Good evening everybody. Thank you so much for coming to this second in a series of programs this academic year on unravelling the problems in Palestine Israel.
As I said, this is program number 2. We have several more coming up.
My name is Tom Morgan. I'm the director of the Alworth Center for the study of Peace and Justice here at St. Scholastica and of course the primary sponsor of this lecture series.
In addition the lecture series wouldn't be possible without the support of the Warner Lecture Series, the Manitou Fund, the DeWitt and Carolyn VanEaver Foundation, and the Mary C. Van Eaver Endowed Fund.
Additional support has been received from the Global Awareness Fund of the Duluth Superior Area Community Foundation and from numerous other private donors.
I thank you very, very much for your continued support of these series. It makes me feel like we're doing the right job.
If you are interested and not on the mailing list and you want to know about upcoming programs, we have a sign-up sheet sheet for you in the lobby.
And we'll send you a postcard every time a new program comes up. Or I'll send you an e-mail. Or both. If you do fill out one of these things, please write carefully.
It is so difficult sometimes to read handwriting and get the e-mails right. Print carefully.
You'll hear from me again about upcoming programs. Out in the lobby there's at least two groups out there. At least I think they are there. I invite you to see what they are all about after the lecture.
One of them is a table operated by veterans for peace and the other one is a table operated by a local Christian group. Twin Ports Peace Not Walls.
They have something to offer and something to tell you. As I said, I invite you to do that.
This is a double feature, this is something we've never done before. I urge you to come. We're going to hear from Phyllis Bennis in a few minutes.
She has a lot to el us. She has a wide view of the whole problem. She's written a great deal.
Tomorrow we have Dominque Nazar. He's here in the audience, isn't he? Take a bow. I want people to see you. Stand up. Because I want you all to come to this one if you can.
I know two nights in a row is a lot, but you should have gotten one of these fliers as you came in
For him the whole issue, I know, of the problems in Palestine and Israel is not theoretical.
It has touched you in a real way, I know. You see his biography and background. He will talk and help us understand and process what Miss Bennis tells us. He will tell us about life as the Palestinians live it today. That's tomorrow. In summer's lounge not here.
But back to tonight's event. After the program there will be an opportunity, of course, to ask questions of Miss Bennis. And the microphones are here. You come right forward. Excuse me. And you ask your question.
Succinctly and briefly to the point. One speech a night. I ask you to please do that. Please make your questions right on the money so she can get to as many as possible.
If you see students in line, defer to the students. Let them go ahead of you. That's mainly what we're here for is to allow the students to engage on this issue or any either.
On the screens we're displaying the text of tonight's lecture through technology called real-time caption. Although we anticipate a high-quality format, there will be errors that are inherent to the technology.
A special thank you to the Edward Jennings Foundation which makes this service possible tonight.
Speaking of technology, if you have it in your pocket or purse, turn it off so we can give full attention to the speaker.
Our speaker this evening is a writer, an activist and political commentator, the author of numerous articles in "The Nation", "the Baltimore Sun", "New York Newsday", the "Christian Science Monitor", the "New York Times", the "Washington Post",
"Newsweek" and "USA Today", as well as many other publications. She's also been invited to deliver political commentary on TV and radio in the U.S. and abroad, including appearances on CNN, the PBS
News Hour, MSNBC, Democracy Now, the BBC and NPR. She is a fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington D.C. and of its offshoot, the Transnational Institute in Amsterdam.
At the institute in Washington, she directs the New Internationalism Project, which works primarily on Middle East and United Nations issues. Ms. Bennis also is a founding member of the U.S. Campaign
for Palestinian Rights, which was established in 2002. She was a leader of United for Peace & Justice, a coalition of more than 1,300 international and U.S.-based organizations opposed to what
it called the U.S. government's policy of permanent warfare and empire-building. She also co-chairs the UN's International Coordinating Network on Palestine. And she's on the national board of Jewish Voice for Peace. In addition, she has been an informal adviser to several top UN officials
on Middle East issues. Ms. Bennis has written and edited 11 books. Her most recent is a seventh updated edition of her popular "UNDERSTANDING THE PALESTINIAN-ISRAELI CONFLICT."
That book and another one of her books is on sale in the lobby right now. She will sign them for you at no extra charge.
When she's not thinking, writing and speaking about these timely and critical issues, she likes to play with Oscar, her lab-hound mix rescue dog. And she's a hiker and reader (but not at the same time).
Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Ms. Phyllis Bennis.
>> Phyllis: Thank you all. Good evening. It is great to be here. I was telling Tom I was in Duluth once before when I was very young to go canoeing at the boundary waters canoe area.
Somebody who was clearly determineed to remind me how I'm not young anymore reminded me it wasn't even yet the boundaries water canoe area protected. Thanks a lot, gang.
I want to thank the Alworth Center for Peace and Justice. I love it is an Academyic Center about Peace and Justice. Peace and justice is what's
important. It is hard to see here. There's a lot of people here. How many of you think that the Israel-Palestine conflict is the most complicated political issue in the world today. I see hands.
I see halfhearted hands. Let's go with a lot of you do. And it makes sense, because the way it is presented to us in some ways designed to make it sound very, very comply complicated.
If you strip out some of the complications, it is not as complicated as you think. It is ultimately about human rights and land. That's what a lot of political struggles in many parts of the world are all about. But when you start putting forward ideas for solutions that are grounded not in human
rights and equality for all, but are grounded in issues of religion and power and money and not justice and international law and equality. It starts to become very, very complicated.
