Bad Hasbara - The World's Most Moral Podcast - 230: The Yid Stays In The Picture, with Arielle Angel

Episode Date: August 25, 2026

Matt and Daniel are joined by Arielle Angel, Editor-at-large of Jewish Currents to cover zionist theatrics taking place in actual theaters, the proper pronunciation of “oligarch,” and an assault on Mark Ruffalo, the likes of which we haven’t seen since he was set upon by the Asgardian wolf god Fenris, having freed the champions of the trash planet Sakaar from their servitude to the immortal Grandmaster.Visit https://halapalestine.com/ and use code BADHASBARA for 10% off. It helps the show! Products made in Palestine and delivered to your door.Visit https://www.middleeastbooks.com/ and use code HASBARA for 20% off. It helps the show! If you’re in DC, visit them in Adams Morgan.Please donate to International Rescue Committee: https://help.rescue.org/donateJoin the Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/badhasbaraSubscribe to the Substack at https://badhasbara.substack.com/Get a Youtube Membership at https://www.youtube.com/@Badhasbara/membershipJewish Currents: https://jewishcurrents.org/On The Nose Podcast: https://jewishcurrents.org/podcastTICKETS: Francesca Fiorentini and Matt Lieb September 4 in Seattle, WA: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/comedy-show-francesca-fiorentini-and-matt-lieb-laughs-comedy-club-tickets-1989424855296TICKETS: The Bitchuation Room with Francesca Fiorentini and guest Matt Lieb September 7 in Portland, OR: https://portland.heliumcomedy.com/shows/373712TICKETS: Matt Lieb and Francesca Fiorentini October 15 in Brooklyn, NY: https://bit.ly/octoberbellhouseBad Hasbara Merch: https://estoymerchandise.com/collections/bad-hasbara-podcastWhat’s The Spin on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/50JoIqCvlxL3QSNj2BsdURWhat’s The Spin on Tidal: https://tidal.com/playlist/3cec7963-1fc5-42bc-ab7d-64fb420eb50eWhat’s The Spin Album List: https://bit.ly/whatsthespinlistSkad Skasbarska playlist: http://bit.ly/skadskasbarskaSubscribe/listen to Bad Hasbara wherever you get your podcasts.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/bad-hasbara/donationsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Hello everybody and welcome to Bad Hasbara. It's the world's most moral podcast for those buttocks. That's right. My name is Matt Lieb, if you're nasty, and I will be your most moral co-host. I'm Daniel Matte, and what have you done for me lately? You've done a lot for me lately, all of you, by listening, by tuning, and I'm your most moral co-host. Welcome, everybody. Yes, you have done a lot for a lot for.

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It's very relatable. Yeah. And they also, they just have such a nice bond, the human and the rat puppet. Yeah, it does seem like they're actually friends in real life. Yeah. But yeah, anyways, join us by subscribing on wherever you get your podcast and or video podcasts. You can also join for a bonus episode by. going to patreon.com

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And yeah, do that now and subscribe. You can also subscribe on Subsec. You can also be a member on YouTube. Do all those things. Just so you know, excuse me. Friday, September 4th, we have, I'm going to be in Seattle, Seattle with my wife, Francesca Furentini. We are going to be there Friday night and Saturday night, September 4th and 5th for some stand-up shows over at Laf's Comedy Club in Seattle. The link is in the description. Please

get your tickets now. It's going to be really fun. You really don't want to miss it. It's going to be incredible. Those are three shows altogether Friday, and then we're doing an early and late show on Saturday. Get your tickets. Come to all of them. I don't care. Portland, Oregon, September 7th and 8th at Helium Comedy Club. Please get your tickets. Pacific Northwest, we come in to you. Today's episode is brought to you by International Rescue Committee. The situation in Gaza is still dire and hunger remains at catastrophic levels. And children are experiencing prolonged malnutrition, which can, of course, have lifelong consequences. You can help.

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That's help. That's help.rescue.org. Uh, help. r-E-s-c-U-E-D-O-R-G. The link is in the description. Matchmaker, matchmaker. That's right. Make me, make me a gift match. Uh, no, but really, they need your money more than we do as much as we would love for you to

hire Shabas Goy to listen to the podcast for you. We do need to say that you, you know, money better spent elsewhere. So do that, help.rescue.org. Daniel, what's the spin? The theme of today, kind of think of it, should have been entirely theater-oriented, given some of the stuff we're going to talk about. But it wasn't. I planned it in advance.

It's, hey, I recognize that guy from television. Now, there's not going to be any Stephen Van Zandt because I've got enough Bruce Springsteen on the fucking playlist. And quite frankly, Bruce Springsteen kind of boars the shit out of me. But I could have done darkness on the edge. town, which Little Stevie was on. You know what's crazy? What's that?

He's not even Jewish. Oh, I know. Springsteen. Come on. It's too easy. But it does look at the kind of spelling that got anglicized or something. It's like Whoopi Goldberg. Like, I know what you're doing.

Right. Or Norm Jewison. Yeah, that's the one that fucks me up. That's the crazy one. What do you mean? He's Canadian, but he's not Jewish. He's Christian son. Yeah.

This whole time. Jesus son. I featured this one before. It's not on Spotify, but I thought I would just show it again. Here's Jerry Orbach from, I guess, Law and Order, in Mark Blitzstein's The Cradle Will Rock. That's right. A great, you know, populist, leftist musical that was dramatized in the Tim Robbins film.

That's right. He's a musical theater actor. He also played the French candlestick Lumiere in Beauty and the Beast. That's right. And he also posthumously, I saw him on subway ads being like, Jerry Orbach donated his eyes to science. You should do the same. Like organ donor shit.

Lenny Briscoe, the only good cop. Yeah, that's true. ACAP does not include Lenny Briscoe. Oh, I thought you meant Donnie Brasco. I'm like, he wasn't really a cop, but don't tell anyone. That's right. He's a secret cop. Your boy, Steve Earl.

Copperhead Road. That's right. Whenever I think of Steve Earl, I just imagine him looking at me kind of like, disappointedly in the back of an AA meeting being like, that ain't the share, bobs. That ain't the share. You're holding it deep down inside. You got to let it out or whatever he said.

You would say things were more profound than that, I think. That's right. This guy also from, I think, some law and order thing, ice tea. Oh, iced tea. Okay. All right. His great album power, which contains I'm Your Pusher. I'm Your Pusher.

Boom, boom, boom, boom. that one? No. Oh, that's I'm your puppet. I'm your mom, I'm your daddy, I'm your inward in the alley. Wait, that's, no. That's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a simple. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's an interpolation, as they say. Okay, interpulation. But it also has the song, Girls, let's get butt naked and fuck tonight, which is a very sex positive anthem. I, I assume so. Yeah. We were, we were kind of channeling, uh, Jackson in the intro, kind of accidentally. that was an accident.

Do you remember that maybe you don't remember this because you're younger than me, but she was a guest on different strokes for a while. She played Arnold's girlfriend. I did know that. Or maybe Willis' girlfriend. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So here's her eponymous album, Janet,

with, that's the way love goes. She's very sexy. She's, and fucking smart and brilliant. Yeah. My favorite Jackson, I would say. You know who this is, Matt? Get it closer to me. Oh, the grassroots, I know exactly.

who this is. That's Creed Bratton, baby. Creed Bratton from the character, Creed Bratton, from the office, the American office. He played Creed Bratton in that show, which is really funny. Because, in fact, I think at one point they point out that he, like, they did an aside where he was like, I was in a band in the 60s called the Grassroots. Well, someone recognized him and he pulls him aside into the coffee break room. He's like, don't tell anybody. Yeah, yeah, this is great.

That was awesome. It's like Bill Murray and coffee and cigarettes when we're. is it and just notice them you know he's probably the was anyway uh the waiter uh you know who this is matt um get it closer um who am i looking at i don't know who i'm looking at i don't know who i'm looking at that's robert morris that's right from the original broadway cast album of how to succeed in business without really trying i love this yeah this is a great show and i love this version of the spin yeah i thought you were i know you're a tv guy i'm a big guy you listen I know it's shocking, but I love TV.

Love to watch it, talk about it. You should listen to this. I mean, he was a, you know, and they did his send-off on the show as a big musical theater number. That's right. Not coincidentally, because he was a Broadway star. I love that. And finally, hey, I know that guy from television.

It's Tom Verlaine, the founding guitarist and singer of the band television, and this is his solo album around RIP Tom. This is a beautiful instrumental guitar atmospheric album. It's one of the most beautiful recent purchases I've made. So I love it. I highly recommend Tom Verlaine. Okay. That's the spin, baby.

So that is what is spinning in the Matte household. You can listen to all the albums by going to our Spotify playlist of the What's the Spin playlist. It is, it's great and it's very long. So check that out. Yeah, it's currently at about, to 646 hours and it hasn't been updated in several weeks. Fair enough.

Fair enough. Okay, it is time to introduce our guest. I'm very excited to have this guest on the podcast. You may know this person as the editor at large at Jewish Currents magazine, Jewish Currents, a magazine that we have yet to cover on this podcast because they haven't done any of the articles that we make fun of. They actually write good articles and you are going to love our guests. Ladies and gentlemen and everyone else, welcome to the podcast, Ariel Angel. Hey. Hi, guys. How are you doing? So glad to know that you also think Springsteen is overrated.

I feel alone in that club. Yes, same zies. Is this everyone on this podcast right now? That is a shocking... It really is. I don't know what it is about... I mean, listen, there's a few Spring Sing songs that I'll listen to that I'm on fire. Great song, but the point of sisters did it better.

Dancing in the dark, that's a good one. I like that one. Yeah, I just don't get it. That was fire, not I'm on fire. He's got both fire and I'm on fire. The thing with me with Springsteen, look, jingle bells should be like sleigh bells

should be for Christmas songs. There's way too many sleigh bells. There's a lot of sleigh bells. That's true. It's the Phil Spector influence. It's the wall of sound thing. Yeah. He just loves it. And look, Clarence Clemens, the big guy, he's a great saxophone player, but I don't need that many saxophone.

And all of the songs are at this fever. Like they all feel like 11 o'clock numbers from musicals with indecipherable plots. Like the emotional pitch of it. It's true. It all goes to this. It all goes to 11 dramatically. It's too much narrative. It's too much narrative, but it's been distinct. It's like, and it's just something, there's something like New Jersey. I don't like, I don't dislike New Jersey as a state. Oh, I love New Jersey, actually. So it's really, I'm really like splitting hairs here. Like I love New Jersey.

You're allowed to love New Jersey. I just don't. I'm, I just don't get Springsteen. Springsteen is just another vibe. It's not my vibe. It's not. Anyone on this podcast vibe. He's a little... It's very bridge and tunnel, isn't it? And I'll be real with you. The song, the opening song for the movie Philadelphia that he does is, to me, is so bad I can't hear it without laughing. Which is strange because I, I, there's just something about, there's something about the way he does.

He sings the song and James L. Washington, Jameson, Tom Hay. Gonna see who's got AIDS right now. There's like a, there's just like. The diagnosed with immunodeficiency. Yeah, yeah. It's just something. Something about them is, I get white people like them. I just, it's not for me.

And you know what? We're going to get letters. People are going to be mad. It's okay. We also like other things from New Jersey. Bon Jovi. I don't love no. The misfits.

