The idea that the Palestinian people have only been able to persist because of their religion is ridiculous to me. They are resisting because colonialism, apartheid and genocide are very bad things to which nobody would want to be subjected, not because of Islam. If Palestinians were atheists, is he suggesting that they wouldn't have the strength or the will to resist? Would their lack of a belief in the supernatural turn them into doormats for Isn'treal?
I like Hakim's content, but his position on religion is quite frustrating. He is a Muslim first and a Marxist second. Also, Joram van Klaveren is still a right-winger.
I don't know if Islam is a material force per se, because it is a super-structural phenomena. But looking at it from the Palestinians perspective, materially, the Christian Zionists and the Jewish Zionists are colonizing them materially. However there are Palestinians that are not Muslim. There are Palestinians that are Jewish or Christian that are subjected to the same horrors as the Muslims.
However it seems that if the Islamic countries united under one banner geopolitically, ban foreign capital from influencing them, that would materially undermine imperialism. Quadaffi tried to do something like this and we'll see if someone there can manage to do this again. Just make sure that if one develops nukes, keep them to protect your people.