Bad Hasbara - The World's Most Moral Podcast - 149: I'm Gonna Git You Sukkah, with Peter Beinart

Episode Date: October 7, 2025

Matt and Daniel are joined by author Peter Beinart to examine the toll taken by supremacist ideology, the curious demographics of the various “top anti-semites” lists, and Van Jones’ trajectory through the Activist-To-Embarrassing One’s Self On Real Time With Bill Maher pipeline.Please donate to Bridge Of Solidarity: https://chuffed.org/project/bridgeofsolidarityJoin the patreon at https://www.patreon.com/badhasbaraThe Beinart Notebook: https://peterbeinart.substack.com/Jewish Currents: https://jewishcurrents.org/Being Jewish After The Destruction of Gaza: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/214490421-being-jewish-after-the-destruction-of-gazaBad Hasbara Merch Store:https://estoymerchandise.com/collections/bad-hasbara-podcastGet tickets for Francesca Fiorentini, Matt Lieb and friends with Daniel Maté October 13 in Brooklyn: https://bit.ly/mattfranbellhouseSubscribe to the Patreon https://www.patreon.com/badhasbaraWhat’s The Spin playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/50JoIqCvlxL3QSNj2BsdURSubscribe/listen to Bad Hasbara wherever you get your podcasts.Spotify https://spoti.fi/3HgpxDmApple Podcasts https://apple.co/4kizajtSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/bad-hasbara/donationsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Mashwam hot, bitch, a ribbon polkote. We invented the terry tomato, and weighs, USB drives, and the iron d'all. Israeli salad, oozy, stents, and jopas, orange, rose. Micro chips is us, iPhone cameras, us, taco salads, us. Podaramos us, all of garden us, white foster us, Zabrahamas, as far as such Hello everybody and welcome

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Daniel, what's that spin? It's a family-themed spin zone today. My family is, my nuclear family is all in town because we just had a little miracle of a Simcha of my niece, my parents' first grandk. born. I talked about being an uncle last week. But so, you know, I got some, I got, I got a record for every member of my family. Uh, wow. Gabor, Zabo, the Hungarian, uh, gypsy jazz master. I mean, not, maybe not just gypsy jazz, but a jazz guitarist with his album, The Sorcerer. Yeah.

Um, really cool album. Sick. My mom's name is Ray, R-A-E. So I've got the new album by Ray Kwan, the chef. I thought you were going to say. say Lana Del Rey. I don't have her, no. No, but this is closer to the spelling. Sure. The Emperor's New Clothes just recently came up. A little tufer here, Daniel La Noir, Akadi, the Canadian, he produced, well, the Joshua Tree.

Less problematically, he produced Or Mercy by Bob Dylan and Emmy Lou Harris' album. He's a great producer, and this is his debut album, but also featured on it is Aaron Neville. So that's my brother's name. There we go. And Aaron Neville of the Neville brothers who sang the theme song to which season of the wire. I knew it before you even asked. I knew it. Wasn't that?

You know where I was going with that. I knew exactly where you're going with the Neville Brothers. My sister Hannah is represented by Bikini Kill, led by Kathleen Hanna, married to which Jewish rapper? I'm going to say kosher dills. Ad Rock of the Beastie Boys. Adam Horowitz. Yeah. Used to be married to Ione Sky, but now he's married to her.

And finally, my little niece, her name is Rio, and she does not yet dance upon the sand because she can't control her legs. She's only a week old. She can do tummy time on the sand. She can do tummy time on the sand. Although not yet. Duran Duran, Rio.

I love it. There you go. I love it. That is what's spinning for the Mate family. They have a lot of records to listen to in the next few weeks. All right. I'm not going to play Rick. on for her quite yet. Yeah, maybe wait a little. Okay, without further ado, it is time to introduce

our guest. We have a great episode for you. Very excited to introduce this guest. He recently wrote being Jewish after the destruction of Gaza. He's the editor at large of Jewish currents. And of course, he has a wonderful substack, the Bynart Notebook. Ladies and gentlemen and everyone else, welcome to the podcast, Peter Beinart. Hey. Hi. How are you doing? I'm doing fine. Thanks for having me. Of course. Thanks for coming on. I'm glad we got to make this work. We've been back and forth trying to schedule this for a bit. And I'm just stoked that you still wanted to come on. You know, I think before we had you, you know, on when we were talking, I saw you had gone on John Stewart's show and a bunch of others.

And I was like, oh, yeah, I guess we are actually asking a lot to have Peter on the show. I mean, it's being on with comedians that people who are funny, like, makes me nervous no matter what kind of, you know, comedians they are. But I feel like maybe that was a good warm-up. Yeah. It was a good warm-up for you guys. Yes, yes. You interviewed a pretty funny person recently. You had Hannah Einbinder on your show.

That's right. Yeah, she was funny. Although I would say more sweet than funny, I would say. It's true. Like radiating, like, kindness and goodness in the conversation. Maybe I didn't bring out her humor very well. Well, you know, the subject in general is not usually, you know, filled with humor. It takes a special kind of pair of freaks to create a show.

Laughing about this every week. And, you know, it's an auspicious time for you to be joining us. We're in the middle of the high holidays. We do want to just say that no halakhic commandments or even. And Talmudic guidelines were hurt or violated in the making of this episode. Yes, not yet. It will be Sukkot by the time we release it because we are trafe as hell. But you, my friend, are recording this with us just before Arab Sukkot.

So thank you for making time in this auspicious time of the year. It's my pleasure. Well, you know, the Sukkot is called Zvann Simchatainu, the season of our joy. And it's not really a season of joy. But I guess being with you is pleasurable. So maybe in that sense, Sukkot is starting early. And we aim to bring that customary Sukkot hospitality. Speaking of which, you know, the festival, not the festival,

the solemn day of Yom Kippur is just passed, and it's not too much of a stretch to imagine Jews turning the gaze in. I mean, it's more of a stretch than I'd like in the case of mainstream Judaism, but turning the gaze inward at what needs to be forgiven and perhaps what's unforgivable. And we've seen some great statements from Jewish leaders again, way too few about that. The festival of tents, of dwellings,

of temporary abodes and hospitality is something Jews and non-Jews know less about. What sort of extra meaning does this holiday get infused with for you in a time like this, if any? That's a good question. I mean, the rabbis often, compare the Sukkah to the human body in terms of its lack of permanence, you know. And then you would read the book of Kohelet of Ecclesiastes, which is a, you know, a downer even

by biblical standard, basically, about how life is short. It doesn't really mean anything. And I guess, you know, I didn't realize Sartre was a biblical character. Right. I mean, actually, it's kind of a mystery why the rabbis allow it in at all, given that it's pretty heretical and it's feeling that life has no meaning, except the very end where they say, you know, we should believe in God. So I don't know. I think that, first of all, for a very personal way for me, as it happened, my father died five years ago, Arab Sukkot.

So I think that resonates for me a lot in that sense, that sense of impermanence. But I also just think, I don't know. I mean, I do think maybe this is melodramatic, but I mean, I think the horrors that we're living through in Gaza, in the United States, like I think do pose the question. question for me, I would like to pose the question. I try to, you know, I hope others pose the question, like, how are we living given the fact that, um, uh, that things are so radically impermanent and that the forces of the forces of evil in the world are so powerful, you know, um, like, what are we doing with a very limited amount of time and resources that we have? Are we using them in a way that like we can ultimately be proud of? I know myself, like, I'm just, just constantly fighting against my own tendency to prioritize things that I know are just not ultimately that important, but just like. Like doing this podcast?

