How Police Killings Forced Israel to Confront Anti-Blackness

the life of my kids especially my sons is not safe here in israel i was escaping from hard conversations about racism with white people police departments can be stubborn sometimes [Music] it's been you know a policy of dividing [Applause] [Music] wood [Music] [Applause] [Music] foreign the family and friends of solomon teca a young ethiopian israeli who was killed by an off-duty cop went to the officer's trial [Music] case wasn't the first to outrage ethiopian israelis in 2015 a young ethiopian israeli soldier was beaten while walking with his bike sparking huge protests across the country the officer was never indicted in 2019 yehuda biaga a 24 year old ethiopian jew was shot to death during a mental health episode the cop who killed him was also cleared of any wrongdoing tucker was killed six months later while hanging out with some friends in a park near his home he was 19 years old his death set off three days of nationwide protests and forced israelis to confront their own bigotry beyond their already fraught relationship with palestinians [Applause] this might all sound a lot like the black lives matter movement in america and the protests that followed the murder of george floyd but ethiopian israelis aren't just fighting against police brutality they're also fighting for acceptance as black jews in the world's only jewish state [Laughter] ethiopian israeli rapper teddy the goose became in 2019 one of his tracks handcuffed became kind of an anthem for the protest [Music] brought me to the life of the protest to the to the struggle it took me a while to see what this song mean to people what do you think this song means to people i think it's like for them that one song that you hear and you know that the one who's seen that being the the same you've been through what are some of the lyrics that you think speak the strongest to people that resonate with them the music video was based on the 2015 police beating of an ethiopian israeli soldier the visuals are pretty strong yeah i know that i may like to bring it to the to the israeli audience for them to understand what i'm speaking about meaning making myself all the issues of racism and polish brutality like reflected on me everyone talk to me about this song everyone talk to me about this video i got like the the buzz and what i wanted and like the the whole noise around it i got it but i felt like i was like something up like yeah we need to fix it i don't want to sing about this like all my life do you feel now the importance yeah i'm saying right because now you feel like you've become a voice i always say if you can see the the problem in the system you have like some sort of uh duty to fix it yeah ethiopian israelis make up just two percent of the population but they're disproportionately targeted by the police according to the public defender's office young israelis of ethiopian descent are twice as likely to face imprisonment than arab youth and three times more likely than jewish white miners in 2016 the country's then police chief suggested that racial profiling of ethiopian immigrants was nothing to worry about [Music] [Music] we wanted to hear from young ethiopian israeli men about their experiences so we met up with teddy and his friends at a barber shop [Music] and the police also checked in have you guys experienced discrimination personally can you give me specific examples of how you guys have experienced discrimination being black in in israel when i was 14 like me and my friends just walking down the street in the evenings and then a police car came drive by and i just just told us get inside and then inside we stayed out with your penguin and like we're asking what do you do here i don't know they just told me to go inside and then they took us to the police station and then we find another at least 10 teopens at that moment even before you know you feel like i supposed to be hiding from them you know the the other guys who should be in my side then you you already feel unsecured in your own country and then this happens it's like an impact for you [Music] were you all a part of the protest i've been here like once or something and what was the feeling in these protests was it sadness anger pissed off ready to fight most of uh anger and ready to fight yeah yeah and then i know that it doesn't really help unless it is a you know a violent one nobody give it them we hate the feeling that we have to fight for an equal opportunity israelis but this is this is life for us now how do you all identify like ethiopian israeli jewish for me i'm both of them what's first what first europeans but first ethiopian ethiopian yeah then israeli yeah and what about you bro i'm ethiopian then jew and then israel because they i feel like they don't want to see so event i was grew up as an israeli and i like any israeli hero i mean russian or yemeni or i don't know ashkenazim you know i grew up just like them but what i got um indifferent with them is like police looking at me how they look at me as like i'm in ethiopia not like i'm in israel so i think for us for my generation it's like the the biggest problem was like for us to feel like belong here uh 100 [Music] ethiopian jews began immigrating to israel in large numbers 40 years ago they're known as beta israel or house of israel and traced their roots back to king solomon and the queen of sheba some religious historians claimed they descended from the lost hebrew tribe of dawn for years in ethiopia they experienced persecution and political instability then in