Qantara: As we speak, the war between Israel, the US and Iran is still ongoing. When you hear sirens announcing a rocket attack from Iran or Lebanon, and you run to the bomb shelter with your family, what goes through your mind?

Yuli Novak: It probably shouldn’t be quoted exactly, but my first thought is: “Shit.” And I feel an incredible rage about the fact that we’re trapped in this cycle of violence—and that there’s a system keeping it going. Over the past two weeks, we’ve felt the violence in the region particularly acutely, but it’s actually always there. The only question is who’s particularly affected by it at any given moment.

After being a human rights activist for many years, you had a personal crisis. You traveled and started writing, which later became a memoir. What did you learn along the way to be able to return to Israel and resume your work as a human rights activist?

In 2017, I stepped down as director of Breaking the Silence [an NGO run by veterans of the Israeli army, Ed.] — I had burned out. I needed to step back and ask myself: Is it enough to fight against the occupation, or does the problem run deeper within the Israeli system?

And what was your answer?

I grew up in a progressive, liberal-Zionist household. The fact that we are in the midst of a series of never-ending wars is taken for granted there. It’s either us or them—the Palestinians. From a distance, it became clear to me that the narrative I grew up with is a classic story of settler colonialism and apartheid. From then on, I understood what we really have to fight against: the system that sustains the occupation in the West Bank and is based on racist and violent values.

Is it really legitimate to compare the term apartheid—so closely associated with South Africa—with the current situation in Israel and Palestine?

I believe so. Both systems are designed to maintain the dominance of one group over others, even if they employ different methods of control, exploitation, and separation. In my experience, however, apartheid in South Africa never reached the level of violence that we are witnessing today in Israel and Palestine.

You once said that your attitude toward Israel changed during a stay in South Africa. What did you mean by that?

It was there that I came to understand that one of the defining features of apartheid is that the privileged group does not realize it is living within such a system. Apartheid divides physical space in such a way that the privileged believe they are living in a democracy, while others live without rights within the same system. Confronting this mode of blindness was depressing but also liberating.

Why did this realization bring you back to Israel?

I would have come back eventually anyway because this is my home. But it wasn’t until I became aware of this contradiction I’d been living with until then that I said to myself: “Okay, yes, I can come back and carry on. I now have the words for what I need to do.”

You then started as director of B’Tselem in the summer of 2023. What is the most significant difference for you between your work as director of Breaking the Silence and your work at B’Tselem?

The biggest change is the fact that I now work with Palestinians. Half of our team consists of Israeli Jews and half of Palestinians from Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza. That’s quite unique because we live in an environment where society emphasizes separation between Jews and Palestinians. Breaking the Silence is, after all, an organization of mostly former soldiers, and it has a strong influence on the discourse within Israel. When you work with Palestinians, you see reality completely differently—as if Israelis and Palestinians were living in parallel universes.

A few months after you started working at B’Tselem came October 7, 2023: the deadliest massacre of Israelis since the founding of the state and arguably the most traumatic event for Jews since the Holocaust. How did that change things for you?

October 7 and the Hamas attack have been the most terrible day of my life to this day. A traumatic moment for practically all Israelis. A few days later, while we were all still in shock, I had a conversation with a colleague from South Africa. She said, “Okay, but now at least the Israelis will understand.” I replied, “No, I don’t think so.” And in fact, the opposite happened. The Israeli discourse has become so genocidal in a way we hadn’t heard before. Dehumanization existed before, but not to this extent. Added to this was the extremely broad support for the attack on Gaza, which B’Tselem has defined as genocide. This shows how much Israeli society has changed.

In July 2025, you published a report with B’Tselem in which you describe what is happening in Gaza as genocide. Why did you decide to use the term despite the sensitivity of the issue?

For most of us at B’Tselem, it soon became clear that what we were seeing was something entirely different from anything we had known before. Since its founding 35 years ago, B’Tselem has documented deaths directly related to the conflict. For the first time, B’Tselem was unable to do so.

Because of the scale?

Yes. But that is just one example. We are witnessing a highly targeted attack on a civilian population aimed at destroying a group. We have all heard the statements calling for it; the intent was clearly there, and the practices were in place. The question we had to ask ourselves—and this is a very terrible question—was: What is our role as an Israeli human rights organization in the face of genocide? And our answer was: We must tell this story. And use what we have. Thanks to our Palestinian staff members, we were able to document what is actually happening in Gaza. But in the second part of our report, we also discuss the conditions that made the genocide possible.

What do you mean?

We’re talking about nearly 80 years during which Palestinians have lived under a regime of apartheid, violence, and dehumanization—and impunity for Israelis who inflict suffering on Palestinians. So October 7 was something of a trigger for the entire system to enter its genocidal phase. And that is exactly what we wanted to show.

Isn’t this analysis one-dimensional, placing the blame solely on Israelis rather than on Palestinian politics? Haven’t Palestinian groups also made a peaceful solution impossible? I’m thinking, for example, of the Second Intifada and groups like Hamas?

