Protest, Folter, Exil: Hamza Howidys Kampf für Freiheit und Recht auf Asyl (Folge auf englisch)

[Music] Hello and welcome to the podcast speaking about Israel Palestine. And today actually I speak with Israel Palestine again. Remember I have been on a trip to Israel Palestine or I was on a trip in Israel Palestine talking with people over there. And now I'm very delighted to have this guest here. Very welcome and warm welcome Hamza Abu Haweedi. Thanks, Shai. It's good to be here. Yeah, thank you for your time. Hamza, we will definitely hear more from you. But let me introduce you real quick. Hamza, you are a peace activist from Gaza. You twice took part in the, we want to live protest against Hamas. You were arrested and tortured for your courage and after October 7, 2023, you broke your vows of silence to speak openly against Hamas and its spokesperson Abu Obeda. That's that made you a target. Even in a Greek refugee camp, you received death threats forcing you to flee to Germany. And now living in a refugee shelter, you have become an internationally respected voice. Criticizing both Hamas violence and the devastating Israeli military operation in Gaza from a humanistic democratic perspective. And you also have been interviewed by CNN that TDIF published an outlets like Newsweek, Lex Press, National Post and ABC Today. And you are engaged in discussions with the political party such as the Greens and the CDU. You even took part in the Holocaust Remembrance ceremony in the Bundestag. And yet, Hamza, despite nearly 14,000 people signing a petition for your protection, your asylum application in Germany has been rejected under the Dublin II regulation. It's a sad story. We will hear more about it. But I would really like to express my big respect that you're here and that you're open to speak with me about everything that is on your mind and heart, actually. My first question, Hamza, is there anything in the news that moved you like this week or last week? Is there anything that's really moved you? Yeah, I mean, looking at the news, there is money to talk about when it comes to Palestine, Israel. We are not only looking at the news, but also talking to the people who are inside the Gaza Strip because while we are talking right now and recording the podcast, there is the court and court Gaza Military Operation, which is supposed to move over 1 million residents of Gaza City to a distance that is less than a third of the Gaza Strip. That was already one of the most crowded areas on Gaza Strip before October 7th. Now we are taking the residents of this strip to make them live in one third of the already small strip. From those people, I have many friends, I have many neighbors, people that I grow up with and it's devastating thinking what's happening to those people because most of those people, all of them actually were already displaced many times, 7, 8, 9, and they are exhausted. They are tired and they cannot do that anymore. And even when thinking about the relocation, they are supposed to be relocation. There is no other space to go to when I was talking to one of them a few days ago and he told me that he is not going to evacuate. I asked him because I cared for his life, why don't you want to evacuate it? He told me, Hamza, I'm going to just move from one war zone to another war zone. I'm not going to a safe zone, even the IDF military themselves did not announce it as a safe zone. So why should we leave these places? And meanwhile they are being bombed and I'm looking at this military operation that's happening right now. It's about making sure that those people wouldn't have a place to go back to. So yes, I keep thinking about this when it's going to happen to those people during this time. Hamza, let's be clear. We have government in Israel and president Netanyahu who openly says that he don't want a two-state solution and he wants to occupy Gaza. It's not hiding it anymore. Everything is on the table. How do you feel with it? We will hear more about your story also. You flee from Gaza in 2003. Before October 7th, we will hear more about it. What do you feel when you hear all these headlines and you read? Like every time, Hamza, I open a haaretz. The app haaretz, I see how many people overnight got killed in Gaza. Every time it's around 14 to 18 people, every day got killed a very vast amount of people. I mean it's like crazy. How do you feel reading all of this? And also having contact with people in Gaza. And this is also your home. You consider it your home. Yes. So those were more than one question. First about Netanyahu and the Palestinian state. One thing is that I want to make clear because some people always make this story about denying a Palestinian state only limited to Netanyahu's mortgage or being feared the circle of religious fanatics in the Israeli government. But in my opinion, that's way more than this because it's not only Netanyahu, it's not only small church, it's not only being feared when I look at the entire government, the entire government starting from even the transportation minister who said the humanizing statements about the Palestinian society going to the defense minister Israel Katz who just yesterday wrote that we are launching this storm of hurricane or whatever. This is the language of a defense minister talking about the humanitarian catastrophe we are seeing in Gaza. And when it comes to Netanyahu, I think that's not a new that Netanyahu is opposing a Palestinian state in 2019 in his look, good meeting. He said it openly that anyone who wants to prevent a Palestinian state, he has to support Hamas to fragmented Palestinian society. And I think they succeeded to an extent both what we are seeing right now. So it's not a surprise that not only Netanyahu but the ruling party, the liquid party is totally against the Palestinian state. That's not a secret that they hide, it's something that they share publicly. But I think that right now it's good to see some pushback by the international community to see some braveness though it's a small but still it's something to be mentioned by these European states talking about France, UK, Canada and the list goes on. It's unfortunate that we are actually recording in Germany, but Germany was one of the very few countries that did not agree actually to