The death toll in Gaza continues to climb, with conservative estimates putting the numbers of dead around 40,000, but a recent report in the British medical journal The Lancet estimates the actual death toll could be 186,000 or even higher—that’s roughly 8% of Gaza’s population. And with each passing day, the humanitarian crises unfolding in Gaza and the West Bank gets orders of magnitude worse.
Seeing the dire situation in Palestine, seven major US labor unions collectively drafted, signed, and sent a letter to President Biden demanding that US military aid to Israel stop immediately. The letter reads, in part: “Large numbers of Palestinian civilians, many of them children, continue to be killed, reportedly often with US-manufactured bombs. Rising tensions in the region threaten to ensnare even more innocent civilians in a wider war. And the humanitarian crisis deepens by the day, with famine, mass displacement, and destruction of basic infrastructure including schools and hospitals. We have spoken directly to leaders of Palestinian trade unions who told us heart-wrenching stories of the conditions faced by working people in Gaza.”
In this episode, TRNN Editor-in-Chief Maximillian Alvarez and Staff Reporter Mel Buer speak with George Waksmunski, president of the United Electrical, Radio, & Machine Workers of America (UE), Eastern Region, and Brandon Mancilla, Region 9A Director for the United Auto Workers, about why their unions signed onto this call for an end to US aid to Israel and what organized labor can do to end the genocide in Gaza.
Featured Music… Jules Taylor, “Working People” Theme Song
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
George Waksmunski:
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Hello, my name’s George Waksmunkski. I’m the UE Eastern Region President. That’s the United Electrical Radio Machine Workers of America, UE. I oversee 14 states for UE from North Carolina, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and New York and all the way up through New England and everything in between. I’m very happy to be here and be part of this conversation. Thank you.
Brandon Mancilla:
I’m Brandon Mancilla, the UAW Region 9A director. We represent 50,000 active and retired members from New York to Maine and Puerto Rico and Region 9A director sits on the International Executive Board of the International UAW.
Mel Buer:
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Welcome back everyone to another episode of Working People, a podcast about the lives, jobs, dreams and struggles of the working class today. Brought to you in partnership with In These Times magazine and The Real News Network, produced by Jules Taylor and made possible by the support of listeners like you. Working People is a proud member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network. If you’re hungry for more worker and labor focus shows like ours, follow the link in the show notes and go check out the other great shows in our network. And please support the work we’re doing here at Working People because we can’t keep going without you. Share our episodes with your coworkers, friends and family members. Leave positive reviews of the show on Spotify and Apple Podcasts and reach out to us if you have recommendations for working folks you’d like us to talk to.
And please also support the work we do at The Real News Network by going to therealnews.com/donate, especially if you want to see more reporting from the front lines of struggle across the US and across the world. My name is Mel Buer.
Maximillian Alvarez:
And I’m Maximillian Alvarez.
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Mel Buer:
And today, we’re bringing the focus back to the ongoing genocide in Palestine and the role that organized labor is playing to try and stop it. In July, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s scorching address to Congress in which he vowed, “Total victory in Palestine,” and called American protesters standing in opposition to the genocide, “Useful idiots,” earned him a standing ovation for many US representatives and underscored, yet again, the deep involvement of the US in the ongoing carnage.
Maximillian Alvarez:
Over the last year, both Mel and I have sat down with many workers and organizers who have been agitating within their unions to pressure leadership to take a public stance against the genocide in Palestine and to draw attention to the US involvement in Israel’s brutal campaign. Since October 7th, the United States government has sent more than $12 billion, that’s billion with a B, to Israel, with billions more earmarked for the next four years. The death toll in Gaza continues to climb with conservative estimates putting the numbers of dead near 40,000, but a recent report in the British Medical Journal, The Lancet, estimates the death toll could be far greater than that, over 186,000 people or more. That’s roughly 8% of Gaza’s population. And with each passing day, the humanitarian crisis unfolding in Gaza gets orders of magnitude worse.
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Seeing the dire situation in Palestine seven major US labor unions have collectively drafted, signed and sent a letter to President Biden demanding that US military aid to Israel stop immediately. The letter reads, in part, “Recent reports only underscore the urgency of our demands. Large numbers of Palestinian civilians, many of them children, continue to be killed, reportedly often with US manufactured bombs. Rising tensions in the region threaten to ensnare even more innocent civilians in a wider war. And the humanitarian crisis deepens by the day with famine, mass displacement and destruction of basic infrastructure including schools and hospitals. We have spoken directly to leaders of Palestinian trade unions who told us heart-wrenching stories of the conditions faced by working people in Gaza.”
Mel Buer:
The seven unions, the Association of Flight Attendance Communication Workers of America or AFACWA, the American Postal Workers Union, APWU, the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades, IUPAT, the National Education Association, NEA, the Service Employees International Union, SEIU, the United Auto Workers, UAW, and the United Electrical Radio and Machine Workers, UE, collectively represent about 6 million American workers. As Alex Press reported in Jacobin, this letter to Biden is a product of relationships built through the National Labor Network for Ceasefire, a coalition of unions that formed around a statement initially sponsored by UE and UFCW International Union Local 3000, that statement called on Biden and Congress to “push for an immediate ceasefire, an end to the siege of Gaza”, stopping short of calling for an end to US military aid to Israel.
This new letter represents a significant escalation in pressure from the US labor movement and an effort to address this ongoing humanitarian catastrophe with us today to discuss this important escalation in the campaign to pressure the US to end its involvement in Israel are Brandon Mancilla and George Waksmunski.
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Maximillian Alvarez:
Well, gentlemen, it’s so great to have you on the show today. We really appreciate you all making time for this. We know how busy you are, but we know that you know how important this issue is to all of us as human beings, as fellow workers and to the unions that you represent and the union members that you represent. And I really want to pick up on that last point Mel was talking about in the introduction about how this has been building over the course of months, if not years, right? This strong forceful push from organized labor to oppose the brutal occupation and genocidal violence happening in Palestine is something that UE has been on the frontlines of, really a leader in the labor movement.
And I was wondering if we could start with George going back there and talk a little bit for our listeners about the Labor Network for Ceasefire, like how it was formed and the UE’s role in pushing this call for a ceasefire and now an end to military aid to Israel within the US labor movement. And then, Brandon, I’d love for you to hop in and talk about UAW as well, your president, Shawn Fain of course being one of the earliest and most vocal union leaders to call for a ceasefire earlier this year. So, George, give our listeners a little background here on UE’s role in this fight and how far that goes back.
George Waksmunski:
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Sure. Thank you very much, brother. Well, UE has been in this for a very long time. For many decades, we’ve had a policy about the situation in Palestine and Gaza and as it relates to Israel. So that goes back many decades. And every two years, we have a national convention and we take up resolutions which our members ultimately vote on. And so again, for each of those conventions over the decades, similar resolutions were passed. In 2015, we passed a resolution called Justice and Peace for the People of Palestine and Israel and that called for an end military aid to Israel back then. It also endorsed BDS, boycott, divest and sanction, because we believe that Israel is acting similar to an apartheid state and that’s how apartheid was dismantled, at least one part of it. And so we were the first union to sign onto that back in 2015.
And again, every two years since then when we’ve had our conventions and we’ve had similar resolutions regarding military aid to Israel and calling for peace between the two parties, calling for a two-state solution. So this last convention in 2023, that resolution come up again, and again, we passed that resolution, calling for an end to all military aid to Israel. And that was about two weeks before the horrific attack of the citizens of Israel that occurred. So even prior to that, we were already calling for an end to military aid to Israel. So once the attack occurred and after several weeks of seeing how this was playing out, we were already in a position, long held, to be able to take the lead on it and that’s what we did.