In many ways, the Israeli regime creates the conditions under which movements like Hamas can emerge. Authoritarian and oppressive regimes often give rise to violent resistance movements. Hamas committed horrific crimes on October 7 when it attacked Israeli civilians, killing and kidnapping around 1,500 people. These crimes were appalling and must be acknowledged. Yet they were immediately used by Israel as a justification to launch a massive attack on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, with openly stated goals of annihilating them.

Ask yourself if you would want to live under a political system that shows no respect for human rights and no commitment to rules designed to protect human life. Such a system is dangerous for everyone, including Jewish Israelis.

During the war in Gaza and now during the war with Iran, the situation in the West Bank is flying under the radar. How do you view the situation there?

There is violence that literally knows no bounds. For two years now, the situation there has been deteriorating further. Whenever attention is focused elsewhere, the Israeli army works together with the settlers to expand oppression and intensify the ethnic cleansing of the West Bank. Since October 2023, more than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed there. This means that almost every day, Palestinians are killed by the army or settler militias, who effectively operate with impunity. More than 50 communities have been displaced since then. 

In a way, the situation there is already comparable to Gaza. Because there are no boundaries—neither under international law nor morality—that we must adhere to. I still see the danger that the genocide will fully spread to the West Bank, because there is no mechanism, neither local nor international, that holds Israel accountable and prevents it from doing what it is doing.

What do you see as the biggest challenge for human rights activists in Israel right now?

The fact that we are truly marginalized in Israel. You just have to turn on the TV and listen to what’s being said. Currently, the Jewish-Israeli public almost unanimously supports the war against Iran. Over the past two years, it has been considered legitimate to kill children because they are supposedly growing up to be terrorists. And anyone who opposes this narrative runs the risk of being attacked on the street. This also raises the question of how we can protect our people, especially our Palestinian colleagues. The government is currently in the process of passing a series of laws to block our ability to fundraise and criminalize some of our activities. In a political environment that is becoming increasingly authoritarian, where right-wing hardliners have taken over key elements of the state apparatus—in the judiciary, the police, and the army—the legal framework is constantly changing.

Israel is not the only country becoming increasingly authoritarian; one could say we are in the midst of a global crisis of human rights and international law. What can we do to reverse this trend?

A colleague of mine, the director of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), once said that Gaza will be the graveyard of international human rights law. I believe we can even go further and say that Gaza could also be the graveyard of human rights—the concept of human rights that emerged after the Holocaust. How can we reverse this trend? I really don’t know. But fighting for the human rights of Palestinians means, in a way, fighting for human rights everywhere.

What do you think the international community should do?

States should use the means at their disposal to end the current situation. As we speak, the genocide in Gaza continues. Hundreds of thousands of people are starving, freezing, and have no access to medical care. The international community has the power to end this, yet the political will is lacking.

What means should they use?

Since we operate in an environment that is becoming increasingly repressive, we can only speak in limited terms about specific measures. However, governments know very well what instruments are available to them under international law, as well as through diplomatic, economic, and legal mechanisms. Some European states have already taken more active steps than others. The least we would expect, particularly from Germany—given its history, its sense of responsibility, and the role it is willing to play in Europe—is for it to be at the forefront when it comes to holding Israel accountable and defending international legal institutions.

Germany has a special relationship with Israel due to its history. A question that always arises in this context is: What does it mean to stand by Israel’s side? What experiences do you have when you come to Germany and work with German institutions?

The last time I was in Germany, I received a lot of advice before meetings with representatives of German institutions. One piece of advice was: Don’t use the word “genocide”. That didn’t make sense, since I had come to present our report, and it’s called “Our Genocide.” But I certainly understand the difficulty these terms cause in Germany. In a way, Israelis and Germans of my generation grew up with a similar notion—namely, that of the Holocaust as the paradigmatic genocide that must never happen again. But then you grow up and realize that the Shoah was not the only genocide in history.

I believe, however, that the fact that both Israelis and Germans know so much about it also gives us the responsibility to recognize genocides and take action. And I believe that the Germans, as the ones who brought the worst form of genocide into the world, have a responsibility not only to the victims of that genocide—the Jews—but also to humanity in general, to ensure that something like this never happens again. I think the discourse in politics and the media is slowly opening up, partly due to pressure from the streets, and exerting that pressure is probably the best thing one can do right now to continually draw attention to accountability and international law and to strengthen them.

Do you believe that the elections in Israel this fall could mark a turning point for the country?

Let’s put it this way: There’s a small chance that hardliners like Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir will no longer be part of the government. That would indeed make a certain difference. But even under a more moderate government, the ongoing attacks on Palestinians would continue to find support; we would still be living under an apartheid system.

Many Israelis say that if the Netanyahu government remains in office, they will leave the country. Don’t you say that?

Yes, many draw that red line there first. But it seems to me that often it’s like the proverbial frog in a pot of tepid water being brought to a boil. The water just keeps getting hotter and the frog doesn’t jump out in time. It’s shocking how people get used to this level of violence. But this is my home. And as long as I can keep fighting from here, I find meaning in it.