Call Me Back - with Dan Senor - Dan's State of World Jewry Address - Part II

Episode Date: May 19, 2025

Watch Call me Back on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@CallMeBackPodcastSubscribe to Ark Media’s new podcast ‘What’s Your Number?’: lnk.to/HJI2mXFor sponsorship inquiries, please contact: [e-mail] contact us, sign up for updates, and access transcripts, visit: https://arkmedia.org/Ark Media on Instagram: http://instagram.com/arkmediaorgDan on X: https://x.com/dansenorDan on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dansenorI have been moved by the reaction to my speech at the annual State of World Jewry Address in the last episode. In Part II of that evening at the 92nd Street Y, I sat down with Rabbi David Ingber, following my address, for a conversation. Rabbi Ingber picked up on some of the ideas in my talk…to probe some more…and push me on several of the issues I raised. Rabbi Ingber is the Senior Director for Jewish Life and Senior Director of the Bronfman Center at 92NY. He also serves as the founding rabbi of Romemu. He serves on the faculty for the Wexner Heritage Program and the Shalom Hartman Institute of North America and Israel. Rabbi Ingber is also the host of the “Detours & Destinations” podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/detours-destinations/id1809796304

You are listening to an Art Media Podcast. It's 10 p.m. on Sunday, May 18th here in New York City. It is 5am on Monday, May 19th in Israel as Israelis start their day and anticipate the possibility of or even movement on a new hostage ceasefire deal. Over the past 24 hours, there has been a lot of press reporting in Israel about a possible deal or near deal To include anything from the release of up to 10 hostages for temporary ceasefire perhaps for 40 to 60 days or the release of all hostages and Hamas having to leave Gaza as an end to the war. At this point the possibilities range between no

ceasefire all the way to an end to the war. So while we are eager to report on these developments we also don't want to rush to report on what so far appears to be just rank speculation. After all you'll recall last week's histrionic news reports for those listening I'm putting news reports in quotes that President Trump would be meeting Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in Riyadh or That President Trump would agree or acknowledge Saudi Arabia's condition for Palestinian statehood as part of any Normalization deal with Israel none of these things wound up happening

Now a lot did happen in the Middle East last week and we do believe something may happen in these hostage deal negotiations so rest assured we are monitoring events closely and we will drop an episode on all of this as soon as there is something we believe that warrants analysis even if it's not on our regular schedule. One thing we know is that during a cabinet meeting today Prime Minister Netanyahu approved resumption of humanitarian aid into Gaza. The Prime Minister's office issued a statement saying that, quote, This was the recommendation of the IDF and due to the operational need to enable the expansion of intense fighting to defeat Hamas." And the IDF's operations into Gaza, its military operations, have been moving forward while negotiations are taking place in Doha.

And it does appear that the IDF successfully killed Mohammed Sinwar last week in an underground command compound below the European hospital where he had been sheltering. Mohammed Sinwar was the de facto leader of Hamas in Gaza, the successor to his brother, Yichia Sinwar, the architect of October 7th. And so, while President Trump was in the Sunni Gulf last week, the IDF, at the same time, seems to have been systematically pursuing a strategy

of knocking off what remains of Hamas's leadership. So keep your eyes and ears open for an emergency episode in the next couple of days. In the meantime, I have been moved by the reaction to my speech at the annual State of World Jewry address, which we played in the last episode. If you haven't listened to it, highly recommend you do listen to our last episode

of Call Me Back. In part two of that evening, which was at the 92nd Street Y, I sat down with Rabbi David Ingber, following my address for a conversation where he picked up on some of the ideas from my talk to probe some more, and to push me on some of the issues I raised.

Rabbi Ingber is the Senior Director for Jewish Life and the Senior Director of the Bromfman Center at 92 New York, 92nd Street Y. He also serves as the founding rabbi of Ramamu, a congregation on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. And he serves on the faculty for the Wexner Heritage Program and the Shalom Hartman Institute of North America and Israel. Finally, Rabbi Ingber is the host of the podcast

called Detours and Destinations, which is hosted by the 92nd Street Y, and you can find that podcast wherever you get your podcast. We'll link to it in the show notes. Rabbi Ingber is one of the most thoughtful and one of the most contrarian thinkers I know, and he's one of my teachers, so made this conversation especially interesting. I hope you'll enjoy it.

