Loading summary
A
I wrote a little song to remind you. Choice hotels get you more of the experiences you value. The Cambria Hotel's got it all. A rooftop bar. Have a bar. Bring a date, your squad, or even your mom. Book direct@ChoiceHotels.com welcome to Qualette. Narrated this article is Intifadas bring neither justice nor Peace On 29 April 2, two Jewish men were stabbed in Golda's Green. Their assailant was a British Somali man, Issa Suleiman, who had traveled to the area with a knife in hand, ready to stab any Jews he came across. The victims, aged 34 and 76, were hospitalized as a result of their injuries. When police apprehended the attacker, he refused to give up his knife. As he lay on the ground after having been tased, he started repeatedly shouting praise Allah. Harakat Ashab al Yamin. Al Islamiya Hayi, an Islamist group with alleged links to the Iranian regime, claimed responsibility for the stabbing, which the Metropolitan Police declared to have been a terrorist incident. This came after weeks of anti Jewish incidents in North London, where the majority of Britain's Jewish population lives, including an arson attack that destroyed four Hatzele ambulances in Golders Green on 23 March, for which Hai also took responsibility. Haii is a murky new organization. Its name translates as the Islamic Movement of the Companions of the Right, meaning those destined to go to heaven. It appears to have surfaced in early March when a telegram post purporting to speak for the group announced the start of military operations against American and Israeli interests. Since then, the group, or people using its branding, has claimed a series of attacks on Jewish targets in Europe and Britain. HAIYI first came to people's notice in the UK following the attack on the Hatzolla ambulances. Hatzola, meaning rescue, is a volunteer run first responder service organized and funded by the Jewish community. Three hooded figures were caught on CCTV pouring accelerant over the vehicles before setting them alight. Oxygen canisters exploded in the fire and four ambulances were damaged or destroyed. Hayi posted a video claiming responsibility with text in Hebrew, English and Arabic. The group has since claimed further attacks on Jewish linked sites in London, including property connected with Jewish charities and synagogues. For years, anti Israel activists have been calling on people to globalize the intifada, demands that have been growing ever louder since October 7, 2023. Intifada is an Arabic word meaning uprising or shaking off and carrying associations of militant struggle. As a Palestinian, I have long had serious concerns about these demands the idea of globalizing the Intifada seems to invite constant violent escalation. With every attack, anti Semites are further emboldened and the conflict is only entrenched and worsened. There have been two Palestinian intifadas from 1987 to the early 1990s and then from 2000 to around 2005. Both arose from the political geography created after the 1967 war, in the course of which Israel captured the west bank from Jordan and Gaza from Egypt. The west bank had been annexed by Jordan after the 1948 war, a move recognized by very few countries involving the expulsion of the Jewish people who lived there. Meanwhile, Gaza had been administered by Egypt. After 1967, Israel ruled both territories militarily while also beginning to create Jewish settlements in parts of the west bank and Gaza, territories that had been part of ancient Judea. Prior to the first Intifada, the West bank was far less physically separated from Israel than it is today. Movement between the West Bank, Gaza, Israel and East Jerusalem was more fluid, though still somewhat limited by occasional military orders and a complex permitting system. Many Palestinians, including some members of my family, worked inside Israel. The first Intifada began as a grassroots revolt against Israeli rule. As it grew and spread, the Palestine Liberation Organization attempted to steer it. The Intifada included non violent civil disobedience in the form of strikes, demonstrations and boycotts. But as the protests grew and more people were drawn in, an increasing number of clashes broke out between Palestinians and Israeli forces and Israeli civilians were violently targeted. The two sides tried to de escalate via the Oslo peace process which culminated in 1993 when the PLO recognized Israel's right to exist in peace and security and renounced terrorism. The Israeli leadership in turn recognized the PLO as the valid representative of the Palestinian people. Thus began a series of negotiations to resolve the conflict once and for all. Palestinians had gained a limited self governing authority but no sovereign state. The west bank remained fragmented by settlements, bypass roads, checkpoints, military zones and the division into areas A, B and C. Israeli society meanwhile, grew increasingly wary. In English, PLO leader Yasser Arafat spoke the language of recognition and negotiation. But in May 1994, during a speech he gave at a mosque in Johannesburg only days after signing the Gaza Jericho agreement. He compared the Oslo accords to the Treaty of Hudaybiya, a temporary agreement between Muhammad and the Quraysh, which was later broken leading to Muhammad's conquest of Mecca, and spoke of jihad for Jerusalem. For Israelis already nervous about suicide bombings, this was evidence that Arafat had one Message for diplomats and another, more violent message for the street. The negotiations at camp David in July 2000 ended without a deal. Israelis saw this as proof that Arafat had rejected a historic offer, although many Palestinians considered the offer unsatisfactory. Then Ariel Sharon visited the Temple Mount in Jerusalem in September 2000, a site charged with religious and national significance for people on both sides. Protests and then violence quickly spread. The level of violence intensified greatly during the Second Intifada. Suicide bombings, stabbings and shootings driven by jihadist groups like Hamas. The consequences of the Second Intifada for Israeli society were immense, and the ramifications are still being felt today. Restaurants had to hire guards. Shopping centers installed metal detectors and searched bags. Israelis had to scan cafes, bus stops, markets and hotel lobbies for danger. The bombing campaign