, Al Islamiya in Egypt, and other places in Asia, not only in Egypt, Egypt, Libya, and Sudan, and also in other places in Asia, Al Jamal Islamiyah means the Islamist group or the Islamic group.
Dalia Ziada: and it was also very influential and very big. So this is Salafist jihadism, and, by the way, for so long since then they have been in undeclared conflict with the Muslim brotherhood, which was more political than them. The Muslim brotherhood had. Yes, they share the same base of Islamist or radical Islamist ideology.
Dalia Ziada: But
Dalia Ziada: the methodology of applying this or their methodology of, you know, doing their own operations and recruiting and dealing with governments, and so was very different. For the Salafi jihadists. Its religion comes first, st
Dalia Ziada: politics and jihad comes second for the Muslim brotherhood, for example, politics comes first, st and religion comes second in order to serve their political ambitions, and so on.
Avi Melamed: So when we are looking at both camps, and there is a right distinguish between the Muslim Brotherhood. Affiliated groups like Hamas, for example.
Avi Melamed: or Salafi, jihadist groups like Al Qaeda or Isis, or Islamic jihad
Avi Melamed: they they both share this. The what is the position? Vis-a-vis in a nutshell vis-a-vis the story of the Israeli-palestinian conflict.
Dalia Ziada: Oh, yeah, actually.
Avi Melamed: The same? Do they have the same perspectives? Do they have some different nuances.
Dalia Ziada: It's a very, very good question, I tell you why? Because for the Muslim Brotherhood, when they started in the 19 eighties and after to adopt
Dalia Ziada: the Israeli Palestinian conflict as central to their ideology. They started to change the narrative and so, but they played it politically. So their concept was about Islamic resistance. That's why we started to see several groups, including Hamas. Hamas actually means
Dalia Ziada: is the Islamic resistance movement. It's not the Palestinian resistance or anything. So it's the Islamic resistance movement. Hezbollah. Actually, its original name is also the Islamic resistance in Lebanon.
Dalia Ziada: So it's not about the Lebanese resistance, for example, or anything, but they made the Israeli-palestinian conflict central to their ideology, not because they want to liberate, you know Palestine or the Muslim holy sites, as they say, but because it's serving their goals in other countries, in other Arab countries, in other, even European countries, it's giving them legitimacy when they speak on behalf of Muslims
Dalia Ziada: and Arabs in the West. And actually, if you go to the literature written by one
Dalia Ziada: of the top spiritual leaders of the Muslim brotherhood, Al-kara Dawi, he's very famous. You can find many of his writings online.
Dalia Ziada: He actually instructed the Muslim Brotherhood worldwide, worldwide, not only in the Arab worldwide to adopt the Israeli-palestinian conflict as part of their ideology.
Dalia Ziada: On the other hand, the Salafi Jihadists know. For a long time the Israeli-palestinian conflict was not their issues. They were more local. They were about spreading virtue from their perspective, like doing jihad to spread virtue in their local communities.
Dalia Ziada: So, for example, the Islamic group operating in Egypt, they would do terrorist attack against tourists in Egypt in the 19 nineties.
Dalia Ziada: not because they want to liberate some land or liberate something. No, it's because they think it is Haram. It is forbidden that, you know. Tourists can walk in the street, you know, with bare clothes, or or women are not covered, or so they are fighting against that. They are fighting for
Dalia Ziada: their ideology, not for a political cause. Salafists remain this way for so long, until in late 2 thousands they started to, or the groups like the Muslim Brotherhood, like the political Islamist groups, started to attract them because he has become, I mean, the Salafists have become
Dalia Ziada: so influential among grassroots, citizens in different countries, despite governments being fighting against them. So the Muslim brotherhood and other political Islamist groups wanted to benefit from that wanted to benefit from their influence on grassroots communities, and thus attracted them to join their ranks.
Dalia Ziada: and they have already worked together and joined forces on many different fronts, including the Israeli-palestinian conflict front.
Avi Melamed: So it leads us to now the point of time. We are now looking at the eighties, the nineties, and we see very clearly 2 major phenomenons that happens in the region that have an enormously significant impact on the story of the conflict.
Avi Melamed: One is that the role of the pan-arabism is coming to end already in the late 7, in the mid seventies or the early seventies.
Avi Melamed: And now it's not any longer really an Israeli Arab conflict. We see that the conflict is now shifting into an Israeli-palestinian conflict, and parallel to that. What we see, that is, there is any growing percolation of an Islamic religious component to the conflict
Avi Melamed: that actually takes it away from, as you said, conflict over land and conflict between Socialism, Arab style and Western style. Now it takes it to the place of a religiously suffocated conflict. When Sunni radical groups, whether they're coming from the hub of Muslim, brother, were Hamas, or
Avi Melamed: the hub of Salafi jihadis, like like Isis and Al Qaeda, and so on.
Avi Melamed: An Islamic job
Avi Melamed: are one part of this picture in the eighties. But then there is something very significant that happened, and you alluded to that before. When we talked about also the rise of Shiite militant ideologies and power in the region, the pivotal moment, 1979, the Islamic revolution in Iran. And what we see following that is, that the Iranian revolution power in Iran, inspired by the concept of exporting the Islamic revolution
Avi Melamed: is creating this network of proxies on the ground you mentioned, for example, the Hezbollah in Lebanon and other proxies on the ground, and and they are resulting in a very significant power base across the region that is going to be known about in the region in the name of the axis of resistance.
Avi Melamed: So I would appreciate if you could very shortly explain, what is the axis of resistance, and how did it impact the trajectory of the Israeli-palestinian conflict?
Dalia Ziada: Of course, Avi, you are the master of the axis of resistance. You've spoken about it so many times, and you have a good mastery over the topic actually. But let me like very briefly explain it. The axis of resistance is built around the idea of resisting Israel.
Dalia Ziada: and either it is for Arabism reason, part of the Arab Nationalist reasons, or because of Islamist reasons. So both sides unfortunately agree that there is a country here that or there is a newborn state here that we want to resist.
Dalia Ziada: So the axis of resistance was formed by a group of militia that is mastered or orchestrated by Iran from behind the scenes.
