Books and Magazines


How most Western governments and elites have supported the destruction of Gaza and silenced voices calling for the rights of Palestinians Providing a record of the first six months of the war waged by the Israeli army after the 7 October attacks and drawing on a rich range of international sources, Didier Fassin examines how most Western governments have acquiesced in and often contributed to the destruction, by the Israeli army, of Gaza, its homes, infrastructures, hospitals, institutions of education, and civilian population. To justify their support and prevent criticism, they have provided an official version of the events, adopting the Israeli narrative. It was largely taken up by mainstream media, which ignored the experiences and perspectives of Palestinians. Dissenting voices were silenced. A policing of language and thought was imposed. Censorship and self-censorship became normalized. To call for a ceasefire or to demand the respect of humanitarian law was enough to prompt the ever-ready accusation of antisemitism. Exploring the multiple dimensions of the extreme inequality of lives between the two sides of the conflict and analyzing the complex geopolitical, economic and ideological stakes that underlie it, Fassin intends to constitute an archive of this moral abdication. In his view, the abandonment of the values and principles proclaimed by Western elites to be foundational will leave a deep scar in the history of the world.

Didier Fassin – Moral Abdication - How the world failed to stop the destruction of Gaza

Explores the echoes across time and space that link Carla Grandi’s book of poetry “Contraproyecto” (1985/1987) & Meredith Monk’s film and album “Book of Days” (1988).The zine is a rare chance for English speakers to be introduced to Grandi’s work, with several poems translated from Spanish for the first time specially for the event.“In a time of increasing authoritarianism, misogyny, and lethal polarization, we revisit these works to learn strategies of mourning and political defiance.And to understand the appeal of medieval settings to capture repressive regimes and the subversive potentials of magic, myth, and madness. Conceived of at roughly the same time and yet under very different circumstances, both works interweave medieval storytelling and contemporary events to protest racial and political violence and to celebrate intellectual and physical survival. Carla Grandi wrote“Contraproyecto” as a personal and affective response to the everyday restrictions and heinous violence of Augusto Pinochet’s regime in Chile, which barred her and many other leftists from teaching and publishing. Written and produced in the late 1980s, in the midst of the AIDS epidemic, and affected by the uncertainties and injustices of the Cold War, Meredith Monk’s film “Book of Days” shifts between a fictional medieval town and contemporary footage from New York City. With a soundtrack composed by the avant-garde artist and composer, and voiced by herself and a twelve-voice ensemble, the film deserves to be listened to as much as to be seen.”

carla grandi t. (& meredith monk) – contraproyecto