had deeper psychological effects, too. To many, it made the pursuit of peace seem naive or even suicidal. In 2001, Ariel Sharon, once seen by many on the left as a hardline militarist, became prime Minister. Then in 2005, after Israel withdrew from Gaza, Hamas took over the Strip and began firing rockets at the Jewish state, reinforcing the Israeli right in their belief that territorial concessions to the Palestinians tend only to produce more violence. Benjamin Netanyahu's rise to power and his long dominance over Israeli politics was a result of this mood. His central message was that Israelis could not afford to risk their security in the effort to appease a seemingly implacable enemy. In the Israeli general elections of 1999, Barak, with his peace proposals, had beaten Netanyahu by more than 12 points. Less than two years later, after the eruption of the second intifada, the right wing Sharon crushed Barak by roughly 25 points. In March 2002, Barak, after the Passover massacre at the Park Hotel in Netanyah, Israel, sent the army back into major west bank cities that had been transferred to Palestinian Authority control under Oslo. Later that year, the government approved the first stage of the west bank barrier, a wall separating Israel proper from the Palestinians living in the West Bank. The irony here is that the Second Intifada helped produce the militarized present day Jewish state that so many Western activists now claim to despise. It helped bury the peace process. Palestinian society became more militarized as a result, too. Jihadist ideology spread widely. Posters of dead martyrs covered walls. Children were indoctrinated with the language of revenge. The call to globalize the intifada is immoral because it's a call for targeted anti Semitic violence. But it goes far beyond even that. The intifada made Everything worse for Palestinians in Palestine, spreading violence, distrust and hatred among our community. To globalize the Intifada is to spread the misery across the entire world. This is already happening. In October of 2023, just days after the Hamas massacres of October 7, and before any sustained Israeli military response, two Molotov cocktails were hurled at a synagogue complex in Berlin. In November of 2024, Israeli football fans who had traveled to an away game were hunted through the streets of Amsterdam by by violent mobs. Five people were hospitalized. In May of 2025, in Washington D.C. two young Israeli embassy staff members, Yaron Liszynski and Sarah Milgram, were shot dead outside the Capitol Jewish Museum. The killer, Elias Rodriguez, reportedly said I did it for Gaza. In Boulder, Colorado. In June of 2025, a group holding a weekly walk for the hostages held in Gaza was attacked by an assailant with a makeshift flamethrower. And In December of 2025, gunmen opened fire on a Hanukkah celebration at Bondi beach in Sydney. The attack killed 15 people, including a 10 year old girl. Dozens more were injured. All the while, many protesters continued to chant globalize the intifada. Here in London, this became a recurring feature of public life. Week after week, the city center filled with crowds whose organizers insisted that they were marching for Palestinian rights or for an end to the war in Gaza. But these marches also demanded the dissolution of Israel and the establishment of a single Palestinian state. From the river to the sea, they chanted, there is only one solution. Intifada, revolution. They demanded resistance by any means necessary. They chanted death, death, death to the idf. Some marchers even chanted Khayber, Khayber Yahyahud. Referencing the massacre of a tribe of Jews during Muhammad's conquests of 7th century Arabia. All these events rationalize and whitewash attacks against random Jewish people whose individuality is erased by the imposition of labels like Zionist, settler and colonizer, and who are accused of complicity in genocide. For the attackers, no concession, withdrawal or peace process will ever be enough. They are not trying to make a deal. They are looking to intimidate, hunt and kill. With every attack, such people gain strength and supporters. And there is an increasing risk that peace will be impossible for generations to come. Palestinians do not need a global intifada. They need a politics that lowers the temperature. They need houses, jobs, schools, courts, trade, electricity, clean water, honest government, reconstruction, and leaders who can make serious agreements and are willing to negotiate and work alongside Israel. That is the only way to stability the globalized intifada offers none of that. It offers no plan for Gaza, no plan to remove Hamas, no strategy for reconstruction, coexistence or peace. And the implications go beyond the impacts on Palestinians and Israelis. The conflict is now global. This is not good news news for anybody. And it has become a civilizational test for Britain. A country reveals its true character and how it treats its Jews In Britain, Jews are the group most likely to be the targets of hate crime. By far, according to 2025 UK government figures, there were 106 hate crime offenses per 10,000 Jewish people, compared to 12 per 10,000 Muslims, 5 per 10,000 Sikhs, 2 per 10,000 Hindus, and less than 1 per 10,000 Christians and atheists. That is a national disgrace. The Jewish community is small and has shrunk over recent decades, falling from over 450,000 in 1950 to 287,000 in 2021. Just 0.5% of the population, one of Britain's smallest minorities, is now also one of its most exposed. After the Golders Green attack, Keir Starmer visited the area and praised first responders calling on the public to open their eyes to Jewish pa. But his arrival was met with boos and angry shouts from some local Jewish residents and demonstrators who accused the government of failing to protect the community. I share their frustration. British Jews are as British as anybody else. Their synagogues, schools, shops, charities, ambulances and museums are part of the fabric of British life. An attack on them must be seen as an attack on everyone. A country in which Jewish schools and synagogues need armed guards, in which the police have to deploy specialist teams so Jews can walk through their own neighborhoods, has allowed something utterly noxious to seep into public life. Thank you once again for listening.
