occupation

83: The Hazara and the US Afghanistan Withdrawal

On May 8th, 85 people were killed in a bomb attack near a school in Kabul. Many of those killed were young women. The bomb was detonated in a part of Kabul that is home to the Hazara, an Afghan minority group that has been a frequent target of attacks, including a massacre in a maternity war last year that killed 24 people. The Hazara are a predominantly Shia-Muslim ethnic minority in Afghanistan, and a community that has suffered a long history of brutal persecution and oppression. 

Previous guest, and nonviolence activist, Basir Bita joins us again from Kabul, Afghanistan, but this time we’ll be talking about his community, the Hazara, and about the personal impact that the May 8th attack had on him and on his family. Be sure to check out our previous interview with Basir in Episode 39.

For additional reading about the history and contemporary issues facing the Hazara community, be sure to check out this article from MinorityRights.org.

 
 

Additional Resources Recommended by our Guest:

 
 

82: Palestinian Voices - East Jerusalem: Colonialism & Apartheid

For this second of two episodes about current events in Palestine we will be focusing specifically on the situation in East Jerusalem, and in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah. East Jerusalem, which contains the old city, has been illegally occupied by Israel since the Israeli military captured it, along with the rest of the West Bank, Gaza, and the Golan Heights, in the “Six Day War” of 1967.

Since that time its Palestinian residents have been the targets of ongoing harassment, violence, and forced displacement by illegal Jewish settlers. The most recent instance of this ethnic cleansing campaign targeted residents of east Jerusalem's Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood. When Palestinians attempted to protest and resist, a brutal crackdown was waged by the Israeli authorities, a crackdown that is now reverberating across the West Bank, inside Israel, and in the form of yet another horrific Israeli bombing campaign on Gaza.

We hope that what you hear in this show inspires you to share it and to take action.

Join the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement, and follow the Five things you can do to support Palestinian human rights, right now.

 
 

Recommended Resources:

 
 
 
 

81: Palestinian Voices: Gaza - Resilience & Mental Health

This episode is the first of a two part series we are doing on Palestine. This episode focuses on voices from Gaza, while the next episode highlights voices from east Jerusalem. You don’t need to listen to them in any particular order, but we strongly recommend that you listen to both in their entirety. 

You will hear a lot today about the psychological toll that repeated wars, devastation, poverty, deprivation, and abandonment by the international community have had on the 2 million residents of one of the most densely populated stretches of land on earth. 

We hope that what you hear inspires you to share this show with others and to take action.

Both of our guests also write for “We Are Not Numbers”.

Be sure to read this essay by guest Haneen AbdAlnabi about her experiences as a child in Gaza.

And read this piece by guest Anas Jnena about the past week of attacks on Gaza.

Join the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement, and follow the Five things you can do to support Palestinian human rights, right now.

 
 

Recommended resources:

 
 
 
 

Episode 39: Afghanistan - Living With the US Occupation

Basir Bita spent his childhood as a refugee in Iran and moved back to Afghanistan in 2003, which means he has spent his entire adult life living under the US occupation. He currently lives in Kabul where he works as a peace activist and as a consultant monitoring and evaluating risk factors for corruption. We discuss the current peace talks between the US and the Taliban, and what he has learned talking to people from across Afghanistan’s ethnically diverse society.


Also be sure to check out our previous conversation with Abdoul Saboor who fled Afghanistan after threats from the Taliban and attacks on his family. His overland odyssey through Iran, Turkey, Eastern Europe and across the Balkans, to finally claim asylum in France, is one of the more remarkable stories I’ve encountered anywhere, and should put the ordeals of many Afghan refugees into a more human perspective.