Dalia Ziada: and this axis of resistance is building, although you may think like, you know, Iran is perhaps operating or spreading these militias around, let's say, territories that are Shia territory or not Arab countries. But unfortunately, it is actually operating in Arab countries
Dalia Ziada: and Iran capitalized on these Arabist sentiments and Islamist sentiments among Arab and Sunni communities to build these militias or implant these militias among Arab countries in very strategic locations that
Dalia Ziada: actually can hurt Israel that can form like a ring of fire, as we will. As you know, we may speak about it later, a ring of fire around Israel. The things that this militia, although they say, like, you know, we're here to attack Israel, and they do attack Israel from time to time. But actually, what they are doing is that they are wreaking havoc in Arab countries.
Dalia Ziada: They are destroying Arab countries, and they are making the Arab people suffer for so long. For example, see how Hezbollah destroyed Lebanon. See how the houses destroyed Yemen. See how the
Dalia Ziada: Shia militia affiliated Hezbollah and Iran has destroyed Syria over time as well, and so on, I mean. In everywhere you go you will find a Shia militia operating in an Arab countries under this big flag of the axis of resistance.
Avi Melamed: So you are describing a very interesting process that when I look at it from a century perspective like from the beginning of the 20th century to our time. Roughly speaking, we see something very interesting.
Avi Melamed: There has been an accumulating process where at different periods of times you got different players, regional players, either political or ideological, or both.
Avi Melamed: that in each period of time those players were impacting the trajectory of the conflict. So we talked about
Avi Melamed: the phase of the fifties to the seventies or the late forties to the seventies where Pan Arabism come.
Avi Melamed: is
Avi Melamed: leading the charge, is leading the whole task of impacting the trajectory of the Israeli-palestinian conflict under the banner of the Palestinian cause, and under the banner of an Arab Socialism style ideology. And then they.
Avi Melamed: sitting on that once Arab calm is no longer relevant since the beginning of the seventies. What we see is that the percolation of an Islamic
Avi Melamed: ideologies and and and radicalization coming from the hub of both Muslim brotherhood and Salafi Jihadi camp. And they are basically adding now the component of the religious
Avi Melamed: and sentiment of the conflict. It's not about now. Cause the Palestinian cause in the context of Socialism, Arab Socialism versus Western Imperialism. But now it's in the cause of a religious
Avi Melamed: jihadi message or mission.
Avi Melamed: And now we add to that the story of the Shiite and the Mullah regime, starting at as of the beginning of the 19 eighties that are basically using both
Avi Melamed: the sentiments of the sentiments that basically were underlying the time, the time of the pan Arabism, the sentiments that underlying the the time in the era of the Sunni radicalization, either from the Muslim Brotherhood or the
Avi Melamed: Salafi jihadi. And now they're basically taking that to the level where you got a translation of this whole structure into an apparatus on the ground. Those militias, those semi-state entities like Hezbollah, like Hamas, Islamic jihad
Avi Melamed: who basically are acting as in semi-state entities.
Avi Melamed: And they are basically centering this whole story of the conflict under the banner of
Avi Melamed: the magic word that you mentioned before resistance.
Avi Melamed: and I want to ask you about the resistance.
Avi Melamed: Tell us a little bit more about this resistance concept, because there is something interesting about it.
Dalia Ziada: So resistance is basically about resisting something. You know they want it. It 1st of all gives
Dalia Ziada: the person practicing the resistance, a sense of ownership of something and a sense of pride as well, which was very much needed by the Arabs in the 19 sixties, 19 seventies, when they were struggling with their own identities, either Arab identity or national identity, or even religious identities.
Dalia Ziada: So that time at that time the concept was built. The idea of resistance. First, st it appeared, by the way, as a Communist ideology, it's part of the Communist ideology. If you read in the Communist literature, and it's it's basically maybe many of you saw this feast
Dalia Ziada: sign on many of your campuses. But actually it goes back to this Socialist Communist ideology of resistance, resistance of something, resistance of a corrupt government, resistance of a dictatorial regime, or, in the in the case we are speaking about resistance against the Western Imperialist. White colonialist entity called Israel. Of course I'm joking saying this. I don't mean any of that. I don't believe any of that.
Dalia Ziada: but I mean, these are the terms that were used to justify this form of resistance, why we want to resist against Israel. So the word resistance, actually.
Dalia Ziada: if you see it in literature, if you see it. Even how people here in the West use the word resistance. It looks like a good word, you know. It's people who are resisting against some form of corruption. Something bad is happening, and they are resisting against this bad thing. But in the Arab Israeli conflict, or in the Israeli-palestinian conflict, in this context.
Dalia Ziada: it was actually twisted and taken out of its meaning completely. To represent, to demonize Israel, on one hand, make Israel appear like the big demon in the region. And not only Israel. By the way, actually, it's part of the concept of resistance in the Arab world, as we know today.
Dalia Ziada: Israel is referred to as the small Saturn and the United States is the big Saturn. So it's a resistance against these 2 evils. You know, these 2 big, the small Saturn and the big Saturn. So 1st it had in order for resistance to succeed. You have to demonize Israel. You have to demonize the Western culture you have to demonize the United States as the mother of this Western culture. So this was part of it, and thus it led to
Dalia Ziada: this, I would say, distorted form of resistance. We are seeing happening in the region today and being used as a cover for recruiting supporters, either donors.
Dalia Ziada: worldwide or supporters on American campuses and European campuses to the cause of these evil people in the region, who who just, whose only cause is to destroy the state of Israel, and impose their own ideology or force, their own ideology on every extremist ideology, on everyone else.
Avi Melamed: So at this point shortly, we are going to open the session to the questions. Obviously, we discussed this issue for the next couple of hours, I'm sure
Avi Melamed: if we first, st I want to thank you, Dala, for your wonderful insights and perspectives.
Avi Melamed: I think that if there is one major thing that I, of course, will take from this short discussion is that we are looking at the story of a conflict that is in the end of the day has been to a large extent impacted and shaped by large factors, by large forces, by large ideologies. Some of them are ancient, some of them are contemporary. And so at this point I would like to open this session to the questions of the fellows.
Dalia Ziada: Any questions
Dalia Ziada: or something you want to discuss. Maybe not not on.
Avi Melamed: Ben, go ahead!
Ben Monroe: Hi, thank you for speaking with us today. Such an honor. So I kind of had a a big what if question?
Ben Monroe: So Avi was talking about like he said, phase one and phase 2 about you know Zionist activity in the land of Palestine and the reestablishment of Israel. What do you think would have happened to like the pan? Arab thought and identity of Arabia if Israel was never reestablished.