As you mentioned, we initiated along with the UFCW 3000 a petition to get all labor unions signed onto to call for a ceasefire. Since then, our members have been out in the streets rallying, protesting on college campuses, at congressmen and senators’ offices, doors, wherever we can catch those folks to give them help. And fortunately, Congresswoman Summer Lee here in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania is a strong advocate for peace in the Middle East and a two-state solution, so we’ve got a good congresswoman here. But so again, as the months have gone on, yes, we’ve been part of the National Labor Network for Ceasefire, working and gathering other unions into the coalition and we weren’t seeing any …
I mean, we got a lot of false hope given to us about a potential ceasefire and about a potential ceasefire and about a potential ceasefire, but it never happened. And we knew it never was going to happen, because Netanyahu, that’s not his goal, that’s not his road to success and the United States just backs Israel no matter what and even if it means that we’re going to be involved in genocide, supporting it with our bombs that we make. So again, we’ve put together our coalition to now put forward this letter to President Biden, going more than just calling for a ceasefire, but an end to all military aid to Israel, especially during this time.
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So we’ve always been at the forefront of this and we’re very proud and excited by the number of national unions that you read off and especially the UAW and being part of this. And we are excited, because in the past, these things took years and years to get a coalition together. In this, it took seven months. So there’s a change going on, I think, not only in our membership, but at the leadership levels as well, to understand that the injury to one is an injury to all. Because there was a time in our history back during the Red Scare when McCarthyism, part of that was to silence unions from being active in political affairs, international affairs such as this. And for a long time, that worked. And although UE has never been silent on it, a lot of other unions on various issues have been.
So we’re very excited to see the other unions stepping forward as quickly as they are, even though in some cases it might seem like it’s been too long, but it is progress and we’re excited by it. Thanks.
Brandon Mancilla:
Thanks for having me on. I think just to add to George, unions like UE and Mark Dimondstein, his leadership with the postal workers and some of the other unions originally listed in that letter that UE helped lead really paved the way. I think it was really smart to realize that this moment was, number one, the demand needed to be serious of our government and of our elected officials to be held accountable to find a pathway to peace and the retaliatory violence that Israel was going to set upon after the October 7th attack by Hamas, right? But I think they also realized that it wasn’t going to be enough to just rally the same unions that have internationalist stance or a solid progressive stance on this issue. It needed to be an opening to the rest of the labor movement and I really commend, I think, UE and Mark and so many others for doing that because I think it forced the rest of the labor movement to have this conversation.
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So I think intertwined with that is the fact that the international UAW has been going through its own reform process over the last few years. The election of Shawn Fain after one member, one vote, and my slate, which we ran with Shawn and the big three, Stand Up Strike and our commitment to new organizing, I think this is another chapter in that story. I think it’s in the same book that we’re writing and I think that’s been powered by our members. So I think two things played a factor in us joining that call in December, one being that a lot of our members, especially in Regions, 9A, mine, and Region 6, but also in places like Dearborn, Michigan, took to the streets and demanded peace, demanded a ceasefire from October 8th, right?
And why October 8th? Because everyone knew what was coming after October 7th, right? So they didn’t have to wait until November, December, January to know the scale of the violence that was going to be unleashed on the people at Gaza, right? So what happened thereafter was a lot of street protests demanding that we wouldn’t see the scale of suffering. That didn’t happen, of course. We supplied the weapons. Israel began its counteroffensive and led to the death of tens of thousands, which the numbers only increased and I do think that it’s far higher than the conservative estimate of the round 38,000 to 40,000 that most media outlets report nowadays.
And I think, with those members going out to the streets, they were demanding that their union, I think realign their own politics around this issue. I think that’s the key part of this. It wasn’t just, “Oh, I just happened to be a UAW member,” or, “I happen to be a union member,” or, “I happen to be a university staff member,” “I am doing this. I’m out on the streets also as a member of my union, not just as an average citizen, as an average worker. I want my protest also to be seen as a demand of my own union to join this explicitly,” right? And I think those were the conversations that started to happen, within local unions, within our political councils. Eventually 5 and 9A, explicitly as political councils, came out in support of a ceasefire sign on to the letter that UE mobilized and that gave myself and Director Mike Miller the leverage to be able to take that to the International Executive Board, have conversations with people like Shawn Fain and others on the International Executive Board to educate and inform.
Shawn was very supportive from the very beginning on being vocal on this. We just needed to find new way to do it. And at the International Executive Board at the end of November, we decided to sign on. So between October and December 1st when we finally came out. We were definitely early on in the sense that a lot of the major unions who have usually been silent or ignorant or on Israel’s side, on critically on this when these bombing campaigns would happen. We’re early in breaking with that silence or changing course, but we weren’t the first ones obviously, but I think our leadership on this, when we did come out, did allow an even further opening of the door for other unions to come out.
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And I think that’s when you saw the numerous local unions, central labor councils, international unions, and then eventually, the AFL-CIO itself come out for a ceasefire. And now I think the discussion is like, “Well, listen, we’re now seven months after this kind of momentous moment of labor union ceasefire statements. What’s next?” right? And I think that’s what this escalation is with the letter to call for halt of arms. And I just think the key thing to remember through this process is that it is a process of political education for our own unions, right? It’s not fast enough, but it’s also historic. So those both things are happening at the same time, and at the end of the day, this is not going to end until peace is secured and there’s a true path to justice for the Palestinian people.
Mel Buer:
Thank you for that. Brandon, I wanted to direct this question to you first. We’ve talked about why calls for permanent ceasefire were really the start or temporary, a ceasefire, and now we’re seeing through, what is it now, months of negotiations, almost reaching an agreement or one side agreeing and then Israel walking back or broken promises that the Biden administration has spent a lot of time saying, “We’re close,” or these negotiations are breaking down for one reason or another, or at some point, it seems like almost a cynical sort of ploy for votes in November sometimes, right? And so I really want to drive home, one, Israel is receiving at least every year until 2028 3.8 billion in military funding from the United States. I think it’s something like 15% of the Israeli defense budget is made up of money that comes from the United States, which is wild to me, right?
I guess I want to ask, why do you think this is the appropriate pressure on Israel to really hone in on the US pulling back its military aid in a way to pressure them to actually accept the terms of a permanent ceasefire in this conflict?
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Brandon Mancilla:
I think that’s a great question. I think there’s a few reasons. The first one that comes to mind is precisely because of what you pointed out, that the amount of political backing, arms, resources we supply and arms we supply to the state of Israel is astronomical, right? I think it’s not an exaggeration to say that President Biden could make a phone call and end this war today, right? How the state of Israel reacts to that is a separate question, but they cannot carry out the scale of violence without our support as the United States as a country, right? At the UN, it’s a countless international bodies, right? In front of the international courts. We are consistently one of few allies that the state of Israel has to give what it’s doing right now, legitimacy or coverup, right?
And I think that’s really important for us as leaders within the labor movement to emphasize for our own membership and for our ability to wage our own political stance, is to say, “We know we are complicit and responsible in ways in which we are not over the actions of a group like Hamas. And we are not and disproportionately in this conflict over so many others,” right? This is why it’s not because people want to talk about Israel more than other countries, it’s because we are directly involved and complicit in ways that really far outweigh anything else. So I think that’s really important.
I think, second, the fact that this opens up the door to talk about the fact about our defense budget, right? The fact that we spend so much on defense, on military spending in lieu of actually trying to solve deep social crises in this country of inequality, of healthcare, of food access, of education, of so many social goods that working people need, union and non-union alike, to be able to survive and make stable good lives in this country. So these things are all intertwined to each other. And I think, even though the majority of the defense industry is not unionized, there is some union representation within defense, right?