Because you realize that people come to it with different assumptions of rights. Whose rights? Whose rights are more important than other people's rights. This becomes a very -- a very tricky
business. So for the last 25 years we've had what's known as the peace process. That's the familiar term. The peace process. The peace process is one organized by the United States, two
baseed on the idea of the two-state solutions with swaps. You have to say that very fast. Two-state solutions with swaps. It used to be just the two-state solution. Then it was impossible
so it become the two-state solution with swat swap. Everybody knows that when there's a peace agreement, the major settlement blocks will belong to Israel. Everyone knows that. Everyone knows
a Palestinian State will not have control of its own borders, airspace, and will not have control of the its own telecommunications, and will not have control any of anything. Everyone knows that
Except the problem is the Palestinians don't really know that. Nobody ever really asked them. We have this problem of this goal that is supposedly what everybody knows is the goal. We just have
to figure out how to get there. It is a goal that doesn't match the realities of people's lives on the ground. If we take a step back or a few steps back and say let's look at the question
of the role of the United States. Why is our government so central to what happens thousands of miles away on the other side of the earth? Why is the U.S. the one that gets to decide what's the
basis for a peace process, who gets to come to the table, what's the shape of the table -- we pretty much decide everything. Why is that?
If reflected a global movement in the context of the Holocaust. Those Jews who managed to escape as the Holocaust took shape across Europe no longer had homes to return to.They were people without a
country, without land, in many cases. Rather than figuring out a way for those people to be able to go back to their own countries, or go where they wanted to go, which was to the United States
where their families were or to the UK which was the second choice, the question of the establishment of a Jewish state in historic Palestine, which had been on the agenda for 50 years or
so by then, but had never been an majority opinion either among Jews or anybody else. It was always a minority opinion. The creation of a Jewish state in another people's land. But suddenly after the
Holocaust, it became the only solution because to a large degree our own government's combination of antisemitism and anticommunism prevented huge number of Jews who wanted to come to the U.S. after the Holocaust - they weren't allowed to come.
They weren't allowed to come. You know the stories of the ships that were sent back. And those people who were trying to get to the U.S., after having escaped from the most horrific of crimes.
They were told the one place you can go where you will be welcome is to this new Jewish state that is being created in Palestine. So people went.
It become the dominant majority view. Certainly among the Jewish community in the U.S., but also among U.S. officials. Again, motivated in many cases by the
combination of antisemitism and a few others who didn't want large numbers of Jews coming to the U.S. So this was a way to divert them somewhere else.
Let some other country take them. We don't want them here. Because antisemitism was a cold, harsh reality in those years.
The state gets created. It is a small state. Finally in 1997, Israel goes to war. The first thing it does is to wipe out the air forces in Egypt and Syria.Then in six days it conquers a whole bunch of
land and triumphs over as the mythology goes, six Arab armies. There weren't six Arab armies that fought. There were six Arab armies on paper. In the real world there were about two. Nonetheless, it was a huge military victory.
The Pentagon looked at this and said these guys are good. We could do business with these people. And military business became kind of the core enterprise of the relationship between the U.S. and Israel.
So, all of a sudden this small state now includes not only the 78% of historic Palestine which Israel had occupied following what it called the war of independence which means catastrophe. When they lost their land 750,000 Palestine were
expelled from their homes and their land in the 1947-48 War. The U.N., which had created the idea of dividing Palestine into two states, an Arab state and a Jewish state, had given 55% of the land for a Jewish
state. Despite the fact that the Jews at that time were only 30% of the population. And owned only 6% of the land. The Palestinians were 70% of the population. They were given only 45% of the land.
By the time the war was over, the Israeli, the new state, had not 55% of the land, but 78% of the land. Only 22% was left. The West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem. In 1967,
following the war, Israel controlled 100% of the land. It also controlled the Syrian Heights and Egyptian Sinai Peninsula. That lead to the relationship with the U.S. XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
We're in the middle of the Cold War. The U.S. is competing for Soviet influence all over the world, and particularly in the Middle East where issues of oil and strategic reach are all very important. Right?
So the Pentagon suddenly realizes they can build this strong, tough relationship with this new state and build on a relationship which movements in the United States, movements to support the creation of
an Israeli state and then to build a stronger relationship with the Israeli state, those movements, mainly in the Jewish communities, the movements that we call Christian Zionism, didn't really
exist in the organized form. In the Jewish community, that become a powerful movement. It didn't have that much influence until the Pentagon said, yeah, we like this. We can do business
with these people. From then on the combination of the lobby, the pro Israel lobby and the strategic advantage that the Pentagon and the state department and the White House saw lead to the
consolidation of the incredibly close set of ties that were economic and political and diplomatic, and in every way the U.S. became the super power supporter of Israel. XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
The Cold War was not very cold in a lot of parts of the world. In Africa and Latin America and elsewhere, the wars were very hot. And in many of those wars, Israel emerged as the cats paw of the U.S. military interest around the world.
Whether it was in Guatemala in the '50s when the military slaughtered native people in the Highlands. It become politically unobtainable to support the dictatorship. They asked the Israelis. They said no problem. We will
become the arms exporter to Guatemala. The Israeli rifle become the weapon of choice in Guatemala in that period. You had those examples all over the world in Africa and all of these places. You had this
now a three-part U.S. policy, one part about Israel, one part about oil, and one part about strategic positioning. The ability to go to war anywhere in the world. If you have bases in the
Middle East, you can go to war against Africa, Asia, Europe. You are in the center of everything. All of that was important. Why was it Israel emerging in the Arab environment becomes this
western enclave? It turns out that was the goal of the people who created the idea of the political Zionist movement. Very different from the religious call for those of us who grow up
Jewish, we grow up learning a prayer that says next year in Jerusalem. The Zionist movement that started at the end of the 1900s and around the 19th century around the 1890s, Theodore Hertzel wrote about what the
Jewish state would be like. He was very clear this is not about religion. This is not realizing the religious claim to the land. That's not the basis of the state. It this state is going to be
a secular state. In his diaries, not so much his famous book "The Jewish State" but in his diaries, he included the letters he wrote to Cecil Rhodes, the great British colonialist, urging
him to support his project. He wanted help to persuade the British crown for the support. XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX That was what lead to the famous letter in 1917. So he writes to Rhodes and say why am I asking you?
You are interested in Africa. I'm interested in this little piece of Arabia. You are concerned about Englishman. I'm concerned about Jews. Why am I coming to you? Then he says - he comes to the crux of it.
