Episodes
Monday Dec 12, 2022
Monday Dec 12, 2022
The following is a presentation made at the 2015 Israel Lobby Con held at the National Press Club.
Miko Peled is an Israeli writer and activist living in the U.S. He was born and raised in Jerusalem. Driven by a personal family tragedy to explore Palestine, its people and their narrative, he has written a book about his journey called The General’s Son: Journey of an Israeli in Palestine. The book covers Peled’s family history since his grandparents immigrated to Palestine in the early 20th century.
Peled’s maternal grandfather was a signer of the Israeli Declaration of Independence; his father was a general in the Israeli army; in the 1970s his father pioneered the Israeli-Palestinian dialogue and eventually met with Yasser Arafat. In 1997 his sister lost her daughter in a suicide bombing in Jerusalem.
Peled is a contributor to several online publications that deal with the Middle East and authors a blog, mikopeled.com, dedicated to tearing down the separation wall, and advocating the creation of one democratic state with equal rights for Israelis and Palestinians. He travels regularly to Palestine/Israel, where he speaks and works with the popular resistance. Peled has been arrested several times by the Israeli authorities for his activities.
Educated in Israel, the UK, Japan and the United States, Peled holds a sixth-degree black belt in karate. For 23 years, he ran a martial arts school that was dedicated to teaching leadership skills and non-violent conflict resolution through martial arts. He also taught classes to Palestinian children in the West Bank.
Since 2015 the annual IsraelLobbyCon conference series at the National Press Club explores the latest research, innovations and tactics for countering the Israel lobby’s damaging policies in the U.S. and around the globe.
The conference is solely sponsored by the American Educational Trust, publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep).
Monday Dec 05, 2022
Monday Dec 05, 2022
The following is a presentation made at the 2015 Israel Lobby Con held at the National Press Club.
Ahmad Saadaldin is a filmmaker/producer, creative writer, actor, and grassroots organizer.
He is dedicated to sharing untold stories in order to raise awareness and create positive change. Through grassroots organizing and filmmaking, he does his best to bring attention to deserving topics.
Using Kickstarter, Saadaldin raised $84,000 to produce the historic epic television show “Salahadin.”
He produced and directed the short documentary “Refugees of Kurdistan” for Aljazeera’s English website with filmmaker Nick Armero.
As a public relations major at the University of South Florida, Saadaldin organized the largest grassroots campaign in the university’s history and collected more than 10,000 signatures calling on the school to divest endowment funds from corporations complicit in human rights violations (#USF4HumanRights).
Since 2015 the annual IsraelLobbyCon conference series at the National Press Club explores the latest research, innovations and tactics for countering the Israel lobby’s damaging policies in the U.S. and around the globe.
The conference is solely sponsored by the American Educational Trust, publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep).
Monday Nov 28, 2022
Monday Nov 28, 2022
The following is a presentation made at the 2015 Israel Lobby Con held at the National Press Club.
Dima Khalidi is the founder and Director of Palestine Solidarity Legal Support (PSLS), and Cooperating Counsel with the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR). Her work includes providing legal advice to activists, engaging in advocacy to protect their rights to speak out for Palestinian rights, and educating activists and the public about their rights.
Khalidi has a JD from DePaul University College of Law with a concentration in International Law, an MA in Comparative Legal Studies from the University of London – School of Oriental and African Studies, and a BA in History and Near Eastern Studies from the University of Michigan. Prior to founding PSLS, Khalidi worked with the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) as a cooperating attorney on the Mamilla Cemetery Campaign, drafting a petition to United Nations officials to act against the desecration of an ancient Muslim cemetery in Jerusalem.
As a volunteer and an intern at CCR, she also worked on numerous cases that sought to hold Israeli officials and corporations accountable for Israeli violations of international law, including Belhas v. Ya’alon; Matar et al. v. Dichter; and Corrie v. Caterpillar; as well as on CCR’s Guantanamo Bay docket. As a law student, she interned with the People’s Law Office in Chicago, helping win the acquittal of a Palestinian-American on major federal criminal charges. Prior to studying law, Khalidi worked at Birzeit University, heading a research project on the role of informal justice mechanisms in the Palestinian legal system. She has advocated on Palestinian rights issues in media forums such as the New York Times, the Jewish Press, The Real News Network, Mondoweiss, Huffington Post, Law and Disorder Radio, and Radio Tahrir. She is fluent in Arabic and French.