Dalia Ziada: Wow! This is a big question. Thank you, Ben. Actually, if Israel was not there, Arabs would be killing each other. Now
Dalia Ziada: Arabs are very divided. By the way, as I said earlier, it's very hard to put them into one basket. One package. I would even say that the people who call themselves the Palestinians. Today the Arabs who exist in this piece of land are actually very divided to the extent that
Dalia Ziada: they cannot have a national identity, or even like a tribal identity that unify them. Do you know today that the so-called Palestinians or the Arabs who exist there.
Dalia Ziada: the people living in Gaza will not marry. Someone from Jerusalem will not marry a Palestinian from Jerusalem will not, and the Palestinian, living in the west bank will not, marry a Palestinian from Gaza, and so on. Why? Because they are divided into families, and these families have been in conflict with each other for so long. If you look at the bigger picture of the region. This is also the case.
Dalia Ziada: Different cultures, different. Yes, they have things in common, but they are different, different, even spoken languages. It's not always Arabic. When you go to North Africa, for example, the language goes into a different direction, you know so and so on. So they have very strong divisions. Even the Arab countries in the Gulf region, as we know today.
Dalia Ziada: it took them so long of fighting over economic resources, although they all one family, by the way, divided into smaller families, cousins and brothers and sisters. And so they were killing each other over economic resources in this big desert until they eventually became the Arab countries that we know today.
Dalia Ziada: So it's not. It's unfortunate, or maybe for I don't know. Fortunately or not, unfortunately, but actually, for for some reason Israel has become the target of this hatred.
Dalia Ziada: so they now can direct their tribal extremism, Islamic extremism, hatred, and everything toward this Israel, rather than making it explode inside or among themselves, and destroy themselves.
Avi Melamed: So, Ben, if I try to sum it in a short sentence, I would say that the emergence of Pan, Arabism or Pan Islamism is not because of the conflict.
Avi Melamed: It has to do with larger factors that in their in their turn obviously impact the conflict. Miranda.
Miranda Ruzinsky: Hi, Dahlia, thank you for the wonderful talk.
Miranda Ruzinsky: I had a question concerning your
Miranda Ruzinsky: comments about the impact of Communist ideology.
Miranda Ruzinsky: because I do know, the doctrine is mostly class based, and it's very secular. So I thought I found that very interesting that it was so impactful within the region. So is there more to this idea of class difference
Miranda Ruzinsky: that you can speak about in terms of how it has shaped the region and the geopolitics, and maybe how that still happens today.
Dalia Ziada: Wow. You guys ask amazing questions. Thank you. Miranda, yeah, it's it's it's very important. Yes, it's maybe
Dalia Ziada: it's true. You know, the Islamist movements to adopted, like the same Communist concepts, in order to recruit and promote their ideology or political Islamist ideology later on, and recruit supporters. And so, but it's yes. You made a very important observation communism. And so and and it's Arab version of Communism even that came to the Arab
Dalia Ziada: world. It was also secular, and it remained secular. You know the Bassist regime
Dalia Ziada: in Syria and in Iraq. It was a secular regime in Egypt, and his and the people who came after him. It was a secular regime, the same thing. The Qaddafi regime in Libya, for example, was also secular regime, even in Yemen it was also secular regime, which it was very interesting. Yes, these these Communist regimes or Socialist identities. They kept this. But actually.
Dalia Ziada: what made Communism succeed in Muslim majority. Sorry Muslim majority countries, like in the Arab world.
Dalia Ziada: is not because it was secular, but because it came with a project that empowered the lower class
Dalia Ziada: over the upper class, which was liberal at that time, so it provided a project that made the poor people, who are the majority, by the way, in Arab countries feel empowered, feel that they have
Dalia Ziada: the power to change things. And this is, by the way, the same, exactly the same notion
Dalia Ziada: or concept that the Muslim Brotherhood used. Later on, when they wanted to build on their movement, they went on to empower the lower class, to empower the people who feel marginalized. So this is the reason why this project has succeeded. The Communist, Communist, or Socialist virgin in the Arab world has succeeded as a result of this project, not because it is secular, actually.
Avi Melamed: Thank you. Carl.
Carl J. Chiappa: Let's let's let the others answer, and I'll go at the end, because it took me 10 min to figure out how to raise my hand. My penalty is, I go last.
Dalia Ziada: Nice to meet you. God.
Carl J. Chiappa: Oh, my God!
Carl J. Chiappa: I'll see you! I'll I have a number of questions for you, but I'll wait till the end. Thanks.
Avi Melamed: Brooklyn.
Avi Melamed: No, Isaac. Oh, I'm sorry.
Brooklyn Tory: The Isaac. Yeah.
Avi Melamed: I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
Isaac Babus: Hi, I was curious
Isaac Babus: how you see Palestinian Arab nationalism being able to stand alongside like Israeli Jewish nationalism, and if that's even possible, what it could look like.
Isaac Babus: and
Isaac Babus: considering October 7, th and I'm sure we're still going to see the fallouts of trauma on both sides. How that could affect any chances of living alongside each other.
Dalia Ziada: This is also a very good question. Thank you, Isaac, but let me ask you, do you identify or define Israeli Jewish nationalism as Zionism. This is what you mean.
Isaac Babus: Yeah.
Dalia Ziada: Or can we use them? Alternative? Okay, yeah, so so this is this is very important. Actually, what you asked, because
Dalia Ziada: the concept of Zionism, or the right of the Jewish people to have their own national state. To have this State called Israel, has been distorted in Arab thought and Arab culture and Arab consciousness. We can say from very early on.
Dalia Ziada: unfortunately, because of this Pan Arabism movement.
Dalia Ziada: I tell you I grew up in Egypt. I spent my whole life there, except for the last year I grew up seeing 2 things on our bookshelves that existed in almost 2 books actually in the bookshelf in our house that existed on almost the bookshelf of all Egyptians and all Arabs. If I'm not exaggerating, these 2 books are Quran
Dalia Ziada: and Hitler's my struggle. Mein Kampf.
Dalia Ziada: These 2 books imagine, like growing up and seeing these things, these 2 books next to each other and reading them. And then, when we grew up. Even. I mean growing up, seeing in the media that you know the media is referring to Israel all the time as the enemy, even saying things that it's not a legitimate state. It doesn't have the right to exist because it exists on the ruins of a state called Palestine.
