Palestine in a World on Fire

by Katherine Natanel (Editor), Ilan Pappé (Editor )

A collection of interviews with some of the world’s leading progressive thinkers on the movement for Palestinian liberation and its connections to struggles for justice across the globe.As more and more people align themselves with the Palestinian people, Palestine in a World on Fire provides the global perspective and analysis needed to inform how we forge ahead on this path of newfound solidarity. Editors Ilan Pappé and Katherine Natanel have gathered a collection of interviews that are intimate, challenging, and rigorous—many of them conducted before October 7th but still startlingly prescient. The interviewees connect the struggle for Palestinian liberation to various liberatory movements around the world, simultaneously interrogating and recontextualizing their own positions given the ongoing aggression in Palestine. This incredible group includes Angela Y. Davis, Noam Chomsky, Judith Butler, Nadine El-Enany, Gabor Mate, Mustafa Barghouti, Yanis Varoufakis, Paul Gilroy, Elias Khoury, Gayatri Spivak, and Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian.Palestine in a World on Fire highlights the centrality of Palestine in struggles shared across the capitalism, imperialism, misogyny, neo-colonialism, racism, and more. Each conversation tackles urgent events and unfolding dynamics, and the scholar-activists interviewed here provide invaluable perspectives and insights, illuminating the richness and relevance of recent scholarship on Palestine.

Genres: Nonfiction, Politics, History, Social Justice, Essays, Ebooks, Audiobook

304 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2024

Reviews

[Ryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

You wouldn't know if from consuming mainstream media, but Israel is still committing genocide on the people of Palestine. I recently found myself almost forgetting, getting distracted by local fights and the fascist takeover of the country. As much as I wish it would all go away, ignoring it won't make that happen, so I decided to read another book on the matter.

Palestine in a World on Fire is a collection of interviews with scholars, which was finished in September of 2022; thirteen months before the most recent chapter of barbarity by the zionists. As much as I wanted to read something that includes the past fifteen months, this book is a good reminder (or, to some, history lesson) that the occupation/ethnic cleansing/genocide did not start recently. I don't think reading this book is a substitution for any activism, but I agree with the editors when they said, “words, stories, and dialogue can play a role, modest as it might be, in creating a future where knowledge does not fan the flames of injustice and devastation—but serves the aims of justice and liberation.”

There is so much to say about this book, and I try to keep these things short. Some highlights:

Since the editors and all of the contributors are academics, there is much talk about their role in the fight against zionism. I'd be curious to hear their thoughts after all of the university occupations (that burned out real quick).

There's a lot of debate about whether there should be a one or two state solution. As one of the contributors points out, it's already one state, but with a system of apartheid.

We can only call for the liberation of people once we realize they're oppressed. The fact that many people can't even let themselves acknowledge the oppression of the Palestinians means they'll never be able to think about liberation.

Nationalisms are all bad. Fuck Israel extra hard, but also fuck all states and nations. That's why I don't fly any flags, even a Palestinian one.

The lack of generational knowledge (whether because of the elders refusing to share or the youth ignoring them) means those of us fighting zionism have to start fresh every generation. This is the case in so many movements.

As usual, I'd be super stoked if someone else read this book and then hit me up to talk about it.

[anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

like all books comprised of interviews, it's a mixed bag. some are in depth and thought provoking, some simply gloss over their subject. a lot of them have to do with the definition of a human being, and how the fact that we even need to agree on one plays into the western culture, the so called civilisation.

[Corvus]

DNF. Nothing wrong with this per say, just misunderstood what it was. I wanted to hear more from folks outside of European and USAmerican academics whose views I am already familiar with. Decent book for a beginner though.

[Ellen Marie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I cant do this book justice here in a quick review - I mean, it’s got people like Angela Y Davis, Judith Butler, Mustafa Barghouti and more!

Even though the interview were in 2021/2022, they’re still startlingly prescient. I found it quite cerebral in parts (and consequently felt stupid), but the conversations are so important. I also got the audiobook and found it quite engaging, so this might’ve helped. Anyway, please try to read this, I think it’s necessary.

“I would ask the question: when did liberation movements decide their goal based on what their colonisers would accept?”

[readingwithshelby · Rating 4 out of 5]

Didn’t really like her comments on October 7th at the end but I guess that’s what happens when you publish early as now much information has come forward

[Kaylie · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful read from a variety of renowned intellectuals on the need for collective liberation and international solidarity in key issues like climate change, COVID, feminism, black liberation in America, decolonialism as it relates to Palestinian liberation currently. Each chapter presents a unique intersectional perspective, the thought behind each I cannot even begin to completely understand. Definitely want to give some thought to each of these ideas in full by going back to the source material -- from authors of the likes of Angela Davis, Judith Butler, and Noam Chomsky. It's also quite amazing to me how these thinkers were being interviewed via livestream and still gave such cognizant, insightful responses in the moment of being interviewed. Overall, more theoretical of a book than I expected, but nonetheless very instructional.

