Black Internationalism, with Khury Petersen-Smith

This transcript was automatically generated and may contain minor errors.

[00:00:00] Sound on Tape: This podcast is presented by Convergence, a magazine for radical insights.

[00:00:08] Khury-Petersen Smith: On one hand, you have an entire generation or a couple generations and an entire kind of political reality that’s been so shaped by Black Lives Matter to a point where, yeah, abolishing the police is now part of the, it’s part of the political ether. It doesn’t mean that There’s overwhelming support for it, but it is a thing that, the New York Times has to talk about right as a political position.

[00:00:35] And at the same time, I think that there is this kind of, I don’t think that there’s a kind of cohesive, Black political agenda the way that there was in previous times actually

[00:00:52] William Lawrence: This is the hegemonic on podcast where we are investigating the workings of power. What is power? How does it work? Who has it? What are they doing with it? How the heck do we get it? And other small questions like that. I’m your host, William Lawrence, and I’m an organizer from Lansing, Michigan. Currently, I work with the Rent is Too Damn High Coalition, an alliance of tenant unions and housing justice groups across the state of Michigan.

[00:01:21] Formerly, I was a climate justice organizer for 10 years, including as a co founder of Sunrise Movement, the youth organization that put the Green New Deal on the political map. Just a quick note. We recorded the interviews for this season between May and July. Now we’re releasing them in August and September.

[00:01:39] A lot has happened in the world in between those times, such as Biden dropping out of the race. So if you hear us speaking with blissful ignorance of what was to come that’s what’s going on. But I think that the conversations are going to hold up very well for our tasks of building an internationalist left in the months and years to come.

[00:02:03] Today, we’re continuing our sequence on internationalism, and I’m happy to be joined by a wonderful guest, Karee Peterson Smith, who is the Michael Ratner Middle East Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies. He researches U. S. empire, borders, and migration, and strategizes with activists to work against the violence that the United States carries out and supports around the world.

[00:02:27] Curry focuses especially on U. S. Militarism in the Middle East and in the Pacific and movements that resisted. He was one of the co authors and organizers of the 2023 black voices for ceasefire statement, which was signed by over 6000 black activists, artists and scholars, and he is a co founder of black for Palestine.

[00:02:47] I’m so glad to have you here. Curry to speak about internationalism in the black community in the United States. Welcome. 

[00:02:54] Khury-Petersen Smith: Thanks. That’s a 

[00:02:55] William Lawrence: real honor. To begin, why don’t you just introduce yourself to our listeners? I’d like to hear you speak about your personal organizing experience and how internationalism, international relationship building came to be a major emphasis of your work.

[00:03:11] Thank 

[00:03:11] Khury-Petersen Smith: you 

[00:03:11] William Lawrence: for that. 

[00:03:12] Khury-Petersen Smith: I’ll say that, on one hand, I was really grateful to grow up with a kind of knowledge of the black freedom struggle. I grew up in a small city in upstate New York, Albany, and grew up going to a church that was on the Underground Railroad. And as a kid in Sunday school, knowing that there were secret hiding places in the church basement where folks escaping slavery would hide on the way to Canada, felt like a living history that I was part of.

[00:03:47] And I was grateful that my mom had taught me about the civil rights movement and that kind of thing was just in the air when I was a kid and when I was consciously Kind of forming a worldview. On one hand, like there were a number of things happening around the world that I learned about things like violent us policy toward Iraq, learning about histories of past wars, like world war II and the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki had a big impact on me as a kid, but really it was like learning about Palestine that I feel sparked my whole political awakening.

[00:04:29] As a self aware and self conscious political being, I think I had this great background and grounding in kind of histories of black America and the ongoing black freedom struggle, but really was engaging with freedom struggles elsewhere and also learning about U. S. violence around the world.

[00:04:54] And coming into opposition throughout violence and into question of responsibilities, as a person located in this place, what is our role in both standing against the violences that the U. S. carries out and standing with freedom struggles elsewhere and seeing convergences and so I think in the context of Black Lives Matter It allowed a convergence in my mind, a deeper convergence between the black freedom struggle here and struggles around the world.

[00:05:29] And it led me to look into more deeply histories of black internationalism. And like many kind of learned about the history of the Black Panthers and their solidarity with Palestine. And with the people of Vietnam and and other places. But the more I looked into it, the more I realized that was that was just scratching the surface.

[00:05:50] The 1960s and 70s in particular were just this time of just incredibly expansive black internationalism. Where black activists in this country were so inspired to connect with people elsewhere. And the opposite was also true. I learned about histories of the Polynesian Panthers, in New Zealand and the Black Panthers in Australia and the Dalit Panthers in India and seeing what mutual inspiration as part of international solidarity could look like.

[00:06:27] So I think that world of mutual inspiration and solidarity and thinking about the particular challenges and responsibilities of being located in the heart of empire. I think that’s what I, that’s where I sit a lot of the time. 

[00:06:42] William Lawrence: I’m curious. You said that you were really awakened as a political being by learning about, Palestine and the Palestinian struggle for liberation.

[00:06:50] How did that happen for you? Because some of our sounds like we have some points in common. We may be around the same age. I was a young teenager when the Iraq war was getting started, and that was, I think, the first political demonstration I ever went to was marching against the Iraq war in March of 20 of 2000 and three.

[00:07:07] And then I became a climate organizer for many years. But the Palestine piece, frankly, was It wasn’t something I got an education around as a young person, and it had to happen many years later. So I’m curious how that happened for you. 

[00:07:20] Khury-Petersen Smith: Yeah. And, so again, growing up in a small city where there were, I didn’t know any Palestinians, it’d be a long time before I met Palestinian folks, but I had this, High school teacher freshman year who was it’s a regular upstate New York, liberal white guy, public school teacher who we were doing the Middle East unit in global studies class.

[00:07:47] And he came into class one day and he said, today, I’m going to tell you why the Palestinians are so pissed off. And he devoted a lesson to that. And he showed us that the thing that was most striking was he showed us the maps that many folks will have seen showing the loss of Palestinian land since 1948.

[00:08:05] And it just blew my mind, especially because I had not heard that story, but I had definitely heard the kind of Israeli story that Palestine was this land without a people for a people without a land that Israelis made the desert bloom. That was in my sixth grade textbook and I remember reading that and having friends who had gone to Israel and came back and told me about how great it was.

[00:08:30] And so when I heard this kind of telling of Palestinian experience, I couldn’t, I was like, is this for real? Like how can in the same place such a profoundly opposite. Experience be true and I just it led me to look into it myself and so yeah, I found myself reading magazine called Middle East report that I started reading and it was cool and you had anything to get my hands on and I can, I concluded like this is real, and I was wrong actually about what I understood to be true.