recognize a Palestinian state in the coming summit in September this month actually. This is one thing, the second thing about about the war in Gaza, I mean, I don't think there is something that can be said about the war in Gaza that has not been said already by by by many people about the atrocities that we are seeing happening day and night and night and. It doesn't seem that it's going to end soon and even with Netanyahu's plans you said earlier that he wants to occupy the Gaza Strip, I would say that Netanyahu is way more than covered to occupy the Gaza Strip actually because occupying the Gaza Strip comes with the responsibilities if he is going to occupy the Gaza Strip according to international law he will be legally responsible for the lives of the two million people inside the Gaza Strip and he doesn't want anything like that. That was actually the reason why Israel left Gaza in 2005 they don't want this responsibility if you can occupy those people officially you are supposed to be responsible about the education about their health care about their well-being so this is something that the Israeli government doesn't want to know and wants a responsibility for for two million people. But what we are trying what we are seeing with Netanyahu right now is just in my opinion a manipulation buying time until the upcoming Israeli elections in in October 2026 supposed to be in October 2026 so I think that Netanyahu is just trying to buy time with that we are looking at the Gaza Strip right now it's 700 plus days they started a military operation against the wall and it's finished they started a one against the Iranian regime and it's not going to be a big deal. Iran and regime and it's finished they finished what even serious political situation is ended and then you political situation is emerging right now but Gaza is still stuck on October the 7th. And actually what you say also an occupying force needs to take care of occupied people we see the same in the in the way that the Israeli government is doing. like Israel have an obligation to take care, like healthcare-wise and school-wise also on Palestinians at the West Bank and occupied Palestinian territories. And they don't really fulfill their obligations. We see how they manage and we just spoke before the broadcast that Basel Aadah, one of the directors of no other land, just got his home, just got raided yesterday, I think, or the day before yesterday and even two of his, I think, brothers were injured that hard that they needed to go to the hospital. Yeah, and the West Bank, the issue with the Israeli government is not that they only don't fulfill their responsibilities to the occupied people, but they are not even letting anyone do these responsibilities because at the same time the Palestinian Authority is trying to take care of these responsibilities, to take care of the education, to take care of the healthcare. But we are seeing the Israeli government is undermining this Palestinian Authority and the small church is very open about that. He has been withholding their tax money, which is the very core financial boundary for the Palestinian Authority. It's the money used to pay the vast majority of the Palestinian employees and the Israeli government is withholding this money for over a year right now. So they are trying to undermine the Palestinian Authority to the extent that the American ambassador to Israel say that this is not in anyone's benefit and I'm talking about religious ambassador, a misceanic religious ambassador who's saying that. So they are not doing that and at the same time what's happening with Basel Aadah and the people from the no other land. It's in South Hebron Hills, yes, my biggest problem with the with the with the undermining those people is that those people are doing it quietly the opposite of what other groups Palestinian groups do, which is resistance, violent resistance, name it whatever you want. Those people are doing the peace for resistance with their documentary with their with their activism and trying to resist and we are seeing what's happening to those people when they are trying to resist and that was actually an argument that was used against us by Hamas's people is that when people try to resist, they are being harmed, they are being imprisoned and no one can defend them. That was actually one of the arguments why Hamas was using arms and kept doing the the the idea of quote unquote and resistance until now. So they were using this argument against us that some people are trying the peace for resistance, but it's not working, they are being harmed, they are being imprisoned and no one can talk about them. And this is the reason why I'm saying that publicly that those people did not do anything wrong, they are just trying to defend themselves, Basel Adra is not a guy with a gun, he's a guy with a house, but then intellectual, yes, and he's afraid for his home, he's afraid for his village and what's happening in Musaferia, it's not only attacks. It's by all definitions and it makes cleansing for the Palestinian society who has been staying there for too long just to make a new settlement to add for to the existing 700,000 plus illegal settlers who are living in the West Bank. Yeah, we will be in Israel and Palestine again for a podcast trip and then we will also be in Musaferia and also talk to people over there. I think it's very important to really take the world at the hands and show them what is happening there because it's like it's like really a systematic oppression. It's a systematic ethnic cleansing and it's really important that the world should watch what is happening there. Hamza, I just said that you escaped Gaza in 2023. Right after you were imprisoned because attending student protests and the student protest you attended was the, as I mentioned in the introduction, was the we want to live protests. What happened there and why were you on the streets? Yes, so after Hamza's talk about the Gaza Strip in 2007. How old were you 2007? I was 10 years old back then. I was a little child but it doesn't matter to be a child or another because you will see a violence and it's up to you how to understand it. But from there from 2007 until 2019 we saw multiple versions of Hamza's oppression to the Gaza Strip. We saw multiple