[Randall Wallace · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gandhi wrote Martin Buber he would never support Zionism, “as Jewish settlers came not to live alongside the native Palestinian population but to replace them.” Imagine ANY Zionist supporter telling you that. His warning was ignored. If I told you about a plan for “the exclusion of one people to establish a land for another” – you’d logically say that sounds racist. Could you imagine such a thing not being racist? Or settler-colonial? A difference between the Holocaust and the Nakba, is that the Holocaust happened, while the Nakba is still happening. What is history for the Jews is a current event (and highly documented one) for the Palestinians. When Primo Levy finally decided to criticize Israel in 1982, he “paid dearly by being shunned by the Italian and American Jewish communities.”

Liberals don’t understand that their love of cancel culture is a gift to the right wing; cancel culture “is an effort to try to prevent the kind of talk they don’t want to hear” - a means of suppressing opinion. For example, watch on YouTube John Kerry’s clear attack on US free speech at the World Economic Forum in 2024. Why focus only on Trump attacking free speech from the right while intentionally ignoring Hillary Clinton, Kamala Harris and John Kerry boldly attacking American free speech from the faux Left.

Occupied people, whether in Kashmir, Western Sahara, or Gaza, “refuse to continue living under conditions of colonialism, racism and inequality.” Zionism has been treated as the antidote to Jewish vulnerability. Did a stranger hurt you? Then why not find a stranger who did NOTHING to hurt you and hurt him? Yeah, that’s the ticket – the perfect way to totally ignore both the sacred Jewish values of “tikkun olam”, and Deuteronomy’s “Justice, justice, justice.” If a stranger robs you at gunpoint, congratulations, that means you can walk up to any stranger and rob them. What kind of logic is that? If you get caught – just tell them you are “chosen”. “Israeli policies are becoming increasingly difficult to defend.”

Palestinians are “not fighting only to end the occupation, but to end the system of apartheid and discrimination in historic Palestine.” Settler-colonialism (what Israel is shamelessly doing to the Palestinians) is a structure (as Patrick Wolfe has said) and not an event. It is baked into Zionist history – throughout history people simply have never willingly given up their land – it is assumed that taking it will therefore require force.
Palestinians are also denied the right to elect their representatives as part of a participatory democracy.

Ilan asked Palestinian children about the towers while they were walking to school, in response, the children called them “killing boxes”. Just calling watchtowers “killing boxes” is a sign of resistance. Greece has recently and formally turned against solidarity with Palestinians because it is now ruled by an oligarchy, says Yanis Varoufakis.

Anti-Semitism: You cannot be justified calling someone an antisemite for them objecting to the policies of a state. If you publicly say ethnic cleansing, apartheid, mass murder, and genocide is wrong no matter WHO does it, you will get called an antisemite, Jew hater and terrorist enabler. If Jesus came back and said such a thing, he’d now be called a Jew hater, and a damned hippie. Cut your hair, boy! Gramsci said, “The new intellectual must be a permanent persuader” (to counter state propaganda and mainstream corporate media).

This was a great 2024 book by Haymarket Books of interviews by Ilan Pappe with a bunch of different famous progressive activists and leaders from Noam to Angela Davis. I‘m really glad I read it.

[Bobbi · Rating 3 out of 5]

This featured a lot of interviews with many experts on the subject. This is a great book for those with no prior knowledge in the Israel-Palestine conflict. I would recommend this to anyone wanting to learn more. Though, Ilan Pappé’s narrative style was not my favorite. It was way more conversational than an interview format and that was not my favorite formatting for this type of book; it was not really what I was expecting but I’d be curious to read something written entirely by the author and not in this format.

[Bex · Rating 5 out of 5]

This brought a lot of social issues that I thought played a role, but didn't realize just how deeply it ran. It always brought new issues to my attention that I wasn't aware of.

[Michael Santaly · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received this book for free, and with that said some of the interviews were definitely a lot better and useful than others. I felt the book was a mixed bag as it’s a little hard to recommend in 2024 given all that’s happened in Palestine. It may still have some valuable ideas in it, but I’d only recommend it to people brand new to this space. I’d ideally like to see these authors and activists revisit it in a few years

[Justin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Better suited for leftist newcomers to the subject. Those with a decent understanding may choose to pass this book along to a friend who still looks the other way.