The misfits. The Misfits. The Roshes. I love the Misfits. The Roshes are my favorite. It's my favorite New Jersey export. The Sopranos, all of these things are good Jersey things. But let's talk about non-Jurzy stuff.

First, Ariel, can you tell us a little bit about Jewish Currents magazine? We cover a lot of different Jewish media on this podcast because at least, you know, since the inception of this podcast, we have a lot of Hezbara that comes out of sort of more like the institutional Jewish media spaces. Jewish currents is the one, you know, kind of rare exception. Can you tell us a little bit about Jewish currents? Yeah. For those, I guess, that don't know anything about Jewish currents, Jewish currents was founded in 1946. It's actually like sort of a legacy publication in its own weird way.

It was the magazine for Jews in the Communist Party that was in English. So, you know, they had Yiddish publications, but this was the first English one. It split with the party like way. too late, you know, in 1956. And, you know, after Khrushchev kind of revealed all of the crimes of the Soviet Union that most of the people in the party already knew anyway. And it became a magazine for a community, not a party. Was it always English language? It was always English language, but it was very closely related to, I mean, like the people who were involved with it were very interested in Yiddish culture. Super Ashkenazi.

The forward at some point would have been a sister publication or? Well, the forward was socialist, so they hated each other. In fact, like the communists and the socialists, like, in fact, the people who were, you know, the forward stopped being socialist at a certain point, but the people who kept on that tradition, it took until, I think, 2010 or 2015, something like that, for the socialists and the communists to come together on the Jewish Current's advisory board. This was before my time. That's how long it took for them to reconcile.

Hey, so. We're irrelevant. You're irrelevant. Yeah. Let's get together. I love that there's no power. Did you why? I love that there was a Bolshevik, Menshevik split within the Jewish currents.

Like the New York City periodical publishing. God, we are. I mean, there was never a split because it was always, I mean, it was a Stalinist publication until 1956. And then it just became kind of, you know, post-communists left, but it still would never have, you know, partnered with the socialists. I mean, those wounds were too deep, you know. So anyway, that was kind of like by the time they had reconciled, that was the magazine that we inherited.

We, you know, a kind of younger group took over in 2018, you know, turned it into basically what it is now, print magazine that also has a, you know, a. news desk and a podcast and, uh, you know, events and whatnot. Tell us the name of the podcast. On the nose. I host the podcast called on the nose. It's a great name for a podcast. I got to say.

You know, it actually was a total. I mean, it's a little on the nose, but. Well, it was a total fluke because the first podcast that we did or just the first like audio recording that we did was because we did, we had this cover with a huge nose on it. And people were so pissed off about it. Like, we. got like, I've never, actually, like, for all the things that we've ever done, I feel like this nose cover was like the thing that pissed people out. They hated that they could like see the pores.

They were disgusted. They thought it was anti-Semitic. They thought it was racist, like all kinds of things. Nazi, blah, blah, blah. And so we did a podcast with the artist on the nose. And then that just became the podcast. So. Derrshnazer.

That's it. Well, it's a great podcast as well. and Jewish Currants has, you know, published a lot of really fascinating stuff. And done some really good live events. Like, you really, you need to thank you. You gave Matt and I, I think, our second or third ever chance to be together in person. Oh, that's right. You brought Matt out.

At JC Live. Yeah, yeah, two years ago. And Matt, Matt, like, sort of headlined or was part of the... No, I just went last. But I also had a kidney stone. and was in the hospital for most of the day, remember. You closed it. You closed down the bar.

I did. Well, just for what it's where it's James plug. But you also hosted panels with Nora Aricot and all kinds of great people. Go ahead. Yeah. Yeah. Well, just to plug, J.C. Live is coming back October 11th. So tickets are available for that.

There's a lot of great people going to be there. And on the topic of theater, Wallace Sean and Deborah Eisenberg and Larry Pine, who are the original cast of the designated mourner written by Wallace Sean are going to read it. Oh, my God. We're going to do a full table read of designated mourner. So, I mean, that's like only one thing that's happening. But since we're going to talk about theater today, I'm pretty excited about that. I love Wally, but Larry Pine, ever since Vanya on 42nd Street, the Wallace-Shon, Andre Gregory, Louis

Mal adaptation of Uncle Vanya. Larry Pine played Dr. Astroff in it. It's from 94. It's one of my favorite movies. Like, what a gorgeous actor he is. Yeah. That's going to be amazing. Yeah.

I'm excited about that. Yeah. He's got to be about 81 years old now. Yeah, he's up there. They're all in their 80s. Yeah. Did you just look that up? I just Googled it.

I just Googled it because I don't know who he is. And I was just like, I'm going to be involved. He's a character actor. You've seen him in other things. He does look familiar, vaguely familiar. We just asked him for a headshot, and he sent us back a picture of him in front of, like, some kind of National Park sign that said, living fossils. And he's pointing at himself.

And that was the headshot that he sent us. Oh, I love that. I love that. But, well, we are talking about theater on this episode because you recently- Bad Has Baradway. That's right. Give my regards. And we're giving our regards to a brand new play that is sweeping the nation.

It is a new play that is getting rave reviews called Birth Right. It was written by Jonathan Spector. And it's about a group of six Jewish-American friends. over, I believe, an 18-year span, and it starts from a reunion following a birthright trip to Israel. This is getting good reviews from places like Vanity Fair and the New York Times. And Vulture, too. New York Magazine quite liked it. That's right. And here's just a little excerpt from Vanity Fair.

Birthright might be the perfect catharsis for Jewish-American families at odds over Israel. and Gaza. Just what they deserve, just what they need. Perfect catharsis. We need some catharsis. Just a nice, clean, get this out of my space and make me feel okay with it. Move on with your day.

Here's just an excerpt from that. Birthright might be the first work of fiction to capture the great rupture in the American Jewish community. What it can't do, though, is predict what happens next. Can friendship survive anti-Zionism? the cognitive dissonance of both wanting to be a good Jew and believing in the state of Israel as it currently exists.

More importantly, who is complicit in the deaths of tens of thousands of Palestinians? Is it American taxpayers who fund military aid to Israel? I'm so glad I missed this one. This is the one that I didn't read, actually. I cannot believe the sentence, can friendship survive anti-Zionism is a sentence. that anyone who's not named Adam Lewis Klein or Jesse Brown has ever said. Can friendships survive anti-Zionism? The age-old question.

As an editor, I would have flagged that grammatically. I mean, like, what does it mean exactly? Yeah. I mean, like, does it, does the anti-Zionism, like, fly in, like, helicopter in from above? Yeah, right. Or you come home and you've been diagnosed with it, you know? And now you have to deal with the onset up, like rapid onset anti-Zionism. I've got early onset.

early onset anti-Zionism, and it's just tearing through my body and brain. Yeah. So, I mean, we all want to know, can any friendship survive anti-Zionism? There is a lot of good... All of mine are surviving it right now. I just want you to know. So far, but, you know. You said on your podcast that one hasn't.

Except one. Well, actually, we reconciled since that podcast was after three years. We really did, yeah. Wow. Yeah. What was that like? It was really intense and I don't know if I can talk about it publicly. You don't have to talk about it publicly.

I just want to know how it felt. It felt good actually. I mean, look, I don't know. You guys may know that my dad took his own life a few years ago. I wasn't aware of that. It was a few months after October 7th and this is my oldest friend and she cut me off on October 7th and like didn't like, you know. Wow. She was like half raised by my dad and I was half raised by hers kind of thing.

Wow. So it was a pretty tough thing for her to then kind of withdraw. I mean, like I said, most of my Zionist friends, like I'm not really friends with them anymore, but this was kind of an exception. Yeah. But we have reconciled since then. It's quite a hatchet. It's quite a hatchet to bury. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, it's really, you know, whenever I hear that something like that has happened, in terms of a friend reconciling with you after October 7th disagreements, let's say. I always want to know what it's like because part of me is like I'm just sitting here waiting by a phone just like a fucking like someone who's a wife whose husband is lost at sea. just and it really it sounds it sounds cathartic and it sounds very healing yeah gives me hope I have one friend who cut me off

a few years into it not just because of the disagreement but because of how public I am and yeah that's really what it was for her too how public I am she was like if this if you didn't have this role right it would be different yeah yeah well so the question can friendship survive anti-Zionism is still a maybe, at least, but it can in some cases. The independent or independent wrote a review of this that I want to read a few excerpts from

because it's my only insight into this. I've not actually seen this play, so I can't judge it based on its merits. I can only judge it based on different reviews that I've read of it. I can't judge it based on its merits. Yeah. Look. Little inside left is Zionism baseball there, but... Oh, merits.

Merits, yeah. Merits, yeah, the merits party. I can't judge it based on its lecoons, nor merits. But I can judge it, you know, based on different excerpts I've read. And I want to read you some from the Independence, William Johnson's review of it. Just real quick for you. At its worst, birthright aggressively encourages its audience to turn inward and stop worrying about the genocide. In a pivotal monologue towards the place's conclusion, the character Alona, who over the course of

the story decides to move to Israel, becoming a settler, describes how due to the violence of October 7th she feels no compassion for the victim of Israel's genocidal aggression. Quote, I know there's thousands of kids in Gaza who are scared, who are just as scared or worse, and I wish I did, but I just don't have the space for them in my heart right now. not after what they did. This rejection of basic human compassion on ethno-nationalist grounds, Alona only has, quote, space in our heart for other Israelis, receives no rebuttal.

And there's more to it, but I want to ask, you had this discussion with Alyssa Solomon. Elisa Solomon, who is a theater critic. Can you tell us about your discussion about this recent slate of different, I don't know, the phenomenon of the Israel argument play in the last three years? Sure. I mean, I think the amazing thing about that speech by Alona is not just that, like that on face value, but the fact that almost an identical speech, as Elisa points out in our letters, comes up in the Zionists, which is another play, both commissioned by a group called Miami New Drama, which formed after October 7th to promote

specifically like Jewish kind of identity plays in the wake of sort of like cultural boycott after October 7th, this kind of thing. The anti-Semitism that the theater world is awash in. They would no longer be silenced. They would finally make space. The same exact speech. And, you know, on the topic of being silenced,

like there's birth, right? There's the Zionists which played upstate or actually in the Berkshire's Great Barrington, I think, or Pittsburgh or something. Barrington Stage in Pittsfield. By Asher Gellman. The first place I ever had a concert of my musical theater work outside of New York City was at Barrington Stage in Pittsfield.

Nice. Yeah. Go ahead. But, you know, this also follows Giant, which closed earlier this year, which is slightly different, and we can talk about that, but still kind of on this topic, also written by a white, Jewish man with like kind of liberal Zionist sensibilities. English, right?

And this also follows, oh yeah, English man. He's English. The rest of these playwrights are American. But we are talking about all white Jewish men who have written these boys. All white Jewish men. You know, and we're also talking about from a few years ago, the ally, which played at the public by Itamar Moses and Prayer for the French Republic by Josh Harmon. Like all of these plays are kind of in this soup right now, which is this Israel-Palestine

debate play. Most of them involve only Jews arguing with one another. Giant, of course, is one exception because there is Roald Dahl, who is non-Jewish, avowed anti-Zionist and anti-Semite, very convenient. And then you also have Itamar Moses as the ally in which you have like a Palestinian student. You have, you know, black, It's a campus play. So there are a lot of other people. So those are the exceptions, but the other ones are just kind of internal Jewish discussion plays in which there is somebody arguing the other side. Actually, like even some of the same actors and actresses, the Alona, who you just read from Birthright, the speech about not having room in her heart for Palestinians,

plays the anti-Zionist American in prayer for the French Republic. So, you know, they're all it's all kind of fluid. As Elisa says, they're, like, cooked in the same kitchen, like, when you go on 6th Street and all the Indian restaurants, how the joke was like, they all share the kitchen. This is that. It's, like, total...

