Date:

April 7, 2021

The Arab Uprisings Revisited
    
Today on Arab Voices, we will air the remarks delivered at “The Arab Uprisings Revisited” event held in January 2021 at the Baker Institute for Public Policy. It was a two-part series event sponsored by the Baker Institute Center for the Middle East. Experts examined the legacy of the Arab uprisings that started 10 years ago and their impact across the region today. The first panel discussion focused on youth, protests and governance, and that is what we are going to air today.
 
The event was moderated by Dr. Kelsey Norman, fellow for the Middle East, and Director of the Women's Rights, Human Rights & Refugees Program at the Baker Institute for Public Policy.
 
The speakers were Sunil John, Founder of ASDA'A BCW and President of Middle East for BCW, Dr. Amaney Jamal, Edwards S. Sanford Professor of Politics at Princeton University and Director of Mamdouha S. Bobst Center for Peace and Justice, and Dr. Shibley Telhami, Anwar Sadat Professor for Peace and Development at the University of Maryland and Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution.

Date:

March 31, 2021

Yemen: Six Years of War
    
Today on Arab Voices, we will air the remarks delivered at the Yemen: Six Years of War event held on March 26, 2021.
 
The speakers were Dr. Aisha Jumaan with Yemen Relief and Reconstruction Foundation, Mohamed Alwazir with Arabian Rights Watch Association, Dr. Shireen Aladeimi, Yemeni-American Activist and Professor, Medea Benjamin with CODEPINK, and Hassan El-Tayyab with Friends Committee On National Legislation.
 
Topics discussed: Why the war on Yemen continues, the Humanitarian Crisis in Yemen: Impact on Population's Health, the latest peace initiatives, the blockade as it relates to the prospects for peace in Yemen, the US role on the war on Yemen, what you can do to be part of the anti-war movement to make real change, and more.
 
The event was hosted by Yemeni Alliance Committee, Massachusetts Peace Action, CODEPINK: Women For Peace, SF Bay Anti-War, DSA International Committee, Students for Yemen, and Democratic Socialists of America: San Francisco.

Date:

March 24, 2021

Stop Asian Hate
    
Today on Arab Voices, and in solidarity with the Asian-American Pacific Islander (AAPI) community, we will share various remarks and statements from various organizations regarding the increase in discrimination and hate crimes against the Asian-American Pacific Islander community in the United States. According to Stop AAPI Hate, at least 3,800 hate incidents were reported against Asian-Americans and Pacific Islanders nationwide over the past year.
    
We will share statements and remarks from The Arab American Cultural and Community Center (ACC), The Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC), The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), and The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). 
   
We will also air some of the remarks delivered at the "Stop Asian Hate" vigil and rally held in Houston on March 20, 2021, hosted by OCA-Greater Houston, an organization that works to advance the social, political, and economic well-being of Asian Pacific Americans. We will listen to Audrey Pan with OCA-Greater Houston, Ayda Pinardag with Asians Against Domestic Abuse, Eti Gulati with March For Our Lives Houston, Liz Peterson with Houston Coalition Against Hate, Angela Johnson with Texas Organizing Project, Joseph Say with Our Revolution Brazoria, Brandon Mack with Black Lives Matter Houston, Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee, Congressman Al Green, Congresswoman Sylvia Garcia, Congresswoman Lizzie Fletcher, and Texas Representative Gene Wu.

Date:

March 17, 2021

Kathy Kelly
    
She is a long-time peace activist and author. She is former Co-Coordinator of Voices for Creative Nonviolence, founder of Voices in the Wilderness, and previously served as coordinator of Iraq Peace Team. At times, her activism has led her to war zones and prisons. Kathy had visited Iraq many times, as well as Afghanistan and the occupied Palestinian territories. In 2011, she was a passenger on the “Audacity to Hope” as part of the US Boat to Gaza project. She also attempted to reach Gaza by flying from Athens to Tel Aviv, as part of the Welcome to Palestine effort, but the Israeli government deported her back to Greece. Kathy Kelly, along with other Voices activists formed 70 delegations that openly defied economic sanctions by bringing medicines to children and families in Iraq. She and her companions lived in Baghdad throughout the 2003 “Shock and Awe” bombing. Kelly has also joined with activists in various regions of the country to protest U.S. drone warfare by holding demonstrations outside of U.S. military bases. In 1988, she was sentenced to one year in federal prison for planting corn on nuclear missile silo sites, and spent three months in prison in 2004 for crossing the line at Fort Benning’s military training school. Kelly is also author of the book "Other Lands Have Dreams: from Baghdad to Pekin Prison", and has been repeatedly nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.
 
