Gaza: The Dream and the Nightmare
Trump’s Gazan dream is to overlay the complex human history with his own narcissistic real-estate fantasy. But for Maia Carter Hallward, co-author of a new contemporary history of Gaza, this once vibrant Mediterranean entrepôt linking Africa, Asia and Europe is now defined more by nightmare than dreams. “In peace studies, we talk about positive peace, which has rights, liberties, the ability to reach human potential - and we talk about negative peace, which is the absence of war,” Carter Hallward says. “I would say we have none of those in Gaza right now.” No negative peace, no absence of war. For Carter Hallward, that - alongside the more than 70,000 dead Palestinians - captures today’s Gazan tragedy.
Keen On America is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
Episode 2117: Celeste Marcus Exposes the Generational Crisis of American Liberalism
Episode 2116: Daniel Porterfield defends the personal and civic value of a college education
Episode 2115: Dmitri Alperovitch on how America can beat China in the Second Cold War
Episode 2114: M. Steven Fish on why Trump's dominance-style politics will win in November (didn't anyone tell the Democrats?)
Episode 2113: Does Silicon Valley have an AI Bubble Problem? Duh....
Episode 2112: The Woman Who Mistook A Stranger For Her Husband
Episode 2111: Tracy O'Neill's Return to South Korea to Discover her Birth Mother
Episode 2110: John Ganz on his German Jewish ghosts of resistance and exile
Episode 2109: Madhumita Murgia on why we are living in the dark shadow of AI
Episode 2108: Shannon Vallor on how to Reclaim our Humanity in an Age of Machine Thinking
Episode 2107: Matt Beane on How to Save Human Ability in an Age of Intelligent Machines
Episode 2106: Julie Satow remembers a time when Women ran Fifth Avenue
Episode 2105: Alexandre Lefebvre explains why Liberalism is a Way of Life