versions of Hamza's corruption, multiple versions for a regime that we were tired of and we wanted an alternative but unlike democracies unlike the Western society, we did not have elections in Gaza since 2006 to 2019, not even university elections. The term elections was totally prohibited in the last 20 years. Yes, they Palestinian society did a mistake when we elected Hamza back then and we wanted to make to correct this mistake, to choose a better alternative to represent us, to govern us. That was the core idea of that we want to live movement, we wanted elections and we also wanted some economical benefits because also the economic situation in Gaza back then was extremely disastrous and the people were tired and were tired of also seeing not only that the economic situation is terrible but also to see a layer, a social layer of wealthy elite people who are living a luxury life. Meanwhile the entire service living in poverty and when I talk about the wealthy elite talking about Hamza's members and leadership in the Gaza Strip. So that was our way to say that we are not okay with this. We want elections, we want some economical benefits and we started from there and. How many people started then back then? In 2019 I always say that when we were talking about the protest before I was afraid that it's going to be a small one because I understood how the gossens are afraid from Hamza's for good reasons. But I was shocked when I went to the protest by the large scale of the people who attended the first two days, Hamza's arrested according to Human Rights Watch. Almost 1000 people in two days and we are talking about the Gaza Strip, we are not talking about Germany so that should be telling about the scale of the protest. But they managed to silence us until in 2023 the situation was no longer also bearable so we decided to protest again in June. And the same response happened by Hamas beating us, arresting us, torturing us, some people stayed in the prison for even the war started and they were still prisoned. For protesting? For saying we want to live, literally. Yes, that was the crime that we committed, that was the reason why I was convicted, criminal according to Hamas's laws. That's why I saw myself in a torture to death with us, that's why Ahmed Al-Masra lost his eyes and Hamas's presence is still alive until now. Many people died and tortured, couldn't make it out, I was one of the luckiest whose family had some money to get him out after being a bribery. Yeah, it was our way to tell the world that we are in Gaza seeking another alternative for Hamas's rule and unfortunately our message was not heard back then. When we hear certain politician in Israel talking about civilians or people in Gaza, they say we don't have civilians in Gaza because everyone, almost everyone, even kids, just recently minister just stated this, even kids are terrorists and they want Israel, he's dead. I was wondering because you say we wanted free elections, we want to correct that we elected a wrong party, namely the Hamas. Do you think that this thing is valid for a vast amount of people in Gaza because I never been to Gaza because I'm not allowed to go into Gaza, of course. And I was wondering how would you see this representation, the question of representation? No matter who he was, no matter who said such a statement, when you start the humanizing society, you are just opening a back door for the suffering and when you want to do an atrocity, when you want to do something that is extremely bad, you want to justify it. And I think this is the way that some try to justify it, actually, to themselves and I think this is just a genocidal language that is not acceptable by any terms. This is to start with the second thing about Palestinians electing Hamas. What happened in 2006, it was a parliamentary elections in Palestine, it was not even a presidential one. And yes, people elected Hamas because we were tired of the Palestinian authorities corruption, we wanted an alternative. Hamas was promising us this. Hamas's political slogan back then was change and reform. And that's what we were looking for, change and reform for the corruption. And even with all the corruption that the Palestinian Authority had, it still had the major support of the Gaza Strip. But what happened in the elections is that because of the Palestinian election system itself, the Palestinian Authority can go under one umbrella as the Fateh, a political party, or each one, each candidate can go in a separate one. For sure they disagreed with each other and many of them went in separate campaigns. But Hamas was united, not a single candidate of Hamas went in a separate campaign. So they all went under one umbrella and after all of this they even got 48 support. So it was a matter of there was still support for the Palestinian Authority but it was technical issues with the Palestinian election system itself. And anyhow, even if there was a support for Hamas because before the war there was kind of when you ask a gas and about support for Hamas they differentiate between two things. Hamas as a government, as a political entity, that was already despised by the gas and before October the 7th. No one supported such a thing. But the idea of armed resistance was still accepted among the Gaza society and it's understandable why they still supported this idea because those people were looking at the West Bank by attacks by the violence settlers against the Palestinians. The Palestinian Authority can protect them. The Israeli police is not doing anything. Hamas was promising them with protection that what's happening in the West Bank can't happen in Gaza because Hamas is in Gaza. And with the limited military operations between Israel and Hamas that strengthened this belief among the Gaza because to some extent thought that Israel cannot eliminate Hamas because it did not even get a closer to before. So this is the second aspect and anyway there was a support for Hamas as an armed resistance but talking about right now this is what matters right now. The vast majority of the Gaza Strip right now opposes Hamas as a political entity and as the idea of armed resistance because they saw the catastrophe consequences of this idea on the Gaza Strip. And according to all polls one of them was conducted by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Research Surveys. The most respected Palestinian Research entity it stays that 65% of the Gaza society don't want Hamas in their future. 