Podcast: Quillette Narrated
Date: May 25, 2026
Article Author: (Anonymous Palestinian narrator, as inferred from text)
Narrator: Quillette
Theme: The consequences of calls to “globalize the intifada” and the harm such rhetoric and violence brings to Jews globally, to Palestinians, and to prospects for lasting peace.
This episode presents a narrated Quillette essay exploring the rise in anti-Jewish violence in the UK and elsewhere, linked to calls to “globalize the intifada.” The author, a Palestinian, argues that rather than bringing justice or peace, the intifada rhetoric and associated violence worsen conditions for all, deepen divides, and imperil both Jewish and Palestinian futures.
“The idea of globalizing the intifada seems to invite constant violent escalation. With every attack, anti-Semites are further emboldened and the conflict is only entrenched and worsened.”
(05:30)
First Intifada (1987–1990s): Began as a grassroots Palestinian uprising under Israeli occupation; included both nonviolent protest (strikes, boycotts) and violence.
Oslo Peace Process (1993): Initial hopes dashed by mutual distrust. The PLO’s mixed messages and growing incidents of violence (suicide bombings).
Second Intifada (2000–2005): Noted for extreme violence (suicide bombings, shootings), the rise of Hamas and Jihadist groups, and the hardening of Israeli society.
“The bombing campaign made the pursuit of peace seem naive or even suicidal.”
(14:00)
Aftermath: Led to the construction of the West Bank barrier, Israeli withdrawals, the rise of Hamas in Gaza, and entrenched political positions (Netanyahu’s right-wing dominance).
Consequences:
“The Second Intifada helped produce the militarized present-day Jewish state that so many Western activists now claim to despise. It helped bury the peace process.”
(15:10)
Spread of Anti-Jewish Violence:
Protest Slogans and Escalation: Weekly marches in London, chanting for a “globalized intifada”, dissolution of Israel, and violence:
“‘From the river to the sea,’ they chanted, ‘there is only one solution: Intifada, revolution.’ They demanded resistance by any means necessary.”
(19:15)
“Some marchers even chanted ‘Khayber, Khayber Yahyahud’, referencing the massacre of a tribe of Jews during Muhammad's conquests.”
(19:50)
Erosion of Jewish Safety: Jews labelled as “Zionists, settlers, colonizers,” rationalizing random attacks and erasing individuality.
Entrenchment of Violence:
“For the attackers, no concession, withdrawal, or peace process will ever be enough. They are not trying to make a deal. They are looking to intimidate, hunt, and kill.”
(20:30)
Bleak Outlook:
“With every attack, such people gain strength and supporters. And there is an increasing risk that peace will be impossible for generations to come.”
(20:55)
Alternative Vision:
“Palestinians do not need a global intifada. They need a politics that lowers the temperature... houses, jobs, schools, courts, trade, electricity, clean water, honest government, reconstruction, and leaders who can make serious agreements and are willing to negotiate.”
(22:25)
Lack of Solutions:
“The globalized intifada offers none of that. It offers no plan for Gaza, no plan to remove Hamas, no strategy for reconstruction, coexistence, or peace.”
(22:55)
Hate Crime Statistics:
Demographic Decline & Exposure:
Response and Frustration:
“I share their frustration. British Jews are as British as anybody else... An attack on them must be seen as an attack on everyone.”
(26:00)
A Stark Warning:
“A country in which Jewish schools and synagogues need armed guards, in which the police have to deploy specialist teams so Jews can walk through their own neighborhoods, has allowed something utterly noxious to seep into public life.”
(26:10)
On Calls to Globalize the Intifada:
“The call to globalize the intifada is immoral because it's a call for targeted anti-Semitic violence... it made everything worse for Palestinians in Palestine, spreading violence, distrust and hatred among our community. To globalize the intifada is to spread the misery across the entire world.”
(21:40)
On What Palestinians Need:
“That is the only way to stability. The globalized intifada offers none of that.”
(22:56)
This episode delivers a searing critique of intifada-inspired violence—both its twisted moral logic and devastating real-world impact on Jews, Palestinians, and broader societies. The essay is a plea for sanity, coexistence, and practical solutions over the seductive but catastrophic vision of endless struggle.