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So we don’t make the corporate decisions that these defense contractors and manufacturers make and we’re not out there signing the contracts with foreign governments, our own government about supplying weapons, but ultimately, many workers do make the arms that end up getting sent, the bombs, the arms, tanks, etcetera to different foreign wars and conflicts. And I think that means that we have also responsibility to say, “We have to have an economy that is able to run in a different way under humane principles.”
Maximillian Alvarez:
I want to hop in here and definitely ask both of you from your respective vantage points at the UE and UAW, what response you’ve gotten from the Biden administration, if any at all, and also from your own members? I’d love to just hear a bit more about that. But, George, I was wondering if we could start with you and if you could tug on that thread a little bit more. When you mentioned the Red Scare, when you mentioned the role that organized labor used to play as a force fighting for social good and fighting for political causes that it’s the labor movement saw as fundamentally intertwined with our ultimate goal to make life better and the world better for working people across the board.
And it seems as if over the past 50, 60, 70 years, and we can’t go into the whole history there about why unions have taken less and less of a strong political stance, deindustrialization, offshoring, the open season on organized labor from the 1980s on, all of these things, of course, compound and put additional pressure on unions to basically be a bit more guarded over what they have while they’re losing so much over the course of the past few decades. But at that same time, unions as political engines for expressing the political will of working people have been largely captured by just this idea that we can endorse a presidential candidate or our job is to endorse and support candidates or parties, but that’s really it.
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And yet, you have more independent unions like UE and the International Longshore and Warehouse Workers Union who played a critical role in striking against the apartheid in South Africa. I just wanted to ask if you could tug a little more on that for our listeners and with your experience and your union’s history, if you could say a little more about how unions got so complacent when it came to taking strong political stances like this and how you see that changing now. And then I would love to hear from both of you about what response you’ve gotten from the Biden administration, all the way down to your members.
George Waksmunski:
There’s a lot there for me to cover. Well, we’ve always been a union that believed in independent political action. We’ve never been a union to get in bed with the Democratic Party. We think we’ve long believed that both parties are corrupt and do not serve our best interest, especially since the McCarthyism and the Red Scare when the unions were divided and they just busted up the militancy of the labor movement to the degree that unions were running scared because of the McCarthy effect and UE was attacked severely. We were almost killed. It’s taken us decades to overcome all of that.
So an example, I think we were a pretty good example to other unions about why you need to fall in line. And I can’t speak for other unions or what their history is or what their thinking was, but we’ve always seen ourselves as being a union that is not in the mainstream and it comes from our principles of aggressive struggle and militancy and the members have to run the union from the bottom to the top. When the members are running the union from the bottom to the top and it’s their nickels and dimes they’re fighting for, they tend to be a little more militant about it when they believe that they have some investment in their union, some control over their union. And they really do in UE. Anything that happens at the local level is all the members business. We don’t get involved with that.
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So we’ve always had this history of being militant and being aggressive. It’s written into our preamble and that the members run the union. So the feedback we’ve gotten from our members has been positive for our positions for the most part. Certainly, there’s every once in a while some member who’s expressing his right to speak hot and disagree with us and that’s okay. That’s healthy. We embrace that. But for the most part and overall, members from coast to coast are out in the street on their own with our support and approval. We have to give them approval. They run the union, but they’re out there in the street and on the campuses picketing and protesting. I’m leaving right now after this to go speak at a rally over to University of Pittsburgh.
So again, during that period of McCarthyism, it just really destroyed the labor movement because there was factions that were very militant and those factions were one by one annihilated. And we were one of the only ones surviving, us, the Longshoremen, maybe the United Mine Workers. I’m not sure if they were in there as well, but there aren’t too many of us left. And the other unions, they fell in line. They signed the pledge, the non-Communist pledge, which we refused to do for many, many years. Ultimately, we had to surrender or we would’ve died. So we’ve been through some tough struggles in our history and we’ve learned some hard lessons, some good lessons, lessons we always knew, but sometimes you got to stand up for your principles and even if it costs you and it nearly costs us, but we still have our principles and we are thriving today even after all of that.
So on response from the Biden administration, to my knowledge, we’ve not gotten any. I think I would’ve been notified of that. I did talk to our national president, Carl Rosen, in the last 24 hours about this call. So he did brief me on some things that I should know or share with you and he did not say anything about a response. So I don’t believe we got anything.
Mel Buer:
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Brandon, do you want to share? I don’t know if Fain has gotten any sort of notification from the administration that they even acknowledged that the letter freaking exists or has there been communication just from the rank and file in general about the direction that the UAW and this coalition are moving towards in terms of their call for ending military aid? What has been the response that you’ve gotten on your end?
Brandon Mancilla:
Yeah, so as you can imagine, when we did not endorse Biden last year and also had our Stand Up Strike, which had a lot to do with the way that subsidies to companies were being dished out by the Biden administration for the transition to EVs and battery plant assembly, etcetera, the Biden administration took note of that and got very involved in our contract negotiations. They did not … Ultimately, that’s not what made the difference, right? What made the difference was our strike and our membership power, but we opened the door to the Biden administration in order to basically set a new tone, which is to say, “From now on when you build these new assembly plants for EVs and batteries, etcetera, you’re going to have to keep labor in mind. You’re going to have to set labor standards. You’re going to have to regulate these places for health and safety standards. They’re really dangerous plants. And also you’re going to have to make this a just transition. If we’re going to actually accelerate EV production, it’s going to have to be a just transition,” right?
So I think that was the beginning I think of conversations with the Biden administration, and then of course, October 7th and the war on Gaza came right around this time, right in the middle towards the end of our strike, right? So when we passed our ceasefire resolution, and since then, Shawn has been very blunt with the president, President Biden about our union’s position. I personally had a little bit of a flareup with Biden’s staff when I wasn’t allowed to go on stage with my ceasefire stickers on. I was ultimately, but they threatened that Biden would leave if I was up there. I didn’t give that up. And ultimately, nothing happened. He went up there, gave a speech for our endorsement and also I had my stickers on. But after that, Shawn has been very clear to him, this is especially after the uncommitted vote in Michigan especially, that, “You’re going to lose this election in places like Michigan because there’s no change in direction,” right?
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And unfortunately, we haven’t seen a dramatic change in course. Some rhetorical I think changes, I think a commitment to find a framework and negotiate towards a ceasefire, but no real actual I think leverage from the government to actually make it happen. And recently in conversations with the Harris team, since Biden stepped down from the candidacy, I know that President Fain has also brought up the fact that we have to see a change in course on Gaza and we also have sent that letter demanding and to arm shipments and did not expect the Harris team nor anyone in the administration to immediately, I think, change course because of those things, right? It’s going to be continued pressure and growing to movement that’s going to ultimately, I think, deliver.
But I think, in part, what we saw from Kamala Harris in that press conference she gave after she met with Netanyahu, I think that is in part because of the continual pressure, right? Because of pressure from the labor unions and generally just I think the US public, is at a place where they just don’t want to see this happening anymore. So a ceasefire, I think, if you poll the majority of Americans, they want to see an end to war and genocide and that’s it, right? So I think you can call that political calculation. I don’t know what you can call it, whatever, but I think they’ve taken note of it. And I think we just have to see now with continued pressure, continued mobilization, how much the Democratic Party will want to change course.
And I think events that happened this week in Iran, I think, are going to be really indicative how the US responds to the assassination of a key Hamas leader through the peace talks.