65%? Yes. Our policy it's 80%. I would say from talking to the people there it's at least 70% of the Gaza Strip do not want Hamas in their future. And even according to some of the IDF statements themselves because this poll that was saying that the people of Gaza supported Hamas was used at the beginning of the war to justify to the human eyes. A few months after the IDF themselves said that Sinwar himself manipulated the results of this poll and that there was no major support for Hamas that's the IDF saying. So this poll was used against the Gaza Strip for a specific time and when there was no need of it. Yeah. It was declared that Sinwar manipulated the results. Yeah, interesting. The same the humanizing language that we hear that those people elected Hamas so they deserve what's happening to them right now. I hate the what aboutism and to reflect that to the others but we should actually also think about it because if we're going to think at the same terms it's the same Israeli government it's not another government it's the same one that was facilitating the entrance of the Qatarimani on a monthly basis to Hamas. 30 million dollars in cash bags literally like movies entering from the the the air it's crossing not even from the air crossing from the air it's crossing. So it's the Israel on Israel territory. Exactly exactly the the Qatarim ambassador was going to Israel and then coming together with the cash bags to Hamas that was announced and accepted by the Israeli government. If such an argument can be used that the Israeli society deserves what happened on October the seventh because the government funded Hamas in a way or another. I don't think this is true. I don't accept such an argument but it's also worth considering for those who are tempted to justify what's happening to the garrisons because of the results of the election process. I would like to go back to the protest because just a couple of months ago I just saw people holding pictures of murdered children in Israel. So we have the same thing in Tel Aviv where demonstrators upholding pictures of killed children in Gaza and at the same time we're having these demonstrators holding pictures from murdered. Or killed children during the seventh of October or during being hostage also and this is something I heard here in Berlin and use outlets. But for instance the student protest and you you you you just told us that you were surprised of the amount of people going on the street. I didn't hear anything about it. How does it come? One time Mahmoud that we the Palestinian writer was asked about why people keep talking about Palestinian Israel and because there is tons of issues on this planet but there is a special amount of focus on the Palestinian Israeli issue. It was that we are known because we live with the Israelis. We are known people talk about Palestinians because we have a problem with the Jews with this ethnicity and back then when the protest happened it did not have a relationship or the Israelis or the Jews did not have anything to do with it. So it was just a Palestinian Palestinian issue and this is not interesting for those who studied the Palestinian Israel conflict. It's a boring thing and no matter what happens between Palestinians and Palestinians or Israelis and Israelis is not an interesting thing. So that's what happened back then and that's what happened even in the the Hamas group in 2007 because Hamas back then killed hundreds of Palestinians and no one even talked about it. So unfortunately when the violence between Palestinians and Palestinians is it's not that interesting. So do an extent accepted by some people? This is what we also see in so-called Arab cities in Israel because the gun violence for instance is extremely high and there is a very vast amount of violence within Arab communities and the police is not really trying to fix it. That's what I also see in lots for instance just near the airport in Israel. Yeah I think this is completely true. There are many reasons for the violence happening in the Arab cities inside Israel but the same goes for it that this kind of Palestinian for example in Gaza who is oppressed by Hamas is not interesting for most importantly the Western audience. He's not an interesting victim. He's not even sometimes they strip him from the definition of being Palestinian because you are opposing Hamas or opposing another Palestinian faction and the same goes for those people inside Israel whether they would like to be defined as Palestinian Israelis or Arab Israelis up to them. But the same goes for them those are not the typical Palestinian that the Western society would like to hear about or the typical Israeli that the Western society wants to hear about. I was wondering Hamza because you know the 7th of October happened. Did anyone see it coming that something like this is going to happen? Because just for the background I was in Israel Palestine in just let me think in September 2023 so one month prior October 7th. And I sat down with the Holocaust scientist Amos Goldberg in Jerusalem and I talked to him and he and I just had an interview with him and you can also see it in Instagram and he says it's everything is open on the table this fascist government is like not hiding anything is there openly saying that they want to like annex the West Bank. And you know like the generation of Ben Gwil and Smotridge they were young when. And they said they will revenge they will take revenge back then they were like very young they say when we come again we will then occupy even more of Gaza then. Ariashar on like the the construction. constructed back then. So everything was open on the table and I have to be honest. I didn't see the 7th of October coming, but there was an atmosphere, something in the air that felt, oh wow, anything will happen here. I don't know how did it feel for you back then in Gaza? Yeah, I think it's valid what you just mentioned because the current Israeli government, I think it's the most far, the most right wing government. And I think in Israel's history actually, I can't think of another