[00:09:09] And so what else am I wrong about, and I think that’s the thing for those of us who learn about Palestine, not by virtue of being Palestinian or by virtue of being in a community where there’s a lot more where there’s a kind of common conversation about Palestine it’s one of those things that, that just gets to the heart of, Of everything, especially because I learned that once I decided, all right, I’m on the side of Palestinian folks, I want them to get their freedom.

[00:09:38] I learned that was not a popular position and, it cost me some friendships and it I was like I, it that itself was confounding. I thought it was something really straightforward about wanting to see a people get their liberation. And the fact that was controversial raised more questions for me and ultimately led me to ask what all is invested into making sure that we don’t identify with Palestinians, and I think that comes down to a question of US policy and how this country has oriented on Israel as its ally, et cetera, et cetera.

[00:10:15] And just the thing I’ll throw in there, I actually think that a lot of folks have a similar, a lot of folks who are not black have a similar experience with black politics. Like you conclude that a phrase like black lives matter, which is that there’s been like an important kind of force attached to that phrase, but the phrase itself is not exactly earth shattering.

[00:10:37] Black lives matter. And yet that’s like a con. It’s been this controversial phrase. That’s why it worked so 

[00:10:43] William Lawrence: well is that it’s it started as something that anyone should agree with. And it’s become so polarized. 

[00:10:49] Khury-Petersen Smith: Yeah, people are like, especially, this continues to be true, but particularly in 2014 2015 2020.

[00:10:57] People rallying around the phrase Black Lives Matter are met with the National Guard. And I think that has forced a lot of people over the past decade to say, Whoa, maybe I knew that racism was a problem or was still here, but I did not realize that it was that deep. And I do think that because of, there’s a kind of central place that the oppression of black folks occupies in American society.

[00:11:27] In the whole system. And I think there’s a central place that the oppression of Palestinian folks occupies in the world system that when people engage with these questions, and in particular, both of these freedom struggles, but these are groups of people who are not just experiencing oppression, but who are in struggle for their freedom.

[00:11:45] And there’s something really powerful about that like politically powerful. That I think is this sort of express train to, see the whole system in a kind of with a different kind of clarity, 

[00:12:00] William Lawrence: right over the last year I’ll freely admit that I’ve challenged. I’ve been one of those people studying and deepening my historical and contemporary knowledge base around Palestine and Israel.

[00:12:18] It’s been that effect of like you said, Oh wait, this is still going on. And then you say, okay what was it like the first time? And it, and the thing that is still going on is settler colonialism and world empire. And it goes down the rabbit hole of having to understand, okay, how has this happened?

[00:12:37] And. in Palestine since 48 and before, but then what was, what’s been going on in the United States? And yeah, boy, and then it really starts out as being a conversation about Jews and Arabs who are mostly Muslim, Jews and Muslims, but then it, You dig down the right and you go, Oh, this is all about Christianity.

[00:13:01] This is about Christians and Jews in Europe and anti Semitism in Europe. And this is this terrible echo of that, which was the the reality for centuries and centuries, millennia in Europe, which has now been the razor’s edge of that has been displaced into Palestine and targeted against the Palestinians.

[00:13:22] And so it becomes a conversation about empire, about colonialism and about world religion which are just these massive, Civilizational questions to be grappling with. I heard Richard Seymour on the dig describe Palestine as, I think he said, the naval of the world system. And it’s I think that was a, that stuck with me because it’s, it seems so strange in our world politics.

[00:13:47] Why is this attracting so much interest and so much attention and you realize something about this reveals something very fundamental about where we have come from. 

[00:13:56] Khury-Petersen Smith: I think that’s exactly it. And it’s, again it’s one of those things that. It enters people’s consciousness through these highly visible acts of incredible violence.

[00:14:11] The, this, the siege of Gaza, this current one is just, it’s just unreal. The, it’s unreal. And I think for so many people, including, and I have to say finally for a majority of Americans. There’s something that seems straightforwardly wrong about invading every single hospital in Gaza or destroying every single university campus.

[00:14:39] And restricting food to a population that’s being systematically starved. And I think people say this is strange. Surely the U. S. should be supporting, food going in. And instead, the U. S. government is the one that’s supplying all the weapons, and when a ceasefire vote comes up in the U.

[00:15:02] N., then it’s surely the U. S. should support that. Of course. Everybody would want a ceasefire, wouldn’t they? And it’s actually, the U. S. is the key force that opposes a ceasefire and that has vetoed those votes in the U. N. Security Council. And that kind of straight, just like straightforward, again, highly visible example of injustice.

[00:15:23] That one feels should not be controversial leaves one, to ask these massive questions or to these big topics that you’re talking about, because it really is at the moment, the kind of cutting edge of contemporary colonization. I don’t want to dismiss the colonization or minimize the colonization that’s happening in this place called the United States.

[00:15:46] On the contrary, I think that. I think that it’s, as you said we witnessed what’s happening in Palestine and then that, that, at least for, in my experience leads me to look back at this place with different eyes. And there is something that is like 15th century style colonialism playing out in Palestine right now that leads one to say you just said, this is still happening.

[00:16:10] It really is we are better people, Israelis, we deserve this land and they don’t. We know how to run a society and have a democracy and they’re incapable. We are a peaceful people and they are a violent people and therefore we don’t want to, but we have to obliterate their society.

[00:16:30] And it is the most crass and crude form of colonization, and it’s being, armed by the most powerful country in the world. And yeah, I’ll just say, I do think, again, there’s a kind of parallel. People in 2020 who know about this murder of George Floyd, and it’s okay, this should be This seems like straightforwardly unjust, right?

[00:16:57] And yet, it’s actually the black population is characterized as violent. It’s, in the problem and to be dealt with. And again, it just raises these questions that go right at the heart of what is this whole society about? 

[00:17:12] William Lawrence: So the, the millennial political experience has been a process of one radicalizing moment after another, one part of the myth falling away after another.

[00:17:28] From 2000. the invasion of Iraq through the financial crisis and onward. And this has shaped, a generation of organizers who, we’re in the streets for Black Lives Matter. We’re in the streets for Occupy. We’re out at Standing Rock and we’re, Campaigning for Bernie or other members of the squad and then who participated in the George Floyd uprising in 2020 now joined by lots of Gen Z ers.