Like doing this podcast or doing this podcast is probably better. Mostly it's just like a whole list of to-do thing, to-do list I have every day that I have to get done, which is basically all about my own interests. You know, did I get the laundry done? Did I do this? Blah, blah, blah. Did I get my, you know, and it's not about the things that are ultimately I know most important, which generally have to do with like the well, you know, with serving others.

you know and so that's a struggle for me it occurs to me i mean i'm no rabbi or prayer leader by any means but also the opportunity on a more literal level of being in a half-formed dwelling you know with this with the stars or the rain you know coming in might and tense you know might occasion some empathetic consideration of what people are living with involuntarily and not as a not as some kind of ritual, but as an imposed... A material reality. Indignity and material reality. Absolutely.

No, that's exactly right. I mean, I think that one would hope that that would kind of bring that sense of awareness that the tiny little amount of discomfort you might have, you know, eating in a succor could give you some tiny glimpse of basically the horrors that the United States and Israel have inflicted on an entire population for two years and longer. Yeah, which reminds me of, this doesn't remind me, but I'm going to use this as an occasion to make a bad joke. Someday I'd like to make a black exploitation film

about this holiday called I'm going to get you succor. And that's the kind of intellectual prowess you're going to be dealing with here on the Bad Hasbara podcast of chewhorned puns having to do with Sukkot. Take that, John Stewart says producer. Yeah, he could never make a pun that good. Daniel, you were telling me before the show, you know, about an experience that you had where Peter was invited to speak at something. And I want you to ask this question.

Peter, you don't know this, but you almost broke up one of my dearest friends' marriages. Not really, but I won't name him or the exact location. But on the west coast of Canada, there's a beautiful town where I once lived. And a good friend of mine is a history professor there. and he went to some lengths to secure a speaking engagement for you, both at his synagogue and at his university. And it so happens that his wife is the president of that congregation. Oh, yeah, okay, I know.

And so, well, and she had to deal with the rather shocking to them fallout of inviting, you know, known provocateur and extremist firebrands. Peter Bynard to these genteel shores to speak, you know, to take questions from anybody who wanted to ask questions. And yeah, the synagogue, there was a whole furor about it. And at the university, there was all kinds of, you know, hand-wringing about how are we going to make sure Jewish students feel safe? And I just want to know, how does it feel to be the new norm?

By norm, I mean, Norm Finkelstein. Yeah, it is fun. Sometimes I feel like I feel bad when people invite me because by the time I actually get to the campus or the synagogue, sometimes like they seem just exhausted already what they've had to deal with just preparing for a visit. I'm like, I just have to fly in, but there's all of this stuff. I was recently at an event with, I was recently an event and someone was telling me about this terrific organization because I have kind of high school college age kids that if I'm concerned about my kids and where they're going to college, I should get connected to this group called mothers again. anti-Semitism or moms against anti-Semitism because they keep the Jewish students safe. And I didn't have the heart.

Are they related to mothers against drunk driving? Like don't drive while hating Jews? I don't know if they team up. But I didn't have the heart to tell this nice middle-aged Jewish woman that actually like mothers against anti-Semitism had just sent like a thousand emails to a university where I was speaking in order to protect the students from the anti-Semitism of myself.

You know, so that far from me needing people protection against anti-Semitism. Mothers against anti-Semitism needs protection against me or the, you know, they're trying to protect people against me. Or you need protection against them. I need protection. We all need, I mean. Classic Jewish story.

I need protection from all these Jewish mothers. I know. Now, I mean, you're the funny people. You're the comedians, but I have tried out this joke a few times, which I feel like goes over pretty well. You can tell me how it works. Sure. So my joke goes something like this.

We Jews are so. creative and talented that we can thrive in even the most hostile industries. Even the anti-Semitism industry, we have managed to kind of rise to the top because so many of the most successful and notorious anti-Semites are actually Jews ourselves. Like there's really no industry in which we cannot, is we not prevail. That's a great joke. That is great. Feel free to use it. I love it. Use that. That's a great joke and it is, hey, you know, I have to say whenever I see a, um, stop antisemitism.org top 10 list and Jews are making up half of it. I'm always like, man, we really do control just everything, man.

Give us some categories in which to exceed or succeed and we will exceed all expectations. I know. I sometimes imagine like going into a meeting of like the Anti-Defamation League, Federation, the board and saying like, so there's a new poll out which shows that 39% of American Jews think it's what's happening in Gaza's genocide, and among Jews under 40, it's like more than a majority. So how do we fight the explosion of anti-Semitism among young American Jews? You know? It's like, what's our strategy? Yeah. Well, these haters, they just don't want to see Jews succeed in anything, including genocide. That's right. Exactly. They want to see us

succeed um i mean it's it's it's got to be uh interesting for you to uh kind of be in the position that you are now i mean i don't know how long it's been since you have been someone who has been you know disinvited from things or uh heavily protested uh at college campuses for me it's strange to see uh this reaction to you because i i have you know not not because I mean I mean look at you you're not you're not a scary guy you know it's a you're now in a in a position in which you are being put front and center by you know hardcore Zionists as like a threat to Jews and to Judaism what what is that like for you like is that is that must be isolating is especially since of of of

all the commentators like on the spectrum of you lead with a certain degree of grace and empathy for people who have not yet made that leap. There's a lot of people on our side of the fans who listen to this podcast who can't muster that. They're just too disgusted by it and too horrified. But you, I would think that your blend of things would go down smoother. But no, it infuriates them even more. Yeah. I mean, I look, I feel like, you know, trying to be trying to be to kind of see the best in other people and be uh and and and be careful about like how judgmental and self-righteous i am i feel like partly i i just have to do it out of honesty because i held those views myself you know and a lot of other views that turned out to be

really catastrophically wrong um and my views have changed a lot and so i just and i very well aware of times when I was taking views that other people thought were very, very profoundly morally wrong and actually were in retrospect. And I really appreciate the people who kind of, you know, who argued, but also gave me the space to kind of come to things on my own terms. I generally don't find that people are likely to change their mind when they're like mocked mercilessly and humiliated. I just don't think that tends to work very well. And I also, the other thing, and sometimes people, don't like when I say this, but I will say that, and again, maybe this is because I grew up

part of my childhood and apartheid South Africa, I really think that human beings are complicated. So, like, I see and know people, you may know two people whose views about Israel and maybe even America, I find really abominable, like really reprehensible. And I see the way they act in other parts of their lives. And I think they act like really, really good people, you know, and perhaps better than me in some areas of my life. And so, I just am also, like, wary of, like, making totalizing moral judgments about people. Like, that's a bad person, right? There are lots of people who have great political views and are total assholes, you know,

in the way they treat the people around them. And so, I don't know. I just want to be careful of that because I'm also, if I was so wrong about things in the past, it stands to reason that I'm probably wrong about some pretty big things now. And I'm going to have to apologize for them at some point. And I want people to just, you know, kind of be nice to me about it. it when I do. Well, that humility is a powerful thing, but what, what I, and we're going to get, we're going to

talk about your book in more detail in a while. We're going to pivot now to, to some of, you know, some of the media content that we like to mercilessly mock and pillory. That's what we do on this show. I don't think we're going to change Van Jones's mind, but we're going to help a bunch of people digest the. We have the privilege of, uh, having, you know, hot takes and, and saying mean things that no one's ever going to hear because no one knows this podcast, but I wanted to