Dalia Ziada: which never existed, but at that time we believed that it existed.
Dalia Ziada: because this is what we were taught in our school and in the media. And so, and even in our mosques, you know it's
Dalia Ziada: well, it's it's sad to say that in every Friday prayer there was a stable prayer against Israel and the Jewish people imagine you're going to your synagogue
Dalia Ziada: every you know Saturday or so to do Shabbat, and then to do Shabbat prayers. And then the Quhain just says something like, you know. May God curse the Arabs! Or so it was exactly. It was exactly this in our mosques. After doing the service they make some prayers. One of them is about cursing Israel and cursing the Jews, so growing up with all of this, like seeing all of this, it made people unable to see that Israel meet the Arab people.
Dalia Ziada: unable to see Israel as as a legitimate state, and they are very hesitant to support its legitimacy
Dalia Ziada: or support its existence. Its mere existence. You know also the things that the Palestinian cause itself. You know many people may hurt the walls, the Palestinian cause. They are thinking, oh, of course, you know, the Palestinians have the right to have their own state, have self-determination, but this is not what the Palestinians are looking for. The Palestinian cause is mainly about destroying the state of Israel.
Dalia Ziada: not about building the State of Palestine. It's actually very different from how the wallet views views it. So, although Arab nationalism is very strong. Actually it has become. Now part of you know how how people identify this Arab nationalism. Part of it has to do with hating the existence of Israel, hating Israel and hating Israeli nationalism.
Dalia Ziada: So it has. I mean, it requires a huge shift in the mindset. Maybe by you know Israel, showing that its right to exist does not, has to do. It's not a threat to Arab nationalism or to the national to the nationalism of Arab countries like Egyptian nationalism, Libyan nationalism, Iraqi nationalism, and so on. It has to show that, and shows that Israel's existence would actually benefit the region.
Dalia Ziada: not hurt other other key players in the region, and also one thing that started to become a trend in the recent years, and I think is serving this purpose really well after the signing of the Abraham accords is that Middle Eastern identity. For example, for the 1st time, Israel has become
Dalia Ziada: part of the Centcom, the central command
Dalia Ziada: before it was part of the European command of the United States army. Now it has become, and it is upon an Israeli request.
Dalia Ziada: after the signing of the Abraham accord, they said, you know we are part of the Middle East. We are the Middle East. We have to be here as part as part of the Centcom, and you know, so this new Middle Eastern identity, I believe, is somehow
Dalia Ziada: a good step in the right direction of building. This sense of sympathy or compassion, not compassion, empathy between Arab nationals and Israeli nationals.
Avi Melamed: I think it's a very interesting notion that I hope that we will be able to further explore this whole thing of like what you call the new Middle Eastern identity. However, we have about 10 min left, and we have 3 questions, and so we got.
Dalia Ziada: Yeah.
Avi Melamed: Brooklyn, and then Tamar and Carl, you all you are concluding you will be concluding the session.
Brooklyn Tory: Actually, I would love to have you speak a bit more on that, because my question was specifically about the shift in perspective that's necessary to break out of this cycle of consistent violence and this narrative of just
Brooklyn Tory: this narrative of violence that everyone in the Middle East seems so passionate about. And so I'm wondering what is really necessary or critical to evoke this shift that I've seen. It's possible in like the Uae really broke this down by really just creating a dictatorship. Is that what's necessary to eradicate violence? Or is there a more democratic way to solve this.
Dalia Ziada: It's a very good question, Brooklyn, actually, and you kind of answered yourself, you know, while exploring it in your head. Perhaps so. Yes. Do you remember the 3 layers of the conflict we just spoke about like the territorial layer, the Arab Israeli layer and the Muslim Jewish layer?
Dalia Ziada: The trick here, I believe, in order to change the perspective and go back like to the point when Arabs and Israelis, Muslims and Jews are living well together, regardless of the continuity of the territorial conflict, which, in my opinion, is not going to end anytime soon.
Dalia Ziada: so the trick is to dismantle or undermine these layers. To uncover these layers one by one. What the Abraham accords did in the 2,020 s. And after which was amazing, is that it dismantled the Arab Israeli layer. It showed the Arabs that it is possible for them to work with Israel, regardless
Dalia Ziada: of the territorial conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians, and whether it will continue or not.
Dalia Ziada: so also actually, all the initiatives that are now happening in order to bring dialogue or to create dialogue between Muslims and Jews should eventually also help in dismantling the Muslim Jewish conflict layer, and also the very deep concept of the Abrahamic accords Abrahamic. You know it's about the Abrahamic religions. It also tried to touch on this
Dalia Ziada: Muslim Jewish layer of the conflict. So if we remove these 2 layers, the conflict will shrink to its actual size, which is the territorial conflict and will succeed, and one main main big step towards making it shrink to this level is by fighting against the terrorist organizations
Dalia Ziada: that are taking the Israeli-palestinian conflict as a lunch bed
Dalia Ziada: for for gaining legitimacy for their own existence, you know. So this is one step in the direction. And I believe it's now happening at least, I mean, by the pressures being put on Hamas, the Us. Involvement heavy involvement in weakening Hamas, and so on.
Avi Melamed: Thank you. Tamar.
Tamar Sarah Weiss: Hi, so my question is earlier. You mentioned that
Tamar Sarah Weiss: part of the problem with Palestinian nationalism is that they aren't looking for sovereignty. The goal is just to eradicate Israel. But in a lot of the conversations that I have on campus specifically with, like other people like when we get into arguments. Is that well, Palestinians actually just want to live peacefully like I've spoken. People say, like I've spoken to them myself, and they just want to live peacefully among Israelis, and I think, like part of that sentiment is true. So like
Tamar Sarah Weiss: in conversation. How do you separate the sentiment of like that overall overarching ideology that's like the eradication of Israel. And then, like the Palestinians who really just want to live a normal life in the land. And there's like anything to do about that, especially because, like, it is coming from the leadership. But like it does trickle down into the common people's life.
Dalia Ziada: Yes.
Tamar Sarah Weiss: Totally.
Dalia Ziada: Yes, this is also a very, very good question. Thank you, Tamar. The things that you know. Yes, I know many, many Palestinians, including in Gaza who want to live in peace, who just want to live a normal life. And actually, 2 years ago, 3 years ago, now, in 2022 a movement appeared. It's called Badna Naish. We want to live.
