About the war on Gaza

More than three months into the War on Gaza, the death toll among Palestinian civilians reached, so far, 22 times that of the Israeli ones during the Hamas attack of 7 October. How do you frame this war? What kind of moral reasoning and moral clarity could one have?

Professor Hanafi will frame it as a passage from specio-cide (targeting land for the purpose of rendering the inevitable ‘voluntary’ transfer of the Palestinian population) to genocide. Beyond analyzing the current contours of the war, he will theorise the politics of denial in Western media and academia, and the officially sanctioned cancel culture surrounding the War. It is indeed a game changer but we still don’t know in which direction: a new Nakba or prospect of a fair political solution.

About the speaker:

Sari Hanafi is Professor of Sociology, Director of Center for Arab and Middle Eastern Studies and Chair of the Islamic Studies program at the American University of Beirut. He was the President of the International Sociological Association (2018-23). Among his recent books are: Knowledge Production in the Arab World: The Impossible Promise; From Relief and Works to Human Development: UNRWA and Palestinian Refugees after 60 Years; The Power of Inclusive Exclusion: Anatomy of Israeli Rule in The Occupied Palestinian Territories. His forthcoming book is on Symbolic Liberalism.