Inside Project Esther’s plan to silence pro-Palestinian activism
The Take
Al Jazeera
4.7 • 748 Ratings
🗓️ 26 May 2025
⏱️ 23 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Trump administration’s crackdowns on pro-Palestinian activism look eerily similar to a conservative proposal to target universities and international students it claims are part of a “terrorist support network”.
Who is behind the plan, and what will its impact be?
In this episode:
- Tariq Kenney-Shawa (@tksshawa), AJ+ producer and US policy fellow, Al-Shabaka
Episode credits:
This episode was produced by Tamara Khandaker, Sonia Bhagat, Haleema Shah and Chloe Li with Phillip Lanos, Spencer Cline, Marcos Bartolomé, Mariana Navarrete and our host, Natasha del Toro. It was edited by Kylene Kiang.
Our sound designer is Alex Roldan. Our video editor is Hisham Abu Salah. Alexandra Locke is the Take’s executive producer. Ney Alvarez is Al Jazeera’s head of audio.
The Take production team is Marcos Bartolomé, Sonia Bhagat, Sarí el-Khalili, Tamara Khandaker, Phillip Lanos, Chloe K. Li, Ashish Malhotra, Haleema Shah, Khaled Soltan, Amy Walters, and Noor Wazwaz. Our editorial interns are Remas Alhawari, Kingwell Ma, Mariana Navarrete, and Kisaa Zehra. Our guest host is Natasha Del Toro. Our engagement producers are Adam Abou-Gad and Vienna Maglio. Aya Elmileik is lead of audience engagement.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Al Jazeera Podcasts. |
| 0:07.0 | Today, Project Esther, the U.S. Conservative Playbook to silence solidarity with Palestine. |
| 0:18.0 | What this is really trying to do, in other words, is effectively kind of like poison the |
| 0:23.3 | pro-Palestine movement. |
| 0:25.4 | From deportations to defunding universities, parts of the plan are already in motion. |
| 0:31.5 | What might come next? |
| 0:34.6 | I'm Natasha D'Althro, and this is The Take. |
| 0:44.4 | My name is Tarek, Keni Shawa, and I'm a U.S. Policy Fellow at Ashabika and a producer at AJ Plus, and I'm calling in now from New York. |
| 0:54.5 | Very cool. We're so happy to have you here on The Plus. And I'm calling in now from New York. Very cool. |
| 0:55.3 | We're so happy to have you here on the take. |
| 0:57.9 | And so we're going to be talking about Project Esther today. |
| 1:01.6 | Project Esther was first made public in October of last year. |
| 1:05.9 | And at that time, it was still sort of this abstract plan from the Heritage Foundation, |
| 1:10.4 | which, if people don't know, is a conservative think tank. And it was still sort of this abstract plan from the Heritage Foundation, which if people don't know, |
| 1:11.8 | is a conservative think tank. And it was, Project Esther was framed as a way to fight anti-Semitism |
| 1:18.1 | and to keep Jews safe. So, Tarek, let's start right there. What did they say that they were |
| 1:24.1 | trying to do? And what was a strategy that they were pitching? |
| 1:31.3 | Yeah, I mean, right off the bat, there's, you know, there's an obvious difference between what Project Estes architect say they're trying to do, and then what Project Esther actually is. |
| 1:36.6 | So, I mean, as you just mentioned, Project Esther is an initiative that basically claims to be |
| 1:41.3 | a national strategy to combat anti-Semitism in the U.S. |
| 1:44.6 | But if you take a closer look at it, what Project Esther actually is, it's effectively a blueprint |
| 1:50.1 | to dismantle or even destroy the pro-Palestine solidarity movement in the U.S. |
... |
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