Dalia Ziada: It was led by young people who just wanted to live a normal life, you know, who who rejected Hamas, who rejected this concept of resistance, who rejected this war, and they just want to live a normal life. However, they were quickly suppressed.
Dalia Ziada: not only by Hamas, but also by the Gazans, especially from older generations, who still adopt this resistance. Ideology, and who's still preaching it as a solution, you know, like violent resistance. By the way, if you look at the way how Arab communities, and even the Palestinians themselves, are looking at the conflict, there is a huge generational gap
Dalia Ziada: between the older generation, who think it's like a resistance where it has to remain violent. It's their war of existence, you know, to destroy Israel, and the younger ones
Dalia Ziada: who are. They know they need to live in peace. They need to get over this sooner or later, in order to live in peace, but they don't have the power to say that. However, I mean, even if this could have been the case before October 7, th unfortunately, after October 7, th with all the level of hatred, and I mean
Dalia Ziada: the Hamas is somehow it has won. It has won in this, in this side of hatred and recruiting people. I think it's it's after October 7, and the war in Gazan. So what we are going to see next is not going to be is not going to be easy for those who want peace to speak up and say, Yes, we want peace. It's very, very hard.
Avi Melamed: Thank you, Miles. And then Carl.
Miles Isaacs: It's nice to see you, Dalio, again. Thank you for the presentation. Just a short question. I have
Miles Isaacs: observed a lot in Europe that
Miles Isaacs: the Middle East and Europe seem to be swapping places insofar, as there seem to be more radicals coming to Europe and settling in Europe
Miles Isaacs: and coming out of the Middle East
Miles Isaacs: and the Middle East becoming less radicalized, Iran being in its weakened, most weakened, weakest position since, or ever really, the fall of the Assad regime. Hezbollah, Hamas.
Miles Isaacs: all been decapitated and more Arab countries
Miles Isaacs: cushioning up towards Israel, and the region.
Miles Isaacs: as I see it becoming more stable, and that there's more
Miles Isaacs: possibility for a future there than there is here in Europe. I wanted to know if you shared the same thought, and what you see.
Dalia Ziada: Thank you, Miles, and it's always nice to see you on Zoom, and I hope we will meet in person sometime soon. So yes, your question is, is very crucial. It needs hours actually to discuss, but very shortly. What happened is that Arab countries at a certain point, especially after the Arab spring
Dalia Ziada: the wave of revolutions that brought down most of the Communist Socialist secular regimes in the region, and then the rise of the Islamists in Arab countries. As a response to these Arab Spring revolutions
Dalia Ziada: was a warning sign, was was a big, you know, red flag or a big alert that made Arab countries, especially the ones who remained stable throughout the Arab Spring movement, like Arab Gulf countries. It was an alert to them, like, you know.
Dalia Ziada: hey? You know, these Islamist groups cannot exist in power in political powers in these Arab Spring countries, because they are going to threaten our own existence. So they started to campaign against them, push them outside of the region. And actually, as history, as we saw historically before in the 19 sixties, when Egypt pushed the Islamists out of Egypt. Where did they go? They went to Europe and the Uk. And some of them even went to the United States.
Dalia Ziada: but just a minority, and they started to promote their evil ideology. In these countries, today or in our modern day. Recent years, we have seen a similar thing happening, these Arab countries, these Arab.
Dalia Ziada: these Islamist organizations operating in Arab countries. When the Arab countries like pressured them and campaigned against them, they came out of the region. Where did they go. They went to Europe, the United States, and the Uk. Abusing the open space, the open free space of free, the open space of democracy and free speech in these countries
Dalia Ziada: to promote their evil ideology among Muslims and non-muslims, and unfortunately, the most
Dalia Ziada: scary thing in the in our times. In this second wave of Islamists
Dalia Ziada: leaving the Arab world and going to Europe is that they got married with red movements. You know we call it the red, green alliance with the Communist Socialist movement that gained traction in European countries and in the United States in the past few years under the woke movement. And so
Dalia Ziada: so it's very interesting to see how they built on that. Once again. The same way they built on the Communist ideology in the region to build their early success stories of spreading radical Islamism. So yes, Europe is now the playground of radical Islamists, and it's very bad. It's even worse than the United States or any other
Dalia Ziada: place, Europe and the Uk. By the way, so it's and I'm sure you, you yourself, Miles, are suffering with these radicals every day, struggling with them every day, which is very courageous of you. I really applaud you for that.
Miles Isaacs: You you! You should have seen me in Al Jazeera's last week doing just exactly that.
Dalia Ziada: Oh, wow. Okay. Good.
Avi Melamed: It's an interesting notion to see how this Islamic radicalism and Communism kind of like, have been playing along this long history of the 20th century, and kind of like different shifting roles.
Avi Melamed: something, I think, fascinating for itself to to discuss. Furthermore, finally, we are concluding, Carl, with you. Our session.
Carl J. Chiappa: Thank you. Thank you very much, Dalia. It's
Carl J. Chiappa: always great to see and listen to you, and and talking about someone who is to be congratulated on her courage. You are foremost for it.
Carl J. Chiappa: Let me ask you the most basic question imaginable.
Carl J. Chiappa: What do we mean when we talk about the Palestinians. And what does it mean within the Arab world? Because it could mean a geographical designation? It could mean a tribal designation. It is also
Carl J. Chiappa: at least I have been told by by Arabs, and read that if Israel were put aside for a moment.
Carl J. Chiappa: is that there's actually a fairly
Carl J. Chiappa: broad animosity toward the so-called Palestinians
Carl J. Chiappa: among the Arabs themselves. But all of this leaves kind of murky and imprecise what we mean when we talk about the Palestinians, and I mean that question to be extremely neutral.
Carl J. Chiappa: What exactly are we talking about but
Carl J. Chiappa: people who lived there, their descendants?
Carl J. Chiappa: This is what the definition.
Dalia Ziada: Yeah, thank you, Carl. It's always nice to see you, and thank you for the very, very smart question. The things that you know there is nothing called the Palestinians. Really there is nothing even in the Arab literature. I tell you even something. There is no P. In the Arabic language. We don't have the P letter in the Arabic language. So the word Palestinian actually was taken from the Romans, and it was to describe the Jewish people who were pushed
Dalia Ziada: into this piece of land. So
Dalia Ziada: so actually, it's it's original, like the the original meaning of the word did not define the Arabs at all did not refer to the Arab tribes who lived in this place, or those who even immigrated to this place later on from Syria, like the greater Syria region, or from other Arab
Dalia Ziada: regions, so it it always meant or always refer to the Israelis now in in the 19 forties, and after, you know, or with the early early steps of of Zionism or the early days of the Zionist movement.