The State of World Jury at the 92nd Street Y, Part 2. This is Call Me Back. So I want to begin with thanking your wife for giving you the time to work so hard on that. Amazing. You know what she said? She said that she now has a sense for what it's like at your home before Colnay Dray. Yeah. Exactly. So she says like it's a lot of work working on a preparing.

Rabbi's like state of the world jury every high holiday, that's what we do. Exactly. Well, you know, I think for a lot of us tonight, through a curveball, I think a lot of us were expecting you to come out, Deanna, and talk about what you usually talk about, what's in your barely, like in your, you know, your sweet spot. And you took us on a journey, an unexpected journey. Israel in your mind at this moment, counter-intuitively is super strong.

Having come out of this hellacious last couple of years and continuing with some 58 of our hostages still there, but still you left that and moved from what my friend Rabbi Michel Tzion used to call the two Zion's, like the Zion right in Israel and Zion here, and you brought us on a journey into a much scarier proposition, which is the strength of North American Jewish life in the aftermath

of 10-7 and 10-8. You're not alone in signaling and raising this banner. This has been like part of the Jewish community's struggle for a number of years, decades, assimilation, acculturation, accommodation, all of those. Why tonight did you focus all of our energies here in our communities? And why did you raise those alarm bells for us?

Soon after October 7th, there was an event in New York for raise money for one of the volunteer efforts. And they had brought in, it was Israelis living in New York who were raising money for these relief efforts. And they had brought in the Israelis for their guest speaker, Lior Ross, the star of Fowda, the co-creator of Fowda, and he and I met while he was in for that to get together and I said, how are you doing? How are you holding up? And he said, how am I? How are you? And I was like, what do you mean? He's like, we're gonna be okay. I mean, we're shattered.

We're at war, but you're under attack. And Israelis were watching what's happening here. And it's the first time they had ever seen the diaspora under siege like that. I think it's the first time Israelis had really thought what it means, you know, Michal Biton, that's what people would, I think it worked both ways. I think the Israelis were looking at us saying,

we're under siege. And then I rattled off for him all the different things that we were doing, the different advocacy efforts and the rallies and the da, da, da, da. And you could just tell he was, there was something missing, like that's not, that's important and I'd still believe it's important. But as I was talking, I was listening to myself

and thinking, this is not enough. And then another conversation I hear a lot. It's not one of the ones I mentioned in my list of most popular questions I get. But I often hear from parents who say, my kid's on a college campus, there are basically pogroms on the campus, and my kid doesn't care.

Meaning he's not sympathetic to the anti-Israel protesters. He's just ambivalent, he's apathetic, he just doesn't care. They're like perplexed that this could be. You know, once I start asking questions, it's very clear that this kid was not raised with anything Jewish. And what I mean by anything Jewish is they didn't get the joy of Judaism. They weren't raised with the ritual and the community and the literacy that comes with living somewhat of a Jewish life, which is what I call the upside of Judaism.

So if you never had the upside of Judaism, then when Judaism is under siege, don't blame a kid for not wanting to stick his or her neck out to defend Israel or defend the Jewish community. And it just became increasingly, I'll tell you one other image that I have in my mind. So I should say it because it's such a, the story of the subway I told in the beginning of the speech. The story of the subway, if you're a Zionist, you know, get off the train. The corollary to that is another one of my favorite subway images that was flying around social media, which was Eshi Rebo, you know Eshi Rebo, the orthodox Jewish pop star, rock star in Israel. He came to perform at Madison Square Garden. And after the concert, there were all these Jews, like, just that had taken,

literally taken over the subways in a good way, not in a bad way. And they were all wearing yarmulkes, you know, singing the songs in unison. Loud and proud. Loud and proud. It was pure joy. And I was thinking as I watched it,

these are kids who have been raised with a sense, like a real Jewish identity, the real, like the real core. And of course, it wouldn't be surprising that those are the kids who are likely who are gonna go out there and defend Israel from unfair criticism. So I just look at like the people who are sticking their necks out,

they're the ones who've lived the most rich Jewish lives. It's something I've experienced, not necessarily like the kids who are at the Yishai Rebo concert, but I've just seen what a Jewish life, and not as observant as yours, I should say. Wait a second, wait a second. Okay, okay. No, but I've just. Wait a second. Wait a second. OK. OK.