It seems like an insular scene almost. And I guess... Sort of a cottage cheese industry. A cottage cheese industry, sure. What I want to ask about is this... At least very recently, there seems to have been a few that were funded directly from this Miami New Drama's Y6K project, which is specifically giving money for, well, let me read from your article here. It says both the Zionists and Birthright were commissioned as a part of the Miami New Drama's Y6K project, a quote, new Jewish play initiative funded by Wasserman Projects, which issued a kind of, mission, kind of mission statement framing the creation of the fund as a response to the horrific

events of October 7th and the subsequent surge in anti-Semitism. Jesus. It references, quote, antisemitic sentiment now openly expressed in academic and cultural institutions and writes that it's commissioning plays to raise awareness about the climate of unprecedented vulnerability for Jewish communities. Yeah, so I want to ask about this. Like this seems to be a play by Jews for Jews. And there's sort of a everything that I read about these plays reads as Jewish exceptionalism.

A hundred percent. Where there's a few quotes from it that are very much just like, you know, the thing about us Jews is, we invented talking to each other. Literally. Two Jews, three opinions. Right. But none of those opinions really get to the heart of what's wrong with Israel. Right.

Yeah, yeah. You know, we love to argue, but there's some people that if you argue with them, you're saying you countenance, Hitler, Hillary, and 87ism. Yeah. What is the role of Jewish exceptionalism with regards to these plays? I mean, it's pretty explicit. I mean, it's exactly what you said. Well, first of all, just to go back to the funding situation, because I think that that piece is important. These plays are doing really, really well, you know, and so you can't discount that. But you also can't discount the fact that there is a kind of theater apparatus that is funding these plays specifically because of Jewish grievance. And it's kind of the same thing that we've been seeing with the Penn stuff, you know, where it's like, oh, Jewish publishing, like, I I don't know, have you guys done a show on this yet, the silent moratorium with Penn. No, no.

Oh, well, Penn put out this report that's like, Israeli authors and Jewish authors aren't being published anymore because of anti-Semitism, which is not true. And now suddenly there's all these like new imprints for like middling Jewish Zionists to publish their books. And like that's what's happening here. Like we're not like in a meritocracy here. Like it's not like people really want these plays. it's like, you know, Jewish funders in the theater world feel that like their Zionist identity is under attack. And they've funded these plays. And I think what's like really significant about it is that they clearly don't feel anymore that they can just have like a Zionist play without an anti-Zionist voice.

Like they actually feel like if they don't reflect some of the experience of Zionists, which is that all their kids and grandkids are anti-Zionists. that they haven't, you know, captured something. Yes. And yet the entire apparatus of the play is designed to just reinforce them where they are, let them stay where they are, but make them feel like they've done something really brave. Yes. It's fine art has barra, which is like something that I've not really experienced before. We see a lot of, you know, your social media has barra.

We see, you know, obviously in the news. and different television shows and whatnot. But this level of theater, this theater world seems to be, it's plays for older Jews to go and watch and yell at their grandson and have someone else give them the catharsis of yelling at their grandson. Well, totally. I don't even think it's the kind of thing that it's for yelling at your grandson. I think it's for going back and saying, like, I understand you.

Like, I've heard you, you know, like I'm, I'm growing, although I'm exactly where I was before. The eternal struggle of how can I remain liberal and still be pro killing kids in Palestine, you know? I mean, the audience when I was at birth rate was overwhelmingly looked to me like kind of Long Island and modern Orthodox people. You know, there were some, like, non-Jewish people there who were gone, like, at every intermission break. It's three and a half hours. Like, the show is not for non-Jews. It's embarrassing. It's actually embarrassing that anyone would see it. Like, I felt embarrassed. I was watching, like, shrunk down in my seat, like, three levels. You know, like, I just couldn't handle the idea of other people seeing this. But it's just like, it's not for, it's for those people. Right. Period. What's interesting to me is that of all the plays you write about, I mean, first of all, the only one I've seen is Giant.

But I get the sense of what Birthright is. I get the sense of what the Zionist is. Like, I implicitly know this genre. Giant sounds to me like the most interesting of all of them, the most interestingly constructed, the most theatrical in some ways. It obviously featured a towering central performance by a great actor, John Lithgow.

Who was great? playing a genuinely interesting, conflicted character who's in some kind of flux and who you like to watch, he's surrounded by interesting people except for one. The character who is mind-numbingly boring in that play and just a cutout, just spouting ADL talking points, as you said, is his New York, you know, this sort of hatchet person sent from New York to check in on him. Why? because he wrote a piece in the, was it the Guardian,

the telegraph, one of those papers, about Israel's invasion of Lebanon in, or actually reviewing a book about Israel's destruction of Beirut. And I read, went back and read that original op-ed, he wrote, that original review. Yeah, me too. It's got some spicy takes. It's got some lines that might make my spilchus get a little bit,

or make my Kishkas, sorry, get a little spilkis. but that doesn't mean anything in there is actually untrue. I couldn't find a single untrue sentence, including when he challenges world jewelry, British Jewry, to say, well, how do you feel about this? The worst thing for me in that was like this idea of Jews as a race. That was the worst part. He says something like the Jewish race, like I can't remember a time.

The only race in history who's gone from being universally pitied victims to universally reliled, reviled aggressors. Well, that just sounds to me like British boarding school slash Norwegian heritage, like just a kind of ambient European anti-Semitism that's bred in the bone and that isn't doesn't really rise to the level of like whatever. Now, of course, Roldahl did say some severely anti-Semitic things, and the play collapses years and time in order to shoehorn them in to let you know that there's really no way around it and that the ultimate takeaway is

your anti-Zionist friends underneath it all. This is who they really are. they hate Jews. But, and yet, the play ends up actually being the most theatrically, dramatically, successful, and interesting. And I wonder what you make of that. That's how I felt. Alisa definitely disagreed with me. I think that Elisa liked birthright a little bit better than Giant. She really, I thought that the performances in Giant made it better. And I do think that it's kind of like accidentally interesting. Because I do think that there is a phenomenon here, right, where like if you are kind of like the target of

Zionist bullying and also just like in the crosshairs of that after being an Palestine advocate for a long time and feeling like the power kind of coming down on you or raid against you that that can create anti-Semitism and antisemitic attitudes. Like I think we're seeing that all the time now. I'm just imagining 20 years from now, someone's going to write the same play but about Miss Rachel, another beloved children's. Oh my God. Oh, my God.

It'll be called pig tail or something like that. Well, but wait, but like, let's just be real. Like, Roll doll is obviously an extreme, like an actual anti-Semite. Like, he said a lot of other, like, really fucked up things and whatever, you know. And so, like, it's like, it's frustrating. I think it could have been interesting if it had sort of explored how he, how his Palestine commitments intersected with that in a real way and actually, like, explored. Like, you know, they did come there to, like, threaten and strong arm him, you know.

But that's like kind of never dealt with at all. Well, that, yeah, because that would undermine the purpose of the play. You know, the purpose, it seems, you know, and this is me being reductive and I haven't seen it, seems to be to make that connection between anti-Zionism and secret bubbling under the surface anti-Semitism. And this is a perfect subject for it because this is someone who does have a history of saying and believing anti-Semitic things, who also was speaking out against Israeli. As far as I know, at that point, at that point, he did not have that history. This is the origin story of that coming public, no?

I don't know about that. I'm not sure when the New Statesman interview happened. I don't think it was. It was 91, I think it was later than this. Yeah, I believe so. Yeah. I mean, see, that would be interesting too, just to like think about the development over time, you know, under the, under that kind of.

pressure, like what happens, you know? I mean, he has a very interesting line in that very anti-Semitic phone call where he basically says, like, no Jews served in the British Army and, like, a whole bunch of other things, like that the reason that they get kicked out of everywhere is because of their own behavior, basically. I mean, like, Hitler, you know, Hitler was a- exactly, which is, which is, by the way, also a line that, like, one of the non-Jewish spouses is purported to have said to one of the characters in birthright. You know, so again, like with the echoes between these plays. But, you know, he says basically like, am I an anti-Semite?

Well, I wouldn't have said that I was, but why would a British Jew take up for Zionism? Like, why would they support this, you know? And I think they have to answer for that, you know? And I'm kind of like, yeah, I think so too. Yeah, exactly. That might be a racist thing to say, but it's got enough truth in it that it should challenge if a play is going to be honest, you have to let that land.

You can't just let that be a gotcha. And the way the play did it, especially the pride of place it gives to this, I forget her name, totally forgettable, but dominant character. Jesse Stone. Jesse Stone, right? Who's the only made-up character also.

Exactly. She's completely fictional, which is what makes her, she's so contrived. She's literally contrived. As you said, Roald's English, publisher who himself is Jewish has a great monologue where he reflects on the difference between American Jews and British Jews. He's like, I grew up being bullied at boarding school and you just get used to it. Everyone gets, you know, Pakistani kids get bullied. Everyone gets bullied. It's just part of our culture here. But the playwright allows Jesse Stone to deliver

the closing line of Act 1, which is, yes, sir, yes, yes, you doom, owe me an apology. Blackout, applause. Well, after she basically says, well, after she says, like, how dare you lump us all together? And then she's like, yes, you do owe me an apology. For your article about a book detailing Israel's destruction of Beirut. Wow. No, there's no self-reflection about any of the, of that stuff at all. And in fact, why would there be? I mean, Mark Rosenblatt, the, the playwright, said that this was based on, like he was inspired to write this by that Jeremy Corbyn affair.

Right. Oh, interesting. Wow. I love it. Yeah. It's like, yeah, this, that character of Jesse Stone is based on various different arguments. I got into myself in the shower, arguing with a, a Jeremy Corbin who wasn't there. All of these plays seem like shower conversations by the way.

Yes. Yes. A thousand percent. And the thing, that's a thing that actually, like, that's my like takeaway, if there's like one nugget from the letters that I would. bring to you guys. It's like, that's my takeaway from all of this is that these are not real conversations. And there are a lot of these kinds of conversations that are happening. Like, obviously, we've all been in arguments with family and friends. I'm sure that you guys have

been, whatever. But also, like, a lot of the conversations are not happening, especially at this point. Like, I think they've, like, sort of, in some ways, chilled out. Like, people have found a way to just, like, go to dinner with their parents and just, like, not get into it or whatever, depending on your parents, you know? Right. Minor chill. But like, but like, you know, but these plays basically are, are almost like a version of the conversation that they get to actually have, for one thing, that people think, that people are like, oh, it's worth having the conversation with you. You're not like too far gone. Like, it's like also like a way of them feeling through this ostracization that they're still human, you know, like, I'm worth talking to about this.

