Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Limitations and Possibilities of the Apartheid Framework with Lana Tatour
251 Plays4 years ago
Lana Tatour and host Yara Hawari discuss the limitations and possibilities of using the apartheid analysis in the context of Palestine whilst also stressing the importance of the settler-colonial framework and decolonization within the discussion on Palestinian liberation.
Recommended
Transcript
Reinterpreting Apartheid: Equality vs. Colonialism
00:00:00
Speaker
Through seemingly radical discourse, for example, apartheid is being reconfigured from a colonial question into a liberal question. So the problem is the lack of equality. It is not colonization. It is not Zionism as a racist settler colonial movement.
00:00:26
Speaker
This is Rethinking Palestine, a podcast from Ashabaka, the Palestinian Policy Network. We are a virtual think tank that aims to foster public debate on Palestinian human rights and self-determination. We draw upon the vast knowledge and experience of the Palestinian people, whether in Palestine or in exile, to put forward strong and diverse Palestinian policy voices. In this podcast, we will be bringing these voices to you so that you can listen to Palestinians sharing their analysis wherever you are in the world.
Apartheid Framework in Palestinian Discourse
00:01:00
Speaker
Apartheid as a framework has long been used to describe the situation in Palestine from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. It has a long history in Palestinian discourse and intellectual production forged by the solidarity with the Black struggle in South Africa and recognition of very similar structures of oppression.
00:01:19
Speaker
But it particularly became popular after the fall of the apartheid regime in South Africa because it presented a successful model of struggle and a way out. Its definition by the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court in 2002 is as follows. Inhumane acts committed in the context of an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over any other racial group or groups and committed with the intention of maintaining that regime.
00:01:49
Speaker
Since then the apartheid framework has heavily relied on the rights discourse which presumes the centrality of international law and therefore the notion that justice will be achieved with the application of said law. But apartheid wasn't always understood in these terms and the history of the term and its application on the situation in Palestine has a more radical understanding.
00:02:09
Speaker
one that recognizes and seeks to dismantle the ongoing Zionist settler colonial project.
Dr. Lana Tatour on Apartheid's Radical History
00:02:15
Speaker
To discuss all of this and a lot more, I'm joined by Dr. Lana Tatour, a lecturer in development at the University of New South Wales in Sydney. Her work focuses on settler colonialism, indigeneity, race, human rights, and Palestine, among many other things. Lana, thank you so much for joining me on Rethinking Palestine. Thank you for having me.
00:02:39
Speaker
So I wanted to start by asking you if you can briefly talk us through the radical history of the use of the term apartheid and perhaps juxtapose it with the more recent liberal uses.
00:02:50
Speaker
So as you mentioned, there is a radical history to the concept of apartheid. And that radical history certainly exists in relation to Palestine, but not only in relation to Palestine, but also in relation to the anti-apartheid struggle. And we need to remember that the context of the struggle, and definitely in the 50s and 60s and part of the 70s,
00:03:13
Speaker
where the Third World Movement or liberation was very strong. South Africa was a big part of this. The anti-apartheid campaign in South Africa was a big part of that movement and so is the Palestinian liberation struggle and the Palestinian liberation organization.
Palestine, Apartheid, and Anti-Colonial Struggle
00:03:35
Speaker
We also need to remember that even though international law has come to be shaped by liberal discourses and liberal frameworks,
00:03:46
Speaker
There is also a third world agency in the making of international law. So if we look at the international convention on the suppression and punishment of the crime of apartheid, which was adopted in the 70s, we can't really understand how this convention came to be without looking at the historical context of third world agency and pressure from within the UN
00:04:15
Speaker
to adopt the convention again against the agenda of Western countries. Now bringing that to Palestine, Palestine the analogy with apartheid and the analogy with South Africa was always dominant and Palestinians always understood their struggle
00:04:36
Speaker
in both anti-colonial and anti-racist terms. Edward Said, for example, clearly said, and I'm quoting, we are clearly anti-colonialist and anti-racist in our struggle. It was clear that you cannot discuss colonialism without racism and that race is central to the colonial project.
00:04:59
Speaker
And similarly, in the second conference of heads of state or government of the non-aligned countries, also we can see an understanding of the question of Palestine by the Third World as one that connects to colonialism and racism.
Interconnectedness of Apartheid, Zionism, and Colonialism
00:05:17
Speaker
And one of the lovely quotes there, again, they extended their full support to the Arab people of Palestine in their struggle for liberation from colonialism and racism.
00:05:28
Speaker
And again, Yasser Arafat in his speech, his famous speech, the Gun and Olive Branch speech in 1974, also was talking about Zionism as an ideology that is imperialist, colonialist and racist. And that is a quote. And he referred to Israel as a racist entity founded on imperialist, colonialist concept.