We will speak with Kathy Kelly about the wars on Iraq that started over 30 years ago (this week marks the start of the 2003 war on Iraq), the ongoing suffering of the Iraqi people as a result of these wars, holding those accountable for the crimes committed against the Iraqi people, and finding ways to atone for war crimes, including reparations.
 

"Rachel Corrie Slated for Demolition" by Amber Poole & State Dept. response to ICC Investigation
    
This week also marks the 18th anniversary of the murder of Rachel Corrie, a U.S. peace activist who was crushed to death by the Israeli occupation in the occupied Gaza Strip in Palestine on March 16, 2003. On that day, Rachel Corrie was protesting the demolition of a Palestinian home when an Israeli bulldozer crushed her to death. In her memory, we will air a special prose by Amber Poole titled "Rachel Corrie Slated for Demolition".
   
We will also air the response of the US State Department to the International Criminal Court (ICC) about its decision to launch an investigation into Israeli war crimes in the occupied Palestinian territories, and how the spokesperson handled a question from a journalist about where should the Palestinians go if not to the ICC.

Date:

March 10, 2021

"Colonial Christianity: Doctrine of Discovery and Christian Zionism"
  
This is a talk by Erica Littlewolf and Jonathan Brenneman delivered at a convention organized by the Mennonite Church USA. It explores the parallels between European colonialism of North America and the Israeli occupation, as well as the underlying Christian theology that supports both. It will connect the histories and current events of these parallels yet unique situations.
 
Jonathan Brenneman is a Palestinian-American Christian activist, who used to be coordinator of Israel/Palestine Partners in Peacemaking for Mennonite Church USA, and is currently FOSNA's communications manager.
 
Erica Littlewolf (born on the Northern Cheyenne reservation to a Native American father and European/Jewish mother) is Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) Central States Indigenous Vision Circle coordinator.

Date:

March 3, 2021

1st Segment: Part 2 of 2: Q&A session that followed Marc Lamont Hill's Houston Talk
    
Last week on Arab Voices, we aired the remarks of Dr. Marc Lamont Hill delivered at the University of Houston on Black-Palestinian solidarity and some of the questions and answers that followed his talk. Since then, Arab Voices received several requests from listeners asking us to air the remaining questions and answers, so today, we will do so. The remaining questions asked of Marc Lamont Hill were on Black internationalism, capitalism, US-Israeli relations, Israel's influence on American politics, US decisions to move its embassy to Jerusalem and cut UNRWA funding, settlement expansion and changing facts on the ground, the role of the media in social movements, nations rights and people’s rights to exist, effect of Donald Trump on destabilizing the Middle East, the two-state solution, how to challenge imperialism and white supremacy on college campuses, reviving the anti-war movement, how to tie college campus and community organizing, BDS movement, the struggle for liberation, solidarity politics, and more.
 
The Q&A session also includes a few remarks from Dr. Abdel Razzaq Takriti, Historian, Associate Professor, the inaugural holder of the Arab-American Educational Foundation Chair in Modern Arab History, and the Founding Director of the Center for Arab Studies at the University of Houston, and his question on the history of the Palestinian revolution and other liberation struggle.
 

2nd Segment: Abby Martin on "Truth Behind SNL’s Controversial Israel Joke"
    
We will air Abby Martin's response to the outcry against Michael Che's joke that aired during the February 20, 2021 episode of Saturday Night Live about medical apartheid in Israel, where he said "Israel is reporting that they've vaccinated half of their population. I'm gonna guess it's the Jewish half.".
 
Abby Martin is Director and Creator of The Empire Files, journalist, filmmaker, and former teleSUR presenter. In 2020, she filed a federal free speech lawsuit against Georgia's unconstitutional "anti-BDS" law.

Date:

February 24, 2021

Part 1 of 2: Marc Lamont Hill's Houston Talk
    
Today on Arab Voices, we will air the remarks of Dr. Marc Lamont Hill delivered at the University of Houston on Black-Palestinian solidarity in April 2019 at an event organized by Defend Our Voice, a coalition of multiple student organizations at the University of Houston. These remarks were never aired before, so you get to hear them for the first time. We will also air a few of the questions and answers that followed his talk. At that event, Dr. Marc Lamont Hill talked about activism, his speech at the United Nations, his firing from CNN, his visit to occupied Palestine and what he witnessed there, differential treatment of Palestinians in Israel, life under Israeli occupation, criticism of human rights violations, criticism of Israel, anti-Semitism, the Afro-Palestinian community, and more.
 
Dr. Marc Lamont Hill is an academic, author, activist, and television personality. He is a Professor of Media Studies and Urban Education at Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was the host of the syndicated television show Our World with Black Enterprise, and hosts the online Internet-based HuffPost Live. He is also a BET News correspondent, and a former political commentator for CNN and Fox News.
 
In November 2018, Dr. Marc Lamont Hill was fired from his position as a commentator for CNN, one day after he spoke at the United Nations at a special meeting of the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, in which he called for equal rights for all in historic Palestine.
 