to say when I read your book, like what I appreciate is, and when I hear you speak and when I hear you interviewing people that I'm like, yay, he's talking to them. And when I see you interviewing people that I'm like, oh my God, I wouldn't go near that person with a 10-foot pole, you do lead with that sort of human goodwill and not benefit of the doubt, but just benefit of the heart. You know what I'm saying? But when you criticize ideologies and you insist on facts and you insist on logical and moral rigor and you don't you don't you don't count out to or you don't pander to people's prejudices you see them you name them but you don't make it personal and I think that's admirable this is something I've actually learned kind of by

modeling myself after two people who I really admire one of them is Naomi Klein who has this great line about how being like something like being on tough on systems and soft on people which I really like. I mean, you know, I think about these, you think about these kids who come to college campus, you know, especially they've gone to like a yeshiva day school or some like super pro-Israel environment. You know, this is like core to their relations with their parents, their grandparents, their whole view of the world. Like what those kids need, those kids should be challenged, but what good does it do to be an asshole to them, right? Like, I mean, you have to have some, like, it's just, it's counterproductive and it's not kind. Like,

there's a possibility of, and the second person is Tanasi Coates. And one of the things that I always struck me about Tanasi Coates is that he, you know, he's, he's, he's, He is, in a way, his writing is quite brutal, right? Because if you get in his crosshairs, right, like he was recently critiquing as recline, but he's gone after a lot of big people in his time, he marshals an argument that is really kind of devastating. But there's never any ad hominem or, like, nasty, you know, kind of stuff like rhetorically. It's understated, and he lets the argument kind of in the facts speak for themselves. And that, I don't do it, you know, nearly as well as he does.

but like for me, that's been something that I have aspired to. Yeah, and one of the things that also occurs to me about Coates is there's sorrow in his writing as much as there is fury. You know, as a disciple, I would say, of Baldwin, you know, and that's a powerful mix, that vulnerability that's not mushy or sentimental. Yes. But it's not trying to protect itself with a deflective wall of, I'm better than you or I don't care or, you know.

Yes, or snark. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, no, no, that's really well. really put i hadn't thought about connecting him to baldwin that makes a lot of sense yeah yeah well speaking of uh you know the black prophetic tradition no no i wasn't going to say that i was going to say offering grace uh towards people who uh slip up publicly yeah you recently commented on an apology that van jones had uh and uh before we get into that we need to play the comment that van jones made uh he was recently on real time

I think it's called with Bill Mar one of television's worst shows and he watched that show you're doing real time yeah it's also taped on Shabbat by the way which is my excuse for never having to have done it that is a great

excuse that makes me want to be kosher like maybe I should but yeah he went on Bill Maher and he had this to say regarding the conversation starts out with some sort of like ham-fisted Bill Maher-esque attack on like I think critical race theory for no reason I don't care to know the context of him attacking that I know it's whatever it is it's racist because it's Bill Maher but Van Jones quickly changes

the conversation and I just want to play you guys this clip isn't part of that because we had to fold everything into critical race theory and somehow the Middle East became part of, you know. I see it differently. And I love this conversation because I think people, those of us who went to college, give a lot more credit to college courses for how the world works than I do. This is not about critical race theory on college campus. This is about Iran.

Iran and Qatar have come up with a disinformation campaign that they are running through TikTok and Instagram that is massive. If you are a young person, you open up your phone and all you see is dead guys a baby, dead guys a baby, dead guys baby, diddy, dead guys a baby, dead guys a baby, dead guys a baby, that's basically, you're all these. That's Thomas Friedman, by the way, to the right of him, noted Arab cab driver appreciator. That's right. Thomas Friedman, grinning and nodding approvingly of this brilliant line of thinking. And an entire studio audience, which, um, I mean, they can be forgiven.

If you've ever been in a studio audience, it's just like, it's... It's applesauce everywhere. Oh, my God. That's not DEI. That is a geopolitical adversary that is deliberately trying to divide the West against its... That view is none.

So that is the clip that recently went viral. A lot to comment on with that clip, because a lot is happening there. The big outrage that that caused was the laughing using dead gazen baby as a punchline. And suggesting that dead gazen babies are misinformation. Yes, definitely. And frivolous on the level of ditty. Well, for sure.

But first and foremost, people, I think, were just like, I can't believe dead gauze and baby is a laugh line and and so that was that is the very least what van jones took from the outrage is that is what he apologized for i'm going to read his apology right now to you he said i made a comment on real time with bill mar about the war in gaza that was insensitive and hurtful i apologize the suffering of the people of gaza especially the children is not a punchline I am deeply sorry it came across that way. What's happening to children in Gaza is heartbreaking. As a father, I can't begin to imagine the pain their parents are enduring, unable to protect

their kids from unimaginable harm. I'm praying and working for an immediate end to this war and for peace and safety for every family caught in its path. I'm truly sorry for the pain my words caused to people who are already suffering more than anyone should. In that apology... What's happening to children and... What's happening to children in Gaza, Van?

That is, I mean, that's the question. But, Peter, I want to start by asking you, you came out and talked about this apology, giving at the very least credit for being one of the very few public figures who actually apologizes when they say something horrid. Can you speak more on that? Well, first of all, I think it does say something about how the public culture has changed. I mean, obviously, you know, I wish it didn't have. take a genocide to change it. But there was a time when you really, and it's still the case in

the Republican Party that you can say anything about Palestinians, literally anything, the most nakedly genocidal, and you never have to, you never really get any heat for it, right? And so, and I think that would have been true in the Democratic Party in mainstream media too up until recently. So the fact that you see then who is also, you know, there's a big backlash against Pete Buttigieg when he wouldn't kind of endorse conditioning military aid. This is a shift. And I think that's good. And I think I really don't know Van Jones. I really don't. don't. But I, he's somebody, you know, I might not agree with all of his political views outside of Israel, but I can see a huge dissonance between the position that he takes on Gaza and

Israel, Palestine, and the positions he takes on the United States. He may not be a radical leftist about American politics, but he does basically believe in the principle of equality under the law. And I think with people like that, I think there is an opportunity to try to focus them on the contradiction between the principles that they claim to they believe in. They even fight for it here and the principles there. I also think, again, I don't know Van Jones, but I just think in a weird way, I sometimes try to imagine what it is like to be a non-Jewish political pundit figure, probably especially if you're black, which means you're more vulnerable.

Because we know that black commentators and politicians get called anti-Semitic more quickly than white people do. And have it stick, and have it stick in ways that it doesn't with others. Yes, exactly. And are sent to re-education camps more quickly? Like, they have to go talk to the ADL with the... Seriously, we all know that there is a way, especially if you're a black and you have a history as being a leftist or a liberal,

there's a way in which you can be considered guilty of anti-Semitism until proven guilty, I mean, until proven innocent, right? And then you have all of these people who claim to speak for the Jewish community. Now, you and I, we know that they don't really speak. for the Jewish community. But they are the people who have the fancy titles and then the media treats them. And they say, listen, we want you to support Jews and any good person, why wouldn't you want to support Jews?