government with the same mentality. And in Gaza, to any extent, we expected a military operation. We expected a small scale war. Like as it used to happen, like for a few days, then it stopped and that's it because there was also problems inside Gaza, the economical problems. And we understood that when Hamas has these kind of problems to annex, then they can deal with it. They exported to Israel that happened before. So we expected that they're going to export this problem to Israel and then we will have a fight for a few days, then they'd be construction money, the donation money starts if loading together, then Hamas is happy because they can rebuild anything. They can rebuild. Sometimes they can use the money. But for them, it's a good situation. That's what we get used to. But the scale of what we saw on October, the same, no one, no one in Gaza could have seen that. And yeah, maybe that was the problem of the Palestinian and the Israeli society is that we did not also take Hamas seriously because yes, you had this far right government in Israel, but you also had Hamas. And Hamas was doing public threats one after the other. No one was taking them seriously. They were open about it. They even some of like, for example, the ex-interia minister, Fatihah Hamad. He talked about something very similar, October the seventh, but no one was taking him seriously because we thought he's this crazy terrorist leader or whatever. The same goes for Sinwar. Sinwar was repeating before that for two years in Gaza, the date 11, 11. And everyone in Gaza was asking him what's going to happen in that day. He did not answer. Probably he was intending to do that date for instead of October, but they changed it for whatever reason. But yeah, I think the same goes for the Israeli security establishment who were according to too many articles on times of Israel and Jerusalem post had some signs that there is an operation happening, but they did not take them seriously. They thought that the biggest danger is coming from Hezbollah in the north and that. The maximum that Hamas can do is just sending some rockets and they have the iron dome which would make it easier for the Israeli society. But then we saw what actually Hamas was capable to do and it was really also visited the kibbutz and that was, I mean, shocking. And walking around, we also produced a reel over there and while walking around and seeing all these destroyed buildings on the ground. I immediately had to think about also the gazaans that it might look the same over there and just a couple of like a couple of meters away. And this, that this what happens in the kibbutzim is now being pulled to justify what is happening in Gaza. It was probably somehow similar for me when I saw what happened on that date because before that I had the decision of not commenting or not even caring about what's happening in Palestine. Israeli was tired of that and they just wanted to have a fresh start in Europe. But after what I saw, I don't think it was a chance for me or for other people to stay silent because yes, I had many problems with the Israeli government, with the exand, why and zid. And there was many injustices happening before October the 7th. But for me when I saw what happened, the first thing that came to my mind is that not under our names, we are not accepting such a thing with all the differences with all the injustices that we have. We will never accept that such a thing is happening to other to our neighbors and that's why I decided to speak from that moment. So it has to be said that what Hamas did there is thinking about their brutality is one thing but to see it in yourself is a totally different story. And unfortunately is that as you say this is being used to justify what happened after and as I say always, October the 7th can never be justified. And it also does not justify what came after because as much as October the 7th was hard for Israel, Gaza remains the biggest victim. If there was one October the 7th happened in Israel, there is 100 happening in Gaza right now. And it's really sad to see it being used to justify that to use the noble cause, the humanitarian cause of the hostages to justify continuing the war. Meanwhile the hostages families themselves are saying that Netanyahu is using our kids name, our sons names to justify this war and we do not stand by him. So it's really sad to see this government not only doing all these injustices to the garsans but also using the cause of their own people just to stay in their positions or to justify the continuity of this war. Taking it back to Germany because you're now living in Germany and it was very interesting to hear you as a gazon, as a gazon saying that neither 7th of October was justified nor this atrocities that are being made in Gaza are justified. And I was wondering why does so many people having a hard time to see these things at the same time? What do you think? Like, seeing student protests here in Germany, seeing demonstrations on the streets, I would also be very careful to label all of these people as anti-Semites because it's also being you. It's being used and instrumentalized here in Germany to shut down critiques on Israel's government. So it's really hard. But what do you think? What do you observe when you see the discourse here in Germany? Yeah, actually it's interesting to see this shift in the public opinion among the Germans about Palestine, Israel because before October and before this war, the situation was different. There was not such a support actually for the Palestinian cause in Germany. It was, yeah, as we say, as the Palestinians, if the two countries with no public support for the Palestinians were first Germany and then the US. That's how we thought about it before. Some of that has some undressurable reasons for the past, for Germans guilt, but some of it also cannot be justified because, yeah, the Palestinian shouldn't pay the price for what, as you Germany did anyway. That's not the discussion here. I think that it has to do much with this conflict itself because many people look at this conflict with preoccupied thoughts and preoccupied thoughts that those people are absolute victims and those people are absolute criminals. Perpetrators, yes. They can't see that those people can sometimes