Israel

LANYARD: What can a philosopher like French Gilles Deleuze tell us today, 42 years later, regarding Israel's treatment of the Palestinians — and settler colonialism?

ISRAEL/PALESTINE: The Palestinian Authority in Ramallah remained silent when it all broke out in Gaza. Observers had expected that the events of 7 October would almost automatically lead to a new and even more violent intifada.

USA: The European political-media elite portrays Trump as the new Hitler, but is nevertheless in a great hurry to subordinate itself to the USA economically, militarily and politically. Glenn Diesen analyzes the US situation now.

GAZA: This book certainly does not lie in the depiction of Israel's brutal conduct in the Gaza Strip, at the same time it creates a helicopter view that sees a series of misunderstandings and misjudgments on both sides.

MYTHS: Ilan Pappe tackles a number of the myths which, in the current situation, have come into frequent use during the decontextualization and dehistoricization of Gaza. Here he describes Hamas as a freedom movement.

BORN: Although Rødt and SV claim that they support Palestine, with the new attitude to NATO they support the maintenance of Israel's 'security'.

LANYARD: The Israeli army has dropped more than 70.000 tons of bombs over the area. That's more bombs than in Dresden, Hamburg and London combined during the Second World War – and three times the atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima. What happens to concepts like democracy, rights and justice in light of the genocide in Gaza?

AWARD: David Swanson received 'The Real Nobel Peace Prize' this year. This has its background in Nobel's ambition to build down, yes, remove, the military, the weapons and consequently their manufacturers.

GAZA: Morten Strøksnes has chosen an unconventional and gifted approach by describing the first 366 days of the war in the form of a long series of roughly chronologically arranged bullet points, which together become a representation of the war's architecture.

ISRAEL/PALESTINE: Francesca Albanese explains that Israel cannot invoke the right of self-defense in response to attacks by groups emanating from the occupied territory. That does not mean that the country does not have the right to protect its citizens and respond to Hamas's crimes – but not with war.

WAR: Author Ketil Bjørnstad's chronicle that the war in Ukraine will get out of control has been met with criticism. Referring to Stefan Zweig, Bjørnstad asked if the war is worth the murders, bombs, mutilations and suffering. The author of this essay believes, like Bjørnstad, that there is little evidence that Zweig abandoned his pacifist position.

PALESTINE/ISRAEL:What is it like to be the UN's special rapporteur for the occupied Palestinian territories? After the launch of the Italian book J'accuse, we spoke to Francesca Albanese – about Israel's war against Gaza, genocide, anti-Semitism and impunity, based on her specialization in international law. She talks about political, legal, psychological and epistemic violence resulting from how Israel, with the consent of the West, has oppressed the Palestinians for decades. (And what about the Oslo agreement, see the sub-section.)

REPORT: You don't understand where you are – indoors, outdoors, on the first floor, on the second, if a roof has collapsed, or if you're in a courtyard, or if maybe it wasn't a roof, but a floor. Every town here, even the smallest, is a fuse ready to be lit.

HEGEMONY: Will the genocide continue until the Palestinians are exterminated or forced into Egypt – or indeed until America's global hegemony is defeated? No true friend of Palestine should therefore support this hegemony's arms deliveries to Ukraine.

GAZA: Snapshots from a Gaza that is gone forever. Once upon a time, everyone passed through Gaza. And to all it was the "Athens of Asia," because it was a center of philosophy. Gaza was conquered, and was Ottoman from 1516, British from 1917, Egyptian from 1948 – and finally Israeli from 1967. In the old Gaza you saw girls in miniskirts, girls with whiskey and cigarettes, girls dancing, and girls painting at the art academy . And the Ottoman teahouse Beit Sitti was a haunt for intellectuals, musicians and artists. There was also a rock band and a yoga centre, and pizzeria Italiano and granita... But today?

HOLBERG PRIZE WINNER: Achille Mbembe's books all revolve around how the people in post-colonial states are kept down and marginalized. But also about how democracy today does not work because threats, violence and murder keep people away from the public sphere, from debates, from being able to say what you think for fear of losing your job, being put in prison or killed.