Because our projects are both something colonial. I remember reading that after spending my life as a strong supporter of Israel from a time I was a kid through high school. Nobody ever told me
that part. Yet it made perfect sense. That was how Israel came to become this huge partner of the United States. As a part of a colonial-style movement around the world. So that's not
something new. So if we go back more recently, the last 25 years where we have this peace process, it is all based on the idea that the U.S. is the legitimate power. That is supposed to
determine what happens. Nobody really questions that. Nobody says wait a minute, who elected you guys? You don't live here. Why do you get to say how many states there should be? One state, two state, red state, blue state.
Why is this your business; right? I think that's where we can start. You look at people. Some of these guys like Dennis Ross and Aaron David Miller -- do you say yes? If you listen to public
radio or watch mainstream news shows, these are the guys that are being brought on as the commentators. What's happened in the Israel-Palestine peace process. And their credential? I was one of the negotiators
for 25 years.You want to say to them how is that going for you? 25 years of failure. They are still the ones they keep calling. You think at some point somebody would say maybe we need
somebody else to have a different idea. Aaron David Miller -- they, of course, all wrote a book when they lost their jobs. In his book he says we acted as Israel's lawyer. Some of us said
well, Duh. It wasn't ever said publicly. So when he says it, it's way more important than when I say it. I wasn't in the team. He was the head of the team. So that becomes a very important part of this. So when we talk about the role of the U.S., we have to
look at what is our responsibility as people who live in this country that pay taxes in the country, some of us are citizens of the country. In that context we have to look at what has been
the price paid for the so-called peace process. And the price has been paid overwhelmingly by the Palestinians. There's a saying that's quite common. It says the current situation is not
sustainable. The parties are going to have to change. The problem is if you are Israeli, the current situation is thoroughly sustainable. It can be painful on occasion. There's been loss of
life and terrorists attacks, illegal and terrible actions. But a tiny number of people have been affected by that directly. If you look at the Palestinian side, that's where it is not
sustainable. The U.N. has said that Gaza -- the Gaza Strip which has a population of just under two million people, more than half of whom are under the age of 15, will be uninhabitable in 2020.
That's in a year and a half. Right now the water in Gaza is 93% not drinkable. And the 7% that exists is almost undrinkable, because it's been salinated. There's too much salt in the water. Why? Because they can't rebuild the water treatment plant.
Why? Because Israel doesn't allow the parts to be brought in. Why was it not working in the first place? Because Israel bombed it in 2008-2009. And again in 2012 and again in 2014. This is what we're looking at. When we now hear the idea of we need a
two-state solution. That's the only solution. The answer is whatever you think about the two-state solution -- and frankly for those of us I've been a critic for a long time. It doesn't
really matter what I think. I don't live there. I'm a Jewish girl from California. I don't get to say how many states there are and what they should look like. What I have a responsibility to is what
my government does with my tax dollars and in my name. That's what I think we have to look at. It is not about -- (Applause).>> -- states. States don't have rights. You know, this -- people
always come up with the question. I'm going to show her. I'll ask her that question she can't answer. Does Israel have the right to exist? The answer is states don't have rights. People have
rights. Israelis have rights. People have rights. States don't. The U.S. didn't have the right to come and steal the land from the native people who once lived here. This was their land.
Not our land. And if we were talking 50 years after the first settlers had come or 50 years had the country had been created, we might say that a not-bad solution would be for all of those people
to have to move somewhere else. One part of the land only or go back to where they came from. That wouldn't have been such a bad idea. Now that's not realistic. Nobody is calling for that.
Ironically, nobody is called for that in Israel and Palestine either. That anybody has to leave. Except for the Israelis. We're going to create conditions that give them no options and
opportunities. For all of these years the 25-year peace process what everyone knew -- right -- there were four what they called final status issues. Those were refugees, borders, settlements,
and Jerusalem. Those were the four complicated issues to be resolved before you could say the conflict is over; right? What are we looking at now? We're dealing with final status issues for
sure. The Trump Administration has gotten rid of one of them. Taken Jerusalem off of the agenda. He said we've taken Jerusalem off of the table. Okay. That's supposed to make things better?
Apparently yes. Because now the U.S. recognizes Jerusalem as the Capital of Israel only and has moved the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. What does that say to those who has been told for 25 years by the United States Government XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
At the end of the day, you will have an independent state. It will have some kind of a capitol in Jerusalem. They said we don't think that's true. We think we're going
to be stuck having our Capitol in some little dusty village outside of Jerusalem. It is like saying if you live in New York, we're going to
give you Newark and let you call it New York. You can say what you want, but Newark is not New York. I don't mean that to disparage Newark. I happen to love Newark. It is not New York.
So, this is what we're sort of facing at the moment. In the context we've now taken Jerusalem off of the table, we've taken refugees off of the table and perhaps the most cruel way by defunding what keeps
the refugees alive. 80% of the population of Gaza are refugees. They were made refugees in the 47 and 48 war. They were forced from their homes and never allowed to return, despite
international law that says that anyone after any war always has a right to go home and the specific international law known as U.N. resolution 194 that says specifically Palestinians have the right
to return to their homes, and compensation for their losses. Not one or the other. You don't get to go home, but we'll give you the money. This is the Trump view. That's not what it says. They have the right to --
return and compensation for their loses. So now all that left is borders and settlements. We know that can be dealt with by Fiat. We know who is in charge of the negotiations - Jared Kushner.
What's he known for? He's donated thousands of dollars to the settlement project in the occupied territories. He's proud of that. He thinks that makes him a better negotiator. That's what we are now
dealing with. That's the new plan. And now we have something even more. How many of you have heard -- another test here -- about the new Israeli law known as the nation state law. A lot of you.
Good. You've done your homework. Excellent. The faculty should be very proud. It's gotten a lot of publicity. It should. Israel doesn't have a constitution. They have basic laws.