be perpetrators, those people can also sometimes be victims. They cannot get this idea together. So if you want to sum of them, many see the Palestinian society as absolute victims. And we are victims, to Alexander, but we are not absolute victims. Many times we do bad things. The same goes for the Israeli society because some Germans here think because of the past and what happened in the past. So the Israeli society is always absolute victims of what's happening. They cannot see that sometimes Israel can be a perpetrator also. Many times actually, not sometimes. So there is this preoccupied thoughts and also about people living under occupation, the people who are living under actually the longest military occupation in the modern history. So they tend to execute everything that they do and I don't think this is healthy because yes, we are occupied as Palestinians. We are enduring many injustices but that shouldn't give us a green light to do everything and to justify what happened. So I understand some of what's happening and some of it has to do with what's happening on the ground right now because some of those protesters are seeing all this blood, all these people who are being killed and are feeling helpless. So they are trying to do something. They are trying to shout in the street. They are trying to boycott X and Yen said they are trying to make pressure on their governments. Everyone is trying in his own way. Meanwhile, as you said, there is a minority that used some of these protests, not all of it. For other ideas. biological battles, some hiding behind the Palestinian cause, but they are just absolute anti-Semite. Some of them went even to the extent of supporting the Hamas regime that is opposed by both the Israeli society and the Palestinian society. So I don't know, in which extent those people are sitting right now. What do they think they support? I read that you once said, if someone supports the slogan from the river to the sea, someone supports the Qasam Brigades. How do you mean it? I read it wrong. I just want to clarify one thing about this slogan, because here it's, I think it's a crime and you can. For me, from my understanding, it depends on the context. It depends on what this man says. Because many people, when they say it, they do not mean that we want the Palestinians, for example, to be in the sea or the Jews, to be in the sea. Some of them mean that we want a one-democratic state for Arabs and Jews and living it and that's it. I'm not talking about this group. I'm talking about the other group who are talking about this slogan, to mean that it's only Arabs and their Jews should be kicked in the sea or send them to Poland, Europe. When they say send them back, my always question is to where? Because unlike, for example, the French Algerian conflict that was many years before, the French people had the France to go back to. But the Jews who are living in Israel right now, many of them, actually, if we are talking about the Arab Jews who are more than 50%, were kicked out, actually, from the Arab countries. So they were already kicked out. And yeah, when someone says send them back, he should come with an answer to where. So this is one thing. And as I said, yes, this slogan was used by Hamas. As it is used by the Iliquad also in Israel to say that this land only belongs to the Jews and I'm saying it. It's bad to see it being used by those protesters, some without even knowledge of what it means. It's bad to see it used by groups that like Hamas. It's also bad to see it used by the Iliquad to deny the Palestinians their right to a statehood. So yeah, for me, I would say it's bad no matter who uses it. If it was a Hamas member, a protistor or a Iliquad member, it's bad to see it used by those people. I think this land is enough for the two societies to live in. Yeah, I think too. The thing is how to manage it, because Germany is still supporting this two-state solution. And if we see how Israel made facts on the ground in the occupied Palestinian territories, then a two-state solution is like fading away. Yeah, the German government's position was actually, I think, one of the most shameful positions when it came to the current war that's happening in Gaza. I'm thinking of it and I'm really ashamed of this government too. So everything happening in Gaza and couldn't do a single thing about it. If we are looking about even the public discourse in Germany, more than 80% of the German society wants this war to come to an end. There is a poll about that. It was published by Deutsche Weller or someone. Yeah, and the German government did not do anything upon this. They are saying that their society wants this war to end. They can do some pressure, but they did not do any. And disclaimer, these people are the people that elected the government. Yes. You know, so that brings the spice into it, because the people that elected the government says 80% around 80% say, "Stop, please stop the war or make or help to stop the war." Yes. And they just rejected. Yes. And the same goes for, as you mentioned, since we are talking about recognizing a Palestinian state, another poll that was also published this year. It says that more than, I think, 54 or 52% of the German society believes that Germany should recognize a Palestinian state. Meanwhile, the German government was one of the very few governments who did not agree to recognize a Palestinian state after all the devastation that they saw. So they saw everything that happened to Gaza, everything that happened to the West Bank. And they still they think they can just wait for another 20 or 50 years to recognize a Palestinian state. So it's not a position that I'm proud of and talking about the Israeli government. Yeah, the expansion of the settlement has been going since 2005. Yes, they evacuated from Gaza, but they, they same year, were expanding in the West Bank. Very strategically also. Yes, yes. And right now, they were, I think, more strategic because the small bridge is now building settlements in the E1 area. And this area is. In between Malay Adamim and Jerusalem. And this will definitely like, cuts the West Bank into two halves. Exactly. And the last year, the Israeli government announced that they authorized the establishment of another 22 illegal settlements