[00:17:58] And now we have this utter clusterfuck that is the Biden administration the genocide in Gaza. And this re election campaign, which is forcing all of these questions to a head. I’m curious because this series is on, internationalism. My view is that there was this the movements of the 2010s were really around learning to be assertive in demanding racial and economic justice here in the United States.

[00:18:24] Yeah. But it came at the. Expense of a little bit of quietism about some of these international issues, which is often the case with social democratic movements. Not necessarily the case, but it can be the case. And Bernie had some very principled positions in both of his campaigns on international issues.

[00:18:43] But I don’t think anybody was confused that was the main point. People were there fighting for racial economic justice in the United States, and that was the big message. Now, under Biden, it’s, foreign policy and international affairs has come back to the fore. That’s come through Palestine, but also through before that, through the, Russian invasion of Ukraine, which everyone had to grapple with.

[00:19:06] And also just the our economic policy has resulted in this crass course with China, which we’re hearing a lot more about in our politics. These have been more challenging issues For the left to grapple with than the economic and racial social justice issues that we were really united around in the 2010s.

[00:19:24] I think there’s been a lot of micro fractures, but also in some cases, macro fractures within the U S left in the Biden administration in large part, though, not exclusively because of the return of these. international issues onto the agenda in a way that people can’t escape. And so I’m curious how you would characterize that trajectory from the perspective of being a black American participating in black movement spaces.

[00:19:51] Would you, how has those spaces you’ve been a part of been tracking with these international issues really over the last 15 years? And another way of framing this is, I’ve seen my friends and comrades in the kind of millennial. Black movements to have a real radicalizing journey in going from for instance from police reform Around the early part of the 2010s to a stance which is about abolishing the prisons and police Which was much more of a mainstream position at least among movement people by the end of that decade, has there been a similar radicalizing process or conscientization process when it comes to internationalist attitudes and orientations?

[00:20:35] Khury-Petersen Smith: Yeah, it’s such a, it’s such a good question, and there’s so much in there, right? And I think the first thing to say is, so I think that it’s true that there’s been, on the U. S. left broadly speaking, and I appreciate you Locating it generationally too, as part of the kind of millennial radicalization.

[00:20:56] I’ll speak to from that perspective 

[00:20:57] William Lawrence: too. I just keep, I say to people who are older, I say just look at the scoreboard folks, just look at the scoreboard and it will make sense to you. You just got to understand that we weren’t there in the eighties and the nine, we had relatively few years in the 20th century to just get all gassed up about this America thing.

[00:21:15] It’s been mostly one failure after another. 

[00:21:18] Khury-Petersen Smith: There’s been a process in this country of just revisiting and figuring out the question of racial justice and where the black freedom struggle fits into, the broader social and economic justice politics. Of this time, because yeah, like obviously there’s a longstanding, there’s like a, there’s an ongoing black freedom struggle.

[00:21:40] There’s a kind of a longstanding, anti racist solidarity politics. So on one hand, like we’ve experienced this breakthrough, in our generation, which is that socialism is no longer a dirty word. When I was in high school and learning about Palestine and, All kinds of other things and ultimately concluding I’m a socialist.

[00:22:00] I heard people say that’s, you’re not what, either. What is that? Or you’re not allowed to be, do that. That’s off limits 

[00:22:07] William Lawrence: reconsider. 

[00:22:08] Khury-Petersen Smith: And that’s no longer true. Like on one hand, like the U S has finally joined. The vast majority of the planet where socialism is just another political perspective that one can adopt, it’s just, it’s on the menu.

[00:22:23] And I think the kind of socialism that became popularized this time was one that really saw things as fundamentally about resolving economic inequality, in terms of wages, in terms of social programs, things like universal health care, which are extremely important. But then Black Lives Matter burst onto the scene, and I think a lot of people on the U.

[00:22:45] S. left weren’t sure what to do with that, actually. And, and in particular, a lot of folks who are not black, on the U. S. left, it’s where does this fit in with that? And where does the question of the police fit in to this? And thankfully, there have been these important uprisings that have, impacted, the kind of political stream.

[00:23:01] And I think you’re right to put Standing Rock on there too, a really deep critique of the ongoing colonization of this place. That as not only a feature of capitalism, American capitalism, but central it’s foundational to American capitalism and then indigenous resistance and the question of indigenous autonomy that having to, if you’re a serious radical in this country, That has to be part of your analysis, right?

[00:23:30] So anyway, that’s all to say there’s been a kind of journey in terms of a domestic U. S. Left politics, but I agree with you that it’s largely been a politics that is bordered by that accepts the boundaries of the U. S. state, that is like you can have a progressive program or socialist vision that is very much like a domestic U.

[00:23:51] S. vision. And I think there’s been, there’s two major problems with that. One is. Because the U. S. Is at the heart of world empire. We have a real responsibility to think about. And and I just think about my act on, the fact that it’s our government that is really, our government are in quotes.

[00:24:12] That’s really enacting violence around the world that, Anybody else who’s fighting for social justice has to deal with, right? And so That’s something that it’s it’s not okay actually to just jettison or leave aside but the other thing is Putting aside our responsibility there’s an american exceptionalism.

[00:24:30] That’s just part of Life in the u. s. And on the left. We’re not immune from it and so I think that we will confront questions of injustice and social justice in the u. s as though we’re like You The first and only people to ever confront these questions when in fact many people around the world not only in history, but in this contemporary moment are Light years ahead of like i’ve already engaged with these questions for a long time and we have a lot to learn Actually, like it’s to our peril that we accept this kind of domestic framing and so internationalism is for me, it’s part of what is our responsibility as people living in the world and people located in?

[00:25:11] At the heart of the state that’s administering the system, we have real responsibilities. But also we have a responsibility like for our own struggles here. We have the responsibility to learn from and engage with other people. I just think about the question of the revolution in Sudan. At the moment there is an important conversation in the U.

[00:25:32] S. about Sudan and about just the absolutely catastrophic civil war situation unfolding there. That’s devastating. But what preceded this moment was this incredible Sudanese revolution, which is not only important in its own right and worth engaging with on its own terms. But here in the U S we’re like, Oh my goodness, we’re seeing like a send an authoritarianism.

[00:25:55] How can we deal with it? And it’s folks brought down a dictatorship in Sudan and I think we can probably learn a lot from them, and there’s any number of struggles against authoritarianism all around the world, across Latin America, across Europe In Asia, in Africa. And it’s to our real peril that we are trying to answer these questions that we’re confronted with.

[00:26:14] Not just the far right by various sections of the U. S. State. We’re trying to answer these questions in isolation where we have a lot to learn 

[00:26:24] William Lawrence: or in Latin America. The U. S. Left is consumed right now with the question of party building how to build some sort of third force in American politics that is a political mass party or party like in some sense.