No, but I've just seen what Shabbat has done for our family. How it fortifies and strengthens. I've seen what being part of a real Jewish community has done. I've seen what the Jewish, the Hebrew calendar has done for our family. I have watched when people are in mourning what Judaism, that they're like the best technology invented in Judaism for how to comfort people. I see how I try to make sense of the world often

by these ancient texts that can inform how we think about the world. You know, like I see these, I see kids, the most amazing thing is we develop kids Jewishly until they turn 13. And then at 13 we say, okay, you're done. You're done, you had your Bar Mitzvah and you're done. No more Jewish education.

And you actually turn off the faucet at the exact time that young people are most primed to learn. And what happens is, I'm always struck when I talk with kids and they're like, oh, I'm taking this great Eastern philosophy class at Northwestern University. And I'm so moved, and it's gotten me to think. So smart, and so much wisdom there.

And I'm thinking, do you realize you are inheriting the most incredible philosophy, the most amazing texts? And so we need to keep fighting the fight against anti-Semitism. But the biggest victory after anti-Semitism, if that's what everyone is so focused on, is to Continue to lead a flourishing Jewish life at scale and that to me is the ultimate antidote to this period so

I mean I I mean I have to pinch myself to like this moment a shekhi on a moment is a blessing Having arrived this moment, a Shekhyanah moment is a blessing for having arrived at this moment. Here we are talking about the state of world Jewry and we're essentially talking about things that rabbis and educators have been saying for decades, which is like rabbis have been saying, how do we get people more involved Jewishly? Like it's Chabad is incredible, they do incredible work in the world, but what about other alternatives to kind of positive Jewish engagement? Essentially you're doubling down on like negative identity formation is one thing. You know, the famous philosopher, American, actually Canadian and Israeli philosopher, David Hartman,

Rabbi David Hartman spoke of two polarities in Jewish life. Auschwitz, kind of negative Jewish identity formation based on anti-Semitism and that which the world kind of refuses to let us forget, be Jewish. And then the other polarity, which is Sinai, the notion of revelation and positive possibilities and wisdom and all the technologies that you're referring to. So I'm just amazed to hear us speaking about positive Jewish identity as the great bulwark against the madness.

Against the madness. Against the madness against the madness again I'm a Jew but that's the Jewish ideas have often been the bulwark against the irony that's happening in the last two years which is like we just at least have to note it here that the Jewish community spent literally hundreds upon hundreds of millions of dollars on birthright Israel and put all our eggs into the Israel basket and thank God we did did. How many, literally how many thousands by thousands of young people were influenced positively

by being able to walk, as you said, in a Gap year or an experience of birthright. But what we didn't do effectively was birthright Judaism. What we didn't do effectively to what you're saying is create a kind of, when you come back here into the assimilated universe of America, of North American Jewish life, we need to buy you a one-year synagogue membership.

I mean, we need to talk about synagogues at all. Maybe that's a good thing, because you belong to mine. So I understand why we're not talking about it. Well, can I say, you're right, I agree with that. I would also add another area we have spent an exorbitant amount of money on, and you and I have talked about this, Dara Horn has written extensively about this, is on Holocaust education, which I don't want to say it's totally failed, but you cannot think of a single period of history behind which more government

and philanthropic dollars have been expended than trying to educate the public about the Shoah. Now in terms of countering Holocaust denial, at least having that record is important. But the lessons of the Shoah, it's clear, I mean it's really clear that as I cite a Kanye West song that's called Hail Hitler, I mean, I can just, the language of this moment is all Holocaustian. What bothers me about it is we've, Jewish education about how to teach non-Jews about Judaism

has been so focused on the Holocaust, it's as though we have left people to believe that the totality of Jewish history happened between 1933 and 1945. And then nothing happened after after nothing happened before. So you wonder why we have these ridiculous debates, ridiculous debates, indulge ridiculous debates about whether or not Israel has a right to exist. I mean, it's a very interesting thing, right? We don't say that about any other country, right? We have problems with Iran's policies,

we have problems with Turkey's policies, we have problems with China's policies. No one ever says we need to discuss whether or not China has a right to exist, right? And yet with Israel we indulge this, we get into it, we're like well there was the Peel Commission and then there was this, and we like indulge this conversation. As if it's still up for grabs. Exactly, which is like, that's a really interesting conversation, you may want to share it with the 10 million Israelis, because if Israel doesn't have a right to exist, where do these people go?