My viewpoint is valid. And so, like, that's, that is the feeling. It's actually cathartic for them to feel like they're worth having an argument with. And also where they don't have to, like, say anything, like, horrifically ugly that they can't come back from. And they don't have to, like, you know, sit with the consequences of, like, their kids thinking that they're genocide errors or whatever, they get to win. Yeah. And they also don't have to deal with the most steel man, like they don't have to deal with the best anti-Zionist arguments because presumably these playwrights are incapable of understanding them or really doing them justice. Or they're avoiding them. A lot of these people are going to go home and argue with their kids

and they're going to be like, hold on, that thing you just said, that wasn't in the play. Well, well, so I don't know about that. So I'm going to, I mean, certainly not in giant. Giant, like, no question, you know. The ally actually does a much better job of presenting kind of like, Itimar Moses's play. Yeah. So I ran into Itimar a week ago today, actually, at a mutual friends musical theater cabaret. And he came up to me and complimented me on my Jesse Brown debate, which, and I didn't know where Eitamar stood.

And I hope he's okay with me saying this publicly. But like, it made me think that anything he would write about this would be at least broad-minded. I think he's conflicted. I think he's conflicted. And I think that's the viewpoint of these plays, is they are conflicted. I mean, like where they land on that conflict, it's kind of like.

But at least conflict is interesting. if you can be honest about it. Yeah, but in this case, it's not. Because the fact of the matter is, is like, these arguments as they're being staged are so well-worn, even if you get the argument, like the kind of text correct, you know, you're basically just retreading talking points.

It's not like anti-Zionists don't have our talking points. We have our talking points too. So you basically have an argument of talking points. And you just can't do anything dramatically with that. That's my feeling. Yeah, yeah, fair. On artistic grounds, never mind political grounds. Exactly.

On artistic or political grounds, you actually, like, can't get anywhere. And they all try to, like, bring in, you know, character to make that work and to make it interesting. As you've said, in Giant, it just totally falls flat, you know. But I think it does in the other ones, too. Like, I just don't actually, I don't actually believe where these conversations land. I think there's also what I find interesting, especially in your retelling of some of these plays in the letters you guys sent back and forth, is not so much the conscious conflict, you know, fanfic that they're doing, but sort of the subconscious, I mean, and maybe that's giving it too much credit, Jewish exceptionalism that's within them. Oh, yeah.

Including things like everyone being in relationships, anyone who's in a relationship with someone who's not Jewish, it eventually falls apart and fails. Oh my God. And that the only real relationships that work are with Jews. It's very Tyler Perry coded, isn't it? It's like Jewish Tyra Perry, like cautionary stuff for the community. Yeah. Like if you strave from the fold, it's not going to go well. I mean, look, this may be fucked up to say, but I kind of expect like some of like the bad Zionist stuff like at this point, like bad politics on Palestine.

But I actually feel like even like establishment Judaism is like moved away from some of like the weird continuity politics just because of how many people were like sexually harassed. Sure. And like you know what I'm saying? And like the fact that birthright in particular just like reproduces those continuity politics like directly. You know, like, you know, it's so bizarre. Like, you have a... Continuity politics, for those listening, this is the continuity of the genes, of the race,

of the traditions by only marrying... Of the Jewish race that we didn't want Roald Dahl to talk about. Right, the Jewish race that doesn't exist. It doesn't exist. If you mention it, you're a Nazi. Right, right, right. Yeah, it does exist only in the sense that you need to marry a Jew, but it has nothing to do with anything other than...

than DNA. Well, and actually, like, this was part of the explicit goal of birthright was to get Jews to marry Jews. Sexual Zionism. And totally. And we actually published in our first issue, Jewish Currents's first, like, revamped issue in 2018, an investigation on all the sexual assault on birthright that comes from these kinds of continuity projects.

I mean, Michael Steinhardt, who is the biggest mega donor, huge sexual harassment and sexual assault scandal was like setting his like paying his employees to like go on speed dates with each other at the office like crazy strange kind of sexual harassment you make out with her you yeah marry him you know copulate yeah for what reason but but this is like weirdly in the play like all of the so first of all you have like young people like my age i mean maybe i'm not that i'm not actually that But still, those people are exactly my age, like, you know, late 30s, early 40s, who are dating and marrying non-Jews. The ones who date and marry non-Jews, the relationships fall apart in insane ways.

Like, one of them is literally just like the Jews get what's coming to them every time, like, whatever. And one of them, like, stops her husband from becoming a rabbi in vague way that we don't know why it is. And one of them, like, won't come home with one of the characters after her father dies because he just, like, can't handle the emotions. Because, like, obviously, Jews are in touch with our emotions. That's right. And non-Jews don't have feelings. Well, they're anti-Semitically against emotions, you know?

Yes. It's like they see the Jews, you know, sitting Shiva and they just go, like, oh, I'm against this for, for Nazi reasons, you know. But even, like, the young, like, kind of, like, open-minded guy is, like, why do, why are Einstein? and Dylan and like, why are they all Jews, you know? Which is part of, it's like flip side of the same coin that does not get mentioned whatsoever is just like, man, can you believe, you know, the, you know, the Weinstein and Epstein and Woody Allen and. Right, exactly. It's the same thing. It's like, oh, look at all these Jews who did, you know, sex trafficking or are rapists or Hollywood bigwigs who use their power. for evil. And then in the same breath, be like, you ever notice that all Jews are Gershwin and Einstein? You ever notice that Jews are Jesus and, you know, a non-sexual, Woody Allen?

You know what I'm saying? It's the same fucking thing. I just, I just can't believe, I just haven't seen a person like a young, like a youngish person doing that. Like, I just thought that was like so boomer-coded. Like, I guess, I mean, Jonathan Spector, I think is close to our age. Like, I'm just surprised. And the rest, I feel like the rest of it, there is like a hello fellow kids like aspect to this play, you know? Yeah. Like, like designed to make older people feel like they're like seeing inside the youth's like lives, you know? Like they smoke cigarettes, you know, but they and they marry non-Jews and they skinny dip.

Like there's actual gratuitous nudity in the show that I feel like is literally just there to make old people feel like they're watching something risky. Yes. And the politics are a part of that. And non-Jews remember that Jews have sexuality too. Right. Or something like that. Well, speaking of sexuality, let me ask you something. The show Birthright, right?

These people all went on Birthright together. I imagine they reminisce a little bit about the experience in the show. Is there any critical look given to the way they were indoctrinated there? Is there any reminiscences about, okay. There's one anti-Zionist character who's basically like, that trip was a propaganda trip. I mean, like, she does talk, like, someone who, you know, she's like when you see her in the second act, which is like mid-aughts or whatever, she's J-Street. And then by the time you see her in 2024, she's like J-BP.

That's a gateway drug. Which is, which like that, you know, I mean, like, that's believable. She's like a believable anti-Zionist character, you know? She's like queer, a lot of, you know, totally makes sense. And it's also, but it's for the audience, too. So, you know, I haven't seen it. But making your anti-Zionist character the, I don't know, the blue-haired girl that all of the- Oh, wait, but she marries a Jew.

She marries a Jew. And has kids. Okay. Okay. And her marriage is intact. Yeah. I love that. Actually, the Zionists are the ones who didn't marry Jews.

See that? See that? So the real Zionism is marrying the right person. Yiddle me this. Oh, my God. I mean, I think another thing to note that you note in this article is that Giants also had some funding that is interesting, which was Giant, meanwhile. Sherry Redstone. That's right.

Of all people. Of all people. Of all people. The former Paramount Chair who put her thumb on the scale for Israel in CBS's news coverage of the genocide. And who has been devoted the last few years to. putting out Israeli Hezbar in the form of popular entertainment. Most recently, as chair of the board of the Israel-based Sipur Studios, which has released a flurry of October 7th content.

Sipur means story in Hebrew. So they're just telling stories. Yeah, exactly. It's just what I find fascinating about this whole thing is, you know, I always ask whenever we deal with Hezbar, who is this for? And for some things, there's a clear, wide audience that they're trying to reach. I think a documentary about anti-Semitism surges after October 7th is for any documentary film enjoyer, right?

Plays have a very limited audience. They exist in a very small space, and it is not something that, for the most part, you can expect to become a worldwide sensation. Birthright, the tour. Ain't going to happen. Yeah, I highly doubt it's going to happen, especially with this one, because it seems to be so specifically for just other Jews to watch and feel better about their inaction. I mean, I don't know, actually, and I wish that that was the case.

I mean, I'm surprised by the reviews, because I just really hated the play, and I thought it would be transparent to, I mean, like, I like Sarah Holdren, you know, as a critic and vulture. Like, I just thought it would be transparent what was going on here and it just like wasn't. You know, Lisa Solomon, who's been covering theater for a long time is just like, look, like, the theater is liberal. Like the idea of theater. It's like, it's like there's two sides in there, or there's many sides and they all duke it out and like, here's the argument. And this argument is going to, You make your own decision at the end of the day, you know. And that still is like the conception.

Right, right. And we talk about Brecht and like actually how we need like a Brechtian intervention into these plays. Yeah. But, you know, I think I think that basically the problem is is that for a lot of people who don't have access to this kind of argument, you know, who aren't having it in their lives or whatever, like this stands in. for like something that pushes the envelope a little bit, that they can actually like get both sides and perform that, you know, without a kind of deeper analysis of what it's doing.

And so, you know, Lisa thinks that this is going to go to Broadway. I think that's possible. But more likely it'll just be picked up by regional theaters and people will do it. It'll travel. I mean travel. Like for theater, that's a different thing.

Right. Of course. What I'm saying? Miami, Chicago, San Francisco. There's L.A. You could totally see something of this at the Amundsen Theater in L.A., you know? Right. Yeah, I guess the way I'm looking at this, and you know, you kind of mentioned this or touched on this in talking about the pen issue, is this idea of a middling white male Jewish writer being able to now have a space carved out specifically for him to participate in the finer arts. Like D.E.I. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

D-E-Oi. De-E-I. Very good. And so with that said, you know, I, is there sometimes I look at starting a podcast about, you know, anti-Zionism as like, I really shot myself in the foot because my, you know, my real dream is to, it's to, you know, be a playwright myself. And so. Oh, God. Here we go.

It's not too late, Matt. It's not too late. I don't think it's too late. And so I wrote a quick play. that I want us to do. This is to submit to either the Redstones or to the Y6K project, you know, whomever is watching and it funds plays. Please watch this. This is my submission.

And so, Daniel, you're going to be playing the part of Jeff. I will be playing the part of my idiot's son. And Ariel, if you could read. everything that's in yellow here. You got it? Got it. Got it. Okay.

So this play is called What It Means to Be Jewish by Matt Lieb, playwright, thinker, intellectual, future Ph.D. Okay. So the character list. Go ahead. Character list. Jeff, my idiot son, rabbi. Jeff, 55 wearing a suit and a Keepa is a successful lawyer and a practicing reformed Jew. His idiot son, 18, wearing a kaffia and a ball o'clock.

has just returned home from his first year in college. Do you want any kind of voice for this matter? Just... I was just yourself, you know? Okay. My son, I'm so glad to have you back from woke college just in time for the Israeli holiday of Pizim, where we mourn the suicide bombing of a sparrow

during the second Intifada. So good to be home, but we need to talk about Israel. I am no longer a Zionist. In fact, I am an anti-Zionist now. Shanda! I can't believe this could happen to my... idiot son. Well, you better believe it, father.