People know what's happened to Jews. And the way you can do it is to take these views on Israel. And I think that that happens to a lot of people. And I think I in some ways am more angry at the Jewish, so-called Jewish leaders who play this game of say, this is how, this is what it means to be pro-Jewish, then I am the people who buy into it. I really wish they didn't because it leads them

to say things that I think just don't make any sense I mean are immoral and also just nonsensical like really like it's a Qatari Iranian disinformation campaign

like I spent a lot of time among pro-Palestinian activist types I'm sure you spend just like I don't know I haven't seen the guys with the Qatari guys with the money bags

and the Iranians like it's just ridiculous like they think that Omar Barthov at Brown is like the Hallic World's calling it a genocide because the Qataris got to him. It's like, but I think in a weird way, like, it's our community that has created this dynamic in which there's such a strong incentive system for people like Van Jones to basically

say these things. And I think that in some ways, like, we have to change that structure and that incentive system so people like Van Jones can actually follow what I think are probably their own moral instincts, which would be to say, I believe that people should be treated equally under the law in America, irrespective of religion, race, ethnicity. I believe that in Israel, Palestine, too. I agree with you. I would add an add-on to that, that there's another incentive structure, and this is

something my brother pointed out immediately in the aftermath of Van Jones, I thought, half apology, which is the incentive structure among American liberals to pin everything on foreign interference ever since Russiagate. And before, yeah. And before, you know, but, but hyped. I mean, Aaron has called it a privileged protection racket, and I think that's apt. And you see that here. And when it comes to moral principle, I've seen Van Jones turn from a radical of sorts,

at least at least in his aspect and his aesthetic. I mean, he was a Maoist self-identified in college, I believe. Yeah. And it's not, that's nothing new, the sort of Maoist or Trotskyite to establishment, liberal or reactionary, you know, know, regime change warrior pipeline has been in place since, you know, Christopher Hitchens and long before. Yeah. Since whenever the FBI just started doing it. Yeah. No, no, sorry, go ahead, Daniel. I'm just saying my reading of his moral compass and how far, how recent his departure from that is might be a little less charitable than yours, but I think your point is

yeah and there's also i mean the danger which i think is implicit in what he's saying is you know with with the ticot being taken over right by ellison and whatever ellen said i mean this is also this does become the predicate right for then censorship of all this material right yes um and and that is something which i think is really really worrying yeah i mean it what's i find uh so disgusting about this beyond the like you know uh putting the the using that punchline aside um is that he is so clearly getting his talking points and his his his has bar straight from straight from the source like to me everything he said was the most clear um projection that i i have seen i mean to the point where it's like he is much better describing the israeli digital content strategy

than he is describing anything else. I mean, where I'm seeing like a heavily funded digital propaganda effort to use trauma porn in order to spread fear and bigotry is in the way that October 7th has been utilized by Hasbars of All Stripes to, I don't know, at least put people in our community in a constant state of fight or flight, a constant state of panic. And ways of not seeing, as you name in your book. people are posting dead babies every day

because there are new dead babies every day that's right and because those babies matter yes and because those are real crimes so like I'm also I feel a little bit less charitable because to me it seems like he is so clearly

you know using his platform in order to spread this kind of I don't know propaganda that is just really a confession. And let's remember, he spoke at the March for Israel in D.C. And he had that, he had that, I don't know what it was, Freudian slip of, you know, we need to oppose Muslims or something like that. He stopped himself. And then he, he tried, his moral, his, his, his erstwhile

moral compass tried to assert itself when he said, we need to protect human beings in Gaza. And he got roundly booed. And he seems susceptible to that. I mean, I, yeah, it's also, it is, you know, the I feel like in a way what when you you know when you develop a kind of set of relationships and you know alliances that kind of lead you to basically go out and make these arguments you you put yourself in a position in which you've got a guy like van jones who's a very smart analyst of a lot of things and then I then he says these things and I think this is just this is just like completely unconvincing and it's not and and I mean the line he was saying at the end of which you didn't show the clip is where he's basically arguing

that it's kind of racist and anti-Semitic to focus on Israel because of all the things that are happening in Sudan and Nigeria. You know, I was thinking like, this is so beneath the intelligence of someone like Van Jones, who I've seen like make actually really thoughtful, sophisticated. Like, it's just such a silly argument. Like, first of all, like, I always think when people say this, like, if people are really concerned about things in Nigeria or Sudan and Mozambique, And goodness knows, there are, like, very serious problems.

Ironically, probably the biggest foreign actor who's causing trouble in Sudan is the United Arab Emirates, right? Which is, like, the Arab country that Israel and America like the most. But, like, nobody is stopping anybody from being an activist about what's happening in Sudan or Nigeria or anywhere else. Right. Like, and I find that there's a whole class of people who, as far as I can tell, only mention the words Sudan, right?

Or Nigeria or Syria or Myanmar or anything. When they want to stop the criticism of Israel. Like, if you want to devote your life to those human rights crusades, like, go for it. I'll applaud you. But like, well, at least those Africans died for something noble, which is to shield the Jewish people from criticism for the crimes. Right. Yeah, yeah, but that's, you know, but the idea that somehow that makes it immoral. And it's, again, it's also like as if you can't see that there's also a fundamental difference between a genocide in which, which is being perpetrated by our weapons with our tax dollars and countries that basically.

receive basically don't receive military aid and American diplomatic support and are often under U.S. sanctions. It's like a very obvious point. Like we have the greater moral responsibility for the things that we are doing. And so to hear this argument, you know, again, peddled not by some flunky, but by a guy who actually, who I think is a pretty smart commentator on a lot of subjects was just to be depressing and a sign that this kind of alliance with the pro-Israel like world is not, it's not good for him, you know? No, clearly it isn't. And, and, you know, It always makes you curious as to what anyone would do this for, especially someone like Van Jones, who is, you know,

at this point, I think his brands might be changing a bit. I think it has ever since he started becoming a willing participant in the first Trump administration with Jared Kushner. So, you know, I look at this in a completely cynical light in which I am just, certain that he has certain positions that allow him to continue having the access that he has and having the name that he has. Do we have any archival records

of his more radical days, Matt? Yeah, I mean, he, like, this is only from maybe this 14 years ago, he put out apparently, he put out some sort of spoken word slash hip hop album in which

he, you know, talked about all sorts of, you know, political persuasions which is not so out there Cornell West did the same thing yeah yeah definitely but this is someone found this in one of his songs in which he is he's on some like cable news panel or show it's what it sounds like and they put a beat over it and this is what he released himself talking about Israel and Palestinian people being respected and at this point the end of the occupation the right of return for Palestinian people. These are the critical dividing line, global dividing line questions of human rights.

