Online Panel by Tareq Baconi, Aslı Ü. Bâli, and Shay Hazkani
Moderated by Ziad Abu-Rish
This panel explores how the Hamas-led attack on October 7 and the Israeli war on Gaza have changed and intensified specific dynamics shaping Palestinian, Israeli, and regional/international politics. Taking seriously that history did not begin on October 7, and that the level of death, displacement, and destruction in Gaza caused by the Israeli military has raised the specter of genocide, this panel moves beyond adjudicating the nature of the war to interrogate its reverberations, reflections, and consequences for Palestinian, Israeli, and regional politics. Where does Hamas stand strategically vis-a-vis its objectives, other Palestinian factions, and the Palestinian people? What social, demographic, and institutional transformations are taking place within the Israeli state and society? In what ways is the regional and international order fundamentally different or affected by the past year? Examining strategic, institutional, and discursive elements, this panel features some of the leading scholars and critical analysts on these and many other questions.
Tareq Baconi is the author of Hamas Contained: A History of Palestinian Resistance. He is president of the board of Al-Shabaka: The Palestinian Policy Network and is currently a research fellow at the Centre for Humanities Research, University of the Western Cape.
Aslı Ü. Bâli is a Professor of Law at Yale Law School. Her research interests include public international law — particularly human rights law and the law of the international security order — and comparative constitutional law, with a focus on the Middle East. She has written on the nuclear non-proliferation regime, humanitarian intervention, the roles of race and empire in the interpretation and enforcement of international law, the role of judicial independence in constitutional transitions, federalism and decentralization in the Middle East, and constitutional design in religiously divided societies. Bâli received her doctorate in Politics from Princeton University in 2010 and her law degree from Yale. Before joining Yale she was Professor of Law at UCLA, Director of the UCLA Center for Near Eastern Studies, and Founding Faculty Director of the Promise Institute for Human Rights. She currently serves as President of the Middle East Studies Association of North America.
Shay Hazkani is an Associate Professor of History and Jewish Studies at the University of Maryland, College Park. He specializes in the social and cultural history of Palestine/Israel. His first book, Dear Palestine: A Social History of the 1948 War (Stanford University Press, 2021), received the Korenblat and Azrieli-Concordia book awards and was longlisted for the Cundill History Prize. The book was also published in Hebrew and is forthcoming in Arabic in 2025. Shay is the co-creator of The Soldier’s Opinion, a documentary based on his research, which won the 2023 American Historical Association John E. O’Connor Film Award. He earned his PhD in History and Judaic Studies from New York University and holds a Master’s in Arab Studies from Georgetown University. Before his academic career, Shay worked as a journalist in Israel, covering the occupied Palestinian territories and the Israeli military.
Ziad Abu-Rish (Moderator) is Associate Professor of Human Rights and Middle East Studies at Bard College, where he also directs the MA Program at the Center for Human Rights and the Arts. A historian by training, Ziad also serves as co-editor of the online platform Jadaliyya and the peer-reviewed Arab Studies Journal.
Online Panel by Tareq Baconi, Aslı Ü. Bâli, and Shay Hazkani
Moderated by Ziad Abu-Rish
This panel explores how the Hamas-led attack on October 7 and the Israeli war on Gaza have changed and intensified specific dynamics shaping Palestinian, Israeli, and regional/international politics. Taking seriously that history did not begin on October 7, and that the level of death, displacement, and destruction in Gaza caused by the Israeli military has raised the specter of genocide, this panel moves beyond adjudicating the nature of the war to interrogate its reverberations, reflections, and consequences for Palestinian, Israeli, and regional politics. Where does Hamas stand strategically vis-a-vis its objectives, other Palestinian factions, and the Palestinian people? What social, demographic, and institutional transformations are taking place within the Israeli state and society? In what ways is the regional and international order fundamentally different or affected by the past year? Examining strategic, institutional, and discursive elements, this panel features some of the leading scholars and critical analysts on these and many other questions.
Tareq Baconi is the author of Hamas Contained: A History of Palestinian Resistance. He is president of the board of Al-Shabaka: The Palestinian Policy Network and is currently a research fellow at the Centre for Humanities Research, University of the Western Cape.
Aslı Ü. Bâli is a Professor of Law at Yale Law School. Her research interests include public international law — particularly human rights law and the law of the international security order — and comparative constitutional law, with a focus on the Middle East. She has written on the nuclear non-proliferation regime, humanitarian intervention, the roles of race and empire in the interpretation and enforcement of international law, the role of judicial independence in constitutional transitions, federalism and decentralization in the Middle East, and constitutional design in religiously divided societies. Bâli received her doctorate in Politics from Princeton University in 2010 and her law degree from Yale. Before joining Yale she was Professor of Law at UCLA, Director of the UCLA Center for Near Eastern Studies, and Founding Faculty Director of the Promise Institute for Human Rights. She currently serves as President of the Middle East Studies Association of North America.
Shay Hazkani is an Associate Professor of History and Jewish Studies at the University of Maryland, College Park. He specializes in the social and cultural history of Palestine/Israel. His first book, Dear Palestine: A Social History of the 1948 War (Stanford University Press, 2021), received the Korenblat and Azrieli-Concordia book awards and was longlisted for the Cundill History Prize. The book was also published in Hebrew and is forthcoming in Arabic in 2025. Shay is the co-creator of The Soldier’s Opinion, a documentary based on his research, which won the 2023 American Historical Association John E. O’Connor Film Award. He earned his PhD in History and Judaic Studies from New York University and holds a Master’s in Arab Studies from Georgetown University. Before his academic career, Shay worked as a journalist in Israel, covering the occupied Palestinian territories and the Israeli military.
Ziad Abu-Rish (Moderator) is Associate Professor of Human Rights and Middle East Studies at Bard College, where he also directs the MA Program at the Center for Human Rights and the Arts. A historian by training, Ziad also serves as co-editor of the online platform Jadaliyya and the peer-reviewed Arab Studies Journal.