the 1980s the israeli government began a series of covert airlifts promising them sanctuary in the jewish homeland under the law of return anyone who's jewish has the right to make aliyah or settle in israel and claim citizenship when the planes first touched down it was celebrated as a massive humanitarian win for the jewish state after 2 000 years a dream has come true they have arrived in the promised but the challenges of bridging the two cultures quickly became obvious this ultra-modern building complex is very different from the techels the native huts of the ethiopians they lived in so-called absorption centers for up to two years to learn hebrew and israeli customs and because some of their traditions differed from modern judaism the country's chief rabbinic council required many of them to undergo a formal jewish conversion the ethiopian immigrants objected to the fact that israel's chief revenant was questioning their jewishness i don't see in the torah that says the jews has to go to convert it in order to live in the promised land [Music] teddy's parents came to israel as part of the first wave of ethiopian immigration so basically what my mom doing now she's making buna buna yeah it's coffee it's like a tradition when all the families sit around the table i can help her yeah you can help her you need to meet them you need to move them like she's doing the whole time we need it crispy but not burnt this is this is the coffee the entire family's going to be drinking yes so if i mess it up no it's going to be a problem yeah you have a problem with a lot of people [Music] what's your father name slade but our last names come from white people oh because my ancestors were enslaved oh we're in slavery they took the last name of the white man yeah yeah [Music] [Laughter] you all had a dream of coming to israel is the reality of israel what the dream was [Music] as an ethiopian jew in israel do you feel equal to white uh [Laughter] the country's chief rabbi technically recognized the ethiopian community's judaism back in the 1970s but some israelis have been slow to accept it in 2018 a kosher winery made news when it moved its ethiopian workers off the job after ultra-orthodox leaders questioned whether anyone they touched would truly be kosher to quiet lingering doubts in 2019 the chief rabbinic council which oversees religious life in israel decided to reaffirm the 1970s decision to fully recognize ethiopian jews rabbi amar was a member of the council until 2013 and advocated for the ruling ethiopian jews moved here over 40 years ago why did it take so long for them to be fully recognized [Music] ethiopia [Music] have you experienced any racism within the council that would make ethiopian israelis feel this way i need [Music] as the older generation who made aaliyah here how do you respond to the idea that you were coming to a place that you thought was safe for you but then young people are being killed in the streets by police officers [Music] [Music] everyone who came to this country has been through it so this is our turn now me i don't think like that but like i respect like this opinion [Music] was discrimination and lewd a big deal for you growing up like for me i didn't think about it that much but like it's very usual thing for a policeman to stop you stop you from you're doing get your id you get to i mean it's very usual thing to everybody it was like going to sleep for a long time the older generation was sleeping like they didn't know racism they felt that but they didn't know that this is where it seasoned so they stepped and we couldn't sleep i mean we got to wake up and what was the response from israelis to the protest like they were sucked from our like reaction you know they were shocked yeah how are you shocked for my reaction okay and you don't even go to check what's happened what's making me do it like let's say one day your brother just went out from the house came back and start to like break everything in the house break everything break everything what you will be care about on what he break on the house or what happened him on outside that matter to him outside this is what you want to know and people in israel was shocked from us like breaking the house i mean go check for go check what made us do it what are you guys doing now to continue in the spirit of the protest for me i was like escaping from hard conversations about racism with white people and nowadays when i hear something that rings like racism i just bring that out no matter who is near me no matter i just bring that up just to make sure that this won't pass to the next man because a lot of ethiopians keep it quiet like the protest is the only only chance for them to express their feelings but not you need to express your feelings no matter where you are over the past few years ethiopian israeli activists have been increasingly speaking out shulamola helps lead weekly protests outside the police stations [Music] tonight we go to kiryat malachi police station to protest we have a new chief we try to to tell him to do better job because kiryat malafi one of the i can say most disgusting police station regarding the ethiopian kids and ethiopian young men last february the chief here was reassigned after israeli media revealed whatsapp messages of officers under his command mocking an ethiopian israeli injured while in custody every woman every mother stand in front of kirat malaki police station is saying i cannot stay at home when i know that our kids are not safe shula has four children two of them are around the same age as solomon