We have to be here. No American would put up with an Israeli-style occupation of their hometown for 53 days, let alone 54 years. We see violence against four people and poor people of color within the U.S. border, at the U.S. border, and beyond the U.S. border, and you see U.S. tax dollars funding all of it. And so we have this now global struggle against a U.S.-led security apparatus and military agenda that impacts people here and impacts people around the world and I think that we need to see

our problems is linked so like just hearing that you know you know immediately that he has had analysis

he has had time to I mean I mean that's more of a smoking gun than Obama used to sit thoughtfully and listen to Rashid Khalidi and consider what he said and nod. I mean, there's plausible deniability in that. He was a networker and he had an open mind. But that's an open mouth. That's saying some very true things that is tough to to unknow that if you once knew that. You know what I'm saying? Right. Right. And yeah. Go ahead. Yeah. Yeah. I know. I mean,

it's just I, you know, again, I can't, I don't know anything about why Van Jones's views shifted. But it's just, it's funny. I mean, there is a way in which when people are speaking, you know, authentically and in a way that flows naturally from their values, it just sounds different, right, than the way he sounded on Bill Maher. Like, that sounds like the kind of thing that someone like Van Jones would naturally believe, right, given his general orientation about what he believes for the United States. And, and, you know, he was there with Bill Maher, who's, you know, like a notorious anti-Muslim. bigot, right? So someone, someone who basically just practices bigotry all the time. So I think that, you know, it's a kind of authentic for Bill Ma. I think that's kind of what Bill Maher actually believes. I think Bill Ma believes that Muslims and Arabs are basically kind of like

some lesser civilization. But I don't, I don't think that's what Van Jones, that's not what Van Jones once believed. And so I don't know why he's making, why he made common cause with those folks. And it's humiliating to watch him have to sit there and even field the question about, I mean the insane you know just free associative anti-woke madlib that is oh DEI is whatever and then Van Jones like actually I think it's some other

you know numerical boogeyman you've got the wrong boogeyman it's actually a run it's so strange to be like no no no no guys let's pivot to this other thing that is also racist yeah it is

it is very strange watching it and you know for for whatever reasons, this has been the evolution of his opinion, I guess, about it. But I will say the silver lining, as you pointed out earlier, Peter, is that the backlash to this was immediate. You know, to a degree that we wouldn't have seen, I think, even just a few months ago, where people are finally, you know, seeing the Hezbarra for what it is. they're seeing the propaganda as propaganda. And even Senator Chris Van Hollen said this about it. He said, I'm glad Van Jones apologized for a sick joke about dead kids in Gaza,

but the problem goes deeper. He spread Netanyahu propaganda that the mass killings of civilians in Gaza, including 20,000 plus kids, is Iranian fake news. It's not the students and young people who are fooled. It's Van Jones. A, solid A. We'd get an A plus if he changed Netanyahu to the name of the actual country of which Navajo is representative.

Yeah. But I think this is really, I mean, I think that you're totally right to pinpoint this. You know, Van Hollen is a liberal, but he's not a radical. Right. He's not Bernie Sanders. He's a pretty mainstream Denmark. He represents the state of Maryland, right? which is a state with a pretty large and Jewish constituency. And I think that my, I don't know Van Hollen,

but my sense is that Van Hollen actually always, that Van Hollen feels he can lean into these things that he believes because he no longer thinks that the politics and the morality are at cross purposes. He actually thinks that saying these things, which I think he genuinely believes he actually has a fair amount of experience in the Middle East and in Israel, Palestine. that he can do that and it's actually a, it's going to help him politically. And I do think that's a shift.

You can see this with Rokana, too, who is now kind of, again, he's, Noro Kana is not where Zarin Mamdani or even Bernie Sanders is, but he's a politician who I think can see that he can lean into his convictions a little more, and actually it's going to be good politics. And that was not the case two years ago. Yeah, the breathing, the political breathing environment is oxygenated such that they can actually inhale and exhale naturally. in accordance with certain moral impulses,

whereas, you know, it's not nearly as stifling as it was before, which raises the question, why aren't more people stepping up like that? Yeah, but in some of these Senate races, I mean, it's going to be really interesting to see what happens in some of these midterm races. In Michigan, in the Senate race, in Maine, this young guy who just Michelle Goldberg wrote this column

about this guy who's starting to be a Christian pastor, this Democrat who's running in Texas. A lot of these people are saying, you know, that they want the weapons to stop. stop and they won't take money from APAC. And it's, I don't know, we'll see whether those, it's going to be really interesting to see how they do against some of these APAC candidates. But I would be fairly optimistic about their chances.

Yeah. If there's any cause for optimism, to me, it's the fact that at the very least, you can say that politicians are able to gauge wind patterns for the first time in two years. Right. Because I feel like, you know, earlier when, you know, Biden was running for re-election and then Kamala Harris, it was very striking the ability to ignore an entire wind pattern. The way they couldn't, like usually politicians will give you a little bit of populist. I see the wind is blowing this way. So I'm going to give you, you know, something to hold on to, even if I'm lying. And the fact that it's taken two years for it, the very least. to see that from American politicians is I mean it's both depressing and it makes me at least a little bit more hopeful about it but yes we need to continue but first we have to take a quick break so everyone please listen to these ads stick around we'll be right back with Peter Bionart. How are you doing, Peter?

Good, good. Good, good, good. So we want to talk about your book, which I've got right here, entitled Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza, A Reckoning. And I'm just about complete in reading it. I'm really been enjoying it. But I have to say, and I hope, you know, you'll, I think you'll be okay with brooking a little bit of, I don't know if it's a critique, but it's sort of a question. I had to get past the title in order to be fully. open to absorbing how good the book is, which is to say, you know, on this podcast and elsewhere,

I've become much more sensitized than I ever have been to people's understandable fatigue and just downright exasperation and over-itness about Jewish self-absorption and the focus on Jewish feelings and Jewish existential wrangling and, you know, that's the old joke, you know, the elephant and the Jewish question. Everything points back to what is, you know, but is it good for the Jews? Right, right. And that's frankly what I, what the title made me sort of brace for. And it's not what I found at all. I mean, it takes you quite a while to even get to a kind of plumbing of Jewish liturgy to try to offer people a new way of thinking about this. But what the book starts off as is in some ways a primer for what we try to do on this

podcast, which is just knocking down, you know, Hasbara bowling pins one by one very ably with that mournful quality that I, that I appreciated Taanasi Coates for earlier, but no lack of firmness, no equivocation, and very logically, very precise, you know. And essentially, it's sort of a guide for the perplexed and persuadable. It's probably, I mean, it's fortifying for people who listen to this podcast and already know this stuff because it's just full of facts. But I think it's also written in a way that people, and I am getting to a question, that people who may not be so comfortable listening to this podcast could absorb

because of the overture you're making. And then in the final chapter, Korach's children, and by the way, Korak was my brother's bar mitzvah, I remember from a long time ago. You know, you use this biblical story. It's very interesting about this question of what does chosenness actually mean? And how does the Bible, how do the rabbis look upon Jews who try to use the notion of chosenness to mean supremacy? And then you're starting to do the reckoning with what kind of Jews do we want to be? What kind of Judaism is worth preserving, right? and that is an important question, but, you know, the title itself made me think that that's

where we were going immediately and we were going to stay there and all that. What do you say to that? I think you're not the first person who said that, and I worried about that or I thought about that when I was writing the book. I, you know, I probably had half dozen or you're so Palestinian friends who I wanted to read the book for a whole bunch of reasons, but partly about this question. I mean, I think you're right that the question about Jewish sensibilities are elevated so radically over the sensibilities and concerns of Palestinians and, you know, the United States, I think that, I mean, the way I suppose I would justify this title and the book more generally is I think about what kind of contribution I can make to a struggle for Palestinian

liberation, which I also do believe is bound up in a kind of Jewish liberation, as I argue in the book because I think supremacy does, as, you know, many black American writers and others have noted, supremacy may not take a toll on the body of the people who are complicit in it, but does take a toll on the soul of them. And I think we see that. Except maybe they're cardiac arteries. Yes. Yes. And I ultimately think also it's bad for your safety to basically just be inflicting massive amounts of brutal violence on people all the time. And I felt like this is the book that I felt like I could write because I feel like I have an intimate relationship with this discourse that is being used to convince people to basically be supportive of these

profoundly immoral things. And I wanted to write to those people, partly because they're the people in many of the people, they're in my own life, all over the place in my own life. So I really grapple with that on a personal level. But I also just felt like that was the contribution I could make. And to me, there's like an irony, which is that, like, we need to create a space where anybody, first of all, first and for, of course, Palestinians, but just anybody, regardless of their background, can enter into this conversation, speak, not have to pull punches, and not have to worry about being smeared and having their career ruined and having their reputation ruined. But, you know, to get to that point, the Jewish community has to

change, right? Because it's the organized Jewish community that is actually the roadblock to that. And it's the roadblock to the shift in U.S. policy that could have an effect on the ground. So I felt like I had to write to the Jewish community in order to change it to create a more open playing field for everybody. I think that's fair. And I might still quibble with the exact word choice. The other word in the title that made me a little scrimmage was after because it's during where the destruction of Gaza is ongoing. It's not complete. It's not a fait accompli.