Mel Buer:
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I think that’s a really good of segue into our final question to wrap up the conversation. This question is for both of you, Brandon, if you’d like to start. Now that the letter has been published and we see groups like Jewish Voice for Peace and Students for Justice in Palestine also picking up this thread to calling for an end to US military aid to Israel, I think it’s an important way to end this conversation by really bringing it back to a call to action for those who are listening. What can rank-and-file union members or organizers workers, individuals who care, what can they do to join this anti-genocide movement and how can we continue to keep this pressure up? What are the things that you think of?
Brandon Mancilla:
Well, I think just to start from the UAW side, the UAW 4811, the 48,000 academic workers of the University of California, I think that something historic in going on strike against the unfair labor practices that the university committed when they repressed protests and silence speech on campus during the encampment period. So I think the fact that we had our first ever … George, you can correct me, but I think it was the first ever authorized strike for Palestine. I think that’s a historic breakthrough. So what UAW 4811, I think that it goes … Honestly, to me, it’s like the biggest advancement of this movement beyond statements and letters, which are all important, but to actually go out on the line defending your co-workers for the simple right to speak out against injustices is crucial because that’s what the labor should be about, aside from also fighting for our benefits and our wages and so many other protections we need on the job. This one’s just as important.
So I would say, for workers across different industries, just know that having a voice on the job is protected. That’s important, right? And if your boss is retaliating against you for political activity, union activity, you have rights and you can organize around that and I think that’s really important. Similarly, I think this wasn’t a strike, but Local 2325 in my region represents public defenders and legal services workers across New York City. Many of those unions, those units within the amalgamated local have passed their own ceasefire resolutions. Ultimately, this became a solidarity resolution that then some of our pro-Israel members sued the local four, which made us exploded it into a whole legal fiasco, which to me was ridiculous because this is a internal democratic union decision of members, not something to bring the courts.
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And of course, the reactionaries in Congress caught onto this and brought the president forward to a deposition and there was a hearing about this, and this is just ridiculous. This is the kind of stuff that is reminiscent of the McCarthyist period in this country. So I think workers and folks should know that. I think, number one, the strongest protection you’re going to have is a union in all of this because there will be retaliation. We take risks and speak out politically, but there’s no stronger defense than a union that’s going to have your back in these situations. But second, we need to take those risks. We need to step up and stand up and speak out on all of these issues, because if we don’t do it, no one’s going to do it, right?
And I think the solidarity movement for Palestine in this country I think has really, I think, constantly spoken about how labor entering the fight has really changed the dynamic, right? Because it’s not just a protest of groups that have usually come out for these things, now it’s got another added muscle to it, which is the labor movement. So don’t get discouraged, is my kind of message at the end of this.
George Waksmunski:
First we got to have discussions. We have to be talking to each other worker to worker have to have … Workers on the shop floor, they’re having these discussions and they have like-minded people. Those like-minded people should bring themselves together, come to their union meeting, exercise their rights within the union too to speak at those meetings and make your voices be heard that we need to express ourselves on this issue, because again, an injury to one is an injury to all. These are workers who are being murdered and injured and starved in Palestine, in Gaza, in the West Bank. And so it is a workers’ issue and we should take these conversations to our locals, seek for them to pass resolutions in support of a ceasefire and in support of end of all military aid to Israel.
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Workers can be seeking out community groups. There’s rallies in every city, in every town at some point, maybe not every town, but almost anywhere you go, you could find a rally in support of the people of Palestine and go to a rally, find somebody. Find a group who sponsored that rally. Get involved with that group and they can share information with you that you could take back to your local union and have more discussions and more conversations about this very important issue. And we got to educate people. We got to mobilize people. That takes time. We got to get people out of their comfort zone because, “Why is this important to me? That’s way over there. I have nothing to do with that. Why should I care?”
Well, we got to educate people on that and we got to get them out of this decades’ old way of thinking that, “What is happening over there don’t affect me,” because it does affect us. We’re paying the taxes. We’re building the bombs, we’re sending the bombs, we’re sending the bombs and the bombs are dropping on innocent children and women and men, citizens indiscriminately. And that has to end because what happens there can happen here and we’re in a living in a crazy time. Our country’s under a severe attack and this political season is very scary. We’ve seen an attempted assassination right here in Western Pennsylvania and we’ve seen multiple other acts of violence against political leaders all across the country.
So we really have to be talking to each other, taking it to our union meetings, having these discussions, educating people, getting involved. There’s all kind of ways. You can go to the National Labor Network for Ceasefire. You could come, look up the UE’s website at ueunion.org, reach out to us. We will try to find you somebody to get in touch with. Many of our locals are active. Like I said, I’m going today here in Pittsburgh area. We have three or four locals who are very active in the struggle. A lot of them aren’t active, but here we definitely have a few who are out there all the time, but thank you.
Maximillian Alvarez:
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All right, gang, that’s going to wrap it up for us here at Working People. I want to thank our incredible guest, Brandon Mancilla, UAW Region 9A director, and George Waksmunski, Eastern Region president of the United Electrical Radio and Machine Workers, for coming on the show today and talking to us about this important issue. And I want to thank the great Mel Buer for co-hosting with me. Mel and I want to do more of these conversations. We want to keep talking to more folks, union and non-union and getting more perspectives on these and other issues as we continue into the election season and beyond. So please do reach out to us if you have recommendations for folks you’d like us to talk to or topics that you want us to discuss.
And as always, I want to thank you all for listening and I want to thank you for caring. We’ll see you all back here next week for another episode of Working People. And if you can’t wait that long, then go subscribe to our Patreon and check out the great bonus episodes that we’ve got there for our patrons. And of course, go explore all the other great work that we’re doing at The Real News Network where we do grassroots journalism that lifts up the voices and stories from the frontlines of struggle. Sign up for The Real News newsletter so you never miss a story and help us do more work like this by going to therealnews.com/donate and becoming a supporter today. It really makes a difference. I’m Maximillian Alvarez.
Mel Buer:
And I’m Mel Buer.
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Maximillian Alvarez:
Take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Solidarity forever.
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Republicans in North Carolina and nationally are assessing the potential fallout for former President Donald Trump from a bombshell report alleging that Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, the party’s gubernatorial nominee, posted disturbing and inflammatory statements on a forum of a pornographic website.
CNN reported Thursday that Robinson, behind an anonymous username he allegedly used elsewhere, made the comments more than a decade ago, including supporting slavery, calling himself a “black NAZI” and recalling memories of him “peeping” on women in the shower as a 14-year-old.
ABC News has not independently verified the comments were made by Robinson, and he insisted in a video posted to X prior to the story’s publication that “those are not the words of Mark Robinson.”
But Robinson, a Donald Trump ally, already has a history of incendiary remarks about Jews, gay people and others, and elections in North Carolina, one of the nation’s marquee swing states, rest on a knife’s edge, raising questions of how much the latest news will impact his race and other Republicans on the ballot with him — including the former president.
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“I think this only heightens the level of toxicity that the Robinson campaign has, and the real question becomes, what’s the radioactive fallout at the top of the ticket along with down the ballot for Republicans here in North Carolina?” asked Michael Bitzer, the Politics Department chair at Catawba College.
“This cannot be something that the voters aren’t going to recognize and probably play more into softening the Republican support. Is it isolated only to Robinson’s campaign, or does it start to impact Trump? Does it impact other statewide executive Republicans as well? We’ll just have to wait and see, but this feels like a pretty significant event in North Carolina politics.”
Robinson, who casts himself as a conservative family man and is running for North Carolina’s open governorship against Democratic state Attorney General Josh Stein, is already behind in the polls.