tekker is not the only ethiopian israeli person who killed by mister by police but his only case that they brought to the court the reality is the situation of my community getting worse they send us to bad schools without opportunity and they send the community to very very very weak neighborhoods to slums and then the police come in to this picture with their profiling with their violence and they they start to to beat and to kill and to put into jail [Music] it's same and also different from other minorities in different aspects one is the color playing a big role here because for average israeli black is less another thing it's also different because we came as a community as a jewish community we return to our home and the gap between our expectation my family's expectation and the narrative of the community the gap between this and with the reality was very strong [Music] schule has been working closely with salomon teca's family since the hearing started last february the officer's trial went on hiatus because of the pandemic israelites [Music] [Music] is foreign [Music] [Music] foreign tucker was killed by a bullet that ricocheted off the ground the off-duty officer who fired it claims the shooting was accidental after he tried to intervene in a fight and fired a warning shot in self-defense [Music] [Music] in the weeks after the shooting the officer was arrested and suspended from his position before being released on bail he's charged with negligent homicide under israeli law his name has not been released to the public [Music] nadashi is his attorney [Music] m [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] even before tucker was killed protest forced the israeli government to finally admit that racism towards ethiopian jews was a problem whenever kimberly shoot maggie williams in 2016 the government published a report laying out a blueprint for how to fight racism in everything from housing to the police one of the report's recommendations was to create a task force that would coordinate with government agencies and respond to any complaints of discrimination it began work in 2017 last march we spoke with the wicked zenna the man in charge of that unit in the three years that your unit has been in existence how successful would you say your reforms have been thus far we improved the awareness against racism and when we started in 2017 uh we just received 77 complaints from the public 2018 uh its grow and we finished with two to 230 and 2019 and we have received approximately 500 complaints so all complaints is against um authorities i think no one accepts racism in israel no one except racism israel especially in the authorities we're all trying uh and this message to the authorities and the government government mysteries we must create a situation that racism is not legitimate period do you think the israeli government cares as much about the minority population as you and your unit does i'm the government you know i established by the way you're ethiopian is right yeah yeah but i'm professional you know i'm in this position because the government decided to establish intermittent unit to fight racism i basically i'm working to lead the government decision to fight racism so i believe that the israeli government believe or that all kinds of minority needs to be equal do you feel like your office has been given the proper resources to tackle this problem not enough really um i think we are dealing with a huge problem and because of that we need more measures and more tools to lead efficient um solution to the people you know which reforms have been the most difficult to implement in my view the policy reforms it's most difficult because first they are big organization and second i think they um still believe they are doing good and they are not see the problem how they are policing how they are treat people how they are enforced below and unfortunately we didn't uh yet um to um cooperate and to convince them to take a step to change police departments can be stubborn sometimes what are the consequences that they do because that uh that they will see more and more uh demonstrations of israeli citizens not just ethiopian jews but other citizens many ethiopian israelis still don't feel heard some like teddy's cousin avishai mao have taken their protest to the country's most venerated institution the israel defense forces this is young soldier you say [Music] he's aged out of military duty but in 2016 he was one of the first to sign an open letter with fellow soldiers pledging to boycott their next stint in the reserves until the country's leaders got serious about systemic racism [Music] foreign more than 1 000 people signed the pledge the punishment for refusing military service could include jail time [Music] refusing to serve in the army is that an act of rebellion for you there's a network [Music] involved [Music] [Music] [Music] my if military service is primary to being israeli and you all as ethiopian israelis refuse to do it does that not run counter to the notion that you are proud to be israeli media is [Music] [Music] we asked the israel defense forces about the reserve duty protest they said they hadn't heard about it the trial of the officer who killed solomon teca resumed last november [Music] today is a special day for me because solomon's father called me last night and asked me to translate for him [Music] the officer is facing three years in prison today the defense will call its key witness to prove the shooting was in self-defense [Music] yogurt [Music] the trial is closed to the general public and