[00:26:37] And it’s been Latin American movements and their political instruments that have just had Tremendous success in building those kinds of formations in the 21st century, rooted in the kinds of, economies and division of labor that exists in the 21st century. It looks different from a Leninist mass party, but it rhymes, but it’s different.

[00:27:01] And it’s responsive to the sort of, the more, some would say movementist formations that, our struggles tend to take the way the global economy is arranged today. And again, I can’t claim to be an expert in, in, in any of that, but if you just read what Latin American theorists and practitioners are writing about, but they’re far ahead, they’re far ahead, they’re far ahead.

[00:27:22] And we have people who are still talking about, not that this is bad to to study, but they’re just, endlessly trying to rehash, 1917 or what have you it’s a little embarrassing. 

[00:27:32] Khury-Petersen Smith: Yeah. I have so many thoughts on that. I will just say like there’s a lot of experiences around the world in history that are extremely important for us to learn from.

[00:27:42] But I do think that at least like from where I sit in the U S I think that on the left, we 20th century. And really need to yeah, just updating of our, engagement with the 21st century. And it’s not to say that the lessons of the 20th are irrelevant, but it’s a new time, and I think that the right in the U.

[00:28:00] S., they get it, like they’re very, they’re they have a politics that is painfully not relevant but that speaks to the realities that people are dealing with. And. redirects them ideologically in the most grotesque ways. While we’re trying to rehash, these past visions.

[00:28:20] But yeah, I think like I, like the, I’m with you, like I have a lot to learn, but like the last Ecuadorian election, I was like, that is like the future. A situation where you have a kind of traditional, like capitalist, like banker candidate, and then you’ve got a socialist candidate, and then you’ve got what could be considered like an eco, an indigenous eco socialist candidate.

[00:28:41] And it’s that’s the race, and where you’ve got two kind of critical visions, one of which is fighting for our redistributive program. And the other which is saying, yeah, but we need a critique against extractivism. And it’s that is so far ahead of, of where we are in the U S.

[00:28:58] It really is at our own peril that we, when we don’t grapple with what’s happening elsewhere and what folks are doing elsewhere. I think I will say like one thing again, just talking about our, we’ve gotten to talk a little bit about our political origin stories and The kind of circles that I got political in were ones where notions of popular power were the inspiration like circles were like very much influenced by inspired by the Zapatista uprising, for example, and the global justice movement.

[00:29:31] And, it’s not to say that you don’t engage with. Official politics powers like our power is popular power, right? That is distinct from and if we do or when we engage with official politics, we do it from a very different base. And that is the challenge today. Like it’s been until frankly, until this like incredible uprising around Gaza and the U S which I think has put the question of popular power back on the agenda.

[00:30:05] I think before that moment, we really struggled. Of course there were these incredible, like there was the occupy movement. There were there are all kinds of extremely important other moments there, there was. Kind of 2020 uprisings. But this moment has forced us and particularly think about the student encampments where it’s okay students are like where precisely does our power lie and We want to make demands on administration How do we do that?

[00:30:32] You know in recognizing That whatever happens at the negotiating table Really rises or falls on the strength of the students Outside of the closed or the rooms with the closed doors, right? 

[00:30:46] That’s a lesson that I think that we’re relearning now. And I do think that challenge of taking popular power that’s rooted in, our communities and our workplaces and our campuses, and then having a political, a set of political visions that can engage with power.

[00:31:07] Yeah. Latin America for me is there’s a whole set of really interesting, important experiments and Europe too. And, but we really have not gotten it in the U S and I think we’ve got to figure that out. 

[00:31:20] William Lawrence: Hi 

[00:31:24] Sound on Tape: there, this is Caden, the publisher of Convergence Magazine. I feel fortunate to spend most of my days working on bringing you the most useful, grounded insights from organizers and movement leaders in print and audio.

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[00:32:11] Thanks for listening.

[00:32:22] William Lawrence: So you were the co author of this Black Voices for Ceasefire statement, which was signed by over 6, 000 people. It’s very impressive. You’re also the co founder of Black for Palestine. I’m curious about, we’ve been talking about these sort of parochial tendencies of Americans to not see or study or, Really understand that beyond our own borders.

[00:32:44] What has the experience been like of organizing black leftist, but also black community members who may not identify as leftists to be in solidarity with Palestine when you’re also navigating these cross currents of working with U. S. Americans. Yeah. So on one hand, 

[00:33:02] Khury-Petersen Smith: I think it’s the same challenges as the whole movement, which is how do we actually and meaningfully do our part to stop the U.

[00:33:14] S. support for this violence, which has been really challenging. And I do think that one thing that’s really interesting is, and we’ve talked about this a bunch in Black for Palestine is so what is our power exactly? What can we leverage? Because we don’t have, it’s not like money. It’s not political Power in terms of a kind of location within the political system that we can pull some strings And I do think that the black freedom struggle has this moral authority that everybody wants there’s this whole kind of zionist Operation around claiming that dr.

[00:33:50] King was on the side of israel and there’s this whole very comprehensive effort to Get black Church leaders to come do pilgrimages that, in the holy land that are very much working with the Israeli state and the kind of Israeli project and embraces the notion that the state of Israel is the kind of custodian of these Christian holy sites.

[00:34:17] And that is actually the Christian thing to do to defend Israel from its enemies. And then there’s a kind of. The black church in particular has this very important moral credibility because of its role in the civil rights movement, its role in the movement to abolish slavery and so on.

[00:34:34] There’s these efforts to get black students, if you’re a black college student in the US, you can have all expenses paid trip to Israel, That is about trying to cultivate support, right? We know how potent that, that kind of moral authority is, and we think it’s really important to engage from that place with the Palestinian freedom struggle and say, actually, this is what, not only do we identify with this freedom struggle, but there are very clear connections between The forces that are oppressing black America and that are repressing that Palestinian freedom struggle.

[00:35:08] Every single major police department in this country and a lot of small police departments. Train in Israel, which is a remarkable thing. And that’s not coincidental, but they’re in liable linkages. And so if you have concluded that there is a problem with racist policing in the U S then you, we implore you to consider that those police departments, they see a connection with the Israeli project.

[00:35:34] And so we think you should too. And we think that you should also see a connection with and identify with. The other piece, the last thing I’ll say about the, just in response to your question, that, that is like this interesting factor and it is related to the question of the moral authority of kind of black, the black freedom struggle is that it’s very clear that Biden’s re election campaign is The orientation is the black vote.