in the West Bank. And this is actually unprecedented. This is this now we, we are not used to these numbers. These are very big numbers. Yeah. And this is the Israeli government way to respond to what? Not to Hamas. This is their way to respond to the diplomatic efforts that happened between Saudi Arabia, France, the Palestinian Authority to make a conditional recognition for a Palestinian state without Hamas. Hamas, this are the hostages are released. These are the conditions that were mentioned by those countries. And after all those conditions, that's the way that the Israeli government responded to that. So I would say that it's hard actually to grasp how this two-state solution will be applied if it's going to be actually. But the Israeli government is facing that decision, is whether to continue or pause the two-state solution, which they are going with. And that will lead you to one of the two solutions, is that you are going with or you liked it or not to a one-state solution, a one-state reality, let's say, in the West Bank. And this one state reality, they are the ones who can decide whether to make it an apartheid like state reality, making the Palestinians second-class citizens, as they are right now in the West Bank imposing military law on them, but civil law on the settlers who are living in the same street. Or you can make it a one-state reality with equal rights for the Palestinians and the Israelis, the Arabs and the Jews, which I don't mind actually, to make it a one-state reality with equal rights to the two societies. But that will deny the Jewish supremacy. Yes, and which is a core foundation of the Israeli state. Yeah. Hamza, coming from a very Eurocentric view on Israel and Palestine here in Germany, it's a privileged white cis man. The question is a bit ambivalent. But I would like to know the garrisons right now. I mean, they have, it's about death or life, basically. There is a famine in Gaza, and it's horrible. But do you think that garrisons see how Germany reacts? Is it something that moves people in Gaza? Or is politics something that they don't care because they have other struggles to fight? They do have their struggles, but they also say what happens in Germany. And this is actually some of the messages that I receive from my friends there on how I can do my activism or the work that I believe in in Germany. Because most of what those people see is the violence that we see in the streets, in Berlin, when there is a protest, the police comes to those people. And they tell me, Hamza, how can you talk about Palestine in this city when that's what's happening to the protesters? Because yes, I have many disagreements with those protesters. I even wrote an opit for the Newsweek against the properly signed protesters. But my disagreement with them is supposed, because I mean, the list, it's supposed to be a democratic disagreement. I'm not justifying any violence that would happen to those people or arresting them. Those people have a right to protest. They have a right for a free speech. They have a right to boycott to protest. The statements can be wrong or we can disagree with it. But that would, my no means justify the violence that's happening to them. And I see it on my social media every time when I see the protest in Berlin. This is not something I'm proud of. The same goes for recognizing the Palestinian state because that was one of the tiny hope-windows for the people. When they started to see that, okay, finally some most in countries are recognizing a Palestinian state. They were surprised that Germany decided not to. But you know what I'm asking myself is Germany really in the position to influence the people? Israel and the war in Gaza or is it more the US? Of course the US has more influence than Israel, but it's still that doesn't undermine Germany's influence. It's still a big one. Even if the US one was the biggest one, that doesn't mean that it's not material, it's not an important one. And it's an accumulative effort. It's not only France alone, it's not only Canada alone, it's an accumulative effort of those countries to say that this war has been going for too long. It's harming and bringing the Palestinian society on the brink of extermination. And it's also harming and endangering the Israeli hostages who are still many of them still in Gaza until now. I think it's those alive are I think it's 20, 21 or 20, I'm not sure about the exact number, but those people are still being killed as a hostage for 700 plus days. And in my opinion, clearly, the government does not care about those people or about their fate. Do you know what I found because in Germany we also discuss a lot about terminologies and not on what is really going on? The best example was the Berlinale, where Basel and Yuval from no other land were and there was a big anti-Semitism discourse around them. But still, we're almost speaking one hour and you haven't mentioned once the terminology genocide. Yes. Why? It's actually one of my mentality is that I'm not saying it's not a genocide or that it's definitely a genocide, but I would say that I'm kind of a person who's not that interested in these levels. Not because it's not important, but because I saw it being misused recently that some people just want to bring the word genocide in their speeches like 100 times at the end. And I don't do that. But I would say that it's still first, I'm not a lawyer, it's not my field, but still I look and I see that I'm Mr. International, I say it's a genocide. The International Association of Genocide School, I say it's a genocide. The Rafa Lemkin Institute. Yes, many Israeli institutions even say it's a genocide. I would say those people are more expert than me and I to be fair also I saw that the UK for example for a minister is say it's not a genocide. That's what they ended up with. But I would say it's not my field to decide. I go with what those people say because I don't have any expert with that. But I would say also that we also so many signs of what can be defined as a genocide in Gaza. We saw it whether we are with the actions with the crimes, the war crimes that happened and also with the genocide that we heard that we hit from the Israeli officials. One is saying we're going to cut the U of Galan defense minister