Toronto did not disappoint!
In this special live recording of ‘Unshocked,’ Mehdi and Naomi come together to do their first ever in-person episode in front of an audience of nearly a thousand people – most of them Zeteo subscribers like yourself! Their wide-ranging conversation takes place in Toronto as a part of Zeteo’s one-year anniversary tour.
“Canada loves you… but do you love Canada?” Naomi asks Mehdi.
During this first part of the two-part conversation, Naomi asks Mehdi to discuss the state of the US amid Trump’s immigration raids and deployment of the national guard in LA.
“Do we have to talk about the US?” Mehdi asks. “It's very depressing.”
“What Trump and MAGA have done is also bring back that kind of white supremacist fringe into the mainstream. That is what's driving, that is animating all these raids, that's what's animating LA,” he says.
Mehdi and Naomi also discuss Israel’s ongoing and escalating assault on Gaza.
“How is it possible that a people who suffered a genocide could be committing a genocide?” Naomi asks. “I can't answer that question without understanding how trauma has been systematically weaponized by an ethnostate, and that Zionism is the ideology that turned trauma into a supremacist weapon.”
Mehdi and Naomi take questions from the audience, including about Canada’s response to Trump’s trade war, how they each find hope, ethnonationalism, and even Israeli strikes on Iran – which began during the recording.
Paid subscribers can watch the full conversation. Free subscribers can watch the first 15-minutes of the conversation. To watch it in full, consider upgrading to a paid subscription. You can also make a donation to us here, your small help goes a very long way.
Stay tuned for Part 2, where Mehdi and Naomi interview acclaimed Canadian doctor Yasser Khan, who received a standing ovation and brought people to tears describing his volunteer work with Palestinians trying to survive Israel’s assault on the ground Gaza.