And to treat it as if it is, is almost to say, or it risks being almost. to say we need to wait for this cycle of completed destruction and annihilation to to and once this holocaust is over which could take decades then we will wrangle with the the who are we after this but that's look titles are titles headlines or headlines it's I'm not trying to take you to task for it sure no no it's finally fine what I found in the book was a very able like I said just dispensing with so many things that that need dispense with yeah thanks yeah I I you know I I find what your you know answer was to Daniel's critique to ring true with me you know in terms of the we have sort of

the same you know issue that way we deal with which is like talking about this issue without centering ourselves constantly but also while simultaneously realizing that who we are trying to speak to is our our own community uh who we're trying to speak to is uh american jews who uh are not hearing it they're they're not able to hear it from any uh anyone else um and you know it's it you know leaves you in an awkward position where you have to uh sort of uh present yourself uh as someone who can you know speak uh who you know the community is comfortable with and you know for you i I find it, you know, interesting because you've had such a public grappling with Israel and with Zionism and what that must be like for you, just because, you know, I'm, I have the privilege to have not put to writing any of my previous positions back when I was a Zionist.

You know, it's like in the same way that I, I feel bad for this generation of kids growing up with TikTok and Twitter, it's like, I feel bad for Bynard because, you know, I, open source disillusionment. Yeah, I mean, just you've had a very public evolution when it comes to Israel and Palestine and politics in general. Yeah. How do you, you know, how do you approach to this? Does it inform the way you approach talking about? this do you speak about it differently knowing you have a for lack of a better term such a history of being so publicly wrong like yeah yeah as i was saying i mean i i do feel like it it i need to remind i it should it should engender in me humility yeah um and i hope it does at least sometimes i mean i sense humility just to be clear i'm not i'm saying that you yeah you what you

do seem to come at it with care, which I appreciate a lot. Humbolded but not chastened and, yeah. I mean, I had this situation almost roughly 20 years ago now where I had at a young age, you know, become editor of the New Republic. And I, you know, I thought I knew a lot. I think in retrospect I had a very I was not I think a deep reader of American history and the history of American foreign policy and I think I was very much influenced by the triumphalism of the era in which I grew up given my positionality in the 1990s and then it all came completely came apart after I and the magazine had supported the Iraq war as it happened my my mentor at the New Republic public, Michael Kelly was killed in the war. My sister-in-law, who was a doctor in the army, was sent to, was deployed to both Afghanistan and Iraq. And it wasn't long before there were,

you know, you saw homeless veterans of those wars on the streets of New York. And I was thinking, like, I have just fucked up so massively. And I also just wasn't really sure how I was going to continue writing, because I felt like I had a, I had like a framework. And the framework was so evidently had led me in such a bad direction. And I, I, I think the thing that helped me a little bit was I wrote a book, which nobody read, but it was my second book called the Icarus syndrome. And what it was was actually, I was kind of tracing the, partly the careers of a series of different intellectuals over the 20th century who had been profoundly wrong about war in particular. Some, and had kind of like had to shift their view of the world. I was really interested in people like Reinhold Niebuhr and Walter Littman

and how they had kind of had to buy you know had to learn from their initial very youthful enthusiasm for World War I and it kind of made it it was it was helpful for me to realize that like if that people can rethink things you know and and that in some ways like what's the alternative I mean I could go I'm not good at anything else like I could have gone to law school like my mother always wanted me to and just given up writing it all, but I would have been an even worse lawyer than I was a writer.

And I just, I knew I, and if I found some, if I could learn from some of the people who I think were reading the history of America and American foreign policy more deeply than I was, then it could inform my views. And I think on the question of Israel, those were, you know, not surprisingly, mostly Palestinian writers, you know.

And in other cases, there were other, you know, there were other people who had thought about Vietnam in a deeper way than I had thought about in other places. And I felt like that, that, and again, it's also the grace that a lot of people gave me to basically be willing to say, okay, we'll be willing to continue to read Bynard, you know, even though he, even though he in the magazine that he led, like, did some real harm, you know? So I, so I feel like that's, that's, that was the way I think about it. Yeah, I mean, you know, I think it is to your credit. and not, you know, detriment that you are so,

I'd have been so publicly willing to grapple with your, with your own past positions. And I, yeah, I mean, I can only put myself in your position and think about like, you know, I am lucky to have not written anything about my previous Zionism, especially when I was in my liberal Zionist phase. because I now so heavily to satire liberal Zionists. I want to just ask you about your, you know, experiences with that evolution,

specifically when it comes to Israel. We've reached a point now where I've been shocked to see how few people have had a similar evolution to you where we've reached a point where people are literally it's the UN it's Amnesty International it's yeah they've had a devolution if anything like no one's been able to stay very few people have been able to stay on the ninth edge

of so-called liberal Zionism right right but they've many have fallen off to the other side right they have just dropped the liberal and just become you know a full on lacutniks and and so you know at this point it's undeniable you know the genocide um for you uh what number one could you even imagine this is a possibility in terms of like Israel committing this genocide or the younger version of yourself could you have could you have even fathomed it or did it was your belief in the moral righteousness of Israel just so strong then that you couldn't even imagine

and part two to that question would be what was the final straw for you that were you realized I can't hold, I can no longer hold on to these two switches. I got to let go of one. Yeah. I mean, that's a good question. No, I don't think if I think back, you know, 10 years ago, certainly 20 years ago, that I would have been able to imagine this. But I think that's, you know, that's very much connected the fact that I don't think I had spent a lot of time thinking about what happened in 1948. I mean, I don't think I would have said, oh, they all just ran away. I don't think I was that kind of crude. But it just wasn't. wasn't something that I was focused on, you know, I kind of was, you know, I was, as liberal Zionists

tend to do in a way, was kind of had this idea that, that Israel could have been on an okay path if it hadn't, you know, if it hadn't gone, taken the wrong turn in 1967. And, and I think that once, as I became, as I, as I over, you know, too late, but began to grapple more with 1948 and the kind of the fact that there could have been no Jewish state without 1948 they were just simply way too many Palestinians there and they were living on most of the land there was no Jewish state to be created without mass expulsion and that and without mass seizure of property that um that I think that you know then when you actually again this is to go back to Coates like this is one of the things that I think makes Coates is writing off and so powerful not his

not only his writing off a lot of black writers but he does it exceptionally well is that like Because you see American history clearly without kind of this, you know, without the mythology, then you see that there are things, there are loaded guns sitting there right in front of us for an ambitious politician or for a particular circumstance, right? That Israel has kind of always wanted to have as much land as possible with as few Palestinians on it as possible, right? And this has created an opportunity to try to move in that direction. It's not going to happen. doesn't happen overnight, didn't happen overnight in the 19th century United States. It took multiple generations, right, to basically largely destroy the native population.