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PHOTO: Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, R-NC., speaking on the first day of the Republican National Convention, July 15, 2024, in Milwaukee. (J. Scott Applewhite/AP)
While he holds statewide office and has broad name recognition, Robinson boasts a highly controversial record, including calling the Holocaust “hogwash” and homosexuality “filth,” and he drew claims of hypocrisy when he admitted this year that he had paid for his wife to get an abortion, seemingly in contrast with his stated opposition to the procedure, which he’d previously likened to “murder” and “genocide.”
North Carolina’s gubernatorial race is still considered competitive given the state’s tight partisan divide, but Republicans in the state told ABC News they had already viewed him as trailing, and that Thursday’s report won’t help.
“He’s already got a lengthy history of publishing comments like that on the internet. These are perhaps a little more graphic. In terms of does this by itself serve as a guillotine, I don’t know. But it feels like the cumulative weight is starting to add up now,” said one North Carolina GOP strategist. “It flies in the face of everything he presents of himself publicly. So, cumulatively plus the hypocrisy of this, it’s obviously hurtful to him.”
Republicans were more divided on what it means beyond Robinson’s own candidacy.
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North Carolina is a must-win state for Trump, and losing it would impose significant pressure on him to perform in other swing states.
Trump is already running ahead of Robinson — while polls show Robinson trailing, they also show a neck-and-neck race in the state between the former president and Vice President Kamala Harris. The main question now is whether the news depresses Republican turnout in a state where even a small nudge in turnout one way or the other can make decide the victor.
“[Robinson] was already toast. The question is if it hurts Trump, something the campaign is very worried about,” said Doug Heye, a veteran GOP strategist with experience working in North Carolina. “It doesn’t directly cost him voters, but his endorsed pick continues to be a big distraction and has no money to drive out the vote.”
“He’s a baby blue anchor around Trump’s chances in the Tar Heel State,” added Trump donor Dan Eberhart. “This is not good news for Trump’s campaign at all.”
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PHOTO: North Carolina Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson speaks at the Faith and Freedom Road to Majority conference at the Washington Hilton on June 21, 2024 in Washington, D.C. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images, FILE)
Democrats are already seizing on the news to try to connect Robinson to Trump, who has repeatedly praised him, even calling him at one point “Martin Luther King on steroids.”
Kamala HQ, an X page that serves as one of the Harris campaign’s rapid response tools, posted a slate of videos featuring Trump speaking positively about Robinson.
“His campaign was toast before this story, so the real impact is on all of the Republicans who have endorsed and campaigned alongside him,” said Bruce Thompson, a North Carolina Democratic fundraiser.
However, Trump has been able to navigate his own headwinds, including felony convictions in New York, questioning Harris’ race and more to remain the leader of his party and a viable presidential candidate, leading some Republicans to doubt that Robinson’s struggles will impact the presidential campaign.
“Doubt it impacts at all down-ballot,” said Dave Carney, a GOP strategist who chairs a pro-Trump super PAC.
“I don’t think it helps, but it won’t hurt,” added Sean Spicer, Trump’s first White House press secretary.
PHOTO: Mark Robinson, Lt. Governor of N.C. and candidate for Governor, delivers remarks prior to Republican presidential nominee former President Trump speaking at a campaign event at Harrah’s Cherokee Center on Aug. 14, 2024 in Asheville, N.C. (Grant Baldwin/Getty Images)
Trump campaign spokesperson Karoline Leavitt sounded a confident note, saying in a statement that the former president’s team would “not take our eye off the ball.”
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“President Trump’s campaign is focused on winning the White House and saving this country. North Carolina is a vital part of that plan. We are confident that as voters compare the Trump record of a strong economy, low inflation, a secure border, and safe streets, with the failures of Biden-Harris, then President Trump will win the Tarheel State once again,” she said.”
Still, sources familiar with the matter said the Trump campaign was bracing for a story to come out about Robinson and is planning on putting more distance between the former president and the embattled nominee Robinson — but initially did not have plans to call on him to drop out.
“He seems to not be impacted by what’s going on down-ballot underneath him,” the North Carolina Republican strategist said of Trump. “There’s no way it helps him. But does it hurt him? I don’t know, I think that’s an open question.”
According to a 2022 report by Article 19, an international organization that documents and champions freedom of expression, 80 percent of the world’s population lives with less freedom of expression today than did ten years ago. The eradication of basic freedoms and rights is partly due to the pervasive normalization of censorship. Across media platforms, news outlets, schools, universities, libraries, museums, and public and private spaces, governments, powerful corporations, and influential pressure groups are suppressing freedom of expression and censoring viewpoints deemed to be unpopular or dangerous. Unfortunately, physical assaults, legal restrictions, and retaliation against journalists, students, and faculty alike have become all too common, resulting in the suppression of dissenting voices and, more broadly, the muffling and disappearance of critical information, controversial topics, and alternative narratives from public discourse.
We collaborated with an accomplished group of international scholars and journalists to document this disturbing trend in Censorship, Digital Media and the Global Crackdown on Freedom of Expression (Peter Lang 2024). Our collective work analyzed contemporary and historical methods of censorship and anti-democratic impulses that threaten civil society, human rights, and freedoms of information and expression around the world today. The collection explains how a rising tide of political tyranny coupled with the expansion of corporate power is stifling dissent, online expression, news reporting, political debate, and academic freedom from the United States and Europe to the Global South.
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The Assault on Press Freedom
Our volume reveals an epidemic of censorship and attacks on journalists and free speech around the globe. Although completed prior to the horrifying atrocities of October 7, 2023, in Israel, the text provides context for understanding that Israeli violence against Palestinians since October 7, including the murder of journalists, has been decades in the making. This strategy initially took hold with the assassination of the veteran Al Jazeera reporter Shireen Abu Akleh, a Palestinian-American, as she documented Israel’s occupation of Jenin. The world has now witnessed the full flowering of the Israeli-state aggression against Palestinians that led to her murder. To date, Israel has killed more than 100 media workers in Gaza, raising the concern and outrage of numerous press freedom organizations and seventy UN member states that have now called for international investigations into each one of the murders. As the International Federation of Journalists reported, “Killing journalists is a war crime that undermines the most basic human rights.”
Journalists around the globe are repeatedly targeted because their profession, which is protected constitutionally in many nations, exists to draw attention to abuses of power. Thus, it is no surprise that the rise in global censorship has entailed the targeting of journalists with violence, imprisonment, and harassment. In Russia, journalists are jailed and die in custody, as they do in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, China, and Hong Kong. In Mexico, there are “silenced zones,” controlled by a deadly collaboration between drug gangs and government corruption, where journalists are routinely killed. In 2022, Mexico was the most dangerous country for journalists outside of a war zone.
The assault on press freedom has also been normalized in self-proclaimed democracies such as the United Kingdom, where WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been imprisoned for more than five years, and in the United States, which has targeted Assange with espionage charges simply for promoting freedom of information. Although US presidents and other national figures often refer to the United States as “the leader of the free world,” the United States now ranks 55th in the world on the Reporters without Borders 2024 World Press Freedom Index.
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Repression of Artists and Academics
News outlets and their workers are not the only targets of the current wave of repression. Hollywood has long been shaped—and censored—by government and corporate power. For example, our book includes a chapter on the Pentagon’s long-standing influence on Hollywood, which has resulted in the film industry abandoning production of hundreds of films deemed unacceptable by the military.
In addition to media, educators and academics are increasingly subject to repressive measures that muzzle freedom of information and expression. Scholars and institutions of higher education sometimes produce research that challenges the myths and propaganda perpetuated by those in power. And even when they don’t, autonomy from micromanagement by government authorities and private funders is a prerequisite for the integrity of scholarly research and teaching, which tends to make elites exceedingly nervous. This is why universities and academic freedom are increasingly under siege by autocratic regimes and right-wing activists from Hungary to Brazil and from India to Florida.