There's five of them. Which together they sort of amount to a constitution. They don't call it that. It is sort of the same thing. It is not just the law, it is the fundamentals of what the country is supposed to look like.
This law was passed -- excuse me -- this law was passed as an amendment to the basic law. And what it says is that Israel is a state only for the Jews. It says explicitly the right of
self-determination belongs solely to the Jewish people. The only legal language of the country will be Hebrew -- until now. Officially Arabic was an official language equal to Hebrew.
No longer. And it says explicitly that this is designed to make Israel the state of the Jewish people. It is like my state. Although I don't live there. My parents never went there my
grandparents never went there. Why do I get to have that be my state? This is a serious problem In a certain way, it takes away the illusion of the Oslo two-state solution with swaps, which was
never real, but it was based on the idea that if nothing else, it would be something called a Palestinian state equal to an Israeli state and Palestinians inside Israel would have some level of
equality. It turns out that you don't have equality either within Israel where 20% of the population is Palestinian-Arabs. Many of the Jews are Arabs as well. They are from Morocco and
Iraq and other parts of the Middle East and Turkey and Iran and elsewhere. They are Jews and nationality in Israel is defined by religion. So there's no such thing as an Israeli nationality.
The Israeli identity cards -- they call for nationality. It is not Israeli or something else. It is Jewish or Muslim or Christian. That's nationality. Part of the problem is Palestinians who
are citizens of Israel, who are about three quarters of the 20%, they have the right to vote, they have the right to run for the Israeli parliament, and this in that way they are equal. But not all
rights in Israel are determined by citizenship. There's the nationality rights that are designed to privilege Jews and to discriminate against Palestinians. So this new nation state law creates a
whole official new legal system where you now have two legal systems for two different population groups within the same territory. And if you look at language of the international Covenant
against a particular crime, that's exactly the definition of it. What is that crime? It is the crime of a partied. And what we now find out is that it is no longer political suicide for mainstream in many cases even officials to describe Israeli practices as a partied.
Because it is violation of the international Covenant. So you have the redefinition of refugees to take refugees out of the equation, you have the Jerusalem issue being taken off of the table.
You have equality for Palestinians either inside Israel or in the West Bank or you have the distinction between Palestinians who are indigenous and Israeli settlements, 650,000 Israeli settlers
who now live in the occupied territories violating the international law every morning just by getting out of bed. You have this huge contradiction. You have the huge contradiction that's called a partied.
I'll give you one example of it if you look at it in the West Bank side of it. Take two kids that live in the West Bank. They are both 12. They've been kind of naughty. They've been throwing stones at a car or a window.
Whatever. One of them, an Israeli kid who lives on the settlement would be arrested the way our juvenile justice system is supposed to work. It often doesn't particularly
with kids of color. But it is supposed to work. The kid gets arrested. His parents are told why. He's taken to a juvenile court with his parents being present, a lawyer is always present
wherever he's questioned. The whole system is designed in the interest of the child. It is to help the child become a better person, stop doing this kind of thing. It is not designed to be
punitive; right? It is designed the way a juvenile justice system should be. The other is a Palestinian kid who has lived in the neighboring village for 10, 15, 20 generations. He's doing
the same thing. What happens to him? He gets identified by the soldiers that are patrolling. He doesn't get arrested. They arrest him at 2:00 in the morning. Which is what UNICEF has determined
is the usual way that Israeli soldiers arrest children. Because it is more frightening. Taken away from his home. His parents are not told where he's being taken. He's taken inside Israel outside of the West Bank and
again in violation of international law and for older kids made to sign a confession written in Hebrew which almost none of the kids speak or write or read well enough to know what they are signing.
There's no lawyer. They are brought to court in the military justice system. Israel is the only place in the world that has a military juvenile detention system for children as young as 12.
You have two 12 years old doing the same thing with the same government in charge and two entirely different systems affecting them. And the determination is based on religion, ethnicity,
nationality, all of the criteria of the U.N. covenants against racism. That's what Israel looks like today. That's why representative Betty McCollum from Minnesota, somebody who you should be
very proud of, said the world has a name in the nation state law. It is called a partide. The sky didn't fall. She's running for a re-election. She's going to win by a landslide. Her district in
St. Paul knows she's a really good member of Congress. She defends her district, and they push her to support human rights everywhere. No exceptions. That's what I think we have to be
about in this country whether citizens can vote or not. Those of us who can vote should be voting. People have been killed for the right to vote, and we have every obligation, those of us who can
vote to use that. This district is a pretty important one, I understand. I hope all of you go out and vote. Students who may not have thought and going out to voide and bothering to register and stuff -- do it. Register. I think
Minnesota you can do same-day registration. Don't wait. Do it ahead of time just in case. Vote. Vote. It is very important. What are we looking at? This isn't as complicated as it has
to be. It is not about how many states there are. That's for people who live there. Do they want one state, two states, three states ? I don't know. Five states, no states. That's not our
business. Our business is to change our government's policy away from a policy that supports occupation that pays $3.8 billion directly to the Israeli military who is doing this stuff like a
juvenile detention system for children in the military. That's what we're paying for. You know, this is crazy. We see these incredible non-violent protests in Gaza. It is now up to 205 people
who have been killed so far in the weekly protests that began on March 30th. And it is extraordinary to think about. These are a family's young people, old people, going out,
approaching the fence that the Israelis have erected to surround Gaza what they've been told over and over again that the Israelis have brought snipers to shoot them down if they march on their own land
towards that fence. Thousands have been injured. Hundreds of young boys have lost limbs. Arms and legs that had to be amputated. Not because they had to be, because the hospitals in
Gaza don't have the equipment needed to do the real repair work. The only option to avoid the child dying was to amputate their leg or arm. They are not being allowed out to go to hospitals in
the West Bank. Other Palestinian hospitals. This is what our support has made possible. There's an incredible quote from an Israeli general, general Fogle, the same day the U.S. opened its
embassy in Jerusalem. He was talking about killing children. He said anyone who could be a future threat to the border of the state of Israel and its residents should pay a price of that violation.
