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Listened to this one...read by Ta-Nehisi Coates. Above all, I encourage folks to read this book through the lens in which it was written: to bring attention to the power of words, the destructive nature of oppression and colonialism, and the importance of giving voice to those that are marginalized.

"The Message" was presented through the lens of Coates experiencing three very different places in the world (South Carolina, Senegal, and Israel & Palestine territories) with an underlying theme of oppression in various forms. Never does Coates claim to be an authority on Palestine or Israel. What he does repeat (as he has in many interviews) is that the Palestinian | Palestinian-American voice has remained non existent for decades in American media | publishing whereas the Israeli voice has agency within media | publishing. He was trying to shine a light where it is often not shown. The through-line of oppression | colonialism is not a stretch considering the writer is Coates, an African-American who has experienced his own oppression | racism as well as the ancestral legacy that is part of America's history. The fact that folks are drilling down on the part of the book about Palestine in a combative way is thought-provoking considering the larger context of the book.

We all come at things through a different lens. I felt that this was reiterated many times by Coates in the book and during interviews. He understands that to have someone speak for him, as a African-American man, is to cause erasure in the name of "othering", ergo, he was careful not to "other" by making his commentary of his visit to Israel & Palestine self-reflective. Recent podcasts with Ezra Klein & Trevor Noah are placing a lot of eyes on this book. If you are a humanists, I highly recommend reading it for yourself before wading into the divisive commentary.