And the overwhelming majority of diaspora Jews who, according to survey after survey, self-identify as Zionists. So what does it mean for them? But we indulge this debate, I think, in part because we really do act like Jewish history kind of ended at 1945 and then we're here and now we're in Gaza. And so like that's, and we've completely, Horn, I think, Darhorn made this analogy to the African American History Museum in Washington, D.C. Because imagine the African American History Museum

was you just walked in and it was just like the history of slavery and you left. Right? Right? They don't do that. And yet we don't spend time educating people about the entirety of Jewish history and I and we don't do with Jews either right and that's that that's the let I mean the living Museum is is this is the cedar the prayer book right the living museum is walking into a synagogue or into a Jewish center and seeing

Hebrew and seeing a mezuzah I mean a mezuzah is itself the most profoundly important expression of our Jewish story, our Jewish history, who we are, what our values are. And so we're living it. And so your call to more positive engagement is really profound. I just want to-

Can I ask you a question? I'm sorry, I know. I've been talking for a while and I normally used to ask the question. But I want one more question before you ask me a question. Okay, fine. Okay. Because- It's like I'm out of my comfort zone and I normally used to ask the question. But I want one more question before you ask me a question. Okay, fine. Because it's like I'm out of my comfort zone. I know, I know.

It's like you have to actually interview somebody. Yeah. Like you get like a withdrawal. Anyone. Can I interview anybody? Yeah. Finally people were asking me before if they could come up and interview them. So you know there was a joke in my family that went something like this.

The you know this mother comes to the rabbi of the community and says, you know, rabbi, you have to do something. My son is at home and he's studying Torah all day and praying all day and it's scaring us. And the rabbi said, well, you know, Mrs. Goldberg, what's the, you know, says, no rabbi, it's really all day, all night, all day, all night,

the whole thing. He says, I don't understand. That's a mitzvah. It's a spiritual commandment. It's a practice. And so then Mrs. Goldberg said, That's a mitzvah. It's a spiritual commandment. It's a practice. And so then Mrs. Goldberg said, no, but Rabbi, really, it's a bit too much. And she said, listen, finally, the Rabbi says, listen, Mrs. Goldberg, I don't understand. That's what I do.

That's my life. That's my living. That's how I make... And she said, no, but Rabbi, Rabbi, he means it. So the question is, you kind of touched on it earlier about observance or whatever it is. Is there a point where there's a fear that blocks or obstructs people from engaging in Jewish life? Is it that there is, because there's so much out there now that's so uplifting.

Is one of the obstacles that we have to address, which is that there's kind of like the patina or maybe the more overt, like don't become too Jewish. Is that a thing? You know, people like, you know, I would go to synagogue, but then people would start saying, I'm religious, or if I learn or if I go, you know, Dan Loeb's challenge, you know, that might be too much.

Yeah. I have friends who say this to me. Yeah, I'm with you But Jewish dates too much Jewish day school, you know, you know, it's Jewish camp, right, right My response to that is basically the following if you're basic if you're saying that you want your child to be out in the world and you want your child to be Worldly and and not boxed in, if that's the way you look at it. I respect that.

But at least teach them about where they're from and what they're rooted in. Let them be literate. Help them be literate, Jewishly. And then let them go out in the world. And at least they kind of know where they come from. And then they can think about being engaged in the world but you know the there's a I think it's time put up who is

His is amazing story in this God of the no Mtsion hug a dog we use where he talks the analogy He gives of these people who just want their kids to be worldly and just go out and they don't want them to is He says it's like rowing from the shoreline and never knowing where the shoreline is And if you put a kid in a boat and say, go row, and just be out there, but we're never gonna tell you where the shoreline is, they're just gonna be out there and they're probably gonna get lost and be lost. And it's okay to be out in the world, but you wanna look back to the shoreline and say, I just wanna remember where I'm from.