3.5

[Kathleen Moore · Rating 4 out of 5]

As most of the interviews took place in 2021/22, it gives good context for the current iteration of the Israeli genocide in Palestine

[Richard Derus · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: A collection of interviews with some of the world’s leading progressive thinkers on the movement for Palestinian liberation and its connections to struggles for justice across the globe.

As more and more people align themselves with the Palestinian people, Palestine in a World on Fire provides the global perspective and analysis needed to inform how we forge ahead on this path of newfound solidarity. Editors Ilan Pappé and Katherine Natanel have gathered a collection of interviews that are intimate, challenging, and rigorous—many of them conducted before October 7th but still startlingly prescient. The interviewees connect the struggle for Palestinian liberation to various liberatory movements around the world, simultaneously interrogating and recontextualizing their own positions given the ongoing aggression in Palestine. This incredible group includes Angela Y. Davis, Noam Chomsky, Judith Butler, Nadine El-Enany, Gabor Mate, Mustafa Barghouti, Yanis Varoufakis, Paul Gilroy, Elias Khoury, Gayatri Spivak, and Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian.

Palestine in a World on Fire highlights the centrality of Palestine in struggles shared across the capitalism, imperialism, misogyny, neo-colonialism, racism, and more. Each conversation tackles urgent events and unfolding dynamics, and the scholar-activists interviewed here provide invaluable perspectives and insights, illuminating the richness and relevance of recent scholarship on Palestine.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: Ask yourself why the US media does't have any, or not many, pro-Palestinian voices featured as speakers about the ongoing genocide Israel is perpetrating against the Palestinians. An answer comes when you're ready to look at the roots of bias in a hypercapitalist world undergoing a multi-front fascist takeover across multiple countries. Populist values, such as they are, burn brightly when people are afraid and abused. Tech scum are in charge of huge pots of wealth and using it to forward the abusive, hypercapitalist agenda...the luckiest thing that has happened yet is the dopes from DOGE coming after the data and the money of the jerkoffs who voted the scumbags who can't even run a group chat properly.

Waking up to the threat to yourselves, at last, means we all have a small chance of making some of them see the pattern of abuse being used. It certainly also includes the murder and the eradication of people and cultures "They" do not like.

Palestinians are on the sharp edge of the sword. "They" do not plan to stop swinging it. If you and yours are not in its path, you will be.

Essentially this collection of softball interviews of Progressive figures across multiple scholarly disciplines is evidence that the reason libraries, universities, and "lower" schools are all under attack. The way to stop an idea is not to ban it, but to render it incomprehensible and unrelatable. Physics is doing that very handily and entirely to itself by getting really, really deeply up its own ass. Economics and social sciences are having it done to them by "Them" demanding their supply of new thinkers and believers be cut off from resources to learn about the disciplines. Stupid people are easier to lie to than educated ones.

It is a book that's been overtaken by events in some ways. It's a shame that many who could best benefit from its focus are likely not to read it as "the news" is hard enough to contend with, still less launch on a deep dive into how the Palestinian genocide is part of a larger playbook.

The terrible truth is it is working as it always has. Critics of the machinery of totalitarianism, like Alexei Navalny and Primo Levi, suffer awful fates if they're high enough profile to be threatening. The rest if us, the insignificant ones, are left alone to chatter amongst ourselves, as we can't do "Them" much inconvenience still less harm.

So take this as my considered advice: Learn more about what atrocities are going on right now; think about what will keep happening; get angry and resist. However small it is, act against "Them."

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not really a book, but rather a collection of interviews. Although published in October 2024 during the war in Gaza, the interviews were mostly conducted during 2021-22, in the midst of Covid and the aftermath of the Jan 6 insurrection.

The people interviewed are mostly academics, and speak in the type of language that I find too abstract and pretensions to have any sort of impact on anyone not in the field. There's all the standard anti-Zionist rhetorical blather about settler-colonialism and various other '-isms', and lots of Marxist/Social Critical Theory with words like 'hegemonic' and 'subalternity' doing a lot of work.

As with any compilation, the quality varied, and I did actually find a few of the sections interesting. But I don't think that Pappé did a good job as the interviewer, he would tend to babble on for multiple pages before finally allowing the other person to speak, and his questions weren't clear or particularly helpful in guiding the conversation. As an audiobook, having the same person read both sides of the conversation was confusing, they should have just played the tapes, or else edited the segments into essays for the written volume.