I may be young and annoying, but you know I'm right when I say Israel is a racist apartheid state. How can you say this? And on the eve of Pitsim, Eref Pitsim, that would be my little note for you then. I'd call it Araf Pitsim. Just a little

dramaturgia, you know. No less. I'm sorry, father, but there have been the equivalent of 100 Sabaro attacks per day in Gaza since 2020. My whole childhood you instilled the Jewish value of Tikuno-Lam. How can you stay silent? Look, I know my identity as a socially liberal,

reformed Jew in Manhattan dictates that I should care about such things, but I don't. And I know that not caring is shameful, but I just don't have the capacity to feel shame anymore. And isn't that the real crime against humanity? Jeff breaks the fourth wall to get reassurance from the audience. The audience nods there. heads in agreement. Don't you know there is a genocide going on? The audience gas and shakes their heads

and disagreement. We never should have sent you to woke college and voted Democrat. They have made you Hamas. Yes, I am proud Hamas. I will no longer speak to you, though I will continue to take your money. But, idiot, son, don't you understand that open debate is one of our distinct and unique traditions? we can disagree about things and still be a family. Isn't that what it means to be Jewish? I believe what it means to be Jewish is being against war crimes and stuff. Idiot son does a poo in his pants like a baby.

I suppose we'll just have to agree to disagree. And isn't that what it means to be Jewish? I just can't. I need to stand by my convictions. And isn't that what it means to be Jewish? Well, cancel me if you must. We Jews have survived. worst.

Worse. And honestly, isn't that what it means to be Jewish? I'm going to start a podcast about being pro-Palestine. And isn't that what it means to be Jewish? I cannot live with this shame, but I must because you are mischpocha. And isn't Jewish what that means to be that? Oh no, father, you are having a stroke. And isn't that what it means?

Smash cut to funeral. I know we all feel sad today. Oh, this is the rabbi. You're playing the part of rabbi. Go ahead. Yeah. I know we all feel sad today. And it's important to allow yourselves to feel sad.

Your feelings of sad are valid. All of your feelings are valid. And you must feel them. Your feelings and subject others to them. Because your feelings are the most important feelings. And isn't that what it means to be Jewish? The end. Everyone clap.

I'm actually a little freaked out as to the fact that haven't seen these plays and you've just kind of nailed it. Like, I am actually a little weirded out. Like, it's not, it's not that far. I mean, like, Young was right. There is a collective unconscious. There is a collective unconscious. Well, also, also, like, the audience gasps and, like, you know, like the applause lines.

Like, it's really, you really, like, hear people just, oh. Yes. You know, it's crazy. I can only imagine the first time genocide was said during any of the plays. There was a distinct gas. Tittering. Yes. You know what?

This actually brings to mind because you guys had, I think, a very cogent, you know, loving, like you didn't go too hard on them. But it resonated with my critique of the theater workers for a ceasefire boycott of birthright, which is basically just a social media call out, dressed up as political action. And I'm affiliated with that group. I'm with Broadway Voices for Palestine. And the decision was taken a little bit ad hoc. And I told them. I was like, I think this is a mistake. And what Elisa Solomon suggested is, why don't you fly her outside the place?

Let people see it and then counter-educate them. And what you could also do is get people in the seats, like raise some anti-Zionist money, right, to get tickets to this sold-out show. Put people in the seats and have them gasp at different lines and applaud at different lines. And shout out, you monster when the person says, I have no, you know, basically like get a, a different kind of wave going in the crowd, because why not? It's theater, right? If theater is supposed to,

because this is the thing about theater, and musical theater is very guilty of this too. But let's face it, a lot of theater and New York liberal theater, it flatters the sensibilities of its audience. There's an unspoken, tacit agreement that you will come to this show and you will feel better about yourself, even if your mind's expanded, you will not have to really confront.

And this is why I love the show, Slam Frank, so much. It's so anarchically, I cannot disagree with you more here. You're going to have to have me back on to argue with you about slam frank. We can talk about in person sometimes. But I'm a big fan of this show and I'm a big admirer of that. And I don't know that they agree with me at all on a lot of things. It's very clear that they do not to me.

I think that and this is a good case example. I think that even if they don't, what they've done artistically and the, the spherical nature of the satire in the same way that South Park at its best pays off by, we won't get it, let's not take this into that whole other tangent. But what I'm saying is... Next week, there's a podcast on Slam Frank.

Okay, good. I will listen to it, and I'll listen to it, and I'll try to allow my own mind to be changed rather than having my own prejudice is flattered. But this is the thing, there's this tacit agreement in a lot of theater that you're going to go, and you'll know when to clap,

and you'll know when to gasp, and you'll know when to boo and you'll know when to hiss, and then you'll know when to get up and leave. And I think any, you know, it's part of the audience's responsibility to not fall for that. Don't let the same button buttons be pushed. Totally. Have a genuine original reaction and don't suppress it

just because you're feeling the peer pressure of the rapt silence or the rhubarb, rubarb whispering at the lines that are supposed to shock you. Totally. I mean, that's why, oh, sorry, go ahead. I'm just going to say, I feel like my play is really good. Go ahead. Yeah, your play is really good. It's excellent. It really is excellent. I mean, it actually reminds me,

have you guys seen this recent, like AI Hasvara with like, um, uh, it's like Israel derangement syndrome or like the kid comes home. It's like 80 style. Yes. And like the kid is like come, comes home with the kid. It's literally this. I mean, also you've done it. So they, they think they're funny, but they have no real capacity for irony because they're scientists. Right. Yeah. So I mean, Look, I... Which is incidentally what Jeremy Corbyn said. So we're full... There it is.

Full circle now. We're full circle back to Jeremy Corbin and the relitigation of British politics. But no, I'm glad that I got to, you know, act out this play with you guys. Theater, what a wonderful world. What a great specific world that being in L.A. I know very little about. Can I say one more thing? because I feel like it just needs to be said. Yes, please.

I mean, it's like so obvious that I think we haven't said it, but I just feel like it has to be said. Yes. The fact that during a genocide, the idea is that we need multiple plays from an American Jewish, like white Jewish male perspective that deals with their feelings about the genocide when there is not a single play that I can think of

since October 7th that deals with Palestinian experience, Not like the fractures. The mulberry tree at La Mama, but a much smaller production. Much smaller production. And it's dealing with ancient history. Right. Yeah. Yeah.

And Arab Jewish relations from a Palestinian point of view, but still, it's quite fair to Jews. Yeah. I mean, like, I just want to say it's like you could do an entire play that's just about the fracturing in Palestinian society from the grief of the genocide. Right. And it would make all of these other plays look pretty gauche. And that I think is like this. That is where, you know, there's something wrong and weird about all of this because it's,

you realize that, well, not to worry, that play is not going to be made or that play is certainly not going to get the funding that all of these plays are able to get. It's not going to get their, you know, carve out of funding so that mid-Jewish writers like Matt Lieb can go and make, you know, what it means to be. be Jewish. Yeah. So I could go and make my idiot son. I think my idiot son is the better title. Yeah, probably. Well, listen, this is the first draft.

Yeah, yeah. But yeah, I think that is something that does need to be explicitly stated. No matter how many times we implicitly stated, it's once again we're dealing with Jewish feelings as being something that is more important than an actual genocide. It's the feelings of what it makes me feel like to live with my complicity in this genocide is the important thing. Or even my being against it. You know, the anti-Zionist characters, you know, making, again, it's the, you know, doing sort of what we end up doing on this podcast too. You know, we're not free from it, but the centering of the, you know, Jewish experience, the Jewish feelings.

on this genocide that's happening not to us, you know? Listen, I'm like, I'm a little allergic to, like, the whole conversation around centering and Jewish feelings. Like, I feel like, I feel like all politics is feelings. Yes, yes, of course, of course. There's like, everyone is doing feelings politics, not just used. Including people who write articles about how centering Jewish feelings. Everybody.

Everybody. Literally. Literally. Literally, everybody. And the thing is, you could make a good play about the fractures and the Jewish community right now over the genocide, you could do it. But it would have to start from the position that the problem is the complicity and like the moral decline. Basically, it couldn't start from the position of like all sides, you know, like that can't be the perspective of the play. I mean, it can be, but it's going to, this is a place where that like idea is going to infect

the playwriting. Like it's not going to be sufficiently deep. Correct. The next show I actually want to write is a one-man show about my upbringing at left-wing Labor Zionist summer camp. And I want to focus it around the songs that we sang, the songbook, which ranges from draft Roger Ragged by, yeah, you went to any one of these. So draft dodger rag by Phil Oaks and Age of Aquarius and lots of touchy-feely stuff to Israeli peacnick songs, David Broza, Shirla Shalom, idealist, vague, not dealing with reality, utopianism, all the way to Shir Ha Palma. the fight song of a fucking terrorist, you know, Haganah Squad. I also sang Shira Palma. Okay, right. I still know all the words.

I still know all the words. Right. So messed up. It's catchy until you, well, you also get, marching around, right? Did you go to Hoshimer, Hatsai? What kind of catch you are? No, no. I went to a Zionist day school and we did like a whole pageant where we learned like all

of these like foundational Zionist songs. And I've thought about just finding the video tape to that pageant and like just digging into just those songs. So to me, the inherent conflict existing, the contradiction existing in that songbook itself contains everything I need, I hope, to draw out and also remembering what a beautiful, sexy time it was at that summer camp. My God, and how appealing Israelisness was and Zionism, but also the inner conflict in me, where, as I said on our last, on our AMA episode, I resented all the Israelis because of the... Because they're all hotter than you. Because they're all hotter than me and all the girls wanted them more than me and us. What about me?

Right. Exactly. Exactly. So all these inherent conflicts in it. But what I want to do for Jewish audiences to help them see themselves and to help them see that they were brought up in an environment that has some things in common with Hitler, you quite frankly. For non-Jewish audiences, I want to give them an insight into how Jews got this way. Because I think a lot of people are fundamental. Some people have no curiosity and they have no obligation to have any curiosity.

But I do think a lot of people are wondering, like, how does this happen? Yeah. And I know how it happens. I know because I was one of those educators. I know the methodology, even if I didn't realize what I was doing at the time. So I'm hoping that shows of that ilk that either want to expose something or excavate something that hasn't been talked about enough. That's the artistic impulse that I want to trust.

not like, oh, wow, like, how can I, like, make Jewish audiences feel better about their anti-Zionist kids? Right. And isn't that what being Jewish? What it means to be Jewish playwright. Guys, we have to take a quick commercial break. So everyone, please stick around. We will be right back.

This episode is brought to you by Hala Palestine. That's right, guys. We finally did it. We got an ad. And I'm very excited about this one because this is a great company. The people of Palestine have been making soap the same way for generations. And usually using just olive oil, baking soda and water. In Nablus, home to one of the world's first known soap factories, they make this exact soap, the Al Jamal, the camel.

And I was sent this one and as well as others from... Look at that. Yeah. isn't this nice? This is from Hala Palestine. This is the Nabilis pure olive oil soap. And this is another one of theirs with the, if you see there, it's got the keys on it. It's really, really cool. And I was also sent this beautiful kaffia by today's sponsor, Hala Palestine. Hala. Yeah, and I believe I've been sent some of that as well, but I will receive it when I get home in a few weeks. because I'm out on the road right now,

but I'm grateful and excited to sample these wears. So Hala Palestine is an online store where you can get all kinds of Palestinian crafts, clothing, and traditionally produced olive oil soaps, all handmade in Palestine and delivered to your door. And that kaffia that they sent you, Matt, it's woven in Palestine, not some factory overseas. And I can't wait to see you wearing it in...

