Decentering the Politics of Power: Palestine and the Global South
This session will delve into the support for Palestinian political renewal from centers of state power in the Global South. Panelists will discuss the potential for these alliances to reinforce Palestinian efforts to build a unified, resilient political platform, and how expanding these relations may contribute to strengthening the Palestinian cause on the global stage.
Ryan Grim
Ryan Grim is co-founder of Drop Site News and the host of the podcast Deconstructed. He was previously D.C. Bureau Chief for The Intercept and the Washington bureau chief for HuffPost, where he led a team that was twice a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and won once. He edited and contributed reporting to groundbreaking investigative project on heroin treatment that not only changed federal and state laws, but also shifted the culture of the recovery industry. The story, by Jason Cherkis, was a Pulitzer finalist and won a Polk Award.
He has been a staff reporter for Politico and the Washington City Paper and is a co-host of the show Counter Points. He is the author of the books “We’ve Got People” (2019) and “This Is Your Country on Drugs” (2009). His third book, published in December 2023, is “The Squad: AOC and the Hope of a Political Revolution.”
Abdullah Al-Arian
Abdullah Al-Arian is Associate Professor of History and Chair of International History at Georgetown University in Qatar, where he specializes in the modern Middle East and the study of Islamic social movements. He teaches introductory courses on the history of the Middle East, as well as advanced courses covering the history of modern Egypt, Islamic social movements, the Arab uprisings, and the history of US policy towards the Middle East.
He is the author of Answering the Call: Popular Islamic Activism in Sadat’s Egypt (Oxford University Press, 2014), and the editor of Football in the Middle East: State, Society, and the Beautiful Game (Oxford University Press, 2022). He is the editor of the Critical Currents in Islam page on the Jadaliyya e-zine, where he is also a regular contributor. His writings have appeared in the New York Times, Foreign Policy magazine, Middle East Eye, Middle East Research and Information Project, Muftah, and Al Jazeera. He has also been featured in media interviews by Al-Shabaka: The Palestinian Policy Network and Democracy Now! Previously, he was the Carnegie Centennial Visiting Fellow at the Josef Korbel School of International Studies at the University of Denver.
Muhannad Ayyash
Dr. Muhannad Ayyash was born and raised in Silwan, Al-Quds, before immigrating to Canada, where he is Professor of Sociology at Mount Royal University. He is also a policy analyst at Al-Shabaka: The Palestinian Policy Network. He is the author of A Hermeneutics of Violence (UTP, 2019). He has published several academic articles on topics such as political violence, Zionism and colonial modernity, vaccine apartheid, anti-Palestinian racism, and Palestinian decolonial movements in journals such as the European Journal of International Relations, the European Journal of Social Theory, Distinktion, Critical Sociology, and Middle East Critique. He has co-edited two books, the most recent with Jeremy Wildeman titled, Canada as a Settler Colony on the Question of Palestine. He is also the author of multiple book chapters, and has written opinion pieces for Al-Jazeera, The Baffler, Middle East Eye, Mondoweiss, and The Breach, among others.
Nesrine Malik
Nesrine Malik is an acclaimed British Sudanese author and journalist known for her wide-ranging commentary on issues of race, identity, politics, and international affairs. Her book We Need New Stories: Challenging the Toxic Myths Behind Our Age of Discontent (2019) critiques the narrative foundations of increasingly intolerant and authoritarian politics in Britain and the United States, exploring how once-fringe views have gone mainstream. Malik’s columns in leading outlets including the Guardian, New York Times, and Washington Post address topics ranging from Islamophobia and feminism to African politics, with deep insights into the ways colonial and postcolonial legacies shape our contemporary world. Malik received the 2021 Robert B. Silvers Prize for Journalism.
Grace Nadeli Pandor
Born on 7 December 1953, Dr Pandor is South Africa’s former Minister of International Relations and Cooperation from 2019-2024. She was part of the ministerial team of the cabinet of South Africa that initiated the genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice.
Dr Pandor became an MP in 1994 and has amassed impressive experience in positions of public office, including Deputy chief whip of the ANC in the National Assembly from 1995 to 1998, served as the Deputy chairperson of the National Council of Provinces in 1998, and its Chairperson from 1999-2004.
Dr Pandor’s experience in education policy planning made her a welcome appointment as South Africa’s Minister of Education in 2004. She has been a member of cabinet ever since, and has served her country in the following portfolios: Minister of Education (2004-2009); Minister of Science and Technology (2009-2012); Minister of Home Affairs (2012-2014); Minister of Science and Technology (2014-2018); and Minister of Higher Education and Training (2018-19).
Dr Pandor has a Phd from the University of Pretoria (2019) and honorary doctorates from the Cape Peninsula University of Technology, University of Stellenbosch, and the University of Lisbon (Portugal) and the University College Dublin in Ireland.
Upon being awarded Germany’s highest federal award, the Grand Cross of Merit, the German Ambassador to South Africa, Walter Lindner, said: “Pandor is for us a symbol of the new South Africa: modern, innovative, dedicated to scientific progress and also outstanding female leadership”.