Dr. Marc Lamont Hill has a new book co-authored with Mitchell Plitnick titled "Except for Palestine: The Limits of Progressive Politics".
 
 
KPFT continues its Winter Membership Drive and Arab Voices needs your support. Please consider a contribution to support KPFT by calling 713-526-5738 or do it online at www.kpft.org.

Date:

February 17, 2021

KPFT experienced power outage due to the severe winter storm in Houston. As a result, Arab Voices did not air on February 17. Our next show will be on Wednesday, February 24.
 
It is Winter Membership Drive for KPFT and Arab Voices needs your support. Please consider a contribution to support KPFT by calling 713-526-5738 or do it online at www.kpft.org.

Date:

February 10, 2021

It is Winter Membership Drive for KPFT and Arab Voices needs your support. Please consider a contribution to support KPFT by calling 713-526-5738 or do it online at www.kpft.org.
 
Today on Arab Voices, we will air some recordings and interviews conducted previously covering various topics with distinguished guests about Bahrain and United Arab Emirates normalization with Israel, Yemen, Iraq, and Palestine:
 
Reverend Erica Williams, Social Justice Activist with Black Christians for Palestine, message delivered at a meeting at the United Nations Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People.
 
A portion of an interview conducted previously with Dr. Khalil Jahshan, Palestinian-American political analyst and media commentator, who serves as the Executive Director of the Arab Center Washington D.C., about why Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates normalized relations with Israel.
 
A portion of an interview conducted previously with Dr. Shireen Al-Adeimi, an assistant professor of education at Michigan State University, about the war on Yemen.
 
A portion of Dr. Sinan Antoon's talk on "Iraq Afterwards: Epistemic Violence and Poetic (In)Justice" delivered at the University of Houston at an event sponsored by The Center for Arab Studies and the Arab-American Educational Foundation Chair in Modern Arab History at the University of Houston.

Date:

February 3, 2021

1^st Segment: Black History Month: “Amanda Gorman Looks for Change” & “The Hill We Climb”
February is Black History Month, and today we will air Dr. Synnika Lofton’s latest Topical Poem of the Week episode “Amanda Gorman Looks For Change”, where he lifts up the youngest inaugural poet African-American Amanda Gorman, who performed her poem, "The Hill We Climb" at the inauguration of President Joe Biden. We will also air Amanda Gorman’s "The Hill We Climb" poem.
 
2nd Segment: Spoken Words on Yemen by Artist Esa Mighty
We will air spoken words on Yemen from Yemeni-American Artist Esa Mighty. He delivered the spoken words at “The World Says No to War on Yemen Global Online Rally” held on January 25, 2021, and attended by thousands of people from around the globe.
 
3rd Segment: Spying on Muslim & Arab Americans
We will air a special episode from Still Spying Podcast titled Spying on Muslim & Arab Americans. It is a conversation with Abdeen Jabara, a longtime civil rights attorney, past president of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, and former board member of the Center for Constitutional Rights, who not only fought against surveillance and discrimination on behalf of others, he himself was spied on by the FBI and the NSA.
 
Since 9/11, the FBI has subjected the Muslim, Arab, and South Asian communities to surveillance. Sending infiltrators and confidential informants into mosques and other community spaces absent any evidence of criminal wronging, it’s clear that for the FBI race, religion, and national origin are inherently suspicious in the War on Terror. However, the FBI’s history of targeting Muslim and Arab Americans goes back long before 9/11. As early as 1972, Richard Nixon had ordered mass surveillance of Arab Americans as part of “Operation Boulder.”     

Date:

January 27, 2021

The World Says No to War on Yemen - Global Online Rally
    
Today on Arab Voices, we will air most of the remarks delivered at "The World Says No to War on Yemen - Global Online Rally" held on Monday, January 25, 2021, and attended by thousands of people from around the globe.
 
Over 300 organizations from 28 countries have also signed the call to action against the war on Yemen, making it the biggest international anti-war co-ordination since the campaign against the Iraq war.
 
The remarks we will air are from prominent voices that participated from different countries to speak out against the catastrophic war in Yemen. We will listen to Apsana Begum, Member of the British Parliament, Lindsey German with Stop the War Coalition, Yanis Varoufakis, with DiEM25 in Europe, Ahmed Al-Babati, British-Yemeni Soldier, Dr. Cornel West, an American philosopher, political activist, social critic, author, and public intellectual, Kate Hudson, General Secretary of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, Congressman Ro Khanna, John Finucane, Sinn Féin Member of the Parliament, Daniele Obono, Member of the French National Assembly, Dr. Shireen Aladeimi, Yemeni-American Activist and Professor, and Jeremy Corbyn, a lifelong campaigner for peace and justice, holding roles in the Anti-Apartheid Movement, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, and Stop the War Coalition. Jeremy served as Leader of the British Labour Party and Leader of the Opposition from 2015 to 2020.