Dalia Ziada: the Arabs living there. They wanted also to have some kind of a counter movement to Zionism, something that makes them claim ownership of this land, and of course they cannot, you know, go on and say, you know the tribe of Abu Mansour, the tribe of Abu Ziyada. You know the tribe of Abu Abu Muhammad, or whatever
Dalia Ziada: are the owners of the land they needed to have a common identities and bring them together. So they use the word Palestinian, and then they started to refer to themselves as the Palestinians, meaning that we are the original owners of the land of Palestine.
Dalia Ziada: which was actually the land of the Jews. The Palestinians at that time were the Jews, you know as described by the Romans. And so so this is where it came from, and then over time, it has become their identity, their way of describing themselves and the way Arabs look at the Palestinians. And today, actually, if you speak to an Egyptian, for example, or anyone in the Arab world and say them who are the Palestinians.
Dalia Ziada: They will automatically think of Gaza, of the people in Gaza. They will not think of the people in the west Bank. By the way, although they also identify as Palestinians, and this area is now, according, I mean, to the Oslo agreement, and so is identified as a Palestinian territory.
Dalia Ziada: But actually they in the collective mindset of Arabs, Palestinian means Gaza, because also, as I was mentioning earlier gamal, Abdel Nasser, when he created a Palestinian State on his own, and he governed it from Cairo. It was a client state actually, and governed it from Cairo. He was calling it the Palestinian State, only Gaza.
Dalia Ziada: So so this is how Arabs think of the Palestinian state. It's only this Gaza strip.
Carl J. Chiappa: So, for example, just one quick follow up in in Jordan, for example, where, although the polls are forbidden, it appears that there's a my majority Palestinian population.
Carl J. Chiappa: It's a little bit confusing, but is. Is that simply mean that they count themselves refugees from Gaza, who are now in what is
Carl J. Chiappa: the state of Jordan.
Dalia Ziada: No, actually, it's not like that, you know. When these Arab tribes started to move around outside of this territory and to other places, you know, some went to Syria, to Lebanon, to Jordan, and so
Dalia Ziada: this affected these Arab countries in different ways. In Lebanon, for example, we know the stories of, you know the Plo. Wreaking havoc there and killing people, and then becoming one of the reasons why the Civil War in Lebanon started in the 19 seventies and eighties. So this is like, this is what happened in Lebanon. But in Jordan the story was different, because at that time the Hashemite family
Dalia Ziada: they need it
Dalia Ziada: number. They needed people in order to emphasize their power and their control over the other Hijazi tribes that existed there.
Dalia Ziada: and most of the Hijazi tribes. Hijazi tribes are more like, you know, like
Dalia Ziada: Hijazi, I don't know. It's more like very Arabian. It's not Levant. It's very Arabian like the Saudi Arabia Gulf. And so these are the Hijazi tribes, and the Hashemi tribe is a Hijazi tribe, but it was not very popular among the other Hijazi tribes, and the other was not as powerful as the other Hijazi tribes. It needed numbers where to get the numbers. Well, they took in all these Arab tribes that wanted, you know, to to come in and become and become
Dalia Ziada: and become part of the Jordan of that time, or the new identity of the Arabs in this region under the Hashemite kingdom, you know.
Dalia Ziada: who wanted to become part of the Hashemite kingdom. Also these Arab tribes. They just wanted a place to live in safely and without without being part of this ongoing conflict. And so so right now we ended up with
Dalia Ziada: Jordan being living kind of an identity crisis between its original Hashemite identity and the Palestinian identity which was exported with those immigrants who went to Jordan, and who now became, I mean, on the top of par. The wife of the king
Dalia Ziada: is a Palestinian. She's from Palestinian origins. More than 70% of the Jordanian population today are from Palestinian origins, and they until today they identify as Palestinians. They call themselves Palestinians. Also there is nothing called Palestinians. There is nothing called a Palestinian state to identify yourself with.
Dalia Ziada: So this is, I mean, Jordan is is a bit more complicated. Even those who are in the west bank today. Many of them identify as Jordanians. By the way more than they identify as Palestinians, or so.
Carl J. Chiappa: Thank you. I'm sorry to go over on me.
Avi Melamed: Yeah, no, that's right. What with this interesting notions and and observations, we are concluding this session. I want 1st to thank Dallas Yadi for your outstanding perspectives and observations. I think that it has contributed a lot to understanding of the many layers of this
Avi Melamed: conflict, which is something that definitely unfortunately, is absent from the Western discussion, and our job in the end of the day is to try to bring those layers into the discussion.
Avi Melamed: Our session next week.
Avi Melamed: By the way, we will be joined by Dahlia in hopefully in the concluding session that is supposed to take place in person in May, so we'll have a great opportunity to further elaborate discussions, and we are very much looking forward.
Dalia Ziada: Thank you so much, Abby and I really enjoyed the the discussion with all of you guys, and I hope we remain in contact.
Avi Melamed: Yeah. And we we definitely, I think it's it's mutual feeling. One last, you know, housekeeping sort of speaking. Next week's session, which is Number 7 we are moving on
Avi Melamed: with is going to deal with an inside perspective of the Palestinian arena.
Avi Melamed: Our guest educator next week is a Palestinian commentator and analyst. Mohamed Najib is from Ramallah.
Avi Melamed: and we will have a discussion about the inner Palestinian arena, the inner discussion, the the
Avi Melamed: the perspectives within the Palestinian, you know, political and cultural discussion. And of course, obviously, we'll talk, among other things, about the whole issue of October 7. The ramifications in the context of the Palestinian arena.
Avi Melamed: So at this point, I'm Maya says that she needs Eli Didier and Ben to stay, and you, you know you have to obey. What can we do? Law of nature other than that? I wish you all a very, very good week. Stay well and see you next week. Bye, bye.
Miles Isaacs: Thank you very much.
Isaac Babus: Thank you.
