Join Oren Yiftachel for a critical analysis of Gaza’s role in the spatial and political dynamics of Israel/Palestine.
This lecture examines the ongoing violence in Gaza within the broader political geography of Israel/Palestine, framing it through a triality of intertwined conflicts, geopolitical, colonial, and ethnocratic, that have shaped the region since the 1970s. Gaza, the largest concentration of Palestinian refugees since 1948, has endured blockade and isolation following Israel’s partial disengagement in 2005 and the rule of the Islamist, rejectionist Hamas since 2007.
A spatial analysis reveals persistent patterns of Judaisation and Palestinian ghettoisation, reinforced by settler-colonial policies, widespread land expropriation, uneven housing and infrastructure development, and recent waves of digitalisation. These processes have contributed to a ‘creeping and deepening apartheid’, entrenching Jewish supremacy while fragmenting and marginalising Palestinian spaces.
Decades of colonial domination and spatial inequality have fuelled multiple forms of Palestinian resistance, including violent radicalism, culminating in the unprecedented terrorist attacks that triggered the current war in Gaza. This has resulted in near-total destruction in Gaza and ongoing ethnic cleansing in the West Bank and Negev.
The lecture underscores the importance of analysing the parallel mobilisations of this conflict across geographical scales to better understand its roots and dynamics. It concludes with a discussion of A Land for All, a Palestinian-Israeli peace movement advocating a two-state binational confederation that has gained growing attention for its vision of justice, coexistence, and conflict resolution.