One of the things that struck me was how little of the discourse actually had anything to do with Palestine, as well as the lack of any sense of urgency. They could just as easily have been talking about Russian peasants under Stalin, or Apartheid South Africa, or Alabama in 1963. Actual Palestinians and their suffering seemed like props for their views on the need for structural change, or communism vs nationalism and religious fundamentalism. Noam Chomsky, for instance, was pretty interesting, but mostly talked about the Occupy movement and the response to Covid. Angela Davis focused on BLM and carcerality (abolish prisons, defund the police, etc.)

Pappé did try his best to get them all to say hateful things about Israel and Zionism, and they mostly complied. But his tendentiousness also backfired in a few places. For instance, he forced Judith Butler to bend over backwards to excuse the misogyny and homophobia of Palestinian society, resulting in the outrageous statement "we are still in the process of rearticulating the category of women, men, or other genders through different languages and different contexts" followed by a bunch of word salad complete with reference to Foucauld, then concludes with blaming "imperialism, colonialism, and Zionism" for intolerance in the Arab World.

In a similar vein, Elias Khoury states with a straight face that "the Arab dictatorships have shown us their real face— that they are another face of colonialism and Zionism." Israel is certainly far from perfect, but blaming it for the brutality of Saudi Arabia (est 1932), the Gulf States, Saddam Hussein, or Egypt under Nasser or Mubarak is utterly ridiculous and blatant antisemitic conspiracy theory.

Even if Israel was as guilty of all the world's ills as they claim, there is almost no actionable content put forth. Mustafa Barghouti probably came the closest, with his BDS movement to delegitimize Israel (which he refers to as "historical Palestine" to avoid recognizing its validity). The rest either prattled on about their own areas of interest, or else spoke in such vague theoretical generalities that benefit absolutely no one.

[Thomas Edmund · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am not normally a fan of ‘interview books’ however Palestine in a World on Fire is not only well designed I feel that the nature of the topic works well to capture a wide range of perspectives. It’s quite hard to review in the sense that even though the topic is Palestine obviously, the breath of interviewees is very wide – for example there are many activists, but some specific to Palestine, some general on racial justice, authors etc.

What I liked about this that the wide range provided different perspectives – when reading any sort of advocacy I often feel a sense of overwhelm – especially given that many advocates are (effectively by definition) often passionate and certain about their subject. Having this range preventing this book from feeling preachy, or even just black/white without losing the intensity.

One thing I will say is that the many interview format did sometimes leave me unsure of that was being discussed, say a piece of terminology or reference to a historical moment or piece of legislation or work. It wasn’t a major issue and I am capable of Googling gaps in my knowledge but I suspect people much more versed in who the interviewees are would be getting a little more out of this book.

[Nando Gigaba · Rating 3 out of 5]

After the profound impact of We Are Not Numbers: The Voices of Gaza’s Youth. The Sunday Times Bestseller I immediately turned to Palestine in a World on Fire hoping to sustain the powerful connection I'd felt. However, this follow-up didn't quite land for me. The absence of direct, frontline narratives meant it couldn't replicate the emotional depth of lived experiences that so moved me in the prior book. While it offered some insightful ideas, and perhaps some content that would be more impactful for others, it also contained sections that felt less essential. Nevertheless, the importance of the book's central themes and its focus on Palestinian injustices cannot be overstated.

[hannah rosenman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ive more recently gotten into nonfiction, so I picked this to listen in order to give myself more worldly perspectives about the topics I find deeply pressing and important. This is structured as a series of interviews surrounding different content, but all tied somehow to politics/liberation/Palestine/global events. I appreciated the diverse disciplines these academics came from (also as I heard the responses from Angela Davis I could only think about how amazing it is that i’ve heard hear speak irl). Some of the most interesting topics to me were economic racism, how liberation struggles can be coupled internationally, the pandemic, mutual aid, and maintaining hope. I also had a personal special interest in how to exist over time as an antizionist jew, and how this has historically worked. Also interesting commentary in the dangers of conflating antisemitism and antizionism, and the historical work of antizonists. I was also interested in how the remembrance of the Holocaust can be coupled into these themes.

[E Money The Cat · Rating 4 out of 5]

“The moment you report on the figures of a one-sided massacre taken out of the context of ongoing and well-planned ethnic cleansing, of pushing a native people off their land, you end up fully complicit in the unspoken genocide. The moment you’re allowed to get away without mentioning the underlying white settler project is when you become complicit with the ethnic cleansing being perpetrated.”

Set of (fantastic) interviews are from 2021 and therefore prior to Israel taking it up to 11 in response to Oct 7. Ilan is a great interviewer. The strength of this book is the tying in of Palestinian struggle with those of indigenous and Black struggles against imperialism and colonialism. Things being connected and all that.