The radio interviewer wasn't sure and said so the punishment is death? He said, yes, his punishment is death. For children. This is why people are coming out. Because the difference
between life and death right now in Gaza is not very much of a difference. So what does that mean for us? How do we go about changing? There's some good news. Despite all of what I've
said. The good news is that the discourse about this issue in the United States has changed dramatically. Dramatically. Now the policy has not changed at all except under this
administration. It has gotten far worse. I'm not making any claims that we've had the kind of success that we need as a movement that supports equality and Palestinian rights. But I am talking
about one of the things that has to happen first. Our democracy in the country is badly, badly damaged. We know that public opinion does not determine what policy looks like. We know that
most people in the country don't support threatening to send the military against a group of 5,000 desperate families marching north from Honduras. Most people in the country don't support that.
Our opposition isn't yet enough to change that policy. But we can't change the policy without public opinion. So that's where there's some good news. Where there's been a real discourse
change. In the last ten years -- I've been working on the issue -- way too long. When I look back 30, 40 years when I started doing the work, the change seemed like it was never going to come.
Forget about policy change, just changing public discourse. That was never going to change. It did slowly. If you look at last ten years, it's been faster than ever before. You have books
being published, President Carter's book, "Palestine: peace not a partide." President or not, ex-President or not, no publisher that published that book 20 or 30 years ago. Suddenly you can
publish that book. The book on Israeli lobby. I don't like the book. I think it is problematic in a whole host of ways. It said you are not allowed to write a book about the Israeli lobby.
When 60 members of Congress skip the speech when Binyamin Netanyahu - the Prime Minister of Israel came Congress to address a joint session. They made it look like a state of the union address.
The arrogance of it. When he brought his own people to fill out the seats and pointed to them in a way presidents do at the State of the Union. And was doing it to convince
Congress to vote against their President, to vote against the Iran nuclear deal. 60 members of Congress said I'm not going to go. That's an outrage. Not all of those members of Congress were
boycotting the speech because of their concerns about Palestinian rights. Some were. For many members of the black caucus, they were outraged at the racism with how Netanyahu treated President Obama.
That's a perfectly good reason to boycott too. What's going to happen? Is the sky going to fall? The sky didn't fall. Not one of them lost re-election having anything to do with that action.
There's been these incredible changes. Congresswoman McCollum would never have said what she did absent this kind of a shift. It's gone on every level. The change in the Jewish community is even more
dramatic. When I was growing up a Jewish kid in California. If you wanted to identify as a Jew, your family, temple, it was all about Israel. God didn't enter into the equation. It was about
Israel. It was a kind of left-wing thing. There was a lot of talk about socialism. It was very exciting for young people in the days. We never thought to ask where did that land come from? Where those
socialists are? Who lived there before? Where are they now? We never asked those questions. We never ask those questions. But now -- if we wanted to engage organizationally, the groups like
APAC and others -- it was with one view of Israel. Israel can do no wrong. We were as loyal to Israel as we were to our own country. That's not the case anymore. Now the Jewish community is
like any other community. It has a left, right, center, organizations that fight with each other and represent different portions all the time. My organization, Jewish Voice for Peace has
250,000 online supporters and 40,000 paid members. It is a whole different world for young Jews growing up with different choices. So all of that is different. The BDS campaign, the boycott
divestment campaign. Nothing like that ever existed before. Nothing like that existed. It is under incredible pressure. It is under incredible pressure. There's fear that young people --
young students -- it is why the students and the campus-based BDS campaigns are in the target far more than the mainstream churches which have passed amazing resolution. They are not being
targeted, because the students are more vulnerable. So all of this change is under way. And this is the important part. This is the part that we see a movement growing that deals with the
question of equality and human rights as the basis for a settlement for a solution for ending the conflict rather than ending the conflict on the basis of Israeli power. That's the big difference
that we see now. So we're saying we need a U.S. position that's grounded in international law, human rights, and equality for all. Not grounded in support for occupation, support for Israeli
militarism, et cetera, which is what we have today. So that's our job. It's not our job to say how many states there should be. It is our job to say what our government does. We have to stop
providing $3.8 billion a year in military aid. Israel is the 23rd wealthiest country in the world. Why are we sending them money at all? Let alone directly to the military? Right? That's the good news.
And I think voting is a huge part of it. Not because the position on Israel-Palestine determines what you vote for. But voting for people who also believe in human rights and equality
for all becomes the basis on which voting really matters in this country. I want to just read you one last thing. Then I'm going to stop so we have time for questions and discussion. This was
just a bit more of what representative McCollum said. She was speaking along with Reverend William Barber. How many of you have heard of Reverend Barber and the Poor Peoples Campain? A lot of people.
Another example. Here's somebody with very much a national presence right now making the question of Palestinian rights and equality for all the center piece of a moral issue. He also spoke at the
national convention of the U.S. campaign for Palestinian rights. This is one of the things she said. She said Donald Trump and Binyamin Netanyahu are partners intent on destroying any future
for the Palestinian people. There's no peace process. The U.S. is not an honest broker. There's no illusion of this White House caring about Palestinians. The White House point person is Trumps son-in-law, Jared Kushner. The U.S.
ambassador is David Friedman, a bankruptcy lawyer by trade and a right wing extremist by choice. They have invested financially in supporting and sustaining West Bank settlements, settlements that violate international law. The two top American
officials leading U.S. policy are not diplomats but right wing settlers who seek to expand Israel's control over Palestinian land, livelihood, and future. It is appalling.
That's a member of Congress who is running for re-election knowing she can say that without worrying about her base being left behind. I'll give you one other example of it. 2010. The students may be too
young to remember. The community people will remember this. This was the year that Obama was being charged with throwing Israel under the bus; right? Netanyahu was coming to lecture him. Doing the finger shaking thing.
