Here's a personal thread about the very strong, complex emotions that I struggled with all of last week, since we watched Assad fall and Syria rise: (I've been working with my team on building systems that would enable me to post new content consistently & sustainably, and on multiple platforms. But I couldn't focus. I had to stop & check-in with myself. So let me acknowledge these emotions)

Israel's immediate reaction to the fall of the Assad regime is mass bombardment of Syrian army bases and expansion into Syrian territory. This tells you two things: First: Israel saw no security threat from Assad's regime - they had a tacit understanding and Assad always stayed within the lines. So long Assad was in power, Israel had no need to take out his weapons depots or aircraft fleets, or to create a further buffer zone.

The rupture in international solidarity communities (that tried to integrate Western + Global South activists) is deep. The rupture in the small Israeli-Palestinian solidarity communities is catastrophic. It'll take a decade to fix what happened in the last two months, if at all. I'm starting to become convinced that many movements will not survive this and will have to be mourned and laid to rest, and new movements built out of what remains. Built on better principles, with more moral courage and clearer-eyed vision.

Here's a thread about the concept of indigeneity in historical Palestine and its implications in light of Zionist settler-colonialism and the persecution of the Palestinians. You may want to bookmark this for whenever someone screams "but Jews are indigenous to the land!" 🧵 Note: This thread is not an attack on Jewish life in the Middle East. It's an analytical critique of the narratives used. My argument is that indigeneity is not an appropriate framing to use in the Israel-Palestine context, but especially when used (aggressively) by Zionists

A long thread about colonialism, decolonization, what models can & can't work, and why the Israel-Palestine context is unique. I wish people would slow-read this because many are walking around with outdated models, and may be causing damage 🧵 Caveat: I wrote this as a stream of consciousness with minimum editing so please forgive me if this ends up being meandering or repetitive or choppy. I just find that I write more powerfully and authentically when I'm not trying to edit anything or make it sound good

A lot has been said recently about what Islam allows or prohibits in war so I thought I'd clarify this: In Islam the distinction is not "civilian vs military"; it's "combatant vs non-combatant". Here's a quick explanation In the classical Islamic era, the distinction of civilian vs non-civilian didn't exist. Neither the Prophet nor his tribal adversaries had standing armies made up of full-time soldiers. Armies at the time were made of men of fighting age who otherwise were traders, farmers, etc.

So many people seem to lack basic reading comprehension. You say Palestinian children should live, they think you say you want Israeli children to die. You say Palestinians are oppressed, they think you say you want to kill Jews. So tragic that this has become a real zero-sum. These people aren't exactly imbeciles, mind you. Some are highly educated. I'm talking PhDs, scholars, journalists, business leaders. They don't really lack basic reading comprehension. No, they can read. They just will only understand what they want to understand.

Something scary happens when people no longer feel they can convince or engage the other side; when they feel the other side is a moral lost cause and there isn't any space of possible agreement between your minimum position and their maximum, or your maximum and their minimum Something scary happens when you stop trying to speak to people's minds or hearts or consciences because you feel it's useless. You then retreat into your identity, you become insular, you keep only to your own "kind" and your own community, and you listen only to your own story

Whenever I tweet about the immense suffering being inflicted on Gaza, I get replies from pro-Israel accounts demanding that Hamas release the hostages. Here's a quick rundown of what's happening on that front. Tl;dr: Netanyahu doesn't care about the hostages Hamas has already offered to release all hostages weeks ago. An "everyone for everyone" deal was placed on the table via Qatari mediation (all Palestinians held by Israel in return for all Israelis held by Hamas). But Netanyahu never accepted it axios.com/2023/10/30/ham…

I feel like when it comes to emotionally charged topics, most people, including highly educated people, only understand what they want to understand. They only understand what confirms their biases. This is a huge reason why disinformation and propaganda continues to works. It takes courage to stand up to our own biases, and some highly educated people are, intellectually and emotionally, fucking cowards. I feel like everyone can be smart, it's just that people make themselves stupid because emotional comfort is more important to them than truth.