Give kids the tools, that's all I'm arguing for. Give them the tools to decide what they wanna be engaged in Jewishly, what they don't wanna be engaged with Jewishly, and what they don't wanna be engaged with Jewishly. And if you're not engaged with Jewishly, Give kids the tools. That's all I'm arguing for. Give them the tools to decide what they want to be engaged in Jewishly, what they don't want to be engaged with Jewishly. I mean, my kids have been educated Jewishly.

Now, I have no idea, and I hope they're gone by now. I have no idea what kind of Jewish lives they're going to live. But at least I know they can make informed decisions. And that's what I'm arguing for So speaking of informed decisions and tools This is the last question then you can ask me whatever you want But we all know the phenomena of kids who go through Jewish day schools and camps and other programs and actually do have

thick Jewish identities Who'll say turn around in the last two years and say you weren't honest with us You know You didn't teach us the Palestinian narrative and and here I am exposed, and I'm exposed to a narrative that I don't know how to counter. What can we do to help those kids? And what do we say to those kids? Well, first of all, Jewish students should learn the Palestinian narrative.

I mean, I want them to be informed about these different narratives they're going to encounter in the world. So I don't think there should be putting them in like this complete like, you know, little silo where they can't understand how Israel's critics, how Israel's enemies, or how people who have to live either next to Israel or in Israel are who they are. I mean, we should have those tools. Young Jews should have those tools. But I think that's different from this incredible fixation with Jewish kids, some of whom have come out of Jewish day schools, who wind up becoming fierce critics of Israel. And the reason I think there's this insane fixation on them,

and we are falling into Hamas's trap when we fixate on them, right? Because if you go to these rallies, I mean, I've told this one student we know who was a Heschel kid who's at Harvard now, and he said, it's the most unbelievable thing, like the Students for Justice in Palestine would hold these rallies on campus,

and they'd start every rally with a Jewish student speaking. Now he says there was always just like four Jewish students or three who were there But they managed to project this like outsized presence of the Jews involved with the criticism of Israel by the way my as a Jew Right as a Jew right no yes as a Jew my favorite was recently One of the I think it may have been Jewish voices for peace. I can't remember what one of the Jewish organized Jewish organizations. It's critical of Israel, the Twitter handle, the Twitter account of that organization, the person who's running the Twitter account accidentally was

posting something on behalf of the account, but he accidentally posted something from his own account. It was intended to be, it was clear he was running the account, but he accidentally, and he was, I think he was someone from Students for Justice in Palestine. I mean, he was literally like, they're running these groups. So, I think we have a tendency to fix it on these organizations and these Jews who are struggling. If Jews are struggling with Israel, of course they should struggle with Israel.

And we should have debates, and they should know that Israel is a real country. And real countries do stupid things. And real countries' politicians make mistakes. A real country that's been at war for a year and a half that's had over a thousand of its citizens, like the equivalent of like 40 plus thousand Americans slaughtered, and at its peak close to 10,000 in proportionate terms to the US, 10,000 Americans, the equivalent, being held in tunnels in Gaza, that a government dealing with that is of course going to lose some of its innocence

and a country will lose some of its innocence. That's okay, that's normal. It's a real country. And kind of wrestling with that is fine. But arguing that students who got a Jewish education and it was too pro-Israel and weren't exposed to the other side, and therefore we've kind of like left them unmoored.

But you will say this though, that the first time a Jewish student hears the Palestinian narrative should not be on the quad. I agree. Right, right. So, okay. Okay, shoot. Okay. We have three minutes so it's perfect.