Since 2015 the annual IsraelLobbyCon conference series at the National Press Club explores the latest research, innovations and tactics for countering the Israel lobby’s damaging policies in the U.S. and around the globe.
The conference is solely sponsored by the American Educational Trust, publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep).
Monday Nov 21, 2022
Amani Al-Khatahtbeh: Daring to speak out on campus.
Monday Nov 21, 2022
Monday Nov 21, 2022
The following is a presentation made at the 2015 Israel Lobby Con held at the National Press Club.
Amani Alkhatahtbeh is the founding editor-in-chief of MuslimGirl.net, a blog aimed at eliminating stereotypes surrounding Islam and promoting the place of Muslim women in Western societies.
Alkhatahtbeh’s dedication to building bridges across different religious and cultural communities has been recognized in a New Jersey state resolution honoring the top community service pioneers in the state. She was a Lloyd Gardner Fellow and a Women’s Leadership Scholar at Rutgers University, where she conducted multiple independent studies on the Arab Spring and Middle Eastern politics. She ran into trouble with The Daily Targum, Rutgers University’s daily newspaper, and trustees, which decided that criticism of Israel is anti-Semitic.
Alkhatahtbeh is a blogger for the Atlantic Council, a foreign policy think tank in Washington, DC. In June 2014, the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee named her its media relations specialist. She is a regular speaker at events on political and social issues.
Since 2015 the annual IsraelLobbyCon conference series at the National Press Club explores the latest research, innovations and tactics for countering the Israel lobby’s damaging policies in the U.S. and around the globe.
The conference is solely sponsored by the American Educational Trust, publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep).
Monday Nov 14, 2022
Dr. Jack Shaheen: The use of cultural stereotypes to shape policy
Monday Nov 14, 2022
Monday Nov 14, 2022
The following is a presentation made at the 2015 Israel Lobby Con held at the National Press Club.
Internationally acclaimed author and media critic Dr. Jack G. Shaheen was a committed internationalist and a devoted humanist. His lectures and writings illustrate that damaging racial and ethnic stereotypes of Arabs, blacks, and others injure innocent people. He defines crude caricatures, explains why they persist, and provides workable solutions to help shatter misconceptions.
Dr. Shaheen was a distinguished visiting scholar at New York University (NYU), served as a CBS News Consultant on Middle East Affairs from 1993-98. As a professional film consultant, he has consulted with writers and producers such as writer-director Stephen Gaghan on Syriana (2005), and producer Chuck Roven on Three Kings (1999), as well as with Coca-Cola’s creative team. He is a 2013 recipient of the Ellis Island Medal of Honor, which pays homage to those individuals who have distinguished themselves in the cultural mosaic of America.
Shaheen gave more than 1,000 lectures in nearly all 50 states and on three continents. In cooperation with the U.S. government, Dr. Shaheen has conducted seminars throughout the Middle East. He also consulted with the United Nations, the Los Angeles Commission on Human Relations, the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, and New York City’s Commission on Civil Rights.
Shaheen’s book, A is for Arab: Archiving Stereotypes in U.S. Popular Culture, features telling photographs of materials from the Jack G. Shaheen Archive at NYU. His book and a special traveling exhibit documents U.S. popular culture representations of Arabs and Muslims from the early 20th century to the present. NYU’s Shaheen Archive contains more than 4,000 images, including motion pictures, cartoons,and TV programs, as well as toys and games featuring anti-Arab and anti-Muslim depictions.
His other books are: Nuclear War Films, The TV Arab, Arab and Muslim Stereotyping in American Popular Culture, the award-winning book [and DVD] Reel Bad Arabs: How Hollywood Vilifies a People, and GUILTY: Hollywood’s Verdict on Arabs after 9/11. His writings include 300-plus essays in publications such as Newsweek, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, as well as dozens of chapters on stereotypes in numerous college textbooks.