Alarmingly, the latest Academic Freedom Index found that more than 45 percent of the world’s population now lives in countries with an almost complete lack of academic freedom (more than at any time since the 1970s). In Brazil, the government of right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro attempted to ban education about gender and sexuality, slashed budgets for the country’s universities, and threatened to defund the disciplines of philosophy and sociology. In 2018, Hungary’s conservative Fidesz government shut down graduate programs in gender studies, forced the country’s most prestigious university, the Central European University, to relocate to Austria, and sparked months of protests at the University of Theater and Film Arts in Budapest by making unpopular changes to the school’s board of trustees. Something similar happened in Turkey, where, since 2016, the ruling regime has suspended thousands of professors and administrators from their university posts for alleged ties to the outlawed Gülen movement and shut down upwards of 3,000 schools and universities. Meanwhile, in the United States, several Republican-controlled state legislatures have enacted draconian laws prohibiting or severely limiting teaching about race, sexuality, and gender in college classrooms. Under the influence of its arch-conservative governor, Ron DeSantis, Florida eliminated sociology as a core general education course at all of its public universities.
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Big Tech Censorship
Censorship is nothing new, but the pervasive influence of the internet and the development of so-called artificial intelligence (AI) have created new, more nefarious opportunities to crack down on freedoms around the globe. So-called smart platforms and tools have created new forms of Big Tech control and content moderation, such as shadowbanning and algorithmic bias. Regimes have set up a form of quid pro quo with tech companies, demanding certain concessions such as removing unfavorable content in exchange for government access to otherwise private information about tech platforms’ users. For example, in the United States, tech companies depend on largegovernmentcontracts and, as a result, often work with government officials directly and indirectly to censor content. Nor do they block only false or misleading content. Social media platforms have also been found to censor perfectly valid scientific speculation about the possible origin of COVID-19 and instances of obvious political satire.
These restrictive practices are at odds with Big Tech PR campaigns that trumpet the platforms’ capacity to empower users. Despite this hype, critical examination reveals that privately controlled platforms seldom function as spaces where genuine freedom of information and intellectual exchange flourish. In reality, Big Tech works with numerous national regimes to extend existing forms of control over citizens’ behaviors and expression into the digital realm. People are not ignorant of these abuses and have taken action to promote freedom across the globe. However, they have largely been met by more censorship. For example, as social media users took to TikTok to challenge US and Israeli messaging on Gaza, the US government took steps to ban the platform. Relatedly, Israel raided Al Jazeera’s office in East Jerusalem, confiscated its equipment, shuttered its office, and closed down its website.
Our book also details the complex history and structures of censorship in Myanmar, Uganda, and the Philippines, and popular resistance to this oppression. To this catalog of examples, we can add India’s periodic internet shutdowns aimed at stifling protests by farmers, the blocking of websites in Egypt, and the right-wing strongman Jair Bolsonaro’s persecution of journalists in Brazil. Each of these cases is best understood as a direct result of a rise in faux populist, right-wing authoritarian politicians and political movements, whose popularity has been fostered by reactionary responses to decades of neo-liberal rule.
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What Is to Be Done?
Censorship is being driven not only by governments but also by an array of political and corporate actors across the ideological spectrum, from right-wing autocrats and MAGA activists to Big Tech oligarchs and self-professed liberals. Indeed, when it comes to censorship, a focus on any one country’s ideology, set of practices, or justifications for restricting expression risks missing the forest for the trees. The global community is best served when we collectively reject all attempts to suppress basic freedoms, regardless of where they emerge or how they are implemented.
To counter increasing restrictions on public discourse and the muzzling of activists, journalists, artists, and scholars, we need global agreements that protect press freedom, the right to protest, and accountability for attacks on journalists. Protection of freedom of expression and the press should be a central plank of US foreign policy. We need aggressive antitrust enforcement to break up giant media companies that today wield the power to unilaterally control what the public sees, hears, and reads. We also need to create awareness and public knowledge to help pass legislation, such as the PRESS Act, that will guarantee journalists’ right to protect their sources’ confidentiality and prevent authorities from collecting information about their activities from third parties like phone companies and internet service providers.
Moreover, widespread surveillance by social media platforms and search engines, supposedly necessary to improve efficiency and convenience, ought to be abandoned. All of us should have the right to control any non-newsworthy personal data that websites and apps have gathered about us and to ask that such data be deleted, a right that Californians will enjoy starting in 2026.
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In addition, we should all support the efforts of organizations such as the American Association of University Professors, Article 19, and many others to fight back against encroachments on academic and intellectual freedom.
Supporters of free expression should also vigilantly oppose the ideologically motivated content moderation schemes Big Tech companies so often impose on their users.
Rather than trusting Big Tech to curate our news feeds, or putting faith in laws that would attempt to criminalize misinformation, we need greater investment in media literacy education, including education about the central importance of expressive rights and vigorous, open debate to a functioning democracy. The era of the internet and AI demonstrates the urgent need for education and fundamental knowledge in critical media literacy to ensure that everyone has the necessary skills to act as digital citizens, capable of understanding and evaluating the media we consume.
Steven Everts makes numerous important and laudable points on the need for the EU to seriously recalibrate both its capacities and posture in foreign policy (Opinion, September 12).
It’s worth adding that in a foreign policy area on the bloc’s very borders, the EU has led the west into a dead end of failure, in which official pronouncements have never been more at variance with the on-the-ground reality.
The western Balkans is the only region in which the US consistently defers to a democratic partner’s leadership — that of the EU.
Nowhere else does the west, if united, wield greater leverage or have a wider array of policy instruments. Yet for far too long, the EU has addressed the region almost solely through its enlargement process, neglecting its foreign policy commitments — including a deterrent force in Bosnia and Herzegovina mandated by the Dayton Peace Agreement and authorised under Chapter 7 by the UN Security Council.
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This force remains well below the brigade-strength required to pose a credible deterrent to threats to the peace and territorial integrity. In addition, the EU states it will support local authorities, who have primary responsibility to maintain a secure environment — defying the reason the mandate exists to begin with: namely to thwart attempts by local authorities to upend the peace.
The desire to maintain the fiction that the Belgrade-Pristina Dialogue is still alive compels the EU into all sorts
of contortions which in effect reward Serbia, despite allegations of Serbian involvement in recent violence, and periodic (and ongoing) threats of invasion. By straying from its original declared purpose to achieve mutual recognition between Serbia and Kosovo, as well as serving as a shield for Serbia’s authoritarian president, Aleksandar Vučić, the dialogue serves as a diversion from genuine problem- solving.
Incoming EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas has demonstrated leadership and vision for Europe and the wider west as Estonia’s prime minister, particularly with regard to the response to Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine.
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One hopes she will undertake the overdue task of making the policies of the EU and the wider west more consistent with the values of democracy and human dignity we proclaim to hold dear. She can begin by leading the west to a restoration of credible deterrence in the Balkans, and start to counter the backsliding of democracy long visible there.
Kurt Bassuener Co-Founder and Senior Associate, Democratization Policy Council, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina
It’s early summer in Moldova, and the cherries are already ripe. Fellow journalist Marian Männi and I pick and pop them into our mouths as we follow our chosen tour guide up a hill. We are exploring Old Orhei, a famous Moldovan landmark and archaeological site. It consists of three villages: Trebujeni to the north, Butuceni to the west and Morovaia to the east. The area is built on a green field, and the Răut River runs through it.
