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Lowkey investigates Donald Trump's links to Jeffrey Epstein and assesses the extent of Israel’s foreign influence in Britain and across the world today.
He also discusses media bias and why Piers Morgan called for his arrest, the limits of recognising Palestine as a state, the challenges facing Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana’s new party in the UK and more.
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The Tea with Myriam François, we sit down with comedian and political fire-starter Bassem Youssef to unpack the surreal state of power and resistance.
Bassem is a former surgeon who swapped scalpels for satire. Dubbed the “Jon Stewart of the Arab world”, Bassem brings his no-holds-barred analysis to questions that many fear to ask — about complicity, distraction, and how the elite keep uprisings in check.
From the fallout of the Epstein files to the IDF’s social media storms, we ask:
Who’s running the show — and how does humour disrupt their script?
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In this powerful follow-up interview, Dr. Mustafa reflects on the growing change in global sentiment. He discusses Piers Morgan’s unexpected shift in stance toward Gaza, the mounting international pressure on Israel, and the tidal wave of public opinion that is beginning to break through years of silence. We also explore how Australia can play a meaningful role in holding Israel accountable and supporting the Palestinian cause. But beyond the headlines, Dr. Mustafa shares something deeply personal — his mission to build a children’s hospital in Gaza, even as bombs fall and the healthcare system is collapsing.
“Donald Trump has assembled the most pro-Israel cabinet in the history of the United States, I’ve investigated his funders and it all makes sense”
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Naomi tells Mehdi on this episode of ‘Unshocked’: “I'm not going to sugarcoat it. It was a blow.” For Mehdi, “the idea that 14 or $15 million from AIPAC and the pro-Israel lobby in this district didn't play a role? Come on! That's just an insult to our intelligence.”
Over in France, as elections approach, the center right and center left have together blamed the anti-Israel far left for rising antisemitism - and given the French far right a pass in the process! There are reports that many French Jews may now vote for Marine Le Pen’s National Rally for the first time.
Naomi says “European politics is a world upside down,” and says it is “chilling” to think that the “charge of antisemitism is potentially going to facilitate the resurgence of fascism in Europe”.
Although all these far-right parties are staunch supporters of Israel, Mehdi explains how “the old anti-Semitism is still very much alive and well.” A mind-boggling idea regardless of which side of the coin you choose to see it from, so mind-boggling that Mehdi says: “I feel like screaming that no one sees the obvious disconnect… these people are still anti-Semitic and they're pro-Israel. What does that tell you about them?”
What does it also say about Zionism? Mehdi and Naomi discuss Zeteo’s upcoming documentary ‘Israel’s Reel Extremism’ and Mehdi’s participation in the Munk Debate on anti-Zionism in Toronto earlier this month.
There are few people who can offer a more insightful analysis of Iran’s policies and outlook than Mohammad Marandi, a professor of English literature and Orientalism at the University of Tehran.
Professor Marandi joined Ali Abunimah on The Electronic Intifada Podcast for an extended discussion of recent developments in Palestine and the broader strategic situation in the region as what has come to be known as the axis of resistance – comprising Iran and allies in Palestine, Lebanon, Yemen, Syria and Iraq – consolidate their front against US-backed Israeli aggression.
Except for a few brave voices – such as the singer Annie Lennox, the actress Susan Sarandon and others – voices of some of the world’s most acclaimed feminists have been silent. Former US secretary of state Hillary Clinton, the hero of the sisterhood, has said little. In fact, she has said that she was “not shocked” by the casualties of Gaza, because “that is what happens in war”. So much for compassion.
After a report in The New York Times – now being disputed for accuracy – played up Hamas’s crimes against Jewish women (which are contested), Sheryl Sandberg, who knows a thing or two about how to influence the media, spoke at the UK House of Lords without a word about the anguish of Palestinian women.
These include mothers who are burying their children or pulling them out of the rubble, sisters who have to take care of orphaned babies, adolescent girls who are getting their first periods without any sanitary products. Not to mention the women struggling to feed their families among a coming human-made famine.
Addameer, a Palestinian prisoner support association, has reported how women in Israeli detention are being subjected to torture, including beatings, isolation and sexual violence. But politicians such as Canadian Foreign Minister Melanie Joly, who has given voice to the pain of Ukrainian women and has pledged financial assistance to victims of Hamas’s crimes on a recent visit to Israel, has not said one word for Palestinian women who are victims of military, and alleged sexual, violence.
I have worked in Gaza since the First Intifada, and the past five months have been excruciating, not just because of friends who are trapped inside under the most horrific conditions, but because the dehumanisation of Palestinians has increased globally. And yet Palestine should be a forefront feminist issue. The marches that took place last week for International Women’s Day should have highlighted more their desperate situation.
So why aren’t enough western feminists defending their Palestinian sisters? Maryam Aldossari, a gender equality researcher, has written about what she considers deeper, more systemic problem – that “their brand of feminism perceives Palestinian women as oppressed primarily not by Israel or any other outside force, but by Palestinian men. For them, Palestinian women have little to no agency and are perpetual victims of a society that has gender-based violence engrained in its very core”.
Ms Aldossari explains that there is a perception among westerners that Palestinian men – especially those belonging to socially conservative groups – abuse and oppress women. To their minds, the Israeli army, with all its brutal tactics, is forcefully “liberating” them, the way American soldiers forcefully “liberated” Afghan and Iraqi women during their invasions.
And yet the lens is rarely ever turned on ultra-orthodox Jewish groups living in deeply patriarchal communities, highlighted in Deborah Feldman’s book (and later Netflix series) Unorthodox. Ms Aldossari deems it modern “colonial feminism” that justifies the occupation, the cruelty of the invasions and the extreme violence that Israel wages against Palestinians.