saying we are fighting human animals, we're going to cut water electricity, why is it a small church saying it's it might be morally justifiable to starve to million people in the Gaza strip. The heritage minister says what about a new king Gaza. So we hit enough genocide in the rhetoric I guess. And I have to excuse myself because I just at the beginning I mentioned that the minister says there are no civilians. I was wrong. It was a formal hostage that says. It is a rabbi. There are no civilians in the Gaza strip. So I'm sorry. I would love to come also to a very sad topic. You're currently facing the threat of deporting to Greece again, like according to the Dublin two regulation. What happened to you in Greece back then and why are you why should we all fight for you to stay here in Germany and also of course your voice is like tremendously important for the German discourse I think. So when when I was in Greece actually my plan my all a plan of coming as an immigrant to Europe the plan was just degrees it I did not have Germany in my mind in any way. One month after I arrived to the refugee camps October the seventh happened and I started my activism from the from day one actually and. Yeah from day one I was somehow an interesting voice for money that this is not not even a Western guy this is a guy from Gaza who immediately after so they attack on them that and that wasn't the case for many people because it took many people some time to condemn it even with sense. So I started with my activism then to be threatened by some radical garrisons actually he was a gas and the guy who threatened me because of my in the refugee camp in Greece. It was about a video I make about about about about by the and yeah I was written because of that but it wasn't still it wasn't enough reason for me to think about living I still consider degrees back then and I continued until I get my documents then I wrote I think another piece for news week it was titled message to the garrisons demand the release of the Israeli hostages if not out of morally obligation. To say whatever is left from Gaza and after two days after I wrote it I was also harassed by another Gaza industry to was living in the same area and the first to go back just for the incident in the camp I reported that to the camp and administration because it was serious and when I saw their response was to move the other guy to another nearby camp and that's it. So now it will just take him 15 minutes to do his straight so I started to feel that okay there is something serious about this this country I then after the second reporting and they saw the hesitation with the police reaction I realized it's one of the two wither I can just stop my activism. Find whatever boring life there and avoid that or to continue my activism but to continue my activism I have to find a safe spot and after talking to many friends many of them suggested Germany as one of the safest or maybe the safest actually European country for now. So yes I decided to come to Germany and they started my activism and yeah at the very beginning I was one of the strongest anti-Hamas voices I was extremely anti-Hamas and until you started your activism. No I was and I am still anti-Hamas but when I first started after October the seventh I was extremely anti-Hamas because I was ashamed by what they did and I know what it means and I experienced injustices and I'm out of my country because of them so I was like this but two years after right now and I see the war that's happening in Gaza. The government is not giving anyone a reason to continue with the same power against Hamas I have now to hold the power the opinions that I had against the Islamist extremism to what I see as a Zionist extremism right now in Gaza because it's anti-intellectual too and that's what I unfortunately see in Germany that some are very brave to talk about Islamist extremism. But many hesitate to talk about Jewish or Zionist extremism and we are saying it right now with small trade with being fear with the current government. So right now I somehow my opinions shifted after two years or four after two years of many incidents that is shaping my opinion and I continue with my activism here in Germany I have this deportation order but I also face other problems of being labeled newly as anti-Semite or whatever. I think it's a way of bullying, a way of harassing someone to stop him from saying specific opinions but I hope that I'm not going to stop because of such opinions or even the deportation order because I believe in the thing that I'm doing and I believe in the necessity for peace for the two societies and the first rule to have peace other than that. So this is to be honest about it and that's what I'm trying to do. Thank you for this. Is there anything we and the listeners of this podcast can do? Is there do you need more signatures for the petition? Do you need donations for a law? Is there going to court for instance for a lawyer? Is there anything we can do? For the meantime we are done with the petition we send it to the authorities and I do have a lawyer for my case so for now I think it's more of a bureaucratic thing with the government that I hope. Is the lawyer paid? I pay for my lawyer. Do you need donations for it? We could ask people to donate. No, no, I can manage this. Great. And yeah, I think it's just up to the government right now and to the bureaucratic laws to see if it's going to work or not. Okay. There is no option that you will be not only deported to Greece again, but to Gaza. I would be happy to be deported to Gaza once we have an airport because we don't have a one. So that can never happen. Hamza, thank you so much for your time and thank you so much for your thoughts and your braveness also to come here and also despite the fact that you are being like threatens and you never know who's waiting anywhere in Berlin or Germany. Thank you for coming out and speak. Thank you. Thank you for having me. And if you like this podcast episode, please share it and just subscribe to this podcast and follow Hamza on Instagram. And are you on Twitter? And Twitter, like X. Yes, X. And so you find the links in the show notes and thank you for listening and stay safe and healthy. And Hamza again, Shukran. I formed. My pleasure. Bye-bye.