"Listen to the Children of Gaza" was the title of her talk in which she speaks about her interactions with children in Gaza over the years she has reported on the Israeli Occupation of Palestine and of how some children deal with the trauma of war and occupation and at what cost to their family. Gazans form a community whose spirit and energy Amira comments on and much admires as it is unlike that of other Palestinians in the West Bank.
Israel, she says, is not the model that many American Jews have been propagandized to hold it up to be. She challenges the notion of loyalty to Israel or any State whose existence requires the negation of an other's human rights or one's moral principles. In response to several audience members, she contests charges, while acknowledging Israel's racist brutality and colonial settler reality, that it is practicing genocide against the Palestinians, such as that the United States did to its' indigenous peoples.
Israeli participation in the Oslo Plan, she says, was always fraudulent and deceitful. It was the "generous offer" of the Palestinians that was rejected by Israeli leaders in order to prevent the possibility of peaceful relations between the two Peoples.
She also speaks about fake news and false analysis that is common in Israeli press reports about Palestinians and to what end it serves.
Amira Hass brings a fresh and much needed insight to past, present and future of Palestinian-Israeli relations. She draws on 30 years experience as an Israeli journalist and analyst who has sought and achieved unparalleled immersion in Palestinian communities in the West Bank and Gaza.
Broadway United Methodist Church Chicago Gay Liberation Network Committee for a Just Peace in Israel and Palestine American Friends Service Committee
Rabbi Michael Davis and Jehad Abusalim, AFSC-Chicago, gave responses to Amira Hass. They were off mic and lost to my recording but reflected in her comments during the Q&A. I have parsed questions from the audience which though difficult to hear in the recording, are referenced in her response.
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