For this interview, we spoke with Dr. Fadi Zatari, a Palestinian scholar who has spent years studying the political uses of the concept of terrorism and the ontological foundations of Zionist violence. Zatari is an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science and International Relations at Istanbul Sabahattin Zaim University and deputy director of the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA).
He recently co-edited the volume The Zionist Movement, Israel and Violence and contributed a chapter to it, “Terrorism as an Instrument for Israeli Illegitimate Violence and Terror,” in which he argues that terrorism is not a neutral analytical category but a political instrument that Israel uses to legitimize its own violence while delegitimizing Palestinian resistance. We talked with him about the political uses of the word “terrorism,” the violence that accompanied the founding of the Israeli state, the limits of the “self-defense” argument, and where the West Bank is heading after Gaza.
1. Editing a book requires a deep, long-term commitment. What motivated you to make this topic feel so urgent both for you and for the readers you wanted to reach?
For the past eight years, I have taught a course on global terrorism. In it, I focus not only on case studies of terrorist organizations in the Middle East, such as the PKK and ISIS, but also on the theoretical dimensions of counterterrorism. Although the oldest terrorist organizations in the region were Jewish, the Haganah, for example, was established in 1920, finding good literature on them for my students has always been difficult. I therefore decided to work on this volume in order to highlight the close relationship between Jewish paramilitary organizations and the establishment of Israel, and to draw attention to Israeli violence and apartheid policies after 1948. With that aim, the book brings together eight chapters by scholars and researchers who all examine Israel as a settler-colonial state and Zionist terrorism as structured, organized state terror.
2. In your chapter, you argue that terrorism is defined politically and that terrorism studies often overlooks state violence. How does that shape the way Israel’s actions in Gaza are understood?
The concept of terrorism is inherently political. How it is used depends on the political agenda, interests, worldview, and orientation of whoever is applying it. The more serious problem is that terrorism studies, as a field, focuses almost exclusively on non-state actors. Yet many states possess formidable armies and weapons of mass destruction, which makes them far more capable of inflicting violence, causing destruction, and carrying out acts of terror. The Israeli army, for instance, has committed sustained violence over the past three years, including the genocidal war it has waged in the Gaza Strip since 2023. Even so, within the field, it would seem odd to describe Netanyahu as a terrorist or Israel as a terrorist state. All of this should make us reconsider how Western and state-centric terrorism studies remains.
3. Israel often presents itself as defending Western civilization, as seen in Netanyahu’s writings and the “Hamas is ISIS” framing. Why has this narrative been so effective in the West, and does it still hold after the war in Gaza?
Both before and after October 7, 2023, the Israeli prime minister and many other Israeli politicians repeatedly equated the Palestinian resistance with ISIS. Netanyahu also insists that Israel is fighting on behalf of Western civilization and that it is integral to the West and its values. That explanation, in effect, concedes that Zionism is a Western colonial practice. He consistently links Israel, “a democratic state,” to Western democracies and argues that the enemy is the same, only under different names. The purpose of this discourse is to justify Israeli state terrorism, genocidal warfare, destructive policies, and crimes against humanity. But Israeli violence and terror are not merely discursive; they are embedded in everyday Israeli policy and conduct toward Palestinians. Confiscating land, expanding colonial settlements, kidnapping children and doctors, brutally torturing civilians, imposing military checkpoints, and resorting to other forms of violence are all integral to the Israeli system.
After October 7, 2023, however, it became clear that Israel is a threat not only to Palestinians or to the region but to the world as a whole. Solidarity with Palestine grew accordingly: more than 60,000 demonstrations were held in Europe alone, while public support for Israel was almost nowhere to be found. This suggests that Israel’s image, and Netanyahu’s narrative along with it, no longer works as it did before October 7.
4. You argue that an occupying state cannot claim self-defense against the territory it occupies. If the legal position is so clear, why do legal arguments carry so little political weight?
As I show in my chapter, a great many legal instruments and international conventions establish that people living under occupation have the right to self-defense and self-determination. Israel, meanwhile, is committing genocide and war crimes, and it tries to conceal them by claiming that its war is against Hamas and not against Palestinian society as a whole. The scale of Israeli violence and destruction tells a different story. It points to a coordinated plan for the extermination of the Palestinians in Gaza. The evidence on the ground, together with the blunt statements of Israeli leaders, shows that the aim is to eliminate the entire Palestinian population of the Gaza Strip. Hence, Israel intends to colonize the Gaza Strip, build new settlements, and annex them to the state of Israel. This political discourse serves to justify its illegitimate use of violence, its ethnic cleansing, collective punishment, and genocidal wars. The force Israel uses is also grossly disproportionate: the scale of the military strikes, the killing of civilians, and the destruction of most homes and infrastructure in the Gaza Strip, hospitals, schools, mosques, churches, and essential services, cannot be considered legitimate or appropriate self-defense by any measure.
Indeed, the legal position is clear; nevertheless, international will is so fragile. For example, Israel has received full support from the US at the international organizational level, where the US prevents any intervention in favor of the Palestinians.
5. You describe settler terrorism in the West Bank as a state policy coordinated with the army, and you speak of a “quiet genocide.” As Israel turns increasingly toward the West Bank after Gaza, what responsibility falls to the Muslim world?
Settler terrorism in the West Bank is fully backed by the Israeli government. Settlers are armed and protected by the state, and when they murder Palestinians, there are no legal consequences. The West Bank is indeed undergoing a quiet genocide, since the settlers’ daily terror and violence attract so little attention. Israel had already turned its focus to the West Bank before October 7, 2023, but its policies against the Palestinians there are now far more aggressive.
Palestine is not a matter for Palestinians alone. Palestinians are, of course, on the front line of the confrontation with Israel and its settlers, but the threat is a pressing one for many countries around the world, including Türkiye. We therefore need to treat Israel as a global problem one that requires global cooperation and consensus to contain, much as with climate change or AIDS.