[00:36:06] There’s a kind of calculation that I think they’ve made from the start, but that’s clear. It’s clearer than ever. They’re like, all right, I don’t know. We’ve probably lost, the quote, the so called Arab vote and the Muslim vote. I hate the way they talk about these kind of reductionist demographic categories, but maybe we can get the black vote.

[00:36:26] And so the fact that Biden gave his commencement, gave this commencement address at Morehouse College. Which was pretty painful to watch as a black person, as a black leftist. Really, the Morehouse administration so in such a crass way, lend its platform to Biden in a way that was it’s just so cynical.

[00:36:50] The move by the Biden administration is it’s so cynical to say, we know that the majority of Americans want a ceasefire. We know that young people in particular are absolutely appalled. by U. S. support for Israel. But this place, which is the crown jewel of historically Black colleges, the fact that Biden can give this commencement address is a gesture toward the notion that this is a progressive administration.

[00:37:16] And so that is something for us to grapple with, actually, like recognizing that it’s not just that we recognize the significance of The kind of political and moral, if you will, significance or the political significance of the moral authority, and credibility of the black freedom struggle, especially that we recognize that it’s like power recognizes that Biden recognizes that the White House recognizes that and therefore that is a contested space that we need to show up to, 

[00:37:40] William Lawrence: How do you feel?

[00:37:41] What do you think is the trajectory as a millennial you? black leftist. It’s not something I can talk too much about because I’m white and it’s not my, it’s not my struggle. That being said, like the extent to which the older generation of black political leadership are such a pillar, frankly, for establishment, capitalist, imperialist, American, and.

[00:38:09] power through their role, as this kind of a traditionalist establishmentist pillar of the democratic party. It’s a big problem. It’s a big problem for left politics in this country. And and it gets us every single time. And it really defangs the white left puts and puts us in, impossible positions, really.

[00:38:32] It’s very effective politically. And I don’t know, I’m curious, but we’re also seeing, now that Unfortunately, don’t want anyone to vote for Trump, but like young black people are falling away from the Democratic Party and the support is not showing up in the same way. We’ll see what happens in November.

[00:38:47] I’m curious where you think this is headed and what the younger black left needs to do in order to change this dynamic. 

[00:38:59] Khury-Petersen Smith: Yeah, totally. And what, just to start again with a kind of internationalist answer of a kind is this is a question that it’s faced in different places around the world where like the cent, the centrist parties and the kind and some center left parties have just failed, have failed to I shouldn’t say fail they’ve been quite successful when it comes to their role in administering the world that we live in, which has been pretty disastrous, but they’re failing in terms of speaking to generations of people, particularly young people.

[00:39:34] So I’m thinking about like in the UK, which just had elections like Novara Media did a really good, this kind of left media project. It’s really good set of reporting in historic strongholds of the Labour Party in the UK. We’re interviewing these young people who are alienated from Labour because it’s been, it becomes so centrist in that actually, the far right is making some inroads.

[00:40:00] including among people of color in the UK. And yeah, see, it’s a similar thing. In France, again, like what has French centrism and truthfully we can talk about the French left too, but as a generation of young people, as a generation of young people of color, and you’re like, what is official politics offered us?

[00:40:16] And in the absence of something compelling, the far right is they’re making their efforts and we see that in this country. And And black people are not immune, to, in various communities of color, are not immune to, I think, the kind of range of trial balloons that the far right is sending up here.

[00:40:35] Maybe, maybe we don’t agree on everything, but you do agree there’s too many immigrants or there’s this crisis at the border, right? Or, I don’t know about all this gender stuff and pronoun stuff, right? That’s a problem, isn’t it, right? Which is to say, challenges that we face here are challenges that our comrades face elsewhere as well.

[00:40:52] That said you’re raising a really sharp question, which is, the, there’s the role that a small, but very visible section of black America has found its niche within you’ve got like Eric Adams running New York City, which is wild for many reasons. But yeah, what does it mean when that’s the black mayor who is absolutely the vehicle for some of the most horrific expansion of policing and surveillance.

[00:41:24] He is a conduit and a voice for a kind of democratic party version of the anti immigrant politics. It’s a disaster. So that’s a reality. And then there’s this, the question of the kind of traditional or legacy organizations of the Civil Rights movement, which and there has been, there’s less of a conversation about it now, but earlier in the Black Lives Matter experience, there was a conversation about tensions between the na, keep in mind or, let’s remember that Black Lives Matter emerged under Obama actually, right?

[00:41:54] It, like Trayvon Martin was murdered under Obama. 

[00:41:57] William Lawrence: I remember a lot of this was, a lot of this was negotiated in church halls and community meetings in Ferguson in the midst of the uprising there. And there were some really heated basically conflict between the legacy organizations and the militants who were in the streets.

[00:42:12] Exactly. 

[00:42:13] Khury-Petersen Smith: Exactly. And 

[00:42:13] William Lawrence: I 

[00:42:13] Khury-Petersen Smith: think that those tensions have not been resolved. Truthfully. To be totally honest, I think that there’s just a kind of, there’s a whole set of political crises in the U. S. at the moment. I think that there’s a real crisis of Black politics, actually.

[00:42:24] On one hand, you have an entire generation, or a couple generations, and an entire kind of political reality that’s been so shaped by Black Lives Matter to a point where, yeah, abolishing the police is now part of the, it’s part of the political ether. It doesn’t mean that there’s overwhelming support for it, but it is a thing that.

[00:42:47] The New York Times has to talk about right as a political position and at the same time, I think that there is this kind of, I don’t think that there’s a kind of cohesive black political agenda the way that there was in previous times, actually, just going back to I’ve been revisiting and learning about it for the first time, truthfully and in a lot of ways, like the Jesse Jackson campaigns In the 1980s, which included, by the way, positions on Palestinian rights, in 1988 that was part of a broader black political agenda.

[00:43:23] And at the moment, what exactly are the organizations or the forces? Or the figures to point to as black leadership in this country. I think that’s a real question. It as we’re sorting out all these political questions, I think that we’re also sorting out the question of black politics, which of course is got to play a central role in the broader, 

[00:43:43] William Lawrence: And the Rainbow Coalition under Jesse Jackson was, it was a black political agenda, but it was also a black led multiracial political agenda for all poor people and for Palestinians too, as you said. And that’s what I’ve seen is this. Incredibly strong tendency and in the black freedom struggle is the possibility of this radical universalism.

[00:44:07] When there is strong leadership and strong organization, which is unapologetically black and for black people, but Also for everybody and people respond. There’s just a long tradition that 

[00:44:19] Khury-Petersen Smith: It’s funny because I’ve been I’ve been really, this is like a whole nother podcast episode, but I’ve been grappling with the question of universalism in like socialist universalisms.