00:05:54
Speaker
And he tied the liberation of Palestine to the liberation of other people. And I'm again quoting, and he said, our resolve is to build a new world, is fortify the world free of colonialism, imperialism, neocolonialism and racism in each of his instances, including Zionism.
00:06:15
Speaker
So there is a radical history to the concept, one that does not bring apartheid instead of colonialism or instead of imperialism, but one that understand the imperial and the colonial and the settler colonial project as intertwined with racial politics. And they would talk about apartheid and Zionism. So apartheid was not a replacement.
00:06:45
Speaker
to Zionism. Thanks, Lana. That's a really important point to note that apartheid can't be a standalone concept. It's not mutually exclusive. And in that sense, that radical history really helps us understand that. I think one of the useful things that happened with the ICC definition is that under international law, apartheid became universally applicable and thus challenged the misconception that
00:07:13
Speaker
apartheid in South Africa was an exceptional case that has since ended. So it allows us an understanding of apartheid as a system that can adopt various characteristics and manifest itself in various ways and thus can also have a retroactive application.
Liberal Interpretations of Apartheid
00:07:30
Speaker
But of course, as you've said recently in various analysis and social media posts, international law isn't everything. So why and how should an understanding of Palestine go beyond international law?
00:07:43
Speaker
I think the point about apartheid being a crime against humanity is very important. And it explains why apartheid as a framework in international law is so appealing to activists and to scholars and to everyone who wants to advance the Palestine cause.
00:08:05
Speaker
The occupation framework, which is another framework under international law, can go as far in the context of Palestine. It assumes that the occupation is temporal and it covers only the West Bank and Gaza. So the apartheid in that sense allows us to speak about historic Palestine, about the system of control, the racial system of control, the colonial system of control,
00:08:34
Speaker
that exist between the river and the sea. So in that sense, apartheid as a crime against humanity is a powerful legal framework, and this is something that we certainly need to mobilize.
00:08:51
Speaker
Having said that, we need to be careful in how we understand apartheid because we can have different understandings of apartheid. So what I described before is a particular genealogy for thinking about apartheid and the history of the use of apartheid in the Palestinian context.
00:09:12
Speaker
Another trend that we are seeing is actually a liberal reading of apartheid. I know it sounds slightly counterintuitive in a sense, but the idea is that we see apartheid merely as a question of equality, as a liberal question of equality or inequality that exists between people rather than a colonial question.
00:09:40
Speaker
And I think this is what we have been seeing with the intervention that Peter Beinart made a few months ago when he was calling for one by national state. And he was constantly referring to South Africa, but he was referring to it as an instance of inequality that could be remedied by equality. And similarly, the reading that Betzel M's report, the Israeli Human Rights Organization that was
00:10:09
Speaker
just released, calling Israel an apartheid regime, have a very particular reading of apartheid, one that doesn't take settler colonialism, imperialism and race into consideration. So apartheid, even when they call Israel apartheid, if you look at the report, they don't even mention racism.
00:10:33
Speaker
and they distinguish the apartheid in Palestine from South Africa as saying the apartheid in South Africa was based on race while in Palestine on nationalism.
Challenging Liberal Narratives
00:10:48
Speaker
So in many ways, they really, their understanding of apartheid and this understanding of apartheid that is becoming quite dominant in particular liberal circles, especially among some kind of more progressive liberal Zionists like Reinhardt or the liberal Israeli, the kind of the radical Israeli left. We are seeing a reworking of the framework of apartheid in a way that goes against
00:11:17
Speaker
the intellectual legacy and the activist legacy and history of the Palestinian struggle and of understanding of apartheid in relation to Palestine, but not only in relation to Palestine, again also in relation to the ways in which the Third World Liberation Movement understood it.
00:11:40
Speaker
If you are enjoying this podcast, please visit our website, www.al-shabaka.org, where you will find more Palestinian policy analysis and where you can join our mailing list and donate to support our work. Absolutely. And as you've so eloquently said that one of the dangers of this more recent liberal understanding of apartheid is the emittance or the sideline of Israel as a settler colonial entity.
00:12:07
Speaker
And we see this even from Palestinians themselves and Palestinian organisations and institutions. And I think this is best epitomised in the cause for equality rather than the cause for decolonisation. And I know that this is something that you've been talking and writing about. So I was wondering if perhaps you could expand a little on that very call for equality as opposed to decolonisation.
00:12:35
Speaker
You're absolutely right. And this is what is happening. The Palestine question is being through seemingly radical discourse. For example, apartheid is being reconfigured from a colonial question into a liberal question.