Racist as could be. And that summer there was a poll -- a public opinion poll, a national poll about a number of international issues. One of which was about Israel/Palestine. One of the questions said
Israelis are building settlements in many places. Which of the follows two sentences best describes what you think about those settlements. Sentence number one says the Israelis are building settlements for
security. They have the right to build wherever they want. Sentence number two says the Israelis are building settlements in -- I'm forgetting the term they used in expropriated land.
The settlement should be torn down and returned to the original owners. In international law, that's what should happen. Describing it it that way was quite extreme. It was done deliberately to see
what would be the balance? Among democrats, 63% chose door number two and used that extreme language and accepted that reality at a moment when Obama was being accused of abandoning Israel
and everybody assumed that support for Israel is a given across the United States. It's become a partisan issue to a large degree in a way that it never was. But it is now. But we now know even though polls are only
snapshots. That was a snapshot from 2010. Who knows how long it lasted. Maybe a week. Maybe a year. Maybe an hour. For that moment, that was what happened. And that's what gives me hope. We
make that hour into a week, into a year, into a decade. We see the current Palestinian children won't have to grow up knowing the U.S. is only the force that enables their occupierer to continue.
We can change it by voting and protesting and demand our members of Congress stop doing what they are doing and do something different. That's what it is all about. Thank you.
(Applause).
>> Tom: Okay. Now she's had a break. Now back to work. We invite you to come down here ask succinct, direct, to-the-point questions. Defer to the students. Please come down and continue the conversation.
>> Phyllis: Students first, come on down. I didn't answer all of your questions. Really? I'm going to be very disappointed. You are still processing. Ask questions. You'll process better.
Otherwise I'm going to make you go out and buy my books. I'm the daughter of a salesman. I get shameless. They are cheap. You can put them in your pocket. Come on. Really. Here's somebody. Excellent. I can't really see.
>> Audience Member: I thought that was terrific. I agreed with almost everything you said. I want to ask you a question about the rights of -- again I think I agreed with everything you said. It was terrific.
I wonder if you can avoid taking some sort of stance on the question of how many states. Here's why: most people think when people live in a place for a time they acquire some sorts of rights.
The rights of Jewish settlers in some cases now go back many generations. I wonder what you think of that and the possibility they maybe required to vacate those settlements.
>> Phyllis: I think you've asked two separate questions. They are related but the question of how many states doesn't determine the rights of people. The great example is Israelis like to say we withdrew from Gaza.
We were met with rockets so why should we ever withdraw again? The reality is they didn't withdraw. They moved settlers out of Gaza. And redeployed the troops instead of patrolling inside, they were on the outside of Gaza where they prevent anyone
from leaving or coming. Gaza remains occupied. It is a different kind of occupation. It is not settler colonialism like the West Bank. It is a kind of siege. It is the medieval notion of
siege. A town or in this case the Gaza Strip which has several towns within it is surrounded. A population has to deal with being cut off from the rest of the world. I'm not saying the number
of states doesn't matter. I'm saying it is not up to us who live in the United States to determine it. One could imagine 30 years ago when settlement had been underway for about 20 years
already in the West Bank and Gaza and east Jerusalem. One could imagine states based on international law, human rights, and equality for all with two states. Which means equality within both of those
states for everybody and equality between the two states. Now, in fact, that version of two states was never on the agenda of the U.S. or anyone else. There was never an understanding that
people inside Israel would have equal rights. That was not on the agenda. Certainly the Palestinian state was never anticipated to be an equality sovereign state. It was always from the
beginning. That's when we come back to everyone knows thing. Everyone knows that state is going to be controlled by Israel militarily. Israel would control the skies, the waters, the seas off of the Gaza coast would control
the borders, and all of that would be under Israeli control. If you want to call that a state, you can. But it is not actually a state. It doesn't have sovereignty. What was being talked about
was never any real states with equality. Today the additional problem is that the idea -- that was based on the idea of a Palestinian state in all of the West Bank, all of Gaza, and all of east
Jerusalem which together only made of 22% of historic Palestine. The Israeli Jewish state could have 78% under that theory. But now within that 22%, a vast component of the land is gone. 60%
of the land of the West Bank now is out of the reach of Palestinians. Controlled by the Israeli military or by settlements or planned settlements for the future or what are known as green spaces.
That sounds nice and environmentally correct. It means it is agriculture land where Palestinians aren't allowed to go. They're prohibited from entering their own land. We're talking about 40% of the 22%. That 40% is not contiguous. We're talking
about truncated stands through the tiny territory. We'll let you call it a state. We're assuming you will be happy. That happens to be my judgment of what's possible. It has nothing to do with
if I think it is a good idea. I don't think the two-state solution ever made sense. I always thought that one state, one person, one vote equality for all with everybody there makes much more
sense. The answer that the negative side of that is, well, that means there won't be a Jewish state. Yeah. Why -- who said that Jews any more than anybody else get to impose a permanent
majority by force of war. Do we get to be a white-people state and make sure that white-people are always going to be the majority here and go to war and forcibly expel people to make sure it stays
a white majority country. I don't think so. Now it is hard to tell. Hopefully we're not quite there. That is really what we're talking about. I think -- you know, there's a lot of different
possibilities what might happen to West Bank settlers who have been violating international law for the past 50 years. They might get bought out, move back to Israel. It is not like Israel doesn't have any room.
Israel has shown itself very, very smart about how to absorb large populations at one time. They brought in one million Russians in one year and put them places they are doing fine. It might be that people will stay in their settlements. They
will be citizens of Palestine. In which case they won't have the right to be armed and protected by the Israeli army. They will have to be Palestinians like everyone else. Hopefully a
Palestinian state would impose equality on its population. Nobody would be discriminated against for being Jewish or privileged for being Jewish. Or not Jewish. Either way. The problem is right
now there's no land left to make it a realistic, viable option.
>> Student: Is it on? Okay. So you said that one of the natures of the issue is colonialism and the ideals of that. I feel like I've taken enough global classes to know that colonialism is still a force being used over much of the world
to control a lot of different things. Do you have an idea of how to combat the colonialist spirit that is still forcing different countries into economic enslavement or things like that to other bigger powers like the U.S.?