[00:44:29] Is that a worthwhile project? And, at the moment I’m I think I land in the same place that you’re describing, but I’m also like, I don’t think that for me, it’s like, you can have left visions that have at their heart a kind of black anti racist critique. It can have black leadership that on one hand is relevant and necessary for everybody’s freedom.

[00:44:57] And at the same time recognizes the kind of differential needs of different, capitalism has ensnared different groups of people differentially. And so it’s like, how do we have, how do we have a politics that is, That achieves the, that, that provides for the freedom of everybody, which I think requires, 

[00:45:20] William Lawrence: right?

[00:45:20] I think this stuff goes awry when you say, okay universalism means you can’t be talking about particular needs and interests in your program. You need to have reparations for that. For black people, you need to have land back for indigenous people. You can’t just act okay, we’re all citizens and every citizen is entitled to the same goods.

[00:45:39] And we’re not going to mention the histories of anybody’s particular and ongoing oppressions. That’s where the universalism thing I think goes off the rails. But to have a universal values, universal rights compared. Combined with particular particular redress for particular injustices seems to be I would love to see it.

[00:45:58] Khury-Petersen Smith: And there it is, right? It’s that kind of unified, convergent politics that, that recognizes I think, honestly, it takes us to a deeper It’s so much again, you asked earlier about the kind of what has been the arc of the past, 10, 15 years, in left politics in this country.

[00:46:23] And I think that we were, we’re in a place where there’s such an opportunity for such greater depth actually than 10 or 15 years ago. I just think about all of the white folks in 2020 who were like, for whom there’s like this revelation. It’s Oh, this is what it means to be white in this country.

[00:46:42] I actually don’t want to be part of I actually don’t want this. I want to break that’s not, this is not how I identify, and I, there’s a kind of, there’s a conversation about all of the so many people bought like even Rex Kennedy’s book, how to be anti racist. And there’s a kind of frustrated conversation.

[00:46:57] It’s okay, what happened after people read that book or whatever? I understand the frustration, i, and I also recognize that I think it’s in a, such a deeply racist country. Like it’s really and yeah, a country with a lot of problems, let’s say it’s really hard to translate a kind of anti racist consciousness automatically into a political vision.

[00:47:17] But I don’t think that went, no, like all those people who read that book. And who interrogated their own position. I don’t think that just disappeared, right? And I think similarly, a lot of people in this past, these past nine months are like, is this the role of the United States in the world stage?

[00:47:35] Not the guardian of democracy, but rather the supplier of the weapons to the forces of, genocide. And if that is the case, where do I fit in with that? And Ray, I actually don’t want that. That’s really powerful and extremely important. And I think it lays the groundwork for something much deeper and more extensive.

[00:48:02] And it’s really hopeful, like I, and I that this is such a, these are really difficult times, but I just, as somebody who, like I said, like my, my, my personal kind of like political Narrative or whatever has been one that’s been shaped by learning about Injustices around the world carried that the government that I live under is deeply implicated in and I’ve been told my whole life That Americans will never care, Americans will never care unless this Quote unquote directly affects them, so you have to think about what is their interest in this and This is what an incredible rebuttal that this past nine months have been.

[00:48:46] The people, the students who are occupying their campuses the hundreds of thousands of people who’ve taken to the streets, the people who’ve gotten arrested for Palestine, like none of that is actually about self interest really. It’s entirely about identifying with and sympathizing with and being in solidarity with these people on the receiving end of violence and the belief that they don’t deserve it.

[00:49:08] And that’s for that to happen among Americans is profoundly hopeful 

[00:49:14] William Lawrence: for me. Yeah. Thanks for that. No I totally agree. You talked about understanding, coming to understand the 21st century. I think given all of that, part of our task is to unfold the future of the 21st century, the next 50 years, let’s say through, 27, 2175 and 2075, excuse me.

[00:49:35] And Imagine okay, I don’t believe that we’re going to have a revolution and we’re going to take over the state in its current form through electoral means or otherwise, I think it’s going to be a lot messier than that and this kind of massive state apparatus we have doesn’t simply change hands from one to the other.

[00:49:54] It’s going to be, it’s going to be dismantled, built and rebuilt. If we achieve. If we even scratch the kind of authority as progressives or leftists to to be able to rearrange the major agencies of the U S state will have been very fortunate. And I don’t know how long that will last, but what does it mean to live one’s life?

[00:50:15] As if all of these things we’ve realized are true as if structural racism still exists in the United States, and we don’t want to play any part of it as if. U. S. Empire is real on a global stage, and the U. S. Is the military hegemon of the globe, and we don’t want to be any part of it. And we’re not just going to be able to, storm the palace and and thereby have no further part of it because it’s going to continue to exist.

[00:50:43] But how can we establish a I don’t know, called a counter hegemonic Idea about what we’re doing here and then give that material reality in the midst of a, the reality of people’s lives where you do have to make arrangements in order to survive. And in order to make arrangements, you have to capture some of the flows of this economy, which is intertwined with racism and militarism.

[00:51:09] You have to ask how to be an integrity while you also engage as a worker and a consumer in this economy. And what, maybe become a landowner, become a homeowner or not, you stuck being a tenant, the place where our politics, when you’re talking about coming to know these things as millennials over the first quarter of this century and then having 50 or more years left to live, hopefully, and doing politics, but also making arrangements in our own lives.

[00:51:41] I think that’s where a lot of the rubber is going to meet the road because the interest structure of the global economy, as it’s currently set up is to sort black people from white people in different sort of class strata within our economy here in the United States, and then is to separate Americans and people also Europeans, Australians, from people of the Global South in terms of the division of labor.

[00:52:06] And so just to make do and live one’s life is inherently contradictory in the midst of that. But how can we recognize all of that and then actually integrate the personal and the political in how we live our lives and do politics? 

[00:52:22] Khury-Petersen Smith: Yeah, those are the questions right and I will just on the question of revolution.

[00:52:26] I’m I’ve been so guided by so this book The Kurdish Women’s Movement by Dilara Durek. I might, I’m probably mispronouncing her name, but, she has this line in there about, about, and this is like a, there’s a feminist kind of history and assessment of the Kurdish, Kurdish women’s struggle and that as part of the Kurdish liberation struggle.

[00:52:49] And she has this line that I’m gonna paraphrase and not do justice to But that’s been really important for my thinking, which is, that we don’t think of revolution. She’s revolution isn’t, it isn’t like a date on the calendar. It is a process of shifting the relations that shape our lives, right?