Following the guide’s lead, we climb a hill to find one of many cave monasteries. This one is rather hidden, so most tourists miss it entirely.
My guide showcases a cave monastery above the Răut River, where tourists rarely find their way. Author’s photo.
A picture from the inside of the cave looking out. Author’s photo.
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The surrounding area is an unusual sight. The sloping bank of the Răut River emerges from a perfectly flat field, looking almost man-made. However, it is a natural reminder of how landscapes evolve. You can find perfect seashells on the limestone bank in a country with no coastline, much like on a sandy beach. Millions of years ago, the Răut River was part of the ancient Sarmatian Sea, just like the lands of today’s Moldova.
Scenic views of Old Orhei. One can barely see the river under the hill. Author’s photo.
My guide, Professor Sergiu Musteață, knows this site incredibly well. He is a renowned historian from Moldova and a professor at the Faculty of Philology and History at “Ion Creangă” State Pedagogical University. He has worked to educate locals about the history of Old Orhei and how to develop tourism businesses. He has also guided them in creating guesthouses and writing proposals for funding to build flushing toilets in their homes.
Old Orhei has been one of the main subjects of his research since 1996. “I know everyone in Orheiul Vechi [the Romanian version of the name]!” he laughs. He also knows all of the approximately 300 caves in the area and has personally researched many of them.
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Professor Sergiu Musteață says that people working in Moldovan tourism need to understand that the basis of it is history and heritage. Author’s photo.
A scenic journey through unknown sites
Musteață leads us along a hidden path lined with cherry trees from an old student’s base. Researchers have been excavating this area for decades, as the unique landscape reveals layers of settlements dating back to prehistoric times.
“When we come here with students, we usually clean the neighborhood and cut the grass first,” Musteață says, pushing branches away from the path. If only tourists knew about this shortcut hidden in nature.
Professor Musteață peers through a rustic gate. Author’s photo.
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“We have organized 20 years of summer camps for the locals during the excavations, including summer schools for local kids. Lots of students, both locals and internationals, participated!” he states emphatically.
Despite many efforts, only a few locals have made a name for themselves in the tourism sector. “I don’t know why. There is not so much interest. It should be the most prominent place among tourists,” Musteață comments.
Unlike other visitors, we walk past the Peștera cave monastery, the main tourist attraction of Old Orhei. The current underground tunnels date back to 1820. However, the caves in these limestone hills have existed since the 14th century. Orthodox monks found solitude and a place for spiritual retreat in this isolation.
“There is another cave monastery here. Locals know about it, but only a few tourists will visit it,” says Musteață. This is where we are heading.
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We walk past the Peștera cave monastery and head off-road to find another lesser-known monastery. Author’s photo.
We walk on the bank, passing through the Church of Ascension of St. Mary. The view of the valley and fields is breathtaking. Turning left, the professor leads us onto an almost unrecognizable road downhill from the bank. Our slippers aren’t ideal footwear for this leg of the journey, but nevertheless, we climb down the limestone bank to a land of grazing cows.
Musteață guides us onto a new path, leading down the limestone bank. Author’s photo.
After walking, we climb again to another obscure cave monastery of Old Orhei, built above the Răut’s waters. There isn’t a single soul up here now, but historically, monks isolated themselves in this cave. As a result, the monastery is covered in signs of human habitation.
The church’s facade is engraved with Slavonian writing: “This church was built by the slave of Bosie, pircalab (Chief Magistrate) of Orhei, together with his wife and his children, to cherish God, to forgive his sins.”
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The professor shows us around. We see where the monks would sleep and where they built their fireplace. All the caves are in remarkably good shape, with few signs of dripping rocks.
We view the monastery’s exterior, which has endured for centuries. Author’s photo.
This structure often goes unexplored by tourists. “It’s a bit too far and difficult to access. That’s why people don’t know much about it and wouldn’t end up here,” Musteață explains.
Musteață teaches us about the monastery. Author’s photo.
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On the whole, Old Orhei is a fascinating, history site. And its antiquity is richer than one might expect.
Mankind has loved this region since ancient times
The surroundings have been populated since the Paleolithic era due to good location — the river protects Old Orhei from three sides. The land is suitable for agriculture and flowing water is nearby.
Archaeological findings suggest that the Getians built some fortresses and settlements in this region during the 4th to 3rd centuries BCE, taking advantage of the natural fortifications provided by the rocky outcroppings and riverbanks.
In the 14th century CE, Old Orhei became part of the medieval state of Moldova (Țara Moldovei) after the collapse of the Golden Horde, a Mongol-Tatar state that controlled this territory as well.
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After the Tatar period in the 12th to 14th centuries, an Orthodox Christian community developed during medieval times. Political stability and the protective embrace of nature made Old Orhei an important center. Moldovan hero and ruler Stephen the Great, whose rule lasted from 1457 to 1504, appointed his uncle, Peter III Aaron, to rule there. The area was fortified with strong defensive walls and towers.
Life in Old Orhei slowly faded in the 17th century. The administration moved to neighboring New Orhei, and gradually, the monastic community began to disappear. The last monks are believed to have left Old Orhei at the beginning of the 19th century. By this time, many monastic communities in the region faced significant challenges due to political changes, invasions and pressures from the expanding Ottoman Empire. The decline in monastic life at Old Orhei was part of a broader trend affecting many religious sites in the region.
At the beginning of the 20th century, a new Virgin Mary Church was built atop the bank near a cave monastery to revitalize the area’s spiritual significance. It serves as a symbol of Old Orhei’s continued religious heritage, even after the original monastic community dispersed.
Though the region’s religiosity remains, Old Orhei’s authenticity, unfortunately, has recently declined.
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The loss of authenticity in a historic land
Many historical sites in Old Orhei face the problem of random preservation efforts, which are not concerned with preserving the site’s authentic look.
In 2023, the road from Butuceni village in the Cultural-Natural Reserve was asphalted, which led to an investigation by the Ministry of Culture. It ruined the village’s authenticity but gave locals more logistical freedom.
Climbing on the bank, we notice a brand-new red-roofed dwelling that, from a logical viewpoint, should not have been built in the reserve. But there it is, like the newly constructed path to the Peștera cave monastery and the asphalted road in Butuceni village.
This modern tampering is one thing preventing Moldova from having its first United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage Site.
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“There is too much industrialization in a place where authenticity is worshiped,” Musteață laments. The Old Orhei Reserve has been on the UNESCO tentative list for years but is not moving forward any time soon. “I don’t think there is much hope at the moment,” Musteață admits honestly.
The situation saddens him. He and other researchers have worked for years to put this site on the world map as a part of humanity’s historical cradle, to no avail.
“The landscape and the density of settlements since prehistory is special. You can see the changes in this part of the world, moving from East to West. The Golden Horde, the Islamic period, Christians — there is a huge variety of artifacts describing how people lived in this area,” Musteață explains.
Life has moved on from this relic. The Orthodox Church still holds significant power in the small country of Moldova, but only traces of the glory the church once had in Old Orhei remain. In the 1940s, the Soviet Union started excavations in the region, which also disrupted the old sites; they built a new road through the Golden Horde citadel and cut it in half.
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“A historic road should go around the citadel. It’s completely doable,” Musteață says.
The professor feels that many of Moldova’s stories remain untold, even that of such a landmark as Old Orhei. “It is frustrating. We need to tell our story!” Musteață suggests.
He thinks the country itself should put Orhei at the top of the list of tourist destinations in Moldova. After all, it’s the most important tourist site in the country. “It should be declared a state priority, a national strategy,” he says. “People working in this field in Moldova need to understand that the basis of tourism is history and heritage.”