00:12:53
Speaker
and more specifically into a liberal question of equality. So the problem is the lack of equality. It is not colonization. It is not Zionism as a racist settler colonial movement, but rather the lack of equality between Jews and Palestinians.
00:13:13
Speaker
And then the answer to the question of Palestine becomes one of liberal equality, right? So it could be remedied by extending
Decolonization: Beyond Metaphor
00:13:23
Speaker
citizenship, for example, to all Palestinians, or it could be remedied by ensuring some forms of civil equality, civil rights, etc. It just becomes a civil rights movement rather than a movement for decolonization.
00:13:42
Speaker
and rather than thinking about Palestine in terms of decolonization.
00:13:47
Speaker
So, and even when decolonization is discussed in so many spaces, it's often done so on a very shallow level, reducing it to a metaphor, as scholars Eve Tuck and Wayne Yang wrote in their seminal paper, Decolonization is Not a Metaphor. But of course, decolonization, although, you know, a really big site for discussion and imagination, is essentially about the repatriation of Indigenous life and land.
00:14:17
Speaker
Absolutely. And that kind of trend of reformulating decolonization, also in liberal terms, is not something that is happening only in Palestine. So I want to give an example from a webinar I participated in with some liberal Zionists present. It was Peter Beinart and Professor Shaul Negean.
00:14:42
Speaker
And I was pressing on the decolonization, not only liberal equality. And at some point, Sheryl Magid was saying, you know, we agree, you want to call it decolonization? Fine. And I thought that captured really some particular sensibility that is happening, where
00:15:04
Speaker
decolonization can be framed in different ways, but we will call it decolonization. And I think this is the tricky part
00:15:15
Speaker
in which Palestinians are finding themselves. What we are seeing because of the effectively one state condition is that we can understand decolonization in different ways. And some are giving liberal interpretation to decolonization. And some of the things we are facing as Palestinians is the increasing use of radical frameworks, right?
00:15:44
Speaker
apartheid decolonization. But the interpretations that are given to these frameworks and to these discourses are very problematic.
00:15:56
Speaker
And then we are asked, why are you complaining? We are talking about apartheid. We are talking about decolonization. And this is where there needs really to be insistent, as you said, that decolonization is not a buzzword. It is not a metaphor. It is not a code work for liberal equality. It is an actual project of dismantling settler colonialism.
00:16:21
Speaker
How does dismantling settler colonialism looks like is the challenge that we have. But this challenge is being constantly met by Palestinians who are constantly thinking and rethinking how decolonization
00:16:41
Speaker
can look like. And I want to bring here the example of the Palestinian youth movement, for example, who had a delegation and traveled to South Africa to study about apartheid and to study about decolonization and to look at the challenges that South Africa is facing.
00:17:03
Speaker
after the dismantling of apartheid and realizing that decolonization is a process that doesn't end in one moment. It didn't end with the dismantling of apartheid because apartheid continued, the legacies of apartheid continued to shape the political, social, cultural, economic realities of South Africans.
00:17:30
Speaker
When we talk about decolonization, we're really talking about a project of dismantling the logics of settler colonialism, the institutions, the structures, and thinking about how do we, you know, a commitment to anti-capitalism, land, wealth distribution.
00:17:49
Speaker
and dismantling other forms of intersectional violence. But my point with this example is that Palestinians are, you know, Palestinian activists are engaged in a process of trying to think about how decolonization can look like.
Youth Movements and Decolonization
00:18:09
Speaker
and how we can understand decolonization. But one thing we need to insist is that decolonization cannot mean liberal equality. It is not about extension of citizenship. We have this kind of model. It's called the Palestinian Citizens of Israel. And we know that the extension of citizenship does not eliminate colonial subjugation.
00:18:33
Speaker
it does not necessarily provide equality. Because even if your aim is equality, to really achieve equality, you needed the anti-colonial project. I think it's easy for Palestinians to fall into this trap of the sort of liberal equality model, particularly in the West Bank and Gaza, where we've seen a process of endurization, which has completely
00:19:03
Speaker
depoliticized a lot of Palestinian thinking and a lot of Palestinian imagination.
00:19:09
Speaker
So I think that trap is definitely an easy one that we have, unfortunately, have to get ourselves out of. Now, Lani, you mentioned earlier the main human rights organisation in Israel, Bed-Salem, came out with a report on apartheid declaring Israel as an apartheid regime from the river to the sea. It received a lot of media attention and it was really welcomed by human rights groups.
00:19:34
Speaker
across the board. I think it's important to note that there have been other reports, of course. There was the ESCO report, which was compiled by Richard Falk from Virginia Tilly. There was also the work of Palestinian organisations, including Al Haq and Adela, and also a lot of activists and academics in Palestine have written about apartheid.