Two things. Now we may go over a minute. So why is he going to have it's perfect. Two things. Now, we may go over a minute. The Y's going to have a heart attack. Two things. One, I heard your little comment there about synagogues. And I thought a lot about whether or not to talk about synagogues in this speech. And I can tell you a little prickly

that I didn't mention synagogues. No, not at all. I deliberately did not talk about synagogues because I think if you did not grow up with it, davening in a synagogue is one of the hardest things to learn as an adult in Judaism. And I realized so much of my comfort in a synagogue is because I am just, there's a familiarity to it,

there's a rhythm to it, there's a cadence to it that is like, I'm instantly at home. And if you didn't grow up with any of it, and I saw this through my wife's eyes, who's converted to Judaism, and by the way, the one synagogue she actually fell in love with was yours, which is why we're members. It's a very hard thing to do. And I don't want to, my message is get more involved with Jewish life and get immersed in it. And I want to advocate for the things

that I think will have the best shot of hooking people. And therefore I think gap year in Israel, sending your kid to a Jewish state school, going to a Jewish camp, adult Jewish learning, the lobes, whatever. I think there are plenty of things, I don't want people to feel like they gotta be in the synagogue right away

because I think that will not help expand our ranks. My... Yeah, sorry. This poor guy. This poor guy. There's a question at the end of it. Yeah, no, no, no. You're on the front lines of this stuff.

My question basically is, no, really, you're on the front lines. I know you didn't expect me to talk about what I talked about. We talked about that before the speech. When I told you what I was going to talk about, you were about. We talked about that before the speech when I told you what I was gonna talk about. You were like, I thought you were gonna do Israel geopolitics, but you're on the front lines of communal Jewish life.

So what are you seeing now? What trends, what are your challenges? What are the opportunities you see? A lot of questions there. I mean, first of all, I think that I and appreciate, and I mentioned David Hartman earlier and the Shalom Hartman Institute has been a major player in many, in many, in many spaces that I've been in over the last, you know, three decades. And they specifically pedagogically placed the Beit Mein Drash, the study hall, at the center of their conversation. So how do we engage people in the richness of Jewish texts

and their relevance, not just kind of their archaic relevance, but their actual relevance in day-to-day living and in framing questions of import that are still animating our lives. So placing the Beit Midrash, the study hall, at the center, as opposed to the synagogue, is a smart move. It's a smart move. But it's partial.

Synagogue life is not going anywhere. And the story of synagogue life being eclipsed in the 20th century and the 21st century is also a tale as old as time. Synagogues are not going anywhere, because God's not going anywhere. Even for atheists, God's not going anywhere. That's a great line, by the way. It's like a good meme. Hashtag, God is not going anywhere. Even for atheists, it's God's not going anywhere. That's a great line, by the way. It's like a good meme. Hashtag, God is not going anywhere.

It's like people are always going to have a metaphysical itch that they have to scratch. And it doesn't matter if they mention the word God, they'll still want to sing and they'll want to cry. Synagogues for 2000 years were not worship spaces, they were therapeutic spaces. Where did Jews in the Ukraine and in Poland and in White Russia, where did they go to cry? They had to release their sadness and their tears, their trauma, and they experienced it daily. And so the house of prayer might be a place

to engage the mind, and that absolutely is the smartest and most immediate way to engage our people. But people are still going to look for affect and they're going to have a place for the heart. And if synagogues also can't keep up and be relevant, and also if people don't give them a chance, and if we don't train next generation rabbis who are relevant and who are Zionist and also liberal and progressive and all those things,

people are going to look for it elsewhere too. And the formative nature of what a synagogue could be in a family's life should never be undervalued. And I think that we need to invest in that too. That's not what we do, but I want to say we should invest in synagogues. Not necessarily mine, but that's also nice. But I think, yeah, why not? By the way, pretty soon they're going to think this is like the Colney Dray donation pledge.

There are cards. Everyone has a card. Please bend the envelope. As you leave. So yeah, I think that more broadly on the front lines, I think there's a lot of exhaustion in Jewish leadership. I think a lot of us were looking for a way to be connected in peoplehood. When we felt like we would say, I'd rather be in Israel.

I know it's more dangerous, but like living here in New York City and walking around in New York, it feels like life is normal and it's not. And we're feeling like- But the Israelis also would rather be in Israel. Exactly. That was amazing. Exactly. Yeah.