Avi Melamed: Actually, you need to stay tuned. I need to stay till, as I said, okay, so first, st I just want to do one quick thing, Eli Eli, ask your question to Didier.
Ilai R.: Yeah, do you have the like the Pdfs, or like the files of the transcripts? So when I go online to the like website. It just like shows the transcript. And I can't download it.
ITME STAFF: Yeah, I can. I go to the zoom where? Where we have all the archive. And I take out the.
ITME STAFF: the, the literal transcript of the as it was recorded, so it might be funky to read, but I can do that differently. So.
Ilai R.: Perfect. If you can just send me like, email, me, the
Ilai R.: yeah, just email, you like the document like the actual file. And then I'll just figure it out from there.
ITME STAFF: Okay? So in that case, Maya, can you just forward me the email of Eli.
Avi Melamed: Sure.
Avi Melamed: Okay? No. Problem.
Ilai R.: Alright. Thank you.
Avi Melamed: Thank you. Thanks, thanks, Ben. So Aaliyah had to go off to do some planning for
Avi Melamed: for Avi actually coming to to University of Denver, so she she couldn't stay. But
Avi Melamed: 2 things I want to talk about. 1st of all, a process in. Could. We talked about it briefly, but how we can
Avi Melamed: do this with the articles that Avi is is sending
Avi Melamed: because he really does want people to read them. And I think the Arabic is probably daunting, so I don't know. Maybe so, either. Again, we could translate it. You could check it, you know you could. You could.
Avi Melamed: you know you could put it into chat, gpt, like we would do, and you could translate it. What would be best for you? What's the best process for you.
Avi Melamed: To kind of be our eyes to make sure that the articles are are giving across the best and and and I'm assuming it's it's you said it's it's fairly easy for you to read right? I mean, you.
Ben Monroe: I mean, I mean, it's not challenging.
Ben Monroe: yeah, I think that would probably work best is if you send me your translation and I just double check that.
Avi Melamed: Okay, okay. So avi, will you do that? Will you make sure that you?
Avi Melamed: That you? I think what what would make sense is? You can post it
Avi Melamed: in the chat and posted in the in the group right? But in parallel. Translate it and send that to Ben separately.
Avi Melamed: Well, look, I I don't. I don't have the time to start doing the whole translation. No, the Chat. Gp, just put it in chat. Gpt, yeah.
Ben Monroe: I could also just do like the chat gpt, and then just check, chat, gpt, and make sure like it's good.
Avi Melamed: That's all. Yeah. Well, again, I mean, my thought was to send you the link
Avi Melamed: to the article, and then you can kind of like, you know, we can post it on Chat Gpt, and then you could also read it.
Ben Monroe: That that works fine, that works.
Avi Melamed: The essence, and that will be shortening the process.
Ben Monroe: So should I. Just how should I send it back to you?
Ben Monroe: I guess.
Avi Melamed: No, you could just then post it
Avi Melamed: posted into the to the grooming. Okay?
Avi Melamed: And if there are things that you want to emphasize, or just to emphasize bold couple of things in this article that you think that kind of like jump out. Of course you can do that.
Ben Monroe: Yeah, perfect. I'm cool with that. That sounds good.
Avi Melamed: Okay, good. All right. So so do you want to? Then send it to Ben before you put it in the Whatsapp group? Yes, I'll send the link to Ben. Okay, Ben, could, you know, put it on chat Gpt, and just, you know, share it with the group. And then, you know.
Avi Melamed: and it's also a good opportunity, for are you sure you have time? You're on spring break this week, too like, are you sure you have time to do this.
Ben Monroe: This week definitely, and I just got done with midterms. So that's why this past week has kind of been like a Balagan, but it. No, it should be fine.
Avi Melamed: We're not going to suffocate you with that. I mean something.
Ben Monroe: Yeah. If if it gets if it gets too bad, then I'll I'll let you know.
Avi Melamed: Okay. Okay. Alright. Wait. Now. Yesterday we had a conversation. I have to remember like what this with Aaliyah.
Avi Melamed: That remind me what we're doing
Avi Melamed: Do you remember the conversation? I got my! I offered the aaliyah to do something, and she really really liked it, and I think it could be also interesting joint joint cooperation of you and her.
Avi Melamed: I I told the aaliyah that, interesting enough. It's interesting to check.
Avi Melamed: While in Western campuses we we see what we see following October 7. It's interesting to see what what has been going on in Arab campuses
Avi Melamed: to try to explore that that issue, that this is something that has not been addressed at all to the best of my knowledge.
Avi Melamed: And and here it calls for someone who has the ability to go to the Arabic sources. And so I was thinking about
Avi Melamed: you and her doing something together.
Avi Melamed: In that regard. Because if you you could kind of like try to, you know, search for information in Arabic about that.
Avi Melamed: and and maybe you could work in it together, or to do something together about it. But wasn't it so we began with something else, wasn't it about Al Jazeera? There was this. Oh, Al-daw! That's where it was sorry we had this whole conversation right, in other words, and that Ben could. She wanted to be able to go. So start with that. Explain that that's where it started, Didier, you don't actually have to stay for this. I just wanted you for the Eli.
ITME STAFF: One thing before I go I can. What I will do from now on I will put also the link to the zoom recording on the Zoom Platform, because this way they can see the transcript with the video.
ITME STAFF: I'll send you an example. And I can also send you the transcript as a text file, but then it's getting all the like subtitles file, so I'll prepare both. But I think it could be convenient for people to watch
ITME STAFF: the way, why, they're watching it. They have on the side directly what the person is saying. So if they have issues with accent, then they can figure it out. Okay.
Avi Melamed: Alright. Okay, just don't end the meeting. Just leave cause I you're you're also logged in as obvious. So just be careful.
ITME STAFF: That that was a good point have a good day.
Avi Melamed: Thank you. Okay, yes. So here is the thing. The university, Denver. They are hosting an event, and they have 2 spokesperson, 2 speakers. One is avi mayor. No, no, they already hosted avi mayor.
Avi Melamed: Fine, they hosted, they hosted. Avi may not together every event they in one they hosted Avi May, who is the chief editor was of the chief editor of the Jerusalem Post.
Avi Melamed: or and now they're going to host the person I don't remember. His name is the managing director of Al Jazeera.
Avi Melamed: and and and Aliyah kind of like wanted to.