And so, no, I don't think I had that capacity because I don't think, you know, I just think that there are things that, look, there's so many realms in my life, if I'm honest, where there's still things, not necessarily as much about Israel Palestine, but about other things in the world that I just don't want to look square in the eye, you know, because they would be too deeply unsettling and they would impair. my ability to just go about my daily life and the way I don't think any of us, very, very few of us can say that we're different. Like that's a facet of living as we do, where we do, when we do. It's just one of the coping stuff. Yeah, I mean, you just walk down the street. I mean, you walk down the street in New York, you see things every day that like I should stop in my tracks and say like, what the fuck? What am I going to do about this? Right. And I don't. Right. At best, I give someone a dollar or two, right? I say, I hope you're doing better or something like that.

And so I think that, you know, and again, you know this. For Jews, like, I think a lot of that is how the thing about Israel works. This is like, it's like a, it's like this fragile thing that is like for, is very intimate for people. A lot rests on it. I don't think people have been, I don't think people have, I think it's different maybe for more younger people. I do think it is easier for younger people to imagine living a Jewish life separate from this. It's easier to imagine them, you know, having friends, having community, having an identity.

They can see people like you. They see Hannah Einberg. It's all kinds of people. But people my age and older is much more difficult. And you've also spent many more decades invested in this. I'm not so far. Yeah, yeah. You and I are probably close to the same age.

I've been amazed at what I see in the millennial generation of young Jews. There's a real revival of Jewish practice and a kind of customized. of Jewish practice. I was at a at a Tubeshvat Seder in Albuquerque, New Mexico. I didn't even know there was a Seder for Tupacvah. Let alone in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

I don't know there's trees there. I was a short walk from Chuck McGill's house in Better Call Saul, you know? I was like right in Breaking Badland. And there's this deeply spiritual um, psychedelically informed,

but very grounded in social. social justice. There's a whole rabbinical school out there run by a rabbi, I forget Rabbi Lynn something. A beautiful community of really beautiful young people that the urban cynic in me would want to write off as burning man hippies, but they're not. They're deep thinkers. They're connecting to liturgy. They're connecting to ritual and community. And they're orienting themselves. They're they're girding their spiritual loins. They're availing themselves of the actual Jewishness of the Jewish tradition, as opposed to what Matt and I do, which is, you know, we drink the borset right out of the belt, and that's our fortification. But, you know, and it's amazing. And I'm

seeing that all over the place here in Brooklyn, in the Bay Area, all over the place. There seems to be a hunger that they're actually turning to our traditions to say it. I think you're so right. And this is what, like, again, the American Jewish establishment, like, so fundamentally doesn't understand that, you know, what's distinctive, I think, about this generation of young American Jews is how interested they are in Judaism, right? I think much more interested than the generations of the 1930s and the 1960s, who were obviously in some ways deeply Jewish, but we're not doing two Bishvat Saders in Mississippi. They weren't, the Jews in the ANC weren't doing this in South Africa. There's a way, and, you know, maybe, I don't know, maybe it's because we're in a somewhat

post-communist age, so the idea of religion as an opiate is not as, or maybe people are further away from, I don't know what exactly it is sociologically that has led to this thing, but I actually think, you know, it is going to come out of this like horror, this evil, is going to come a kind of spiritual renewal and, you know, and something that's, that's alive in American Jewish life and religious practice with like commitment and study and dedication. It's very, very exciting for me as a middle-aged person to think that my children and grandchildren may have this available to them. Well, that's an expression of the title of your book that really actually lights me up. You know, because, again, what's worth preserving about being Jewish if we equate being Jewish with,

and we talk, you know, we whine and complain all the time about how anti-Semites conflate Jews in Israel? No, they don't. They're just following our lead. And if we want to sell ourselves down the river, forgive the, you know, the historically derived idiom. But, you know, if we want to sell our, if we want to sell the best of our tradition for the cheap thrill of idolatry and supremacy and all the things the prophets warn us not to do, you know, at a certain point, there's nothing worth preserving. So the fact that people are able to till that earth and find something that might be a healthy human contribution and an or an orla goeme like in earnest is uh is wonderful yeah yeah no

i think it you know it's it's it's not just that these institutions are morally corrupt you know and that they're complicit in genocide they also is you know they also don't actually provide young american jews with access to this tradition yes in a way that's really alive and it can help them grapple with the struggles that they face in their lives, right? Like, because what they do is they put, the rabbi basically at your average, you know, conservative, you know, reform, you know, suburban synagogue basically thinks the people who come in here have so little interest in, in anything in the prayer book or in the, in the, you know, in the humash, in the, in the, in the Torah, that I better talk to them about

what was in the New York Times about Israel, because at least that's a subject that they have some interest in, right? As opposed to, you know, and I think that, you know, there was someone from Jewish current said to me the other day that it's now gotten to the point in Brooklyn where she says, you know, people refer to the anti-Zionist minion they don't go to, you know, right? Like, I mean, that's really, that's really new. And those places are forced to actually have to try to answer the question, what in Judaism is compelling, right? Has something to say to people. And I think that's amazing. I hope to someday be at the point where more to that point, people, you know, the old joke about the um two synagogues uh one that you uh will never set foot in i hope one day we have that kind of option with anti-zionist synagogues right like that would wouldn't that be a beautiful thing i want to read something this was the opening text of the uh the colnidre service that i went to uh i didn't fast and i didn't attend synagogue on yom kippur itself uh i was i was traveling

but I did go to the egalitarian Sephardi Mizrahi Kahila in Brooklyn. And the title at the very top here says, Unforgivable. And that made me so happy. That's the word I wanted to hear. Right, right. You know, I wanted Jews all over the country to interrupt the silent Amidah and say, what do we think we're going to be forgiven for here?

Anyway, we will gather leaning on each other in our tradition to practice of Judaism that we so desperately need now, a Judaism that does not shy away from facing and reckoning with the annihilation of the Palestinian people in the name of the so-called Jewish safety, a Judaism that resists the hijacking of the very words of our prayers

to murder, maim, starved, displace, massacre, and wipe out an entire people. How do we enter meaningfully this year into the spirit of compassion, love, and the possibility of Techuvah, which is the concept of return and reconciliation and atonement? What is the meaning of Tchewa?

in our times? What is the meaning of prayer in our times? This year we will make space for rage, helplessness, and humility while finding sustenance, resilience, and hope. We will enter in an authentic way into the profound process of our holidays with love, gentleness, and beauty. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, in this idea of unforgivable, you know, I mean, the Talmud says that for the, for al-Hu Hashem, the desquation of God's name, Yon Kippur does not atone, you know? And so, I think there's something very true about that, about that line, unforgivable. Well, I, I want to ask, you know, sort of on this subject, and I know we have to go soon, but, you know, this idea of kind of the, I don't know, creation from the bottom up of these, you know, sort of new young Jewish communities that don't center Zionism, that don't, that are, you know, explicitly anti or non.

