28 November 2025
The first was with podcaster Mahmood OD, a Palestinian born in Haifa and a supporter of a one-state solution, with equal rights for all.
On his YouTube channel, Mahmood provides daily briefings on the situation across the region, using his knowledge of Hebrew and Arabic media to provide in-depth analysis of current events.
The second was with the Makdisi Street podcast.
The video of my interview with Mahmood OD is at the top of this page and the Makdisi Street video is below.
Covering Palestine
In my conversation with Mahmood, we talked about the roots of The Electronic Intifada in early internet journalism and activism by Palestinians in the 1990s.
In those early days, we were mostly doing media criticism because all we had were the same biased sources – BBC, CNN, NPR, The New York Times – and we had to push back.
Eventually we realized we didn’t need permission to tell our own stories, so we began reporting directly.
I also spoke about both sides of my family living through the Nakba – my father’s village of Battir in the West Bank and my mother’s village Lifta, which was one of the first to be ethnically cleansed in early 1948.
These histories shaped me and with Israel’s ongoing genocidal violence across Palestine, they remind us that the Nakba has never ended.
We talked about why covering Palestinian resistance is essential – not to cheerlead, but to report reality as it is, not as Israeli or Western propaganda presents it.
Insisting on Palestinian rights and refusing to toe official lines inevitably brings about repression as I experienced.
I talked about my arrest in Switzerland in January – being ambushed in the street, thrown into an unmarked car, jailed, deported and used as an example to intimidate others.
It is part of a wider pattern in Europe and North America where governments are copying Israeli methods to silence critics.
In the end, Mahmood asked about the one-state solution.
I told him I still believe in a single democratic and decolonized state with equal rights for everyone, because that represents my fundamental values.
But amid this genocide, it’s much harder to imagine. Accountability is essential: There has to be justice for the victims. Israel’s enormous crimes and the role of so many ordinary Israelis in them cannot just be overlooked. It is hard to see Israeli Jewish society ever accepting the concept of equality.
As bleak as things look on the ground in Palestine, the changes in global public consciousness, especially among young people, suggest we’ve reached a point of no return – a theme explored further in my conversation with the Makdisi brothers.
Anti-imperialism abroad, solidarity at home
In my conversation on Makdisi Street, brothers and academics Saree Makdisi, Ussama Makdisi and Karim Makdisi also asked me about the roots of my work.I talked about arriving in the US from Europe as a student more than three decades ago and being stunned by how distorted the coverage of Palestine was – and how the early internet opened a door for Palestinians to connect and organize.
A big part of our discussion was why mainstream US media have actually become worse over the years in their treatment of Palestine. Even as recently as 10 years ago, people like me could still appear on mainstream Western media, but especially since 7 October 2023, we’ve been almost completely shut out.
I argued that it is not simply bias or ignorance. Rather, these outlets operate as part of the US imperial propaganda system: Their job is to reinforce official narratives, not challenge them.
That’s why, even though public opinion has shifted dramatically – especially among young people all across the West – political and media elites have barely moved.
A majority in the US now opposes further military and economic aid to Israel for the first time.
But as public opinion changes, elites – feeling they are losing their grip – are resorting to ever more direct repression and censorship in an effort to shore up the status quo.
Recording on the eve of his victory in the New York City mayoral race earlier this month, we also talked about Zohran Mamdani’s rise and what it signals. His popularity shows just how much the ground has shifted, even if anyone entering the political system faces intense pressure to compromise.
Whether he can keep pushing from within remains to be seen, but the fact that someone so openly critical of US policy toward Israel can gain such traction is significant.
The title of the episode – “Anti-imperialism with solidarity at home” – stems from my claim that there is a huge constituency for a politics that combines opposition to US aggression abroad with support for social solidarity and economic equality within the United States.However, this agenda is not being reflected by any major parties or politicians, including by “progressives” who may advocate for more economic justice within the US, but consistently fail to oppose US wars and intervention around the world.
From there, we got into the unusual cracks appearing on the American right, where some prominent conservatives – particularly Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene and broadcaster Tucker Carlson – have become harshly critical of US support for Israel.
Their motives vary, but the fact this debate exists at all shows how fast the old consensus is unraveling.
By the end, we were asking whether we’re living through what historian Ilan Pappé calls the terminal phase of Zionism.
I said yes – and the Makdisi brothers largely agreed – not because it will come easily, but because the tight narrative control Israel depended on for decades has collapsed and that has to have real-world political consequences.
Israel’s ongoing genocide has opened too many eyes to the truth and – despite the escalating repression – there can be no going back.
Add new comment