Reminder though that the genocide of the Zionist movement against the Palestinians long predates any violence (whether you agree with it or not) committed in response. The Afterword of this book *is* written after Oct 7 and does condemn the attacks, for what it’s worth.

[Amanda books_ergo_sum · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’m genuinely embarrassed by the Western intellectuals in this anthology of interviews. Angela Davis, Judith Butler, Noam Chomsky… hello?!

They say don’t meet your idols. Maybe it should be: don’t listen to your (Western) idols discuss Palestine in an academic setting in 2021-2 🥴 Because the noncommittal equivocations about Palestine in these interviews was pissing me off.

The only three people who spoke with any concreteness and urgency were the two Palestinians, Mustafa Barghouti and Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, and our favourite Greek socialist Yanis Varoufakis (who went the furthest, calling it genocide even in 2021).

F-ing respectability politics 🙄 Playing the respectability game from your ivory tower located at the heart of the imperial core when you’re supposed to be critiquing it? Hate that. Only Spivak (👆that Spivak) and Varoufakis had a critique of the hegemony of the academy. Also, I love Ilan Pappé but he’s not a great interviewer.

[Andrew Eder · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don’t know what I did wrong reading this to not like it? Some of the essays were better than others, which makes it hard to rate. But overall I was much less interested in this than any other Palestine book I’ve read.

I felt like the essays were kind of all over the place and it would have done better if there was some loose strand connecting them maybe? Maybe I missed it?

The audiobook was absolutely horrendous and the reader was one of the worst audiobook readers I have ever experienced. That severely hurt the score.

When I was reading it in print, it was also pretty un engaging and dry. Maybe it was the way the editor scribed the interview interviews? Truly, I do not know what happened here but I’m sad and disappointed

[Ellis · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are a lot of valuable insights and perspectives here, but honestly, I think many of them are buried underneath layers of academic-ese and abstraction. Much of this has to do with the limitation of a book comprised primarily of interview transcripts— in a conversational form, participants are less likely to stop to define terms they’re using, provide context, etc. I appreciate this book’s focus on intersectionality. The conversations about Palestine and its connections to prison reform, anti-Black racism, and gender studies were particularly interesting to me. If you’re looking for a theoretical discussion of how these fields of study intersect with the movement for justice in Palestine, then this is for you.

[Rolf · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a collection of interviews conducted with prominent scholars who have written on Palestine, largely conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic.

As with any collection of transcribed interviews, there is some variation in level of insight, and you to some degree trade the depth you might find in purposefully written texts for conversational accessibility. The interviews that most stuck with me were those with Angela Y. Davis and Nadine El-Enany.

[Sharda]

This was fine. Good primer for folks coming in with limited info on Palestine or not knowing the interviewees (I didn’t know some/most? of these people, or at least their fields). Some interviews I liked more than others— notably those were the ones with the two Palestinians.
I will not recommend books that condemn the al-aqsa flood or do not support all forms of resistance though

[Lorenzo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Esta es una obra poderosa que ilumina la lucha palestina desde la intersección de diversas problemáticas, particularmente, en el marco del actual genocidio. Con profundidad y claridad, expone las injusticias y la resistencia de un pueblo que enfrenta una violencia sistemática.

[Diana · Rating 5 out of 5]

And important read about Palestine in the context of Islamophobia, feminism, the BLM movement, capitalism, to name a few.
Personally for me, also a great introduction to some great scholars and activists currently fighting for freedom and liberation.

[Emily · Rating 5 out of 5]

A genuinely profound experience: listening to this book felt like drinking from a reviving well of rational, credible, not-beholden-to-settler-colonialist-academia thought. I’ve borrowed it twice, to date, from King County Library System to savor it more fully.

[Anna Hallock · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a little too conversational for me, but it was still a beneficial read that I would definitely recommend for people who have basic knowledge about the movement for a free Palestine but would like to expand on more specific aspects of this movement and its history.

[Mira Sturdivant · Rating 5 out of 5]

this book could do with a subtitle, and most books that do have subtitles don't need them! this is not just a book about palestine, it's transcripts of conversations between a lot of great people regarding engagement on the topic of palestine.

a lot of great thoughts by a lot of great people.

[Sara Habein · Rating 4 out of 5]

Like a lot of collections, some interviews are more interesting than others, but I still learned something. This is not a Palestine 101 book, but it's also probably not revelatory for someone who has been deep in decolonial work.

[Joseph Barrett · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good place to start for newcomers. Informative and digestible.