Norm Diamond

For two decades, Palestinian rights activists have called for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel. The aim of the BDS movement is to pressure Western companies and governments to stop funding and supporting Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories and Isr... Read more

In 1980, in a stunning act of solidarity with progressive forces both in the U.S. and Central America, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, the ILWU, refused to load military supplies being shipped from the US government to El Salvador’s dictatorship. Their refu... Read more

For the last eight years, including the Trump’s years, the U.S Congress has been increasing appropriations for “Border Protection,” and still every year, on average, over one million undocumented people crossed into this country, getting work and settling down. How and why ... Read more

  Norm Diamond hosts this episode of the Old Mole, beginning with a story from Portland's May Day past, followed by these segments: Campus Protest: For two decades, Palestinian rights activists have called for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel. The aim of th... Read more

There was another prominent movement among oppressed Jews in the Russian Empire and Eastern Europe: The Bund. Sharon Rudahl is the author of a new graphic history of The Bund. Norm Diamond talks with her about that working class socialist organization, its commitment to the... Read more

Book Mole Larry Bowlden reviews James McBride’s 2023 novel,The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store, which, he argues, deserves all the wonderful press it has gotten. The love and cooperation between poor Jews and Blacks in a small town in Pennsylvania is the backbone of story, a... Read more

  Why do we hear so much about the supposed failures of recent progressive reforms in Portland?  Why does there seem to be so much panic about downtown?  Local organizer and activist Hyung Nam explains how Trump-era tax breaks have further incentivized the wealthiest devel... Read more

  Silhouette of Godzilla looming over silhouette of Broadway bridge against a rainbow background. Image by Mark Nerys. Used with permission. Norm Diamond hosts this episode of the Old Mole, which includes the following segments: Zionism Was Not the Only Alternative! There... Read more

There is a rich history of filmmaking in the Middle East, including a growing number of women filmmakers.  Jan Haaken talks with Professor Yasmeen Hanoosh about the course Hanoosh is teaching this term at Portland State University titled “War and Coloniality in Arab Cinema.... Read more

  Norm Diamond hosts this episode of the Old Mole, which includes the following segments: Is Racism Un-Oregonian? That’s what a former governor claimed in addressing the murder of an Ethiopian immigrant by racist skinheads thirty-five years ago. Elinor Langer knew differe... Read more