Obama Urged People To Understand The Complex History Between Israel And Palestine When It Comes To Gaza
“If you genuinely want to change this, then you’ve got to figure out how to speak to somebody on the other side and listen to them.”
Former US president Barack Obama has urged people to acknowledge “the whole truth” when it comes to the war between Israel and Gaza by understanding the complexity of the history between Israel and Palestine.
Obama made the comments during an appearance on the Pod Save America podcast, which was released on Tuesday Nov. 7.
During the interview, he was asked how people can become participate in the conversation around the war if they don’t feel like they don’t know enough or are worried about the extremely polarized debates that are going on online about the issue.
In response, Obama said that it is difficult to avoid the issue right now both online and in person because there is so much history and so much blood has been spilt.
“There is going to be rage and anger and and not just generational traumas, right?” he said. “This is century old stuff that’s coming to the fore. And you’ve witnessed the kind of worst cruelty and tragedy that can befall people with involving children and spouses and grandparents, and passions are going to be high.”
He added that if there is “any chance” of the world acting constructively to do something about the war, it will “require an admission of complexity and maintaining what what on the surface may seem contradictory ideas.”
“What Hamas did was horrific and there’s no justification for it. And what is also true is that the the occupation and what’s happening to Palestinians is unbearable,” he said, adding that the history of anti-Semitism is also a fact.
“And what is true is that there are people right now who are dying who have nothing to do with what Hamas did,” Obama said.
He added that if people want to help solve the problem, they have to “take in the whole truth” and admit that “nobody’s hands are clean.”
“All of us have complicit are complicit to some degree,” he said. “I look at this and I think back, what could I have done during my presidency to to move this forward as hard as I tried.”
He added that he has the scars to prove how hard he tried but there is a part of him that wonders if there is something else he could have done.
“That’s the conversation we should be having, not just looking backwards, but looking forward,” he said. “And that can’t happen if we are confining ourselves to our outrage.”
He said he would like to see people talking to others, including people who they disagree with.
“If you genuinely want to change this, then you’ve got to figure out how to speak to somebody on the other side and listen to them and understand and what they are talking about and not and not dismiss it,” he said.