Dr. Shaheen, an Oxford Research Scholar, was the recipient of two Fulbright teaching awards; held degrees from the Carnegie Institute of Technology, Pennsylvania State University, and the University of Missouri. He appeared on national network programs such as CNN, MSNBC, National Public Radio, Nightline, Good Morning America, 48 Hours, and The Today Show.
Since 2015 the annual IsraelLobbyCon conference series at the National Press Club explores the latest research, innovations and tactics for countering the Israel lobby’s damaging policies in the U.S. and around the globe.
The conference is solely sponsored by the American Educational Trust, publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep).
Monday Nov 07, 2022
Dr. Alice Rothchild: Silencing voices that question Israeli actions.
Monday Nov 07, 2022
Monday Nov 07, 2022
Since 2015 the annual IsraelLobbyCon conference series at the National Press Club explores the latest research, innovations and tactics for countering the Israel lobby’s damaging policies in the U.S. and around the globe.
Alice Rothchild is a Boston-based physician, author and filmmaker who since 1997 has focused on human rights and social justice in the Israel/Palestine conflict. She graduated from Bryn Mawr College with a degree in psychology and studied medicine at Boston University, followed by a medical internship at Lincoln Hospital in the South Bronx, and an obstetrics and gynecology residency at Beth Israel Hospital in Boston. Her early political interests involved opposing the Vietnam War, and working for women’s reproductive rights and health care reform. She was involved in the first edition of Our Bodies Ourselves and practiced ob-gyn for over 30 years in the Boston area. Until her recent retirement she served as a Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Biology at Harvard University’s Faculty of Medicine.
In 2003 Dr. Rothchild began co-organizing health and human rights delegations to Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza. She writes and lectures widely and is the author of Broken Promises, Broken Dreams: Stories of Jewish and Palestinian Trauma and Resilience (Pluto Press, 2007, second edition 2010, translated into German and Hebrew), and On the Brink: Israel and Palestine on the Eve of the 2014 Gaza Invasion (Just World Books, 2014). She directed a powerful documentary film, “Voices Across the Divide,” which premiered at the 2013 Boston Palestine Film Festival.
Dr. Rothchild was named one of ten “Jewish Women to Watch” by Jewish Women International, and has won numerous awards. She is an active member of Jewish Voice for Peace, American Jews for a Just Peace, Workmen’s Circle Mideast Working Group, and the Gaza Mental Health Program.
The conference is solely sponsored by the American Educational Trust, publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep).
Monday Oct 31, 2022
Monday Oct 31, 2022
The following is a presentation made at the 2015 Israel Lobby Con held at the National Press Club.
Jeffrey Blankfort is a photojournalist and radio host. His articles have appeared in CounterPunch, Dissident Voice, Mondoweiss, Pulse Media, Left Curve, the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs and the Encyclopedia of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict.
Since the 1960s his photographs have appeared in major publications in the U.S. and around the world. During this past Black History Month, an exhibit of his photos of the Black Panthers from 1968 and Palestinians taken from 1970 to 2004 was on display at the African American Art and Cultural Complex in San Francisco. It was his first trip to Lebanon and Jordan in 1970 to take photos for a book on the Palestinian struggle (Palestine: the Arab-Israeli Conflict, Ramparts Press, 1972) that led to his involvement in their cause.
Blankfort became a founding member of the November 29th Committee on Palestine and a co-founder of the Labor Committee on the Middle East, and was editor of its publication, The Middle East Labor Bulletin (1988-1995).
He currently hosts a twice-monthly program on international affairs for KZYX, the public radio station for Mendocino County in Northern California where he now lives.
Since 2015 the annual IsraelLobbyCon conference series at the National Press Club explores the latest research, innovations and tactics for countering the Israel lobby’s damaging policies in the U.S. and around the globe.
The conference is solely sponsored by the American Educational Trust, publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep).
Monday Oct 24, 2022
Monday Oct 24, 2022
The following is a presentation made at the 2015 Israel Lobby Con held at the National Press Club.