media during the hearing police officers who were first on the crime scene were called to the stands tekken's family and shula left frustrated by the testimonies feeling as though the police were closing ranks the hearings are expected to continue throughout 2021 [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] m [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] after the hearing the techa family invited supporters over to their home for the movement for ethiopian jewish rights to be successful activists know they'll need the support of the rest of the israeli society [Music] generally i see this last few months that more and more white activists who wanted to be part of this fight [Music] actually [Music] [Laughter] my name is [Music] and their supporters plan to show up for every hearing until the trial is over shulamola is preparing for that to be a very long time the whole day was very hard for me [Music] the gap between the effort we invest and i can speak about myself i invest on this process the gap between that and the understanding that there is no justice it's it's killing me it's hard nobody really changed the the environment of the police organization the behavior of police [Laughter] it's not it's not fair it's not it's not honest treatment they don't really want to change themselves [Music] ethiopian jews aren't the only ones being killed by israeli police last may police fatally shot iad al-halak an autistic palestinian man setting off a new round of protests over police brutality [Music] prosecutors recommended the officer who shot him face charges of manslaughter the protest soon converged with a broader movement against the leadership of prime minister netanyahu racism in israel is so strong the problem is that thus far it's been you know a policy of divide and rule and especially the expert in divide and rule is netanyahu he all the time has been dividing and despite that ruling different communities all the victims of racism palestinians uh ultra orthodox the ethiopian community everybody and others [Laughter] [Music] foreign do you think it could ever get so bad here for ethiopian jews to the extent that you would leave israel no way i don't think it's a it's an option it's cross in our mind but we can leave israel because it's our land i think i belong here and i do everything i can that is that is my power to you know to make it better for me and for my friends and civilians most of the israelis are not racist but the silence there are silence and and being silenced when you see racism is you know part of the crime yeah so if we will fight if we will you know be activists for that maybe the rest of the israelis will you know be with us and you know make a statement against racism but we are not going to leave you know israel because of you know a few races or all the systems that treat you know racism against us we have to change the system we have to change those people maybe let's ask them if they want to leave you know [Music] what do you guys feel is the most effective way to fight racism our generation has been like on the halfway of bringing the [Music] solution when i grew up i was like with white friends i had russian friends i had arab friends and they all knew that we are all just equal when we was like i think this is what like uh can fix racism when you know the person you you will not afraid him you will not shoot him you will not do anything to harm him because you know uh he's just just like you [Music] [Applause] [Music] so israel was the first country in this exploration of black lives matter movements around the world what do you what did you feel in terms of the difference in the racial reckoning in israel compared to italy the racial reckoning in israel has a few more layered components there's okay i'm black i'm israeli and i'm jew and how do you negotiate the three of those in which order do you consider yourself to be those things and and how do you and how do you negotiate being in a place that for your entire life you've considered to be your spiritual home your home period and when you get there and it's definitely not what you expected to be in terms of you being accepted amongst the people that you would consider to be your your brethren and your sisters you ended up going to a barber shop why the barber shop because it feels like the barbershop in the us is obviously such a symbolic space you know i was like there is no martin luther king jr boulevard in in israel so what's the next place best place to look go to a barber shop and we went to a barber shop and there were brothers there and we were able to have a real substantive conversation about identity how do you all identify like ethiopian israeli jewish for me i'm both of them well first what first europeans got first ethiopian ethiopian yeah then israeli yeah and what about you bro i'm ethiopian then jew and then israeli because they i feel like they don't want us here and you made ethiopian coffee was it good because obviously you could lie and be like wow i did a great job but was it actually good listen the family said coffee was good but in terms of making the coffee i was nervous the pressure was you saw how many people were there you had aunts uncles you had the you had the the the matriarch of the family they're watching so you you know you have to maintain a certain level of respect and that's that's a custom it's ritualistic wow and i thought i could just pour from like a height of one inch they're like no no no no you got to go higher you gotta go higher i went the more nervous i got did you go to israel