>> Phyllis: That's a really good question. And it is a really hard one. This is what America first means. It means we get first dibs. We get first choice. We get the best. We get the power. And everybody else does what we want them to do. That's a real problem.
It means that we are not calling for equality among nations. We're calling for our superiority. Everybody else can do what they want as long as they have access to the goods and
services and none of the people that we don't want. It is corporate globalization on steroids. We want no borders when it comes to capital and goods, but fences and gates and the bars when it comes
to people. So that we can talk about isolationism when it comes to diplomacy, and consistent unilateral interventionism when it comes to military and economic engagement. How to challenge
that puts a lot of responsibility on us. This is not just about Israel and Palestine. Israel does -- punches above its weight. Israel is being very quiet right now in the crisis around Jamal's
murder because the current Israeli alliance with Saudi Arabia in general and the Prince in particular is not something they want to brag about. It is a key component to the U.S. strategy. I think what makes
the most sense for us is to keep our eye on what we're fighting for. Not just what we're fighting against. We know what we're fighting against. We see it on the television sets every day. And
it is a hard one. What we're fighting for is equality and human rights. If we keep that at the front that can be the basis for determining what does globalization look like, that's a real globalization, and not a U.S.
corporate-driven, economic process that's really about colonialism. It is what makes it possible to keep people at the center. Who are you targeting when you are patrolling the south China Sea. Why is it when
we talk about Vietnam, it is not just about the lessons of Vietnam, it is about now the 7th generation of children facing the possibility of Agent Orange damage to their body. It is real and immediate.
These are huge questions. Dr. King called them the evil triplets, his beyond Vietnam speech where he talked about the evils of racism, poverty, and militarism. We add climate. Now climate degradation is the other evil that we have to combat.
And the poor people's campaign is bringing together diverse communities that are fighting for where it is the fight for 15 or tight fighting for environmental justice whatever it is. It includes fighting for Palestinian rights.
Fighting for an end to war and an end to the military budget taking 53 cents of every discretionary federal dollar. Why don't we have enough money for health care for all? 53 cents of our dollar is going to the military. That's the
answer to a lot of these questions. That's the kind of movement that we need to build. A movement based on rights and that isn't trying to orchestrate the lives of other people around the world. That Palestinians and Israelis
should live in separate countries. Why? Who said? That's what we need to fight for. I'm glad there are students here that are trying to answer that. >> STUDENT: Thank you. >> Phyllis: Thank you.
>> Audience Member: Without sounding unrealistically optimistic, I wanted to point out when Israel left Gaza there was the phenomenon of the non-Israeli population becoming larger than the Jewish population inside the occupied territories of Israel for the first time since 48.
And there was the demographic exceeding with cosmopolitanism and it is possible that it is going to be inevitable they are going to have to become a true representative democracy in the a partied. Not just Jimmy Carter, but it could become a reality.
The other thing I would like to address if you could, I believe it is a human rights lawyer, Mr. Mack, for supporting the Rwanda genocide and a lot of stuff that's not
really covered here in the U.S. and U.S. media and the relationship between there being the cats paw for the government policy.
>> Phyllis: That's an important comment that Israel has played a negative role around the world in tandem with our own role around the world. More students. Come on guys. Thank you.
>> STUDENT: I have a question. You talk about how thing issues between Israel and Palestine are really devicive, even in America when we're talking about the issues and how
decisive the politics are at this time. How do we navigate the conversations in a way that's not going to just shut people down.
>> Phyllis: Yeah. That's a hard one. There's the easy way and the right way. The easy way which sort of works and is the lazy way out is get somebody Jewish to
do it for you. The right way is first of all, that doesn't always work. Kidding aside, it is a serious question. We grow up in the country even now with the enormous shift in the discourse.
Jewish words are on the front headlines. We never used to hear Palestinian voices. It is not enough. It is not even or equal. It is way more than it ever was. I think despite all of that,
we still grow up in this Country with an incredibly, emotional connection to Israel. What we're taught from the time that we start school in kindergarten, you know, is age-appropriate focus on
the Holocaust to the exclusion of every other Holocaust that the world has known. So we don't learn about Rwanda, we don't learn about Cambodia. We don't really learn even about the other
victims of the Nazi Holocaust beyond the Jews. We don't learn about gay people, the gypsies, and they were wiped out in higher percentages than the Jews. We don't learn about that. The solution
is not to not learn about the Nazi Holocaust. It is to expand that knowledge. Because we learn it that way, it is something we relate to emotionally. We feel connected to it. And things like
the novel "Exodus." He was commissioned by three Jewish organizations to write a book to justify the creation of the state of Israel. Boy, did he did a good job. They had Paul Newman play the hero. We
were all in love with him for God's sake. Gees. This is really a problem. We don't have that around Cambodian and Rwanda. We have to recognize it is something that's personal and powerful.
For how we grow up in this country. Not only Jews. Not only Jews. All of us grow up with that. I think the thing to do is first pick your battles. You know, decide when it makes sense. It is
not something that you want to just insist everybody has to sit and listen to you at Thanksgiving, you know, on this. It is always a mistake. Wait until they fall asleep from the turkey and talk
to the three people left awake. But it is also about recognizing what -- it comes back to what's our job as people in this country. Do we really think it is a good use of our money to be spending
almost $4 billion a year directly to go to the Israeli military when we don't have enough money for health care in this country? That's a very real question. So you can start that way. When it
becomes clear what you are calling for is human rights and equality, you aren't talking about supporting terrorism or driving the Jews into the sea. You are not talking about any of that. Your
talking about people being equal. And however many states isn't my business. People should have the right to vote and have an equal say in how they are Governed. That's what this country
claims to stand for. We have all of the allies liked Saudi Arabia. Like whoever. Make clear that you're not only criticizing Israel. There's penalty of other bad actors out there too. Most of them we don't give them money directly. That's one of the big differences.
