Background Briefing: October 10, 2023
Jared, MbS, Biden and Bibi Ignored the Palestinians as They Dreamed Up Their Plan for Peace and Prosperity in the Middle East
We begin with the political failure amid talk of an intelligence failure that elites in Israel, the Middle East and in Washington are now having to face for not considering the plight of the Palestinians as they dreamed up a new peace and prosperity plan for the region. Joining us is Nader Hashemi, the Director of the Alwaleed Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding and an Associate Professor of Middle East and Islamic Politics at the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. A Non-Resident Fellow at Democracy for the Arab World Now, he is the author of The People Reloaded: The Green Movement and the Struggle for Iran’s Future and Sectarianization: Mapping the New Politics of the Middle East.”
The Distinction Between Supporting Palestinian Rights and Supporting Terrorists
Then, with pushback against Harvard students blaming the US for the latest war between Israel and Hamas and AOC condemning Sunday’s rally by Democratic Socialists of America for bigotry and callousness in not rejecting Hamas’s horrifying attacks, we speak with Mitchell Plitnick, the president of ReThinking Foreign Policy and former vice president at the Foundation for Middle East Peace. A political analyst and frequent writer on the Middle East and U.S. Foreign Policy, he served as director of the U.S. Office of B’Tselem and co-director of Jewish Voice for Peace. He is the co-author with Marc Lamont Hill of Except for Palestine: The Limits of Progressive Politics.
Elon Musk’s X Now Monetizes Disinformation by Fake Journalists With Blue- Check Accounts Who Get Paid to Spread Lies
Then finally we examine the flood of disinformation about the war in Israel on Twitter or X since Elon Musk allows anyone to buy Blue-Check accounts previously restricted to journalists, politicians and business and world leaders which fake journalists can now use to spread outrageous lies that can be monetized depending on the millions they deceive. Joining us is Emma Steiner, the Information Accountability Project Manager at Common Cause where she leads efforts to protect voters from disinformation related to voting rights and democracy, and to help defend against lies that undermine the integrity of our elections.