[00:53:09] The economic relations, the social relations, the political relations. And that is such a, the Kurdish struggle is such an interesting case study as this Kurdistan is this nation that. Is divided and set, fragmented by these different nation states, Iran, Turkey, Iraq, Syria, in which there’s one overall struggle, but navigating fairly different political circumstances.

[00:53:40] And within that, there’s all kinds of interesting experimentation. There’s like autonomous zones. There is participation in official politics. There is. There is struggle of various kinds, so which is armed, right? But the idea of having more or less a vision for freedom and then having to navigate these different conditions, which is really interesting.

[00:54:02] And so anyway, I do think, on one hand yeah, the U S state and World capitalism are very formidable. They are not they’re not keen on going anywhere. And I do believe that we need political visions that see the dismantling of All the, like borders have to be dismantled.

[00:54:25] Like it just, it has to be done, right? I think the kind of petroleum based world economy, it can’t it can’t go on. We have to dismantle it. All the military bases have to be closed, and so I think that, and then we can go on, right? The various things I have to change. So I think that When I think about where radical internationalism fits into that and the lessons that I take from black internationalism, it’s so on one hand, we’re in this era, I think, of transnational instability, of very, social instability, certainly politically instability, ecological instability, and It’s disastrous, honestly, like the way that is playing out for people and for the planet.

[00:55:15] Within the instability, there is possibility because the kind of politics of the way things have been done have proven so inadequate, so insufficient, especially for those within those states that claim to be democracies. It’s, they’re, places like the United States. That where they want to do the same way of rule that they’ve done for the past 80 years or so since World War Two, neoliberalism privatization kind of corporate hegemony, et cetera, et cetera, that has served them pretty well.

[00:55:50] There’s some debates at the top about whether or not to do that, that, that exact same thing for the next 80 years. And I think that’s really what. From the perspective of the U. S. elite, I think that’s what Trump versus Biden comes down to. But for the people living here, it’s not working. And there’s some recognition of that, right?

[00:56:07] And so therein lies some possibility. And unfortunately, the far right is certainly taking advantage of that. And the left, we need to figure out our perspectives in it. And so I think we, for those of us located in this country, again, having a very focused sense Of what precisely our position is in relationship to this and what our responsibilities are is extremely important.

[00:56:34] And then the other piece is recognizing that when we, when I talk about dismantling borders, I don’t mean that we in the U. S. will dismantle borders. It’s like there, there will be struggles from below that will challenge the U. S. Mexico border, right? The tens of thousands, if not more, people who are being confined to Mexico by the walls are not going to sit there forever.

[00:57:00] That itself will be a struggle. And how do, what is our relationship to that struggle, right? When I talk about closing the military bases, I don’t just, I don’t just mean us demanding closing these bases in Okinawa. We should do that. But there is an Okinawan struggle that is fighting to they’re working on it.

[00:57:16] They’re working on it, right? And so then what’s our end of that equation, like what’s our relationship to that? And so that’s, I do believe in the dismantling and it becomes like, I think an internationalist perspective unlocks a new set of possibilities and a new set of responsibilities as well.

[00:57:32] William Lawrence: Yeah. Here’s a what some may think is. A wonky question, but it’s to this question of what is the particular position within the larger thing? And what does that mean about our visions and our responsibilities? And it’s grounded in the contradiction that black U. S. Citizens experience as a Privileged U.

[00:57:53] S. Citizens within the global system while being very oppressed within the class and racial structure of the United States. So there’s a long tradition of socialists, especially black socialists, grappling with that, trying to understand what it means. And, so one answer to this question, which has been shared by many, but was has been quite prominent at times.

[00:58:13] For example, it was the official line of the Communist Party of the U. S. A. At the peak of its influence in around the 19 thirties holds that black Americans are not part of the working class of the United States imperial power, but in fact are a colonized people themselves, a colony within the nation.

[00:58:36] And in our times, MSNBC even wrote a book called The Colony Within the Nation, talking about how this is still an analysis That one can make today and make a strong case about how the position of black us Americans within the global system functions more like a colonized people than it does, than it is on par with other workers in the United States.

[00:58:58] As part of this, black people would hold a claim to nationhood and land either in the black belt in the South and, or in, super majority black cities like Detroit here in Michigan you can find These ideas that people are still organizing around. So I’m curious what your perspective is on those questions.

[00:59:14] First of all, do you think they have any relevance today? Or is just, solidarity the thing to focus on? Or what are the implications of thinking of black U. S. Americans as citizens of a democratic republic versus as internally colonized people of a world empire. 

[00:59:31] Khury-Petersen Smith: Yeah, it’s a great question.

[00:59:33] It’s one that, yeah, black folks, particularly black folks on the left have been grappling with for A long time. And I think that the position of black people in the U. S. is really complicated. And arguably like black people throughout the Americas and it’s in the way black population has, all of the Americas was really shaped by the transatlantic slave trade.

[00:59:53] And the way that slavery played out throughout the Americas is has been differential in the way that black populations are where they fit in different countries now has played out differently. So just just putting that on the table without exploring it, but that’s a reality.

[01:00:13] And so here, here we are in this little corner of that. And it’s really, I think it’s complicated because on one hand, there are features of black American life that are very familiar when one looks at just colonialism. And at the other, on the other hand, there are things that are really different.

[01:00:29] You look at Palestine. This is this is a location where people claim a set of relationships to this land for many generations. And every, advance of Israeli colonization, Is a loss of Palestinian land. And that’s not, it’s not quite the same. Like we as a black people were displaced from, Africa, like starting 500 years ago and brought to this new place and forced to the bottom of this new society, but in a kind of unique position.

[01:01:11] And I’m actually struck by, and again, you can talk about it in terms of Palestine. You can also talk about in terms of the struggles of indigenous folks in this place. When I really engage with and listen to what indigenous folks are fighting for, where I live, in this place called Massachusetts, where people are fighting for fishing rights, where people are fighting for the right to access, certain places, sacred places, or to access places to do certain sacred practices.

[01:01:40] That’s really different, I think from the position of black Americans, or black America rather. And so I think that, obviously it gets a very, it’s a call. I think that we are within a colonized context. But I don’t see us as a colony. And I think that there are in a lot of ways, like different theories of the internal colony.

[01:02:07] have taken inspiration from and or be been in relationship to other anti colonial struggles around the world. You know what I mean? I just think about the way the black Some of it has 

[01:02:17] William Lawrence: the feel of trying to fit a situation into a category so that can become the basis for solidarity rather than just engaging the Straightforward analysis of the unique situation that has actually happened.