Israel does this with our money and protected by us in the United Nations. The reason they've never been held accountable is because the U.S. protects them in our name. It is what happens that we're directly responsible
for. When people care about you, this isn't some slogan. It gets easier. It never gets easy. It gets easier. Buy my book and it is done as FAQs. It will give you the answer to each of the questions that I ask. Good.
>> Audience Member: You mentioned a few times that international law is ignored in the Middle East. There's very little pressure to make the people respect the law. What has to change to reinstate International law in that area?
>> Phyllis: That's a hard question too. What does it take to make international law work? International law is usually written by the Victors. Certainly the creation of the
United Nationa and all of that, that whole period was designed to protect the Victors of world war II. There's no easy answer to that one either. I think of of them is talking about international law is important.
People in the U.S. do think international law is important. People do. People don't want the U.S. to be seen as a bully country. They want them to be seen as a cooperative country that's
respected. I don't think most people support the notion they hear from the White House. We don't care if they respect us if they fear us. I don't think most people in this Country agree with that. Talking about international law and what are the obligations as well as the rights in the international law
contexts is the beginning of changing that discourse. It is not easy. International Law, like U.S. domestic law is written in a way that is designed to give a lot of money to lawyers, because it's designed to not be very clear.
You read it and say what does that mean? Part of it is there's a whole set of people out there. Starting to understand it and read about what is international law about. Richard Faulk is
one of the most well known international law scholars in the country. He's taught as the University of California. His reports he wrote for the UN were deliberately written and designed to be used as tools by social movements. He used the language
of people as much as possible. Sometimes he slipped. Mostly it is really accessible language. So those can be really useful things to read as a framework for looking at Palestinian rights and Israeli occupation.
I think it is about starting to use the language ourselves and talking about it as something normal. It's not something weird and out there that you need to be an expert. You can't really talk about it unless you know everything.
It is like something about what should happen to hold people accountable? Maybe MBS should be brought up on charges in the Hauge at the international criminal court. That's something that everybody can
start talking about. What's the difference between the international criminal court and the -- international court of justice? International court of justice is to figure out things between nations. The international criminal court holds people accountable for crimes. Those are big crimes. This might be a
crime against humanity. It might be a war crime. I'm not sure. Raising that is something normal that we would talk about. It seems to me is a good start in the struggle for using it. Otherwise
international law is a tool for movements. It -- it is not self-enforcing. That's the huge contradiction.
>> Audience Member: You said there's been a change in the public opinion in the U.S. in the last 20 to 30 years. What's happening in Israel as far as public opinion?
>> Phyllis: Good question. Not very optimistic. Right now all of the public opinion of polls in Israel show that the farthest -- you know what's happened? I'll start a different way.
The cabinet in Israel is now a coalition of right wing parties. Netanyahu, who has been prime minister longer than any other prime minister in Israel, is now kind of the left wing of the cabinet. Not because
he changed any of his right wing policies, but because public opinion in Israel has moved so far to the right and the creation of new right wing parties has grown so much. That you now have this coalition
that's between the right, far right, extreme right, and what I will carefully call the fascist right. That's the alliance. His fear is not about the left. He's not concerned about the
labor party. He's worried about his right wing. He could be unseated. By the right, not the left. That's the political side. At the level of people, the polls all indicate that the younger you are, the further right you are. That the most progressive cohort is
the 65 and up. And then the next is the 55 to 65 and it is direct. And the most right wing are the kids. That's because Israel has an educational system that raises children to believe they are
victims and they have the right to fight back against anybody who attacks them because they are victims and therefore anything they do militarily is self-defense. There's no sense of challenge to the idea of living in a militarized society. That's the bad news.
>> Last question. >> Phyllis: Okay. You have to speak in close.
>> STUDENT: Okay. I like to consider myself an optimist. You talked about how human nature and morality will prevail. We said that in 2016. Look where that got us?
>> Phyllis: We didn't all say it. >> STUDENT: Well, what I'm wondering is - is there a solution to what you are saying here other than public revolution basically?
>> Phyllis: Yeah. Unfortunately I think things are bad enough in this country right now for an awful lot of people that's not something you can just sort of smile and dismiss and say that's ridiculous, you
know? I think it is still possible to reclaim periods of our history where democracy won out. Reverend Barber talks about the third period of reconstruction of the U.S.. It was a period of incredible
optimism and hope. After the Civil War when It was not just that the north won, but formerly enslaved people to have positions of power. You had people having the right to vote. It lasted -- I guess it was about
12 years or 15 years. Then there was a period this some ways like this period. Where you had a President who was elected without the popular vote who had lost the popular vote and was put in
office by the electoral college and proceeded to appoint a number of federal judges, including two on the Supreme Court who proceeded to dismantle the reconstruction. Within one year you had the rise
of the clan, the rise of killings and lynchings across the south and you had an end to the rights of black people to vote and the rights and the beginnings of Jim Crow's segregation. Which lasted until the second
reconstruction which was the civil rights movements in the '60s and '70s. The question is now what does it take to build the third reconstruction. I think there's room for optimism. It has to
be a wide-eyed, clear-eyed optimism that has no time for illusions. It is not going to be easy or happen quickly. It is not going to happen if we continue organizing in our silos.
If we're organizing in our own little movements, if we can't build the cross movement alliances - it won't happen at all. If we can, I think there's a chance. If we understand that
the links between fighting against police brutality and the black lives matter are linked with people fighting for LGBT rights and women's rights and environmental justice and against the war economy.
If those movements can come together, that's where we'll see the beginning of a third reconstruction.
(Applause)
>> Tom: Thank you, Miss Bennis, for a wonderful talk. Thank you all for coming. We have a little reception in the back room. There's a buffet. There's more goodies.
We can continue the conversation, maybe sell some books. She will be out there to sign them I'll remind you about tomorrow's event again. Mr. Nazar came all the way from Mendota Heights to
talk to you. I hope you come to hear him. I know he has a good deal to say. Thank you very much for coming. See you tomorrow night.
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