and italy expecting something similar to the black lives matter movement so um i did my best to suspend those preconceived notions and in order to open myself up to learn from kin folks in another culture yeah i mean i think it's it's twofold right like i feel like the george floyd protests definitely propelled grassroots movement and also consolidated these movements under the banner of black lives matter so guardia sorensen who is the founder of black lives matter denmark she really drew her strength from the protests the george floyd protest and was able to like recruit so many people because of those protests but at the same time it makes sense that that would be that they would actually take on the brand because there's so few the history of black resistance is actually limited because there's so few of them whereas in brazil the history of slavery meant that it had to have its own movement like they couldn't afford to wait until america like created this you know black lives matter movement to actually take that on and it was just interesting to see how they were so empowered by it you know it didn't feel like there was any sense of well we're not american if anything it was like hopefully the american struggle can validate what we've been feeling you know i would agree with that and it was similar in in italy i think one of the biggest things the activists mentioned in italy was like you know we've been doing this work for quite some time and we appreciate you know black lives matter because there's significant similarities between blm and america and what's going on in italy it's interesting you mentioned you mentioned denmark and i wanted to to to ask about your experience there um i've never been to denmark and i'm interested to know what was it like to to discuss race in a place like that the image of denmark as this you know the happiest place in the world like and this like very you know neoliberal progressive uh color blindness like i knew that but i'd also read about the ghetto laws back in 2018. so i knew there was something up and i knew that that whole we all know how that liberal agenda can actually be used to conceal racism you know but i don't think i realized how insidious the racism in denmark is until i went until i saw just the like nationwide gaslighting that was going on [Music] it felt like racism was seen as a very um extreme thing and i think that by doing that subconscious bias microaggression blindness within the system to the experience of black and brown people you know these were the ways in which racism was not only like surviving in denmark but was thriving in denmark one of the first black parliamentarians in denmark he said to me that they think they say here that police in denmark have a sixth sense i think they need more training they have a two day course on diversity it's not mandatory and it's not everyone who gets it the sad thing is one of them told the national media that they think the police have a sixth synth that's why they stop more people of color than disturb white people denmark for me felt like such a nuanced case study because it was really about perceptions of racism and also this inability to comprehend that racism could be something beyond the explicit outburst sixth sense from the police it only works for black people [Laughter] tell me about the very interesting conversation you had with the head of the newspaper over there so ma'am that was honestly one of the most uncomfortable not interview conversations like most one of the most uncomfortable conversations i've had in my life but i don't think the story is about race this because all our investigation shows that it is not you want it to be a racial i want it to be yeah yeah your feelings around this murder case is feelings what we try to do is of course talk to people who show emotions and tell feelings but the core of this murder is facts with me saying it feels dismissive that you are discounting racism his defense being you wanted to be racist was probably one of the most ridiculous yet symbolic things that anyone has ever said to me in a conversation of race so when he said that i mean i was taken aback and i was i responded to him but i also suddenly understood what black people in denmark have been experiencing which is when you say actually no can you take a moment to look at this through the experience of a black person it's immediately you want to be a victim i left that interview with michael and i was i knew i was gas he he gasled me he basically said to me that you know you're projecting what you want only on the basis of me being black so he used my blackness against me to undermine me as a journalist you know and then going on to say that you know racism doesn't need to just be covered by black people because we're journalists we're skilled to cover it do you think that you have to be colored i mean if you're that is that is the that is the idea of identity policy right now you know you have to be colored to cover racism no you don't i think anyone if they are a journalist if they are skilled if they are trained okay and that's what we believe in denmark you know actually as an editor this newspaper and other newspapers in denmark of course it doesn't need to just be covered by black people but when you don't see the value of the black perspective in covering a story about a black man being killed by two brothers and racism being the debate in you know the thing in question then you then there is inherently an issue here it's interesting your your your experience with the head of the newspaper there