Hebrew → English transcript

This isn't going off the agenda — of course, Hamas's response to Trump's plan,

and to Trump's plan in general.

What's interesting is the first cartoon I brought,

I saw that it has indeed already been published in many places,

but look at the cleverness.

That is, there's a play on words using two Arabic words,

of 'la' and 'na'am' together.

No and yes.

We end up with 'lahum' — meaning 'to them'.

So, there's actually a double meaning here.

Right? It's ambiguous, but there's the…

Right? It's the yes and the no at the same time.

Everyone reads whatever they want to read.

Exactly. As people sometimes say,

When you say 'no,' what do you mean?

But in this case, when you say 'yes,' what do you mean?

And you can see Trump with his tie hanging down, all messy,

all the way down, right?

He's sitting — it's his trademark, right?

What Dr. Night actually wanted,

with the Palestinian shoulder in this drawing,

was to show that Trump is naive,

that he doesn't understand this subtlety, this Arab ambiguity,

that, as they said, is both yes and no together,

and good luck making sense of that.

So it's charming.

This wordplay cartoon shows up a lot,

but here…

we actually saw it, right?

Over the weekend I saw several cartoons with the word "yes."

Right. Especially, yeah.

We're not surprised by that.

So here — let's put another one on the screen, if you don't mind.

This… yeah, it's a cartoon by Muhammad Sabama,

who is also Palestinian,

and of course it portrays Netanyahu

as trapped inside the word "Na'am."

Yes. It's been cropped a bit at the bottom, but yes.

Yeah, it's cut off.

So the word "Na'am," which is "yes" in Arabic,

the eye in the middle actually becomes a trap, Michal,

and it catches him.

It's supposed to catch his leg,

and in this case they wanted to show it in a ridiculous way,

so it grabs his butt — the butt they depicted,

as if he fell into that trap,

actually, yes, into the trap of the word "Na'am."

Like, they said yes, but actually,

they put us in a trap — put Netanyahu in a trap.

It's like Israel hoped Hamas would say no, actually,

to this plan. Hamas, allegedly, said yes.

On the contrary, so here the trap kind of caught his butt.

And he tries to pull him out, but it doesn't work,

So we've seen this game a lot with the word "Noam".

Let's see the next one in line.

We're moving on to the third cartoon,

and it's the Jordanian cartoon,

by Nasser Jeffrey,

which shows Trump blowing fire, right?

Basically he says, you know, that if Hamas doesn't respond

to his parrots…

the gates of hell will open.

Yes, so obviously Gaza will burn, right?

So here, the fire that eventually turns back its aim on him,

but returns to him.

And he places Netanyahu as a human shield.

Exactly. Netanyahu, the human shield.

But there's also the Arab perspective

on these relations between Israel and the United States,

I mean, look, when he needs to, he even sacrifices...

the one that basically remains our only supporter in the world.

Netanyahu had no choice but to say yes

to stopping the war and not to negotiate under fire.

So here, the cartoonists see that too.

So the fire comes back, and he uses Netanyahu, right?

who stands in front of him.

Let me show another one.

We're now getting to a rather repetitive cartoon

Kamel Shtaf from Yemen.

I always have to bring one thing by Kamel Shtaf,

because you can't — he's very wicked,

and anti-Semitic; he doesn't hide it, of course,

but here I'm showing Trump with the plan,

who's holding the plan in his hand,

and he's kind of inciting Netanyahu,

the dog, right? In Gaza.

In Gaza, yes.

And below, when we see the second part of the cartoon,

he… Hamas's response is yes,

but it, at the same time, Slimi Levnikal,

it also throws a bomb, right?

a bomb with a fuse,

and Netanyahu is startled, but Trump looks as if…

lit up, I mean, look, they said yes, right?

it basically neutralizes the attack dog.

And the attack dog, exactly that biting dog,

actually recoils backward.

Here, again, we always see the histombut

the surrounding issue of the trap,

we also saw this in the team that...

in the trap that catches Netanyahu, and here too.

Salima, this "yes" is not really a yes.

You have to understand the language.

The language of the Middle East is ambiguous,

it's not the same.

Even when people say the word 'Inshallah',

I always explain it in my lectures too,

what does 'Inshallah' mean? It's also very vague.

It means yes, it means no, and it's maybe, maybe.

So you can't know.

And it's worth saying, Hamas did not say yes.

They said 'yes, maybe, yes, but, yes, exactly.'

Yes — and let's have a debate that goes on and on.

But we missed it.

Many people missed it; I didn't.

Do we have another cartoon? Here it is.

The final cartoon — this last one,

published just this morning in the newspaper Al-Watan in Qatar.

And again, if we're already talking about Qatar,

then we see Trump here,

pulling out of his hat,

like a magician pulling a dove out of his hat.

And the dove has 'Gaza, thin' written on it, of course,

and it's in the shape of Gaza, but it's bleeding.

Why is it bleeding at all?

Because we see little Netanyahu there inside the hat,

with a knife, trying to stab the dove

and Gaza, of course.

Again, this is a cartoon…

Where does it come from?

From Qatar.

So we already understand Qatar's role in incitement,

because what does it show? It basically shows Israel committing genocide,

Israel… all the things that affirm us.

And this cartoon, of course, shows that.

It's a little—just a little—mocking of Trump,

to some extent, with the hat of

Make America Great Again.

Yes.

And Netanyahu, who is like…

he pulls rabbits out of the hat, he pulls doves out of the hat.

he pulls doves out of the hat.

Roi Kais is with us here at the university.