Date:

January 20, 2021

1^st Segment: Chip Gibbons
    
An expert on US Constitutional law, journalist, researcher, and a longtime activist. He is the Policy Director of Defending Rights & Dissent. Chip has led a successful campaign to defeat a proposed unconstitutional anti-boycott bill in Maryland. He has advised both state and federal lawmakers on the First Amendment implications of pending legislation. His work has appeared in Jacobin, In These Times, and The Nation. Chip authored the report "Still Spying on Dissent: The Enduring Legacy of FBI First Amendment Abuse".
 
We will speak with Chip about the new proposed “domestic terrorism” legislation, what it means, why it would make things worse, the FBI's "terrorism investigations" into nonviolent groups while failing to thwart attacks by others, state surveillance powers, and more.
 
Gibbon's organization, Defending Rights & Dissent, is one of 137 civil and human rights organizations that are opposing the new domestic terrorism legislation.
     

2^nd Segment: Jehan Hakim
    
Yemeni American based in California, and Chair of the Yemeni Alliance Committee, which advocates for ending the US support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen by raising awareness and pushing legislation. Previously, she served as the Community Advocate with Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Asian Law Caucus to support communities through educational programs, community organizing initiatives and empowerment and advocacy, and also served with the American Association of Yemeni Students and Professionals.
      
We will speak with Jehan about the crisis in Yemen, the ongoing war and genocide in Yemen, the upcoming World Says No to War on Yemen Global Day of Action scheduled for January 25, 2021, the Biden administration’s stance towards the war on Yemen, how to stop it, and more.

Date:

January 13, 2021

1^st Segment: Remarks & Commentary on last week's attack on the U.S. Capitol
    
We will talk about last week's disastrous event at the U.S. Capitol during the certification proceedings of President-elect Joe Biden, and will share statements and comments from a few organizations and individuals, including a statement and community advisory by the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), statement from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR National), and a community safety alert issued by the local chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR Houston), statement from the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC), commentary from James Zogby, President of the Arab American Institute (AAI), and latest commentary from Sahar Aziz, Professor of Law and Chancellor's Social Justice Scholar & Director of the Center for Security, Race, and Rights at Rutgers University Law School on "The FBI's Racialized Priorities Endangered Our Democracy". In that commentary, Aziz analyzes past week's siege on the Capitol, and asks where was the FBI in the months leading up to the violent siege on the Capitol?
       

2^nd Segment: Insurrection: A New Day of Infamy, Rooted in Centuries Old White Supremacy!
    
We will air an episode from Building Bridges radio program that airs on our sister station WBAI in New York on white supremacy and white nationalism. The episode is titled "Insurrection: A New Day of Infamy, Rooted in Centuries Old White Supremacy!". The guest is Eric Ward, Executive Director and Senior Fellow at the Southern Poverty Law Center and Race Forward, and Executive Director of Western States Center. Eric Ward is a nationally-recognized expert on the relationship between authoritarian movements, hate violence, and building toward an inclusive democracy.
    

Date:

January 6, 2021

Issa Amro (in Hebron, occupied Palestine)
    
We will air an interview we conducted with Issa Amro (in Hebron, occupied Palestine) a few hours before he appeared in an Israeli occupation military court today.
  
The State of Israel had brought 18 charges against Issa for his civil disobedience and nonviolent protests against the Israeli occupation, and today, January 6, 2021, was his day in the Israeli occupation military court. Issa was convicted on 6 military charges. The Judge, who is an Israeli colonizer living on stolen Palestinian land, told Issa he is not allowed to protest against the Israeli occupation peacefully without a permit from the Israeli occupation forces!!! The sentencing hearing for the 6 charges is set for February 8, 2021.
 
Issa Amro is a Palestinian activist and human rights defender based in Hebron, occupied Palestine. He is the former coordinator and co-founder of the grassroots group Youth Against Settlements. Issa won the 2009 One World Media award for coordinating the B’Tselem camera distribution project, and in 2010, he was declared "human rights defender of the year in Palestine" by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. In 2013, the United Nations Human Rights Council expressed concern for his well-being and safety due to numerous accounts of harassment from Israeli soldiers and settlers and a series of arbitrary arrests. Issa was arrested numerous times by the Israeli occupation army. In 2017, Bernie Sanders along with 3 U.S. Senators and 32 Congressmen wrote to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, at that time, to urge Israeli authorities to reconsider the charges against him. In late September 2017, after being released on bail from Israeli occupation jail, Issa Amro met Bernie Sanders and members of Congress in Washington, D.C.   
 
Stand With Issa