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USS Liberty to Tantura: Ilan Pappé on Israel’s Suppressed War Crimes
Description
⚠️ Today’s guest is someone who needs little introduction if you've ever scratched beneath the surface of Israeli history — Professor Ilan Pappé.
🗓️ We recorded this conversation on a day loaded with symbolism:June 8 — the anniversary of the USS Liberty attack — an infamous case of “friendly fire” that killed 34 American sailors and was quickly buried by both Tel Aviv 🇮🇱 and Washington 🇺🇸.
💣 But while that incident served as our starting point, this interview quickly shifts to something far more personal, more devastating — and far more suppressed:
🕯️ The Tantura Massacre.
Why Tantura? Because it didn’t just reshape Ilan’s research.It shattered his assumptions, ruptured his professional standing — and ultimately forced him into exile.
🧠 The day he chose to believe the survivors — rather than the state’s official narrative — was the day he crossed a line that most Israeli academics wouldn’t dare approach.
🌍 Tantura isn’t just a village erased from the map. It’s a microcosm of the Nakba.Of historical amnesia.Of the violent price of remembering.
🎙️ This conversation builds on testimonies I personally recorded in Amman 🇯🇴 and Germany 🇩🇪 — with two Tantura survivors — and it converges here, with Ilan’s powerful archival and moral investigation.
⚠️ So if you're tired of the sanitized history told in textbooks — or buried by state agendas — stay with us.
This isn't just about the past.It’s about memory 🧾, complicity 🤐, and courage 🧭.
Time Stamps:
00:00 Intro
03:55 USS Liberty incident
13:15 Silencing critical voices
16:40 The end of the Zionist project
24:50 Europes complicity and silence
31:30 Hidden motives
39:50 Tantura
47:15 Repercussions for researchers
57:50 Gideon, the fallen Israeli soldier
59:20 Tantura the documentary
01:06:50 Denialism
01:08:15 Victims and witness of war crimes
01:11:01 Whats next
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