because it it's somewhat similar to um the conversation i had with a far-right member of parliament there carlo fedonza it's the the brothers of italy party because it was the same it was the same with this guy where he he refused to acknowledge that racism exists and this is after i've had conversations with at least 15 20 black folks over there and so i asked him like in so many words as a white italian from where do you get the confidence to tell these people that they are wrong he didn't like that very much and then and then of course he pulls out that well which black people did you talk to because i know a black person that would tell you that racism doesn't exist i confronted him about the colonial past of of italy so he acknowledges that on a very my new scale but then he says [Music] well look what look what they got they got bridges and tunnels and such and i was like what i came away with is there there are two issues that that black folks face mainly over there there's the citizenship laws because if you are born and raised in italy that doesn't guarantee you citizenship if your parents were not italian you have to go through you know certain levels of bureaucracy in order to to get citizenship they said they said italian citizenship is earned and the other issue is the exploitation of migrant laborers in southern italy calabria and then my personal experience we're interviewing one of the main characters who was a migrant worker in the courtyard of his apartment complex and the neighbors shutters open into the courtyard so of course you know nosy neighbors they open their shutters they want to see what's going on and there are two white italian women that were ready to call the police and our fixer there who was a white italian went to explain to them what was going on that that our character we're interviewing is uh he was a uh he worked for the union on behalf of migrant workers and then i'm a journalist and the woman said no that's not true there's no way he could be a journalist he's a migrant worker too he's black he can't be a journalist it's a form of resistance in and of itself to not internalize these things you know not internalize these presumptions that no you can't be a journalist you can't be a voice of authority you know and it's and it's just like that consistent thread there's obviously this in brazil this class element that's used to justify police brutality so when we interviewed the head of the government body that promotes policies for racial equality we went into it thinking okay they've appointed someone black which is a good step and he has a good human rights record as a lawyer we weren't expecting you know him to be martin luther king jr like we knew that for him to to get to this position in in bolsonaro's government he must be you know an enabler in some fashion but we were not expecting such an outright denial when there's so much evidence of police brutality and there's so much evidence of the fact that the black population are targeted by the police when you have statistics that are saying that 80 percent of victims of police brutality are black in brazil and what hearing that argument it completely undermines the fact that black people are in this position because of the lack of opportunities because of the fact that they're not allowed in these spaces it just feels like it's twofold it's we're not going to give you any opportunities to leave the favela but it also feels like there's no way out there's no option for black people in in these situations there's no opportunities for social movement [Music] stepping outside of the black experience and trying to be neutral things do come up that are personal in terms of like your upbringing in terms of what you experienced growing up as a black man in the u.s what came up for you um [Music] as a as a black man having grown up in the u.s and specifically the south what came up for me was that there is a connection between kin folks across the world in that there is oppression in some form or fashion it may be it may be dressed in different clothing but it's still oppression and discrimination that's interesting the notion of invisibility because as a black man in america i don't feel invisible i feel very visible but in the negative way right i feel visible yeah as a threat you know is what is what i'm seen as many times with what you've seen um and the people that you've spoken with and the experiences that you've had are you hopeful i am cautiously optimistic and in the same vein in brazil it you know as much as brazil feels maybe definitely a more extreme case study that will need more time and more work it feels like they can't really keep hiding behind this denial anymore because you've got so much mobile phone footage you've got so much evidence to prove that systemic racism is not only there but it's it's it's it's everywhere it's so it's so prevalent in terms of like where my hope lies is on the side of the people that are fighting the good fight right both black and our allies you know because i was inspired by their commitment and their dedication you know in the face of what seemed to be insurmountable odds my hope and expectation on the side of of the people that are fighting the good fight is solid if there are black folks around the world in different countries that are fighting the good fight in the same way that i saw these folks fighting then i think you know we're we're in some good shape

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Length: 59min 44sec (3584 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 26 2021