[01:02:32] Khury-Petersen Smith: Exactly. Yeah. And it’s genuinely complicated, especially because this is a colonized place. I’m like, we are colonized, but so I think about the way the Black Panthers negotiated, as they were thinking about their political program and are very much in solidarity with the Vietnamese National Liberation Front, like one, one of the pieces of the Black Panther program is we want land.

[01:02:54] And I think there’s a line in the 10 point plan that’s no free people has ever, gotten free without control of their own land. And I’ve I’ve thought about, I’m like, what does that mean when you’re in like Oakland? You know what I mean? Yeah. Does it mean the same thing as when you’re in Vietnam?

[01:03:07] I don’t think so. But then, what’s interesting too, reading like, you might know Donna Merch’s work on, historian of the Black Panthers, like she talks about how the Black Panthers in Oakland were one generation removed from an agrarian situation in Louisiana, where the question of land was also a different question.

[01:03:23] There, there was this thing called the Great Migration where the Black population went from being this overwhelmingly agrarian population. In pretty difficult and exploitative conditions to, an urban population in other difficult and exploitative conditions, but different ones.

[01:03:39] And so on one hand, I think my overall takeaway is, yes, engage with all the critiques of colonialism, of course, and draw on them and also really grapple with our situation as it is. But the last thing I will say is. In the context, so now that the black population is a largely urban population, the question of gentrification does play out in ways that I think are, the question of colonialism is absolutely relevant.

[01:04:07] And some of the same technologies that the Israeli project employs with stealing Palestinian land are, they’re so similar, in fact, the same things as the gentrification of U. S. Cities in particular black neighborhoods. There was a few weeks ago, this protest in Los Angeles.

[01:04:25] At a synagogue that was denounced by President Biden himself as being anti semitic or protesting the synagogue and what they were not protesting the synagogue. These Palestine protesters were protesting, A quote, unquote, real estate event that the synagogue happened to be hosting the question of, real estate being this very sanitized term to describe selling Palestinian land to Israeli folks.

[01:04:51] The real estate industry was really incubated here in the United States, right? And is both deeply rooted in the colonization of this land and theft from indigenous folks here and absolutely was like. The formation of the real estate industry was part and parcel came part and parcel with the segregation of the U S and the kind of racist anti black segregation.

[01:05:16] So it’s relevant, but I think we also have to be careful, when looking at colonialism As there’s a way that like the metaphor can be applied literally. 

[01:05:27] William Lawrence: Yeah, and I just don’t let the term obscure the reality. The reality can only be revealed through a lot of study about a lot of particular situations, things that have actually happened.

[01:05:40] Wow. This has been. So interesting. I want to talk to you for another hour and a half. We do need to land the plane here. So I guess I’ll just, we’ll just leave it with this, which is, what do you think are the key tasks for deepening Black internationalism as a political program and practice over the remainder of this decade?

[01:06:01] I think that 

[01:06:03] Khury-Petersen Smith: it starts with, again, the question of, politics. I think that in the U. S. it has been so challenging to imagine any political program outside of the state or outside of official politics. It’s like when we think about what do we stand for and what are we fighting for? The question immediately becomes like what is the policy?

[01:06:27] How does this translate into policy? I think we’ve got to start. a bit removed from that and really grapple with what all is going on in black america and what do again what do black politics look like which at the moment i think are in flux that’s a kind of like hopeful generous way of looking at it that we’re in transition to something that has yet to emerge and so then the question is how do we want it to emerge right like if there’s a transition then we get to play a role In what comes and what emerges.

[01:06:59] So I think that has got to be rooted on one hand in the kind of ongoing black freedom struggle and the vision of black liberation it in a way that is both grounded in right now in the 20th century, and also looks at all the. Just wealth of lessons that we’ve generated over these centuries.

[01:07:19] I think that one of those lessons is that Black freedom within the kind of U. S. project is not, it’s not possible. You know what I mean? I don’t think that there can be it’s, We’ve been here for at least 400 years and there’s still this, there’s still a fight for civil rights, which is to be like accepted as like full membership at the table of citizenship.

[01:07:48] And it’s okay, if it hasn’t happened in 400 years, what, is it going to take another 400? I don’t think it’s going to happen. I think that frankly, the black experience. Indicts the whole question of us citizenship and the whole kind of us project and therefore visions for black freedom have to they have to burst that like it has to go beyond that project, right?

[01:08:11] It go beyond the confines of it, right? On one hand, big picture vision. On the other hand, I think that again, like what these past nine months of this genocide in Gaza have really forced upon us is. A real responsibility to engage very practically like it’s not enough to Like the idea of solidarity with people in palestine.

[01:08:31] It’s what are we actually doing? And this is what my palestinian friends in palestine remind me They’re like, what are you doing to actually stop your government from actually sending these weapons? I think that we have to grapple with those practical questions very seriously and the last thing is All that grappling In the context of building relationships, both direct and in terms of learning with freedom struggles all around the world.

[01:09:01] Because again the state. Like they learn, they’re very keen on, on sharing all kinds of lessons. There’s a branch of the NYPD in Tel Aviv and there’s various learnings that, that they’re doing very intentionally. And so how are we learning from and with each other also?

[01:09:19] And I think that learning and that grappling, that’s the context in which we’ll shape this emergent radical politics, which I think black politics and black internationalism has got to be part of. This kind of new liberatory politics for the 21st century. 

[01:09:33] William Lawrence: Oh, yeah.

[01:09:35] Thank you. Really appreciate it. This has been a great conversation. As we close, I want to give a shout out to our mutual friend, Asha from Chicago, who connected us to do this episode. She was going to join us, but she fell sick. So shout out to Asha. We love you. Corey, thank you so much. This has been great.

[01:09:51] Let’s we’ll stay in touch and let’s keep building. 

[01:09:54] Khury-Petersen Smith: Yeah, likewise. It’s really been such a pleasure and super grateful and we’ve got a lot to do. 

[01:09:59] William Lawrence: So let’s keep talking. This podcast is written and hosted by me, William Lawrence. Our producer is Josh Elstro, and it is published by Convergence, a magazine for Radical Insights.

[01:10:11] You can help support this show and others like it by becoming a subscriber of Convergence at convergencemag. com slash donate. Standard subscriptions start at 10 and really help support the sustainabilities of shows like this one. One time donations of any amount are welcome there as well. You can find a direct link to donate or subscribe in the show notes.

[01:10:32] This has been The Hegemonicon. Thanks for listening and let’s talk again soon.