Seth Morrison has held leadership posts in various local, regional and national Jewish organizations, starting in college as a youth leader in Young Judea. He is currently active in Jewish Voice for Peace, serving on the DC Metro Chapter Steering Committee and on the national Congressional Outreach Committee.
In 2011, Morrison resigned from the Washington, DC Board of the Jewish National Fund in protest over Israel’s repeated evictions of Palestinians from their homes in East Jerusalem.
He chaired the Washington, DC Metro Chapter of J Street in 2013 before becoming active in the BDS movement. His op-eds supporting Palestinian and Bedouin rights have been published in The Forward, The Jerusalem Post and +972 Magazine.
Professionally, Morrison is a consultant specializing in marketing and strategic planning for both for- and non-profit organizations. Previously he was the SVP & General Manager of CTAM, a trade association serving the cable television industry. As a marketer, Morrison has been responsible for major local and national marketing, PR and social media campaigns for the cable television industry and non-profit organizations.
Since 2015 the annual IsraelLobbyCon conference series at the National Press Club explores the latest research, innovations and tactics for countering the Israel lobby’s damaging policies in the U.S. and around the globe.
The conference is solely sponsored by the American Educational Trust, publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep).
Monday Oct 17, 2022
Monday Oct 17, 2022
The following is a presentation made at the 2015 Israel Lobby Con held at the National Press Club.
Grant F. Smith is the director of the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep) in Washington, DC. He is the author of two unofficial histories about the American Israel Public Affairs Committee–America’s Defense Line: The Justice Department’s Battle to Register the Israel Lobby as Agents of a Foreign Government and Foreign Agents: AIPAC from the 1963 Fulbright Hearings to the 2005 Espionage Scandal. Smith is also the author of the books Divert!, Spy Trade, Deadly Dogma and Visa Denied, and editor of the book Neocon Middle East Policy.
Jeff Stein of The Washington Post designated Smith “a Washington, DC author who has made a career out of writing critical books on Israeli spying and lobbying.” Nathan Guttman of The Jewish Daily Forward recognizes Smith as leading a public effort to “call attention of the authorities to AIPAC’s activity and [demand] public scrutiny of the group’s legal status.”
Smith has initiated lawsuits against the Department of Defense and Central Intelligence Agency under the Freedom of Information Act for public release of files officially acknowledging Israel’s clandestine nuclear weapons program and unprosecuted weapons-grade uranium diversions from the United States.
Since 2015 the annual IsraelLobbyCon conference series at the National Press Club explores the latest research, innovations and tactics for countering the Israel lobby’s damaging policies in the U.S. and around the globe.
The conference is solely sponsored by the American Educational Trust, publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep).
Thursday Jun 09, 2022
Thursday Jun 09, 2022
The following is a presentation made at the 2022 Transcending the Israel lobby at Home & Abroad conference held on March 4 at the National Press Club.
Roger Waters is an English rock musician, singer-songwriter and composer best known for his work with the legendary rock band Pink Floyd. Over the last few years, he has emerged as one of the world’s most prominent advocates for Palestinian human rights and a cultural boycott of Israel.
In June 2009, Waters spoke against the wall Israel built on Palestinian land. Later that year he pledged his support to the Gaza Freedom March. In 2011, Waters announced that he had joined the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement in solidarity with Palestinians. He has said he is disillusioned with UK foreign policy toward Israel.
After accusations lodged by the Anti-Defamation League and other Israel advocacy organizations, Waters responded that, "I deplore the policies of the Israeli government in the occupied territories and Gaza. They are immoral, inhuman and illegal. I will continue my non-violent protests as long as the government of Israel continues with these policies. ...It is difficult to make arguments to defend the Israeli government's policies, so would-be defenders often use a diversionary tactic, they routinely drag the critic into a public arena and accuse them of being an anti-Semite.”
Waters has also long campaigned for five indigenous groups and 80 farmer communities in Ecuador fighting energy giant Chevron’s destruction of the environment.
Since 2015 the annual IsraelLobbyCon conference series at the National Press Club explores the latest research, innovations and tactics for countering the Israel lobby’s damaging policies in the U.S. and around the globe. See https://www.IsraelLobbyCon.org for more information.