Yeah, I will wear it, but I wanted to wait until we recorded the ad to show it, just because it just comes in this nice package and because it's, you know, it's got a little printout of where it was made, how it was made. And, you know, just it's nice to, I wanted to do the unboxing here on the ad. Well, then rip it open while I read the next few sentences. Yeah, you go ahead. When I'm choosing anything like this, you know, products from the region, products displaying

Palestinian culture, it's especially important. I want to know that my purchase supports Palestinian artisans and their families, not just companies trying to make a buck off the Palestinian struggle or Palestinian identity or Palestinian iconography or whatever. And at Hala, Palestine, you know, we know full well that our purchases are doing just that. They're supporting actual Palestinian artisans and their families. That's right. So you can feel good about shopping with that. That's right. And in Arabic, Hala means welcome.

And that's the feeling I get from these, you know, great. pieces that Hala Palestine sent me. This is the beautiful Kaffia. I love this so much. This material is just incredibly soft. And, you know, of course, I love the design, the two trees. It's beautiful. And, you know, just the

feel of it is nice. And speaking of welcome when we were in Jordan, the hospitality of our Palestinian hosts was so much. And they literally say, when you're meeting someone, they'll say, you are welcome. Yes, they do. They do. And like... You haven't thanked them for anything.

but they're just letting you know you are welcome. That's right. That's right. Yeah. So you can get a 10% discount. A 10% discount on any of the great products at halapalestine.com with the offer code bad hasbarah. That's right. You can feel good about where your money is going when you shop at halapalistine.com.

I think I almost said chala. It's hal. Hala. H. They taught us how to say that age when we were there. That's right. They tried to unhah. You know, they're like, get that goddamn ha out of there.

Stop putting chas and stuff. They said, imagine opening a, like, a can. of soda. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Halapalestine. There is. And use the code bad Hasbara. That's H-A-L-A-Palistine.com offer code bad Hasbara for 10% off. Thank you so much to Hala Palestine for this beautiful Kaffa and for the soaps. Hey, everyone, we have another ad read for you. Isn't that exciting? Look at us. We're just racking them up. Uh, so we, we, we're always looking to stay informed and broaden our knowledge

on the subjects we talk about on the show because, you know, can't all be references to PG-13 action comedy classics of the 80s, you know. Speak for yourself, brother. Of course, we're both kidding. Ah, yes, that's right. We are joking and we're a joking podcast. It's just a clever setup for us to tell you about today's sponsor,

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Read, save. Enjoy. And we're back this bad as barra, the world's most moral podcast. And we're here with Ariel Angel. How are you doing, Ariel? Things good. Doing all right. Sick.

Hell yeah. Hell yeah. We have so much more to talk about on this here podcast. We got to talk about something that happened recently to a man who has played the Hulk. This segment is called I am the Ruffalo Fluffalo. I heave and I Huffalo leave me alone because I've had a Nuffalo. So we're talking about... A bunch of Jewish organizations trying to Buffalo Ruffalo.

Yes. It is happening. Right now there is a political standoff as Skydance tries to acquire and merge with Warner Brothers. Warner Brothers discovery would be, you know, the latest acquisition for the Ellison's, both David and Larry, who is involved despite people saying he is not. So there's a coalition of 12 states led by the California Attorney General who is sued to block the deal and is arguing that it will heavily reduce Hollywood job opportunities, spike cable and movie ticket costs, and consolidate too much power within the industry.

So David Ellison is threatening to leave California. And meanwhile, over a thousand prominent directors and actors and writers, including Dennis or Denise Villeneuve, however you pronounce that guy's name. Denny Villeneuve. Denny Villeneuve. What is it with Americans in France? I have no respect for it. I know.

Really Americans make a point. of mispronouncing French above all other languages. You know, because there's just something about it. I just don't, I don't like it. I'm allowed to be racist against the French. I hold that as well. Yeah, see? We get it.

Real Americans. Well, because I'm a fucking Canadian. Yeah, because you're Canadian. You're basically French because you speak it. Kristen Stewart and Joaquin Phoenix, they all sign an open letter strongly opposing the consolidation of power that is happening over fears of industry contraction. But Mark Ruffalo took it a step further.

He pointed out that correctly, that beyond the whole like industry-based concerns, these new Hollywood overlords are criminally complicit in the genocide being committed by Israel. And to, I don't know, drive that point home, he posted this video that came out of the Oracle's executive chair, Safra cats openly boasting about supplying a secret scary technology to the Israeli government for their genocide in Gaza. So here is a video of that. You hit our website in an Arab country and you saw your entire screen filled with an Israeli flag which said not only we stand with Israel, We stand with our employees in Israel. We stand with the people of Israel.

We stand with the military establishment of Israel. There's a few things that we did that I really can't talk about, to be honest, because to advance the agenda for the Israeli military. But our teams did a lot. We have some really profoundly scary technology at Oracle, and we wanted to make sure that it was available for the effort. Let's just say that. No.

I was in the curiosity. Let's just, I don't want to, you know, tell tales at a shul. But we have some secret, scary technology. She's like giving away state secrets on the stage. Yeah, just on stage. Just letting everyone know that Oracle is directly creating killer role. robot dogs or whatever the fuck kind of technology she's talking about. You know the old, the old anti-Semitic stereotype of like the scheming Jew, you know, the fingers and all this kind of stuff?

Yeah, yeah. Is there something to it? It's not that Jews are the only villains in the world, though. But we're just the most on the, like, is there another people who, when they break bad, get, are, have no game about hiding it? Well, so here's the problem with this. We have some genuinely scary technology. The agenda of the Israeli. Who talks that way?

People who get it. Well, they just don't talk to anyone who's not them. I can't say it out loud, but it rhymes with schmenicide. No, but really, they just, they only talk to each other. You only ever see these clips I've noticed at this point at one of the millions of fucking blue background conferences. You know, in this case, we've got the freaking, what is this? This is the, uh, uh, uh. And I go in and I meet with everyone you to match.

This is the Israeli American Council YouTube channel. Oh, yeah, right. So, you know, they have this thing where it's like, you know, this is going to be on YouTube. Like, what do you want? Like, this is crazy. And on my way out, I run into, I don't know, five of my team who are all in uniform working. And to be honest with you, it's like my proudest. moment. So, you know, talking about this is Oracle. This is the company that Larry Ellison owns.

I can't do it anymore. And this is David Ellison's father, who is also, you know, this idea that David Ellison and Larry Elson, like, it is anti-Semitic to conflate the two is the most insane thing. And we're going to be reading a bunch of comments from people who are saying almost exactly that. But, you know, this is Oracle and outgrowth of the CIA. Yes. And so we're going to be reading a bunch of people who talk about conflating the skydance merger and consolidation with Oracle is somehow the height of anti-Semitism. First, we need to read what Ruffalo said about this in an Instagram statement. He wrote this, Orrtle.

is the company that Larry Ellison is using to fund his son David's Warner Brothers acquisition. These, quote, really profoundly scary technologies will most likely be merged into one of the largest media conglomerates in the world and one day used on you. Look how she reveals in what we now have come to see as a genocide. Oh, revels, excuse me, look how she revels in what we now have come to see as a genocide, which was built on an apartheid system of a genocide. oppression powered by Oracle. There is an old saying, the way you do one thing is the way you do everything. Well, he meant to say the way you Jew one thing is the way you Jew everything.

Well, then he really would be in trouble, Dan. From one of the biggest tech companies in the world, powering, from one of the biggest tech companies in the world, powering some of the most destructive and inhuman forces in the world. Why has Trump pushed this illegal merger through? Larry Ellison will own most of parabros. Larry is a classic oligarch. They are crushing workers and consolidating the wealth of the world for their own power and concentrated dominance. We have a chance to stop this. There are 12 state attorneys general suing to block this merger.

It will be catastrophic for our film industry. Hey, there was something in there, though. There was a trope. The pronoun for the collective Jewish people, plural, is they. And he used it. He said, their agenda. That's how we identify collectively, multiple of us. It's us. It's they, we, us.

They is the collective Jewish pronoun. If you use it, you're doing anti-Semitism. Damn. Who was that? Who was it a while ago who said, like, actually, like, if you are against capitalism, you are anti-Semitic? Yes. Who is that?

I can't even remember. I forget who said it, but it is. There's, like, Ena Vernikov or like, it was like one of like the like New York State. Yes. Raps or something. I can't remember exactly who, but that, I'm getting like big vibe that, those vibes right now. Yes. I mean the and they will say as much in some of the, you know, outcry against this because the rap reported a, a spokesperson for Paramount commenting.

on this. And he was immediately, Bruffalo was called anti-Semitic for this post. And Paramount spokesperson definitely chose his AI prompt, I mean words carefully. And here is that statement.

A Paramount spokesperson responded to the actor's remarks in an exclusive statement to the rap, saying that his scorched earth Instagram post was anti-Semitic and a bridge too far. Quote, we are always, we are, as always, troubled when anti-Semitic tropes are invoked in purported service of a business dispute.

Words like genocide and apartheid apply to a corporate transaction aren't just wrong, dash, dash. They're a bridge too far, and they cheapen the very real suffering those words are meant to describe the statement read. This doesn't deserve a response in kind, dash, dash. And to be clear, we don't tolerate prejudice of any kind against anyone. Israel cats, Israel's defense minister, went on to announce plans to bomb that bridge. The bridge too far is a housing terrorist, troops. We will be bombing it. Oh, we love to burn bridges too far.

So, I mean, first and foremost, it isn't just this, Endash. It's that. classic AI. So I love that Paramount spokesperson was just like, oh, I don't want a spokes today. Claude, can you spokes? I mean, honestly, like, I feel him. Yeah, I know. Sometimes I'm like, I would like to outsource this podcast to, you know, CHAPGT. Because how many times do I have to say the same thing about how many times? Yeah. It's like the same goddamn statements over and over again. But yeah, you know, they openly are calling him anti-Semitic, and this includes, you know, Jonathan Greenblatt also called him Antisemitic for this. But the crazy thing there, before you go to him, using, applying the words genocide and apartheid to a corporate transaction.

Like, just just unpack that for a second. First of all, it's not just any corporate transaction. It's like, it's not just, you know, it's not like, hey, advance us a little bit of money and we'll pay you back in the next quarter or whatever the fuck. corporations transact. It's a major media merger that will completely and further alter the landscape of global news, media, entertainment, everything, and directly affect the lives of millions, if not billions of people, right? And it has a military tie. I'm getting to that, right? The military technology, it's tied to it, right? And he didn't say this corporate transaction is genocide. He said, the people doing it are implicating.

in genocide. Yeah, the people funding it. Yeah, I'm sorry, the limited liability that being, that incorporating gives you the idea doesn't, doesn't include people not pointing to the other things you do. Yeah, that's right. You can't call me names. I'm an LLC. I'm not some, I'm not some fucking S-Corp that you could smear publicly. Yeah. Yeah, it is, it's, for me, I'm reading it going, this is a very carefully worded statement about the ties between Oracle, the very public ties between Oracle and the Israeli government, and between Oracle's Larry Ellison and his son David Ellison. And the way in which David Ellison's entire media venture has been funded by, of course, his fucking billionaire father. Like, are we kidding? And how they've spoken openly about the reason for existence.

Yes, yes. They're raised on the corporation. I mean how Larry Ellison is one of the biggest donors to friends of the IDF, like private donors that exist. Yes. And how they've been making a ton of post-October 7th propaganda basically. Like Sherry Redstone and the Ellisons have been very close in that project. Yeah, more for a circle. And you can see it coming, right?