Yes. Sometimes, you know, I always wonder strategically what is the path, at least for, you know, Jews of conscience who want to, you know, talk about this stuff and try to actually affect change is, you know, do you believe that these institutions that at this point been completely co-opted by the interests of the state of Israel? Do you believe that they can change? do you believe that it is worth it to try to, I don't know, to try to, you know, take them back, or is it more, you know, this is, we just have to abandon them and start our own institutions? I mean, I guess it would depend on exactly which institution, but I would say I'm definitely more pessimistic about the fact of those institutions changing than I, perhaps I was in the past. I actually think that the future of the American Jewish establishment is, as I think Daniel, you were saying, is not liberal Zionist, but is really a Zionism that doesn't really traffic in liberal discourse at all. I think that's where the demographic movement is, given that Orthodox Jews are playing a larger and larger role in these institutions, and Orthodox Jews are basically largely, you know, in the Republican Party at this point. And I think that, you know, also there's also more and more pressures in this authoritarian regime. I mean,

It's crazy, but you see the Anti-Defamation League, basically, having to now stop calling out white nationalists at all, right? Because they're afraid of Elon Musk and Donald Trump and these people. That's where the power is. That's where the money is. And so I think those institutions are probably are going to move away from any kind of, you know, liberal patina probably. And I think in some ways that's going to be clarifying, right?

That the center that liberal Zionists have fried to hold is, is going to increasingly evaporate, I think. And I think the choices will be clearer for people. Yeah. Well, there's more than a silver lining in that. You know, this book opens with an act of an open-armed outreach to somebody. It's almost written as an offering to someone whose views you find abhorrent. And with whom your relationship is perhaps irreparably strained by the disparity between the ways you're responsible.

respectively looking at the situation. And I watched the video of your appearance at my friend's university, which he moderated, the Q&A. And all I see is you being generous and gracious and not skimping on the forceful speaking of truth and the prophetic, even the fury that comes out of you sometimes or the intensity,

but the spirit of keeping an open door. how's that going for you is what I'm wondering have have even a small trickle of people in your life or you know what's your experience of the the utility of that in doing what you're setting out to do you know it's hard for me to tell to be honest I think that you know when I think about myself I don't think my my shift didn't happen overnight because of any one doc source it happened over a long period of time of a kind of peeling away of an onion I do think I see people who, even over the last two years, have shifted what they say a bit and their orientation a bit. And I also do notice, and we've kind of alluded to this earlier, that this happens much, much faster with younger people for various reasons.

Like, one of the most striking things that has happened to me over the last two years was I got a call one day from a student who was in the Columbia JTS, Jewish Theological Seminary Joint Program. So studying to be a rabbi. And this person said, I have a problem and I'd like your advice. And I said, okay. And he said, well, here's my story. Basically, my grandfather was one of the founders of APEC. I went to Yeshiva my entire life. And then I, in America, and I went to spend two years in yeshiva in Israel.

And I said, okay, but what are you calling me? And he said, well, I just put a Palestinian flag outside of my dorm room at the Jewish theological seminary and they're going to kick me out. Where should I do? You know, and I thought like, that's where you just see the much, much more dramatic, rapid transformation. You know, people who have been in, you know, and that's amazing. You know, there's so many of these, a lot of these kids on these encampments were in a completely different place than they were in high school, you know? And so I think it's there. Again, I can't take credit for that. I think there are many more powerful forces, but that's like the too now, that they're much more dramatic shift that I see happening among younger people. I think older people, it's happening more slowly. But that's what gives me a sense of like, of, you know, of hope for all this. I mean, I would like to believe that. if if our role in history like it like tragically horribly is that like we are a group of people who state the state institutions that speak for us are complicit in genocide at least that when the history books are written there will be reference to the fact that there was like powerful jewish opposition you know um and that that will be like the way in which that's what people will be able to look back on with pride you know that we're

we will, that that existed. Well, it's a tug of war, isn't it? And we're all to the best of our ability or, you know, trying to pitch in, at least, tug, you know, tug the ribbon towards the side of justice and liberation. And we're making whatever contribution we can. And, yeah, I don't mean to say it's all resting on you.

Like, when are you going to succeed in turning the Jewish community around? But the contribution you're making is loud, it's consistent, it's diligent, it's impassioned, and I think it's infused with a spirit that is really needed. So I want to say, callakavod, as we say. Yeah, for sure. And just to complete that thought and tie it sort of back, it also is, whatever, however you say it, it shows integrity, which is something that I think, I look at your trajectory, your political trajectory. And I can't help but, you know, put it next to Van Jones's

right now because of the fact that we just talked about him. And I think you see two sort of clear paths and and i think it is commendable when someone um evolves to the to the to the correct moral position which way american liberal right i yeah i mean honestly though it is you know when i see someone like van jones i see sort of the opposite trajectory and not just politically but almost like you know in terms of clout you know for lack of a better word like you are someone who uh if you were to read your Wikipedia page you see you know new republic all the way down to Jewish currents you you're seeing someone who's prioritizing a different thing and I what I see is you prioritizing not access necessarily to you know the inner workings of

power and you know trying to be a voice to you know in the room I see someone who is developed more and more politically principled and I see Van Jones and I like see sort of I think a more common trajectory which is like I have to say this in order to get this so I'm going to say this you know and yeah for that I just want to commend you because that's it's rare it is shockingly or unshockingly rare well I mean I appreciate I appreciate I would just say that you know as you know, there are a lot of people who never had to go through the set of positions that I had to get to these positions in the first place, right? I mean, you know, and I, and I'm grateful to a lot of those people, you know, to who were people that I learned a lot from, and many of whom are still

relegated to the margins and have gotten no benefit for having been consistently right, right? It's not like people are celebrating them and giving them fancy jobs with fancy titles, right? And so that's like, you know, those people in some ways, the people who really deserve the greatest hour. Absolutely. But, you know, in fairness, your penance was marginalizing yourself. And for that, we can know. And I've ended up on this podcast, right? This is where I leave.

Welcome to the margins, baby. Welcome. Welcome to the periphery. We out here, no one noticing. Welcome to anonymity. Peter Beinart, thank you seriously for coming on the show. Thank you. Really appreciate it.

glad we could make it work um plugs uh where can people find your work and uh what should they support oh thank you well there's the book being jewish after destruction the gods of this jewish currents where edward edward edward at large has a lot of incredibly talented people most of whom didn't uh weren't wrong about the things that i was wrong about what is an editor at large uh i kibbits i write um i fair you know fair amount of kibitzing um you're around i schmooze like kinnutel yeah yeah exactly so you know It's a good thing to do if you're at a Jewish publication. And I have a newsletter, The Bynart Notebook.

I also teach at the Newmark School of Journalism at CUNY, which is a great institution, really, public university, really, really talented faculty and wonderful students. And I'm a fellow at the Foundation for Middle East Peace. And I should say, the Bynart Notebook has, I mean, I'm proud of our roster of guests, but yours, I would put head to head with ours in terms of the people that you've had on, including some people I would rather never hear from, but the fact that a Shabbas Kesterbaum and a Norman Finkelstein and doctors in Gaza

and all these voices are welcome to sit opposite you and get a hearing and you don't make any secret about where your sympathy is live, but you're providing some sunlight that can be the disinfectant that is needed. Thank you. I appreciate it. Everyone should check that up.

So you'll be able to find all of the links in the episode description. And Peter, thank you so much. Please come back. Absolutely. I'd love to. Thank you guys so much. Great. And thank you to everyone out there for watching slash listening.

Patreon.com slash bad as barra. Badisbar at gmail.com for all your questions, comments and concerns. All right. Thanks so much for listening. And until next time, from the river to the sea. Van Jones's new shit, not my cup of tea. Mmm, very nice. Jumping jacks was us.

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Breathing air, us, drinking water, us. We invented all that shit.