And so there was a sense that we couldn't recreate that sense of we're in it. We could look at each other and say, I know what you're going through, and you know what I'm going through. We felt like we were in the wrong place. And I think that a lot of leaders that I speak to are exhausted trying to navigate

creating those spaces for people, but also still very, right, knowing that they have to, and they have to show up in pretty profound ways. I also think there's been a huge uptick, believe it or not, in membership and synagogues and in activity across the board. And like a place like the Y really rose to meet that. I want to give a big thanks to the Brompton Center and to all of those here. The leadership, the board of the Y and the Jewish Life Committee and the Brompton leadership and our CEO and Elise, like everyone here at the Y,

pivoted towards like every Jewish institution, how can we support our people and programs and so on? So I think it's been a very challenging time, but it's also been a rewarding time and we'll see. Can I, and I know we got to wrap and I just want to, if we can't enclose, I just want to hit two very important points I hope everybody leaves with.

Great. Okay? I can't be more emphatic about the point about us transitioning from being prominent but weak to Jewish and strong. When Douglas said that, it like got me, prominent but weak, because I know so many Jewish leaders, or Jews who are in extraordinary positions

of influence. They are extraordinarily prominent and they want to keep their heads down. I mean, I had Wendy Saxon who created that film October 8th, October 8th I think it's called, and she walked through my podcast, the stories of trying to get this film, get some studio, someone, some distributor, anyone. She's going to Hollywood. And by the way, everybody she's meeting with are like, is Jewish, like the CEOs of every major talent agency, every production company, every studio, and they're all like, and they're like,

hey, I'm with you. I agree with you, but can't do it now. Why? It's just, you know, there's going to be blowback. There's going to be blowback. And I hear this over and over of people, that's the quintessence of being prominent but weak. What is the point of having all this prominence if at this particular moment you're so afraid to use some of that prominence for something that matters? The corollary to that is I spoke on Sunday

to Bruce Pearl, who's the head coach of the, you guys know. Of the, he made it, his basketball team made it into the Final Four, and there were three Jewish coaches, three of the four coaches who made it in were Jewish. But he, Bruce, after they, I think it was right when they got into the final four, he gave a press conference as these coaches do at the end of a big game.

And all the sports press is there and the national media is covering it. And he says, I want to start my press conference by talking about a Don Alexander. And everybody was like, everyone was like blown away. And then he starts talking about the hostages and he starts talking about, and he says, I checked with the guys, meeting the players on his team. And they said, he said, I want to start by talking about this. It's very important to me. And they said it was fine.

And he, this thing went viral of this guy in the big sports event. And so I said to him on Sunday, I said, I'm just curious. Did you get any blowback for that? And he said, no, because I just got into the final four. He's like, no one's going to criticize me. He goes, if I did that when we weren't in the final four, we lost the game. But there was an important truth he articulated, which was...

He was there and he used it. Used it, used the strength. Esther, Esther. Exactly. Neodea. Right. Use the strength. Esther. Esther. Exactly. Neodea. Right. So we're going to wrap up.

Before we wrap up, there were questions about putting on your call me back hats to tell us a little bit about the geopolitical situation. But given how late the hour is, I want to actually invite people here. We'll be having Sapir, is Susan here? Is Susan, Sapir, this coming Thursday. Thursday night. Thursday night here, Sapir debates will be on the topic of whether or not Donald Trump is good for the Jews.

And obviously that's a very alive topic for all of us here in this room. And I would love to hear Deanne W wax about that, but not this evening. But come back, Brett Stevens will be here and Rahm Emanuel. It's going to be an incredible evening. So come back. Before you go, everybody, one more big round of applause for Deanne Thank you all for being here. Time and again we've seen that our listeners are the ones driving the growth of the Call Me Back community, so thank you. To offer comments, suggestions, sign up for updates, or explore past episodes, visit our website ARKmedia.org, where you can also find transcripts with hyperlinked resources, which will hopefully help you deepen your own understanding of the topics we cover.

Call Me Back is produced by Ilan Benatar. Additional editing by Martin Huérgaux. Research by Gabe Silverstein. Our music was composed by Yuval Semmo. Until next time, I'm your host, Dan Sinor. Music Music Music