Barry Weiss is going to be the president of Paramount. And like 30 years from now, she'll be sitting by her pool narrating the audio book. book to the Yidd stays in the picture. That's a great. That is a great Robert Evans reference. The kid stays in the picture, but he said the, Daniel, 10 out of 10. That's the joke. I haven't given you a 10 out of 10 in a while, but I loved that one.

Thanks, man. Yeah, so Mark Ruffalo was torn apart, not just by, of course, a spokesperson using chat GPT in a public statement in the entertainment press, but also by the Hesbarosphere here is Jonathan Greenblatt, head of the ADL, writes, The posts by Mark Ruffalo over the past 48 hours are cynical and sickening. Oppose the Paramount merger on the merits. Find, not the Likudes.

Find arguments grounded in fact and draw on what you know about the industry without engaging in anti-Semitic rhetoric. That's exactly what he's doing, asshole. Yes, you just literally named the thing he did. Yeah, introducing the Jewish state out of the blue when it's entirely unrelated. Okay, excuse me.

Fuck! I feel much better. Yes, sometimes you just got to let it out. When it's entirely unrelated, making baseless claims about Israel and then trying to avoid accountability by essentially claiming that some of my best friends are Jewish as gaslighting 101. Mark Ruffalo, your acting might be convincing on screen, but careless and hateful words like yours continue to put Jewish communities around the world at risk while anti-Semitic incidents are far too common. I'm, I for one, am afraid. Yeah, no, I mean, listen.

I'm terrified. I've never been more afraid in my life of, you know. Anti-Semitism is going Hulk mode. Can I actually, can I actually, like, try something out on you guys? I was like, what if we just like, what if like we actually just like ignore Jonathan Greenblatt? Like, what if we were just like, like, I don't know. It's like everyone hates him, like on all sides of this. Like literally the right, the left, the center.

Everyone hates him. No one thinks that he's, you know, he's like a fail son. Nobody thinks he's doing good job. What if we all just collectively were like, we're just not going to ever talk about it. We're just going to pretend he does not exist. Why are you trying to shut down our podcast area? That's right. Listen, it's my magazine too.

That's true. That's fair enough. It's my magazine too. And like, you know, technically we like report the news. So like we have to. But I'm just saying what if we were like he's not newsworthy? Like what if we literally were just like a rate like if we just like scrubbed him from the record? Honestly, I don't, I agree. Jonathan Greenblatt should not be normalized and doesn't have the right to exist. So I'm with you there. It's not call out culture. It's blood out culture. It's tune out culture. That's what we I'm just saying there's an argument to be made that he's actually not relevant anymore. I agree with you completely. We should start, you know.

Yeah. I agree with you completely. I, it's whenever I see him, uh, even on shows where you think he's going to, um, be, I don't know, uh, welcomed. He's never not challenged by whoever he's on with because everyone just collectively hates him. They're just like, this guy is the worst. He is just, uh, yeah, listen, Jonathan Greenblatt. Nobody thinks he's like talented or interesting or like literally no one. Yeah.

We need to start a campaign to exhume the bones of Abraham Foxman. I know, get Foxman. Listen, I would take Abe Foxman any day. Much more candid. Formidable adversary, you know, a real, someone real. Give me the fox. Not this fucking think water guy. Like, who is this guy?

Yeah. There is something a little water chestnut about him. There's a blandness almost like, you know, his face is that of silly putty pressed against a different thing. You know, it's like you put it silly putty against a newspaper and you can read the words of it. You know the caffeine water you can get now? Yeah. He's ambient water. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Heroin water, yeah. That's right. He's air-flavored LaCroix. So, like, everything about him is awful. It's always the power that he wields over this, you know, institution, the ADL. It's like he floats off the name. He's not the only one who went after him. First, let me read you a little bit of Mark Ruffalo's post.

Mark Ruffalo responded to these attacks against him, saying the accusation that I am anti-Semitic is appalling and fundamentally dishonest. Criticizing the actions of the Israeli Prime Minister and Military Technology Contract or the executives who supply it is not the same as criticizing Jewish people. This critical and necessary dialogue is then dishonestly framed as being anti-Israel. To be clear, my views come from my own political convictions. It should never be interpreted as hostility towards Jewish people for whom I have deep love and respect. Everything I know about acting activism and humanism has been profoundly shaped by the Jewish friends, colleagues, and loved ones who have been integral and family throughout every point of my life. So he was ripped apart for saying basically, I have Jewish friends. Um, jessman is saying we run the, we run the acting activism and humanism shaping industry.

That's right. Yeah, that's right. We're the puppets controlling the Ticcun Olam industry. But yeah, Jasper Nathaniel pointed out, you know, in a response to Jonathan Greenblatt's statement, um, introducing the Jewish state out of the blue when it's entirely unrelated to the Paramounts skydance merger. is sickening. And then he shows these images. One is David Ellison Skydance,

the official David Ellison account on Instagram writing, Skydance stands with Israel, strongly condemns the attacks against its citizens and is donating support to the victims of this tragic act of terrorism and praise for the safe release of the innocent

hostages. I stand with Israel. We will skydance again. Well, straight up. wrote Hamas is ISIS. They do not want a two-state solution. They want a final solution. The atrocities committed by Hamas on October 7th are not complicated. This is a barbaric evil plain and simple. More Jews were murdered on this state. Blah, blah, blah. So all of the, you know, all of the Hezbarra talking points that happened immediately after October 7. Finally, I want to point out Jonah Platt's response to this. My favorite boy.

Jonah Platt wrote, quote, I'm not anti-Jew. The majority of Jewish people and institutions tell me I am and explain precisely how my words and actions constitute obvious hate towards them. But since they're Jews, who I don't hate, they're wrong. And I, the guy who definitely doesn't hate Jews, is right. Hey, Evan Henson, come get your brother.

I know, man. This fucking guy. He's out of pocket. Jonah Platt always out here. I mean, you know, poor guy, he can't get a podcast guest to save his life. What are you going to do? The only, you know, you just get a Tishby over and over. I mean, he used to want to be an actor.

So this is how, this is the only way he can get real attention. Well, you know, and also he has to deal with, you know, being less talented than his more talented brother, less successful than his extremely successful Hollywood producer father. I mean, it's tough out there. I understand why people start podcast, Jonah. You know what? They need a play about this. Yes. Ooh.

They need a play. My idiot's son. This is a play. My idiot son. My idiot's son. By, you know, whatever Jonah Plaid's dad's name is, something plat. Mark, I believe. Deplatformed. Yes.

Deplatformed. Very good. And finally, I just want to play a little bit of Noah Tishby's reaction to this just because it's a hard watch because any Tishby is a hard watch. So everyone just, everyone just prepare yourself mentally. Mark Ruffalo is not anti-Semitic. Or at least, he doesn't think that he is. Let me tell you what happened. This week, Mark went after David Allison and oddly also his father, Larry Allison.

Oddly. Isn't that weird, guys? Where'd that come from? So weird. I don't even know. The Paramount Warner Brothers merger. He called Larry, who isn't even a part of the deal at all, a classic oligarch. And then he went on...

Excuse me. Did she just say oligarch? She did. Did she put the chah on oligarch? She did. I'll bet that's a tick. I bet she can't not. She's like data from Star Trek who can't do contractions.

Like she can't read C.H. I love that. Good luck, chuck. Wow. I'm actually never going to say it differently ever. Yeah, I want to say oligarch. Oligarch. Oligar.

Olligarch. Shohmer. Oh, yeah, chok. Oh, God. Guys, we're being chiledish right now. Sorry. All right. You're right.

All right. Let's continue. The deal at all, a classic oligarch. And then he went on this whole rant about Larry's company, Oracle has these profoundly scary technologies that one day will be used on you. Okay, look, I don't want to be patriarchal. but that works though but this woman needs to shut the fuck up

oh my god oh lord I like that she passed off scary technologies as Mark Ruffalo's phrase when actually it belongs to the Oracle CEO exactly like that's really that's that's Jeff's kiss right there scary techs

that's kiss I already have Pep's Steph's kiss sorry sorry holy fuck it is not his son and Oracle not a part of the at all. Do you say Larry Ellison is not his son? Wait, is not his son? He's saying Larry Ellison is not his son.

Like, okay. Larry Ellison is not my father. I am not my son. That's what it was. But I actually just missed that. Is that what she said? Yeah, she's saying Larry Ellison is not equivalent to.

Yes, exactly. Oh, I see. Sorry, sorry. Sorry. I get it. No, no. But I watched it too and I was just like, I'm having a stroke. Once again, Larry Allison is not his son and Oracle, not a part of the deal at all.

In response, not true. I'm sorry, but like pretending as if these are two totally, um, uh, separate sources of money, pretending that the, uh, Larry and David are not, not just related, but also share bank accounts. Like, you got to be fucking kidding me. Financing backed with Oracle equity is exactly right. So pretending it's not. is just, I mean, it's ridiculous. Not issued a statement saying that they're troubled to see

anti-Semitic tropes invoked in a business dispute. Oh, so that's an important part to note too. She also denies the statement itself. Once again, Larry Allison is not his son and Oracle, not a part of the deal at all. In response, Paramount issued a statement saying that they're trouble to see anti-Semitic tropes invoked in a business dispute.

But Mark, double down. He put out a whole statement telling us that some of his friends, his best friends, in fact, are actually Jewish. Mark, that is not a defense. Nobody has called you an anti-Semite. Paramount said that you're invoking anti-Semitic tropes and the fact that you're thinking... Oh, nobody?

The weirdest part is she's... You just did! You just did! The beginning of the video is saying that he is anti-Semitic, but he doesn't think he is. See that? That's exactly the problem. That's Israeli prison guard bullshit. Like, nobody's calling you a terrorist. Yeah.

Why are you denying it? Yeah, yeah, straight up. I mean, to, it is, it's just mind-blowing. It's mind-numbing. It makes you want to explode to say, no one's calling you anti-Semitic. These people didn't call you anti-Semitic. When the article itself, the rap in discussing the statement, said Mark Ruffalo was, quote, anti-Semitic according to the statement.

It's just everyone knows to interpret you are doing anti-Semitism as you are anti-Semitic. Stop pretending as if those are distinct things. And then you're going to immediately go on and call him anti-Semitic in the next sentence. They hate Jewish individuals in order to promote dangerous age-old anti-Semitic tropes about the Jews. Things like Jewish billionaires,

Israel, shadowy technology, secret control over the world's biggest media companies, insinuations about No, it's not shadowy technology. It's scary technology. Yeah. And general bloodthirstiness. Sometimes anti-Semitism is like water to a fish.

So actually, I believe you. I do. I think that you think that you're not anti-Semitic. It just subconsciously makes sense to you. All of it. The genocide lie, the father and son connections. This is the new thing, the genocide lie. You guys have been tracking this.

I just had started becoming aware of the genocide, quote, genocide lie. This like went out in. the like memo, you know, everybody got that memo now. So now it's the genocide lie. The genocide lie. Yeah, that's the phrase. I can already see the fucking book cover. Power. Yeah, it's just like that. Poof. Just like that. You're entangled in the exact same anti-Semitic tropes of the last thousands of years. But no one called you an ex-Semite. It's your subconscious biases against Jews. It's the subconscious belief, actual belief, The Jews are just too powerful.

