Getting Serious about Accountability for Genocide and Apartheid: Sanctions, US law, the ICC and Universal Jurisdiction

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Note from FMEP: This conversation, recorded on the last day of Ahmed’s fellowship with FMEP, which began in 2025 and continued in 2026, represents his final contribution to our Occupied Thoughts podcast series (at least as an FMEP-affiliated host). We are grateful to Ahmed for the many generative, productive, and educational conversations he hosted and participated in as an FMEP Fellow.

In this episode of Occupied Thoughts, FMEP Fellow Ahmed Moor speaks with Omar Shakir, Executive Director of Democracy in the Arab World (DAWN), about accountability. They discuss holding key figures in the U.S. administration accountable (such as former Secretary of State Antony Blinken, sanctions on Israel, and universal jurisdiction laws.

Occupied Thoughts by FMEP · Getting Serious about Accountability for Genocide and Apartheid: Sanctions, US law, the ICC and Universal Jurisdiction

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Omar Shakir is the Executive Director of Democracy in the Arab World Now (DAWN), the organization founded by the late Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi that seeks to change US policy in the Middle East and hold human rights abusers in the region accountable. Prior to his current role, Omar served for nearly a decade as the Israel and Palestine Director at Human Rights Watch. A former Fulbright Scholar in Syria, Omar holds a JD from Stanford Law School, where he co-authored as part of the International Human Rights & Conflict Resolution Clinic a report on the civilian consequences of US drone strikes in Pakistan, an MA in Arab Studies from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Affairs, and a BA in International Relations from Stanford. He speaks Arabic and English.

Ahmed Moor is a Palestinian-American writer born in Gaza and a Fellow at FMEP. He is an advisory board member of the US Campaign for Palestinian rights, co-editor of After Zionism (Saqi Books) and is currently writing a book about Palestine. He also currently serves on the board of the Independence Media Foundation. His work has been published in The Guardian, The London Review of Books, The Nation, and elsewhere. He earned a BA at the University of Pennsylvania and an MPP at Harvard University. You can follow Ahmed on Substack at: https://ahmedmoor.substack.com and on X at @AhmedMoor.