On the Brink: Jenin’s Rising Resistance (Armed Resistance in the Jenin Refugee Camp) w/ Yumna Patel

On this edition of Parallax Views, journalist Yumna Patel of Mondoweiss joins us to discuss her new documentary On the Brink: Jenin's Rising Resistance, an examination of the Jenin refugee camp's growing armed resistance movement against the Israeli occupation in Palestinian West Bank.

On January 26th, 2023 an Israeli raid on the Jenin refugee camp left nine Palestinians dead. The tensions between within Israel/Palestine has increased, especially in light of the new government of Benjamin Netanyahu and the rise of far-right figures like Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, and whispers of a Third Intifada, a violent Palestinian uprising, or a Second Nakba, a brutal expulsion of Palestinians from their homes and lands, are becoming more common. With events like the Nablus Massacre and the Israeli settler attack in Huwara, the Israel/Palestine situation seems to be at an exceedingly dangerous juncture right now.

Yumna joins J.G. and special guest co-host Karl Barx, host of the West Bank Robbery podcast, to delve into these issues and to help us understand why many young many are joining an armed resistance in the West Bank's Jenin refugee camp.

Among the topics covered in this conversation:

- The uniquely deadly Israeli army raid on the Jorat al-Dhahab neighborhood of the Jenin refugee camp

- The Western discourse over Palestinian armed resistance; the context from which armed resistance to an occupation is born; the use of terms like "nuance" and "complexity" when discussing the Israel/Palestine conflict in the U.S.

- The disconnect in how we think about armed resistance in Palestine vs. armed resistance in Ukraine; the Western tendency to demand that Palestinians be "perfect victims" that do not engage in violent resistance

- Why are Palestinian youths, particularly young men, turning to taking up arms in the Jenin refugee camp and why do they feel that the horizon for a political solution has been slammed shut at this time?

- The Jenin Brigade, the Islamic Jihad Movement, the cross-factional model of the Jenin Brigade and the various political factions that have engaged in Palestinian Unity, the militant armed Palestinian resistance group known as the Lion's Den, the emergence of new political formations amongst Palestinians, the failure of the Palestinian Authority and negotiations between Israel and Palestine (especially the Oslo Accords) and Yumna's interviews with armed resistance fighters

- The May 2021 uprisings of Palestinians that has been called the Unity Intifada

- The argument that armed resistance plays into the hands of far-right wing Israeli politicians like Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich's desire to justify further clampdowns against and oppression of Palestinians

- Did the Nakba, or the mass expulsion of Palestinians in 1948 that is otherwise known as the Catastrophe or the Cataclysm, ever really end?; Israeli settlers and the displacement of Palestinians from their homes and land

- Yumna's background; her parents grew up in apartheid South Africa; the apartheid regime oppressed Yumna's Indian parents; how this ties into her work on Palestine

- The Palestinian struggle and changing views on Israel/Palestine in the U.S. and the Western World; Israeli ultranationalism and the Jerusalem Day Marches that saw Israeli far-right wingers march through the Muslim corridor shouting "Death to Arabs"; the normalization of anti-Palestinian violence, hatred, and sentiments and the U.S. and international community's lack of a sufficient response to it

- Hope vs. despair when discussing Israel/Palestine; the desperation of the Israeli far-right and the unraveling of Israeli society

- Yumna's interview with a paramedic based in Jenin; the paramedic claimed that Israeli forces violently prevented medics from entering the camp to treat the wounded during the Jan 26th raid

- And more!