It is true that some organisations, such as Vital Voices (supported by Ms Clinton and feminist activists such as Diane von Furstenberg) have called out to Israel’s leadership to halt the violence, establish a ceasefire and adhere to international and humanitarian law.
But media statements are no longer enough. If Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ceased listening to US President Joe Biden – his most important and most strategic ally – then there needs to be a more urgent response to protecting the women and girls (and all civilians) of Gaza.
UN Women says that every day the war continues in the territory, 63 women will be killed, 37 of whom are mothers, leaving their families devastated and unprotected. More than four out of five mothers in Gaza, as of March 1, report that their families eat “half or less” of the food they ate before the war started.
The worst feeling for a mother is having a child who is hungry and cold. If every mother on the planet put herself in the shoes of a Gazan mother for just one moment, there would surely be more outcry at the absolute injustice of what is happening in Palestine.
Unless there is a ceasefire, many more women will die, and families will crumble. The international community needs to act now.
The New York Times has reportedly fired “journalist” Anat Schwartz who co-wrote a front page story for the paper spreading pro-Israeli propaganda in repeating lies about Hamas fighters committed mass rapes during the October 7th attacks. The paper shouldn’t get off the hook so easily, however, for intentionally assigning this story to a former Israeli intelligence agent.
Jimmy and Americans’ Comedian Kurt Metzger discuss the rank hypocrisy and propagandizing coming out of the “Paper of Record.”
“They decapitated women and children” was the Independent’s headline. (The paper’s reporter later deleted the post on X that regurgitated that claim but the “special dispatch” on the beheaded babies is still on the Independent’s website).
The story also featured heavily in the broadcast realm on 11 October, with little room for any view of a conflicting nature.
On LBC, presenter Iain Dale expressed disgust at a caller who did not condemn what Dale referred to as “what Hamas did” including their “beheading babies” and furiously took him off air.
What started as a claim from Israeli military and media circles that lacked certainty was instantly transformed into an established fact by virtually the entire British media.
No evidence
In subsequent days, journalists at the scene in Israel continued to investigate the validity of the beheaded babies story. A French journalist in Kfar Aza reported that nobody had mentioned beheaded children to him.
Meanwhile, Oren Ziv, a prominent Israeli journalist, highlighted he had not seen any evidence to support the claims before adding that Israeli soldiers and the army’s spokesperson remained unable to confirm the allegations.
The White House quickly walked back on Biden’s earlier claim. It reiterated he had not in fact seen evidence of the beheaded babies he was convinced of less than 36 hours ago, making clear that the president’s comments were merely repeating Israeli news reports and officials.
However, there was little detectable appetite from the British media to change tack and report on this clarification in the ongoing story.
In fact, the newspapers had moved on completely. The zealous willingness to examine in scrupulous detail atrocities taking place on the ground and describing in vivid terms the violent acts, spectacularly disappeared.
Nor was there a lack of information to report on. By the time one week had passed since 7 October, more than 2,000 Palestinians had been murdered by Israel’s relentless military bombardment. At least 720 of them were children and around 450 were women.
But by this point, the British media had ditched the graphic images and were no longer interested in being the arbiters of what constitutes a massacre or terrorism and there was palpably no longer a need to make that clear to the public.
This is extraordinary: members of Israel's intelligence community have exposed the workings of Israel's war machine. The truth is more shocking than you may realise.
With a mounting death toll of over 1500 lives, we are yet again witnessing the oppression of Palestinians unfold before our very eyes. While the the media buzzes with news articles, think pieces, and commentary, there is much being lost on the context and crux of the issue—primarily, the liberation of Palestinians from an apartheid regime that is committing genocide. Why is it so hard to explain this without being attacked?
People who don’t visibly advocate for Palestinian rights have no idea the way anyone who does is quite literally *terrorized*. I have never spoken about this in public, mostly because I know real activists for Palestinian rights have it so much worse. But I thought I would share part of my story just to illustrate the way speech about Palestinian humanity is suppressed, silenced and sanctioned.
The first time I experienced this reality I was 17 years old, a freshman in college, and the only engineering major on the staff of my university newspaper. I wrote a *response* to a long article by a student who had spent the summer in the IDF and recounted their experience with the “faceless soldiers who were defending the only democracy in the Middle East.” The article had countless factual errors about the history of the occupation, as well as the current (at the time) reality. I did a point by point rebuttal and my editor said it was a masterpiece. He ran the piece prominently.
I started getting hate mail. I was called a terrorist whore. I was called a killer of Israeli children. The responses to my article poured in in a seemingly coordinated campaign. They were all published in my paper’s opposition newspaper. Like 5 a day! About my article. For at least two or three weeks. For about a month I was the most famous person on my campus of 40,000 students. The irony was that the onslaught backfired. Alot of my professors had not read my article, but saw the avalanche of responses, which lead them to read it, and told me it was very persuasive.
Then my editor started getting calls. Not from students or faculty, but from big donors and advertisers warning him to issue a recant of the article or apology or they would pull their funding and ads, blackmailing a 20 year old with literal bankruptcy of his college paper if he didn’t make sure the opinion section had the proper views about Palestine.
What happened? I was 17 and alone and terrified. My parents were terrified for me (they worked at the same university). I stopped writing about Palestine. I stopped writing about anything for months despite my editor begging me to come back. To my amazement and eternal gratitude, instead of apologizing, he published a piece exposing the threats he was getting. He told me later he had never seen or experienced that kind of bullying and censorship about anything he had ever worked on.
This is a very small window into one tiny incident where the stakes were so low. Imagine what it looks like when you’re a member of Congress, a writer for a major newspaper, or anyone else with influence.
We simply are not able to speak freely about Palestine in this country without facing very real negative consequences. Our media has a documented and severe bias.
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