Alright, since you decided to ask me, I'll tell you why the same guy you praise for "wonderful analysis" also concludes, based on the facts & evidence, that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza:

https://twitter.com/IsabellaPfaff/status/1724053824761925700

There are multiple definitions of genocide, but the most widely cited is the 2002 Rome Statute's, which established the International Criminal Court (ICC). Around 120 countries are signatories (notably the US and Israel still refuse to sign it):

Since many are asking such questions, I'm going to answer. I'm assuming the questions are being asked in good faith and by people who are not malicious but misinformed

https://twitter.com/PhilipRSchiff/status/1719365495806206078

Hamas should release the hostages. Israel should also release Palestinian hostages it holds. Israel has legalized the holding of Palestinians as hostages; this isn't me saying it but Israeli human rights organization @btselem

https://twitter.com/muhammadshehad2/status/1711055986977358084

It's hard to describe how anguished and triggered I am by the videos of Israeli soldiers & settlers torturing and humiliating Palestinians in the West Bank. It immediately triggered ugly, painful, dark memories from Abu Ghraib from 20 years ago. It was Abu Ghraib that radicalized a much younger Iyad, twenty years ago. A whole new generation is being radicalized right now, and it will take many, many years to undo this damage, if at all.

https://twitter.com/iyad_elbaghdadi/status/1321855322760355841

A couple days ago I posted this about the geopolitical context of the Israel-Gaza war. I promised to answer question in another thread and here it is. This will also be another a pretty long thread, here we go:

https://twitter.com/iyad_elbaghdadi/status/1716532694564127072

I want to start by thanking everyone for their engagement & their questions. I'm particularly grateful that the thread *did* change some minds. I try not to preach to the choir and to write so that everyone, pro-Palestinian or not, will read. I hope others take note, this isn't a popularity contest where you try to say whatever is most extreme in order to get followers. You speak in order to be heard.

Here's a thread outlining the geopolitical situation around the Israel-Gaza war its possibilities, impossibilities, and possible outcomes. Heads up, it's my longest thread yet. It's also raw, unedited, and unevenly paced. Sorry, none of us are well but at least we're trying A note that this thread rhetorically departs from my usual tone because it's about geopolitics. I'm analyzing the actions of many actors the majority of whom are awful. I'm trying to do that from a position of objectivity, which is hard when you actually value all human life.

Good afternoon (or morning, or evening). I went dark yesterday, really dark. But I managed to sleep and I have some clarity about the Al Ahli hospital massacre that I want to share with you. I'll only tweet this rambling thread today and then log off. Please read and share. I want to first thank everyone who checked on me. A Palestinian friend thanked me for openly saying that I'm struggling, she sounded like she's struggling even more than me. Remember, it's okay not to be okay. It's okay to reach out for help. There's a lot of love out there.

I was just notified that I have been granted Norwegian citizenship. For the first time in my life, I am no longer stateless. My great-grandfather, grandfather, and father were all stateless Palestinians. I'm now Norwegian. And forever Palestinian 🇵🇸🇳🇴 As soon as I receive my passport, I'll be able to travel and see my family. I've been separated from them since 2019 in the aftermath of the death threats I received from Mohammad bin Salman following the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. bbc.com/news/world-mid…

The people who want soft apartheid are rebelling against the people who want hard apartheid

https://twitter.com/ashoswai/status/1640096731877580801

Reminder that a majority of those in those streets were totally okay with maintaining a 75 year old apartheid regime. Reminder that the majority of them want equality only for Jews, democracy only for Jews, meanwhile they're totally fine with subjugation for Palestinians.

Tl;dr - what's happening in Israel isn't a "revolution". Rather, a new elite have taken hold of the levers of power, and the old elite are rebelling as they watch their power wane. With this, Israel's self-described* identity goes from "liberal, secular" to religious-nationalist. Note the placard above, "our second war of independence". Reminder that their "first war of independence" was our Nakba, our ethnic cleansing. Maybe Ben Gvir is right when he says his version of Zionism is "real" Zionism, unapologetic Zionism. It doesn't pretend to be "liberal".

Palestinian leaders* need to provide not just strategic but also moral leadership. Instead, most are led by the crowd and succumb to populism, instead of telling their people the truth. Both the strategic truth and the moral truth. I get that Israel-Palestine exists in a very distorted moral landscape*, one in which it's not simple to know what is or isn't "right". I also get that it wasn't us who distorted this moral landscape, it was our colonizers and their allies who did through their racism & hypocrisy

So I asked this question yesterday and got a lot of quality replies. Here are some random reflections (that nobody should take seriously):

https://twitter.com/iyad_elbaghdadi/status/1612515319020412934

Some people pointed to historical events: Industrial revolution, development of agriculture, end of ice age etc. But these events were not sudden, they took anywhere from a couple hundred to several thousand years. Also, agriculture/industrial revolution were initially localized.