Avi Melamed: you know, express concern with to the administration about this guy. And I basically said, I said, Look, don't go that path. It's it's counterproductive. It's not the right thing to do. They can invite whoever they want to invite, and you don't want to suffocate anybody's voice. But what you can do is to come with some
Avi Melamed: tough questions about Al Jazeera and the role that Al Jazeera plays, and so on and so on. But the tough questions should be basically based upon
Avi Melamed: what, in events that associated with Al Jazeera in the Arab world.
Avi Melamed: and because I told, I told Aliyah that in the Arab world the Jazeera is a very kind of like controversial
Avi Melamed: network, to put it up, to say the least.
Ben Monroe: Color, yeah.
Avi Melamed: There has been episodes of like friction between Al Jazeera and Arab governments, and they shut down offices, including Palestinian authority, shut down the offices and other things. And so
Avi Melamed: we we talked about, you know, coming up with these tough questions, and I gave her an example
Avi Melamed: during the war in Gaza Al Jazeera had this retired Jordanian general. His name is Dweri.
Avi Melamed: I don't know. I see, that you nodding in your head. I guess you you are familiar with this person.
Avi Melamed: El Dweri is a general, retired. The Jordanian retired general, which, by the way, a couple of not so long ago, was one of the very harsh critics of Qatar.
Avi Melamed: Now they hired him to be the military analyst during.
Ben Monroe: Of course.
Avi Melamed: And the guy was just spoon all kind of like nonsense about Gaza and about, you know, he was basically echoing Hamas propaganda. And to the point where people in the Arab world started to mock
Avi Melamed: this person. And they basically kind of like it became a slogan. It's it's in Arabic, they say, which means analyze that, you know, because he was really it's like, it's totally kind of like people were like, are you? You're from Mars. You don't know what's going on in Gaza Street. What are you telling us those stories for?
Avi Melamed: And so
Avi Melamed: I think that when I told it to I said it to Malia. She was very intrigued. And so one of the thought that we heard was that she will kind of like prepare a couple of questions that she would like to present in this session with Al Jazeera's manager tough questions based upon the inner discussion.
Avi Melamed: which I believe if this guy is going to come across those questions. He's going to be very surprised, if not to be, you know, taken by surprise.
Avi Melamed: And and if she is not able to
Avi Melamed: present those questions during the session.
Avi Melamed: to write something afterwards, and bring in those aspects in the school paper, and to bring those aspects into this writing, and this is article that she she will make publish.
Avi Melamed: So we thought that you could be very helpful in kind of like finding those things that deals with the very controversial image and position of Al Jazeera in the Arab world.
Avi Melamed: And so 1 1 link is, as I told you I told you before, is this guy? Al Dweri.
Avi Melamed: yeah, yeah.
Avi Melamed: And and other and other examples for this very controversial.
Ben Monroe: I think something very obvious just to look for. You know, Qatari specific, either maybe protests or revolutions or things happening inside Qatar, because, as I'm sure you know, Al Jazeera is really kind of a lock and key when it comes to like specifically Qatari like news.
Ben Monroe: So I think that that's probably would lead to a hundreds of questions.
Avi Melamed: Yes, that's that's a good example. That's, of course, a good example. And I would
Avi Melamed: definitely bring that into the discussion. And I would add to that also in the context of other Arab players like also how
Avi Melamed: Qatar is well, Jazeera is actually Jazeera is
Avi Melamed: playing along that cuttery agenda which is kind of like the changing one from place to place and from time to time.
Avi Melamed: And so that's that's the that's the idea. So I think, like, you know, finding couple of in couple of examples, you don't need to do lots of examples.
Avi Melamed: And so those examples could be part of what Aliyah was planning.
Avi Melamed: Yeah, yeah. So forget the 1st thing we said about the campuses. That wasn't the that was a different issue. It's really this, because because the way it kind of evolved was Avi was telling her about Aldweri, and she was like, How do you spell it?
Avi Melamed: And I was like, I don't know if you'll find anything in English. So I thought, oh, this could be cool. So again, you know. 1st of all, the question is, we're kind of asking you a favor like, are you interested in like in like working with her on this? This is not something that you need to do so. Is this something that you'd be interested in, kind of helping her with.
Ben Monroe: No, I would be very interested in doing it.
Ben Monroe: I'm not sure if I have time, but I would love to to meet with her, and and talk about it at the very least.
Avi Melamed: Okay, yeah. So let's so we'll make. What we'll do is I'll we'll make another meeting. Because again, I didn't know that she had anything afterwards today. So we'll make another meeting again. This shouldn't be. And if you can, great, if you don't have time, it's okay. But again, this needs to be her leading it.
Avi Melamed: And like you, kind of like, maybe helping her. This is not something that you're supposed to be leading. This needs to be her thing, and if you can help her to kind of get information, and again she can also. Then right click, put it in chat Gpt, it's just we thought you could be helpful, and it might be.
Ben Monroe: Yeah, if I could be a help with a helping that'd be awesome.
Avi Melamed: That's all we're asking. We're not asking you to. You should not
Avi Melamed: lead it. So let's set up. Well, I have a Whatsapp group with the 2 of you. We'll set up another, you know, conversation, so we can just all be on the same page, and so she can also hear from us that she needs to be leading this. And you're helping, not. This is not your project, and then and then, you know, we'll take it from there. But 1st I wanted to see if it was something that you would be interested in. Okay, cool.
Ben Monroe: Yeah, sounds good.
Avi Melamed: And and like I said, I'll send you the I'll send you 2 pieces on avi. One is kind of a 1 pager. One's the bio. Use what you want. And again, you know, we don't need to. Have, you know. However, we can be helpful. Just the dates we talked about were April 15, th and 16, th one of those dates, or 7, 16, th or whatever.
Ben Monroe: 1617. I think so. Is that still the focus
Ben Monroe: that that's that's that. Yeah. 15, th 17.th That works for me.
Avi Melamed: Great.
Ben Monroe: Those are the dates I've kind of been spewing out in my emails. So I think that's probably what we should shoot for.
Avi Melamed: That's fine. So yeah, so just let us know beyond the bios like what else you need from us.
Avi Melamed: And you know. So don't wanna bug. You just want to be a resource if we can.
Ben Monroe: Will do.
Avi Melamed: Okay. Great. Alright.
Ben Monroe: Awesome. Alright. Talk to you guys soon.
Avi Melamed: Cool. Okay, bye. Then, thanks. Bye-bye.