So she is doing this song and dance about you, he is now anti-Semitic because he was defending himself against being called anti-Semitic, which she's reading as like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, hey, who said anything about anti-Semitic? We said you said some things that were anti-Semitic. No, no, you're entangled. You're fully entangled in anti-Semitic tropes. You got caught in that net. The only thing that's true about that is you should never defend yourself against. Like ultimately, I'm not saying you shouldn't.

But the minute you, I mean, it's interesting to see Norman Finkelstein sitting down with Jeremy Corbyn the other day because Norm, I haven't watched it, but I wonder if Norm said to him in person, what he's always said is that Corbyn fucked up by apologizing and, you know, coutowing and bowing to it and then denying it.

The minute you deny it, you're playing into their game. Right. I mean, it's, and you get entangled. You do get entangled in it. The minute you start even denying it, because then you're going to be bound to sayings,

or like Abdul Al-Sayed just did by disclaiming how something Hassan Piker said, right? The minute you try to meet them in the middle, there is no middle. It's, you know, it's stuck between a rock and a hard place for more, for most public figures is a thing because he uh to not respond i think is it's certainly my

reaction to this stuff because i'm like i don't need to put out a fucking public statement for every time i make fun of israelis that i'm not anti-semitic you know um but these public figures they live in a reality in which like the media is going to paint them over and over again as an anti-Semite and them, you know, needing to respond to it. I mean, you've seen that with the, the Hassan Piker thing is fascinating because it doesn't matter how many times you can contextualize whatever statement about, you know, America deserved 9-11. You're still going to get asked by every single journalist that you are talking to about that statement because it doesn't matter that you already contextualized it and talked about it and even apologize for it. You are now,

once again made to apologize for it. So I think he did have to say something, but I just, the thing that I object to, and also like I, I'm like kind of on the fence about the Corbyn thing. Like, I actually think there was a way of being able to handle that, like, early on that didn't seed too much ground, but actually just recognized like British society as an anti-Semitic European society and like just recognized that it existed across the spectrum and then moved on, you know? Like, like, I think, like, some of the way that it was not acknowledged was also toxic and some of the way that it was acknowledged was toxic.

There's like, there was kind of like a sweet spot and I don't think he had good enough advisors, but whatever, that's my hot take. But in this case, it's the Jewish friends thing. It was kind of like, you don't need to do that. Like, you don't need to do that. Like, like, stick to your guns. Like, you said what you said. Like, like, further illuminate the, the nuances of what you said, but stay on point. Or don't. Or just do this.

That's not what I said. You know that's not what I said. Anyone can go back and look at what I said and fact check it. It has nothing to do with Jews. Shut the fuck up. Right. Miss me with this. Miss me with this tropes bullshit where you can read into words like oligarch and decide,

oh, you're talking about Jews, where you can read into the pronoun they and think, oh, you're talking about Jews. Where you can act like nepotism is a Jewish thing. Right. Like who's the one connecting Jews with capitalism. Yeah. Right. And with oligarchs, like now they are, you know.

Right. Yeah. Like stop doing that. Yes, exactly. But they know this. They don't care. I will say Mark Ruffalo is one of those people who gets, uh, gets smeared a lot in, uh, the Hezbarra press for his, uh, solidarity with Palestinians, for his statements against Israel.

And sometimes when he backtracks and apologizes for it, he will get shit from pro-Palestine people. In general, my thoughts are this. Mark, keep on, keeping on. I know you watch this podcast. I don't know for a fact, but I mean, come on. What else is there? And you are doing great work.

Keep fighting the good fight. And come on the show and let us praise you in person. Yeah, call on the show. By the way, quit your stuff. He goes on like, fuck it. He goes on to tail. It won't go on this show. That's some bullshit. Exactly. You have 24 hours. Did you see that a bunch of

fellow Marvel actors put out a statement? Like a lot of them supporting him. I think this was real, like including Benedict Cumberbatch and Ian McKellen and, you know, a lot of, you know, of course, who didn't was Robert Danny Jr.

Gwyneth Paltrow, like his fellow Avengers didn't didn't come to avenge, you know. But there were a lot who did. Good, good, good, good. We know he's not an anti-Semite. Right. Well, did you guys see Gwyneth Paltrow's amazing commercial for television?

Yes, for real estate. Yeah, we covered it. Very much. And then she recently held an AI, like a Sam Altman fundraiser or information session in the Hamptons about the miracles of AI. She's killing it. She's really cool.

I love Goop. I got my vaginal candle right here. I got my jade egg. And you know what? It's really doing wonders for my yoni. Sorry, everyone. So lastly, we have one more piece of Hasbara. Daniel, I have not seen this video.

You sent it to me. Can you tell me a little bit about this? Well, we've been talking on the show about, do you know what we're talking about? Have you seen this? Yes. Yeah, yeah. So we've been talking to the show about the advent of, you know, there's woke one, woke two, bullshit. There's Hasbara 2.0 that's now in its new phase, which is trying to just be a little more sanitized, a little more, a little hipper, you know, a little more down to earth.

And less, because everyone knows that Hasbara has gone bad. It's broken bad, and that's why we have a show. That's right. But this is like what we're about to see feels like Hasbara 2.5 to me or maybe 3.0. It's signaling a new thing. Yeah. Which is, well, let's just watch it and you tell me what you think. Okay.

This is an Israeli-American woman, sipping, for those who aren't watching, just listening, sipping a big old Starbucks iced drink. Okay. And just, you know, hanging, hang in. hang in and relating and offering a take. I love I love to be relaxed and chill. Let's do it. Yeah. Hey, Jewish community. I'm about to see something

really controversial, so if this gets you upset, apologize in advance. I think we as a collective, we as a community, we need to stop talking about Zora Mom Dutney. I'm going to be so real. I'm going to be so for real because I understand, I understand that he is Israel. I understand he wants to arrest Bibi Nantanayahu, but B'i Nantanahu, comparing him to Ayatollah Kamiini,

it's a little much. It's a little dramatic. He's a mayor. He's a mayor. Sometimes when we ascribe importance to someone that's not that important, we make them more important with our words. It's almost like, my Jonathan Greenblatt. That's true. Me and her, man. Yeah, when you're right, you're right. You're right.

That's right. Someone about your access on the internet, like, you keep talking about them. You're never going to forget them. And they're actually irrelevant. I love this. You know, Mandani's just like that anti-Semitic X you had who's still on there and you're still vague, vague booking about them. and you should just like

You're better than this Yeah you can get over this Find a new man You make them more relevant And sometimes it feels like the obsession with On Donnie And sometimes it's warranted like the rest Video was freaking insane

Like the chill vibes The chill girl vibes are just a little She's not quite nailing The chill cadence Well look at the eyes here Yeah yeah yeah That's not chill eyes This is the Israeli

version of chill vibes. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Less like his hatred of Mdani and more than it's just his lomophobia. Like, if I'm just going to be dropping. Like, some of you all have never been on a college campus, and you don't realize

that the entire world kind of hates Israel. And he's a Muslim millennial. Like, he's just a millennial. Like, I was in... He's just a millennial. You just said he was Muslim millennials. Seems like it'd be very specific about that. New York City the other week,

and I thought it was really... what she loves new york city she stood in line for a proanette okay my nervous system has never felt that regulated all my years in is real please don't kill me listen i stand a queen i love her yeah hey you know what she's she's making she's making uh some she's got points she's got points you know here's the the funny thing about this is she concedes to the we all know that Mamdani hates Israel. You know, she concedes that almost like, yes, everything you're saying about Mamdani is right.

He is an anti-Semite. He hates Israel. He, you know, wants to free the Palestinians to do crimes against humanity against us. But also, maybe we could focus on something else for a bit. And I'm like, honestly, strategically valid. Exactly. And that's why I'm calling it Hasbara 2.5, because what it is basically saying, and it is a very, it's got something very Israeli about it. Israelis are not, most of them, fundamentally hateful. They're fundamentally indifferent.

They're callous and they're aloof and they couldn't care less. Loech padli, right? I don't care. Get that away from me. Why are you bothering? You know, Tauff me, Meni, I don't care. Get this away from me. And what she's essentially saying, I think, is quite adjacent to, she's saying, okay, he's a Muslim millennial, he hates Israel. What does it bother us? We don't care. It's actually equivalent to, okay, let's say it's a genocide. Or the world hates us. The world hates us. Well, why should we care that the world hates us? Just chill. Don't make it worse. It's a genocide. Okay, it's a genocide. Okay, so it's a genocide. So what, you know what I'm saying, Ariel, do you recognize this trait in Israeli society?

Yeah, no, I totally recognize it. And so Israeli zoomers. I mean, I also think, no, I mean, I also think what she's saying is, like, I just went to New York and it was chill. Like, I had a good time. Like, I just hung out with my friends and none of this affected me. And like, I mean, it's crazy. Like, you do go into certain spaces when you leave New York City and people are just like, oh, you're in New York City with that mom, Donnie. Are you experiencing anti-Semitism? Like, like, it's like, like, no, but that's real. Like, that's happening in a lot of the communities that this woman is in, you know? And she's like, I just went to New York City and, like, had brunch and, like, made out with a guy. at a club. Like, no, actually. Right. You know. And she's saying you're making us look bad by being histrionic about it. Totally. Why don't you just chill out? We're actually fine. And that to me is a very interesting new line of... I'm with it. I'm not even sure it's Hasbara. I'm not even kidding. I'm against it. Like I you're against it. I think it, I think it augurs a new kind of Hasbara is what I'm saying. I'm against it because it is a direct attack on this. I'm against it. I'm against it. because it is a direct attack on this show.

If people... Yeah, if they're too chill. If they're too chill, then what do we? What do we do? You know? Like, that's... You got to meet their chill. What makes this show work is the fact that they're not chill.

The fact that they do openly want to drone strike, Ms. Rachel. It's pronounced Hill. They're not being killed. Zionists have no Hill. They have no Hill. If she wants to import Hill into Zionism, and Zionism, we're fucked. Yeah, yeah, that's true.

I don't want Hasbara to change, okay? Never change. I want never change, Hasbara, because I need you exactly the way you are because without it, what it even is this podcast. You know what I mean? You know what I'm saying? But also, yeah, everyone meets the hill. I think that's been a podcast.

What do you guys think? Yeah. Absolutely. You know. Ariel Angel, thank you so much for coming on Bad Hasbara. Thank you guys for having me. Former editor in Kif. Yeah.

Yes. Oh my God. Were you saving that? No, it just came to me. It just came. Where can people find you, follow you, anything to pluck? I would just say, subscribe to Jewish Currents. Jewish Currents.org.

And, you know, if you're a podcast listener, you can definitely find on the nose. I host that every week. I think our last episode was Keanga Yamada Jones and Alex Kane talking about the idea that black voters hate Gaza and socialism, which is not true. So check that out. And actually the last one was on birthright, but the one before that. Yeah. Well, it's a great podcast and it's a great magazine. We're going to have links in the description for people to subscribe and people to follow and all of that stuff.

again, Ariel, thank you. It was a pleasure speaking with you. Thank you, guys. And thanks to everyone out there for listening slash watching another episode of Bad As Barra, the World's Most Moral Podcasts. Patreon.com slash badassbarra. Baddha, gmail.com for all your questions, comments and concerns. All right, everyone. Thanks again so much for listening. And until next time, from the river to the sea. Don't Khuz Jew hate. Who's oligarchy. Oh, man. Oh, no. We did it.