00:19:58
Speaker
And I think, you know, it does definitely signify a shifting discourse in certain circles. But I think there's another side to the story that Palestinians and Palestinian organisations have been talking about this for a long time. And what it feels like is that when, you know, when we say it, it's ignored or deemed extreme and
00:20:18
Speaker
and that we literally need an Israeli or an Israeli organisation to say it, to legitimise it in the eyes of the international community.
Centricity of Palestinian Voices
00:20:26
Speaker
So I think this isn't just about apartheid as a framework, but also about knowledge production and discourse in Palestine in general. As Palestinian academics and activists, thinkers, et cetera, we know far too well that an Israeli voice over another or another non-Palestinian voice
00:20:46
Speaker
nearly always needed to legitimise and confirmed our lived experiences of settler colonialism, military occupation and apartheid.
00:20:56
Speaker
And this reminds me of a poem by the writer and artist, Greta Colombo, who wrote, when they speak, it is scientific. When we speak, it is unscientific. When they speak, it is objective. When we speak, it is subjective. When they speak, it is neutral. When we speak, it is personal. When they speak, it is rational. And when we speak, it is emotional.
00:21:21
Speaker
How would you encourage allies, comrades to not fall into this trap of monopolizing the conversation on Palestine and minimizing Palestinian voices at the same time? First of all, you know, that quote is, it just captures that racial politics. And, you know, before moving to talking about what comrades can do, I think one of the ironic issues with all the attention that B'Tselem is getting
00:21:50
Speaker
is that it really, that attentions shows how much of the politics that we, you know, it shows a particular apartheid or racial politics that also underpins a global civil society. So ironically, Bezalem is speaking about apartheid while overriding Palestinian voices, while
00:22:17
Speaker
disregarding how Palestinians have understood apartheid. I'll be interested to know who written the report and I'm quite certain that the report was written by Israeli Jews.
00:22:34
Speaker
And the Israeli human rights organizations, and this is something we need also to talk about, they are capitalizing on that global politics that renders their voices more valuable than Palestinian voices. And this is where when we think about decolonization, we need also to think about decolonization as daily praxis. I don't think in this regard
00:23:03
Speaker
Bitzellum is doing a very good job at that, you know, looking at decolonization as a daily praxis. But generally we are constantly seeing this dynamic and we're constantly seeing the undermining of Palestinian voices. And I think what comrades and solidarity groups can do is keep reminding, not bringing voices, but being reminded and keeping
00:23:33
Speaker
reminding how Palestinians understand their own reality. That when a Palestinian organization issue a report, that they give it the importance that they are given to the Pitsalon report. And it's something that I think also in the activist circles
00:23:57
Speaker
Often when you want to get your point across, you find some allies referring to Israeli organizations or Israeli scholars because it would sound better to a liberal international audience.
00:24:14
Speaker
And
Practicing Daily Decolonization
00:24:15
Speaker
what we constantly need to do is resist. The fact that it sounds better doesn't mean that we need to follow that dynamics. And the question is, how do we dismantle the dynamics? And this really needs to be our responsibility, our allies' responsibility to center Palestinian reading of their own reality, but also holding Israelis, whether they're
00:24:45
Speaker
human rights organizations or sympathetic scholars accountable when they erase Palestinian voices or override Palestinian mobilization on the same issues. And I think it's really important to hold them accountable because one of the things that I identify is this sense of self-righteousness
00:25:12
Speaker
that is surrounding these kind of conversations among Israelis. And we, you know, we constantly need to dismantle these dynamics in our activism and again holding them accountable.
00:25:30
Speaker
Thanks, Lana. I think you really summarized it beautifully there. Decolonization as daily praxis. In other words, it's not just about the discourse of the abstract. It's also very much about how you live your life in the present.
Conclusion and Call to Action
00:25:44
Speaker
And that means centering Palestinians
00:25:47
Speaker
in your work and centering Palestinian lived experience and recognising that Palestinian voices can't be replaced, not even by allies and well-intentioned people. And I think for Palestinians it really does mean resisting the urge to present Israeli voices, to back up our own
00:26:08
Speaker
lived experience to back up our own analysis. And it's really, you know, it's part of the struggle because we're working against a whole system, a whole knowledge production system which deems our voices illegitimate or less valuable than others. Lana, thank you so much for joining me today to discuss this really important topic. It was an absolute pleasure. Thank you so much. It was an absolute pleasure.
00:26:43
Speaker
Thank you for listening to Rethinking Palestine. Don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review. For more policy analysis and to donate to support our work, please visit our website www.al-shabaka.org. You can also follow us on Facebook and Twitter.