That is another reason why Moldova’s Old Orhei is not on the UNESCO list. “Our country overall is underrepresented,” Musteață believes.
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According to UNESCO, the organization is not in a position to comment on what is missing for Old Orhei to receive its World Heritage Site title. Moldova first proposed the area as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2008 but withdrew its nomination the following year.
In September 2015, Moldova submitted a new version of the nomination dossier as “Orheiul Vechi Archaeological Landscape,” a cultural site. Following the evaluation process and a recommendation by the International Council on Monuments and Sites, Moldova withdrew the nomination again.
Luckily, Moldova appears on the UNESCO list as part of a group of countries with the Struve Geodetic Arc, a chain of survey triangulations spanning ten countries and over 2,820 kilometers. This chain reaches from the world’s northernmost city — Hammerfest, Norway — to the Black Sea. The listed site includes 34 points across all ten countries, one of which is in Moldova. The country is eager to earn its very own World Heritage Site title, even if it isn’t Old Orhei.
Neri Zilber’s piece “Far-right minister accused of politicising Israeli police” (Report, September 17) eloquently describes the crisis in the West Bank. Israel’s current government and its unsavoury allies in the settler movement stand accused, but in truth every government since 1967 has favoured illegal settlement.
The first settlements — the so-called Nahal settlements — in September 1967 were supposedly military and so did not, Israel argued, contravene international law. The west did nothing, so Israel then went ahead with brazen colonisation. When the first Oslo Accord was signed in 1993, there were in the order of 110,000 settlers in the West Bank.
A central principle of Oslo was that neither party would takes steps that would prejudice final status talks five years later. But Israel’s so-called moderate leaders, Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres, immediately inaugurated the most intensive phase of settlement to date. By January 1996 settlers numbered 140,000. Rabin told his electorate not to worry — the Palestinians would not get a state. Meanwhile, Rabin and Peres accepted the Nobel Peace Prize. Butter wouldn’t melt in their mouths. The west did nothing. The Palestinians knew they had been stitched up.
So we should be under no illusions. This isn’t simply Benjamin Netanyahu and his associates, it is the long-standing thrust of the majority of Israelis across the political spectrum. Western governments have known this all along and even now appear unwilling to ensure respect for international humanitarian law as they have undertaken to do.
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The UN General Assembly is likely to agree that the July 19 advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice, which spells out Israel’s lawbreaking in detail, must be applied.
If it isn’t, in the Middle East the killing will continue while in New York the UN may face an impasse given the unwillingness of the US and its allies to uphold the international order they themselves helped put in place.
Once used for sun protection from the blistering sun in Southwest Asia and North Africa, the kaffiyeh’s function, and symbolism, has undeniably transformed over time. It’s been spotted on high-fashion Palestinian supermodel Bella Hadid, on the necks of students at college encampments, and covering the faces of activists at pro-Palestinian marches. It’s been sold on the shelves of Urban Outfitters and Louis Vuitton, and subject to bans by the Australian state of Victoria, which barred legislators from wearing the scarf in parliament because of its “political” nature.
And in recent decades it has become widely recognized as a symbol of Palestinian nationalism and resistance. The link far predates the Israel-Hamas War, which has taken the lives of more than 40,000 Palestinians since Oct. 7, when 200 Israelis were taken hostage and more than 1,000 were killed on the night. Just last week, the Noguchi Museum in New York City fired three employees for wearing it to work, banning clothing associated with “political messages, slogans or symbols.”
For Palestinians, the symbolism of the kaffiyeh can also be deeply personal. “I embroidered my kaffiyeh with tatriz, which is the word for embroidery in Arabic, to express my connection to my homeland, not just as a symbol of resistance to what is happening today in the Israeli occupation, but as an expression of myself,” says Wafa Ghnaim, a Palestinian dress historian and researcher.
What is the kaffiyeh?
The kaffiyeh is a square-shaped hand-woven checkered scarf with a wavy motif around the border– representing olive leaves—and oftentimes tassels along opposite sides. (Olive trees, which have been growing in Gaza and the West Bank for centuries, are a pivotal part of both Palestinian culture and the local economy.)
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Though historically an Arab male headdress, today the kaffiyeh is worn by people of all races and genders across Southwest Asia, Northern Africa and beyond. “There used to be many different patterns, sometimes different colors and designs. But the idea was having a scarf that was useful within a hotter climate,” says Haitham Kuraishi, a tour guide at the Museum of the Palestinian People.
The black-and-white kaffiyeh is the one most commonly worn by Palestinians and those who wear the scarf in solidarity with the people living under tumult in the Gaza Strip. But other predominant colors of the kaffiyeh are popular in other territories. The red kaffiyeh, for instance, is more popular in Jordan, suggests Kuraishi.
A clothing item that dates back centuries
Kaffiyehs were first worn by Sumerians, part of an ancient civilization dating back to 4500 BCE, in what was then-known as Mesopotamia, according to Kuraishi. The scarf then took off among Bedouins, indigenous people in the desert regions of the Arabian Peninsula, partly due to its practical uses. “If you were trudging through the desert, you could also use that scarf to cover your mouth from a dust storm, or a sandstorm, and [it was] also a way of just having shade,” says Kuraishi. Until the early 20th century, kaffiyehs were primarily worn by Bedouins, to distinguish nomadic men from the villagers and townsmen, according to Ghnaim.
That changed after World War I when the League of Nations issued the British Mandate for Palestine, which was drawn up in 1920 and granted Britain responsibility for the territory that then comprised Palestine. That mandate also called for the establishment of a “national home for the Jewish people,” according to the document. The resulting tumult broiled into the Arab Revolt of 1936-1939, which marked the first “sustained violent uprising of Palestinian Arabs in more than a century,” in a call for Palestinian sovereignty and independence, says Kuraishi.
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“Palestinian men put on the kaffiyah, and not just on their head, around their neck, as almost a uniform,” adds Ghnaim. The kaffiyeh thus became a symbol of solidarity uniting working class Palestinians with the upper-class, who would typically also wear a fez.
Other prominent figures also popularized the scarf in the years to follow. Former President of the Palestinian Authority Yasser Arafat, who once graced the cover of TIME magazine with the kaffiyeh in 1968, was well-known for wearing the scarf on his head in a triangular shape that mimicked the shape of Palestine, Ghnaim says. In the 1960s, Leila Khaled, a “freedom fighter” and leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine—which the U.S. designated a terrorist group—also wore the kaffiyeh. “That move of wearing [the kaffiyeh] on her head as a woman, like a hijab, garnered a lot of attention [and] widespread popularity around the world, but also in the Palestinian community [and] diaspora,” adds Ghnaim.
Recent adoption
The scarf has resurged in the fashion world several times in recent decades. In 1988, the same year that the Palestine National Council announced the establishment of the State of Palestine following a staged uprising against Israel, TIME wrote about the scarves’ adoption by the American public. Then, TIME reporter Jay Cocks argued that the kaffiyeh, once a “garment of choice among the political protesters and antimissile advocates of the ‘70s and early ‘80s” had become “politically neutral.”
That connotation doesn’t remain true today. In 2007, the New York Times reported that kaffiyehs were marketed as “antiwar” scarves by Urban Outfitters, though they were later pulled from stores “due to the sensitive nature of this item.”
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Today, many Palestinians recognize that while the checkered scarf is a symbol of resistance, it’s still undeniably tied with their own cultural heritage.
“While other Arabic-speaking nations might have a similar pattern or design, [the kaffiyeh] doesn’t have that added meaning of resistance against occupation and invasion that it does amongst Palestinians,” says Kuraishi. “Palestinians will wear it for weddings or graduations, not just protests—so good times and bad.”
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