Episode description

The Palestine Laboratory premieres October 10 on all podcast platforms and DropSiteNews.com. Paid subscribers get exclusive early access to all episodes on October 10. Others can listen weekly, with new episodes every Thursday. Become a paid subscriber now at DropSiteNews.com/PalestineLab and enjoy 20% off your subscription. Subscribe today to get full access and support our work.

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Below is investigative journalist and Palestine Laboratory Podcast host Antony Loewenstein’s introduction to the series.— Jeremy and Ryan

Israel’s brutal onslaught in Gaza since October 7, 2023 has been apocalyptic for Palestinians. But for Israeli weapons makers, it’s been an unprecedented time of financial success and a unique opportunity to show off their latest tech.

In December last year, the CEO of Israeli defense company, Smart Shooter, told the Israeli newspaper, Yedioth Ahronoth, how proud she was of assisting Israeli forces in Gaza because her product had allowed them to eliminate a swarm of seven attack drones. 

Gaza was the first time Smart Shooter’s SMASH had been used in active war and the company was receiving orders from militaries across the globe including the US and Britain. Business was booming.

CEO Michal Mor was asked about her “vision” for the future and she proudly explained how “the ultimate goal is to make our technology a standard on every rifle in all armies, and to continue developing features for non-combat purposes as well, such as dispersing demonstrations; when you don't want to kill but deter, the system will know how to hit, for example, only below [the] knee.”

During the Great March of Return in 2018 and 2019, when thousands of Palestinians marched in Gaza to the “security fence” with Israel, Israeli soldiers opened fire, killing hundreds and injuring tens of thousands. Some Israeli snipers proudly recounted how many Palestinians knees they’d hit, making them disabled for life.

I’ve spent more than a decade investigating the Israeli arms industry, regularly reporting from Israel and Palestine since 2005 and living in East Jerusalem between 2016 and 2020. I’m an Australian, German Jewish independent journalist and film-maker, my work and life was recently featured in a film broadcast by Al Jazeera English, and my latest book is the global bestselling The Palestine Laboratory.

Understanding the Israeli weapons trade, an industry that’s worked with some of the most repressive nations on the planet since the Jewish state’s birth in 1948, is vital to decode a key rationale behind the Israeli military mindset; endless occupation and war is so profitable that it’s seen as literally insane to even think about stopping them. War in Gaza and the West Bank and exploding pagers in Lebanon are a unique opportunity to teach, sell, and inspire other states who want to repress their own minorities, unwanted populations, or dissidents. Israel will show them how.

This four-part podcast series will take listeners on a global journey into the Palestine laboratory, how it developed, how it works, why it’s so attractive for many nations, how it’s fueled by anti-Palestinian racism and been deployed on a massive scale since October 7, 2023.

This project has been a collaborative effort since late 2023 with a team of experienced producers, researchers, artists, musicians and sound designers. We’re honored to feature voices from Gaza, the West Bank, Israel, and across the globe.

The first episode of The Palestine Laboratory premieres October 10 across all podcast platforms and on DropSiteNews.com. As a thank you gift to paid subscribers to Drop Site News, we are making all episodes in this series available right away on October 10. For everyone else, episodes will be released every Thursday. You can become a paid subscriber today by heading to DropSitenews.com/PalestineLab for a 20% discount on your subscription.

Don't miss out. Subscribe to Drop Site News on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and your favorite podcast platforms to get The Palestine Laboratory Podcast delivered straight to your feed every Thursday.