The Munk Debates Podcast - Friday Focus: protesters fail to disrupt the Munk Debate on the Two-State Solution and Putin threatens Europe with war

Episode Date: December 5, 2025

Friday Focus provides listeners with a focused, half-hour masterclass on the big issues, events and trends driving the news and current events. The show features Janice Gross Stein, the founding director of the Munk School of Global Affairs and bestselling author, in conversation with Rudyard Griffiths, Chair and moderator of the Munk Debates. Chair Rudyard Griffiths and managing director Ricki Gurwitz start today's show with a brief recap of the spirited Munk Debate on the Two-State Solution that took place at Meridian Hall on Wednesday night. Hundreds of protesters gathered outside to try to shut down the debate but were unsuccessful in their efforts, thanks in large part to the fantastic security team at Meridian Hall and the Toronto Police Services. In the second half of the show Rudyard and Janice talk about the high drama out of Europe this week: leaked memos of conversations between leaders revealing a deep distrust of the US and a desperation about how to support Ukraine at this moment. Putin has said he is ready for war with Europe. What does he mean by that? And after invoking the threat of nuclear weapons for over two years now are his warnings starting to ring hollow? And finally, where do we go from here? Is there any hope for a solution to this conflict? To support the Friday Focus podcast consider becoming a donor to the Munk Debates for as little as $50 annually, or $1.00 per episode. Canadian donors receive a charitable tax receipt. This podcast is a project of the Munk Debates, a Canadian charitable organization dedicated to fostering civil and substantive public dialogue. More information at www.munkdebates.com.Become a Munk Donor ($50 annually) to get 72-hour advanced access to the full length editions of Friday Focus and Munk Dialogues. Go to www.munkdebates.com to sign up. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The following is a complimentary excerpt of this week's edition of the Friday Focus podcast by The Monk Debates. To access full-length editions of each and every episode, along with all kinds of great additional benefits and perks, become a donor to the Monk debates. You can do that for as little as $25 a year, and you'll receive each and every year 50 Friday Focus episodes at full length. It's all available right now on our website. in just a few simple clicks. Triple W. The Monk Debates.com. Look for the Friday Focus option in our navigation bar, the top right of the website. Make your donation, and we will send you each and every Friday a link to listen to the

full-length edition of this program. Thanks in advance for your generous contribution. Welcome to the Friday Focus podcast for the 5th of December 2025. Special show today. We're going to do a little bit of a debrief. right off the top on this week's big monk debate in downtown Toronto on a two-state solution. And to do this, I'm joined by Ricky Gerowitz, our managing director here at the monk debates and the person who really spearheaded Wednesday's debate.

Congratulations, Ricky. It was, I think, a feather in the cap of the monk debates, a huge amount of, I think, interest in the debate itself, some controversy, and let's talk about that. But more important for me, 3,000 people in Meridian Hall engaged with this debate, working through some protests, some, you know, some craziness on the night. But the result was a serious and substantive debate, which is exactly what we wanted. And I think an audience that went home really feeling like they had had an opportunity to learn something. Absolutely. We've had an overwhelming positive response to the debate.

You know, we were nervous heading in that protesters might disrupt from inside. there were a few protesters, but luckily the security managed to deal with them safely and swiftly, and the debate went on, and I think it was a success. Yeah, and just to say to our audience watching and listening online, if you are a monk donor at any level, you can get access to this debate right now as part of your existing membership and beautiful high quality video on our website, triplew monkdebates.com. If you're not a donor yet, we'd love to have you as one. you can come in at our lowest level $50 a year and get your streaming rights to this debate and hopefully more debates in the next 12 months as part of that membership package. So do that now at triple W monkdebates.com. Ricky, let's talk a bit about the controversy going into the debate and then coming out of the debate.

Because I think I want to use this show a little bit of setting the record straight. Let's talk first about the intimidation that we faced and the campaign against Meridian Hall to cancel this debate. Basically to say to the Monk debates and all of our members and the 3,000 people that ultimately came to Meridian on Wednesday night that this debate couldn't happen. It shouldn't happen. In fact, some people, some protesters, unfortunately, who were arrested on Wednesday night, said that the debate isn't going to happen, that they were. were going to shut down the monk debates because of the topic. So talk about the controversy, the origins of it, and the environment that you were working in going into this debate Wednesday night. Yeah. So look, we knew that this was a contentious topic. We knew bringing four

prominent Israelis into Toronto at this time would be difficult. So we were prepared. I will say that we had unbelievable support from Meridian Hall and from Toronto Police Services. We cannot thank them enough. They understood how important this was to us and to our members. And, you know, one of the things that I feel grateful for, and I know you do, is that we work for an organization that has the desire to kind of how we're, particularly, to move forward with these debates, regardless of intimidation. We will not let protesters dictate our, what we, our productions, our debates. And we are so fortunate to have the Melanie and Peter Mung Foundation behind us,

every step of the way, and our individual donors who support our mission. And we really want to kind of reiterate our thanks to those people for allowing us to continue to convene these debates, which are becoming harder and harder. Yeah, because this is not the first time. We had protests around the ban on from debate on populism. Again, a debate that I stand behind in terms of its substance and importance to the conversation at that moment. Our anti-Zionism debate, there were threats to shut that down with Douglas Murray and Midei Hassan. I think everyone agreed that was a really important debate. Same with last night. There is this unfortunate tendency, especially here in Toronto, especially among

the arts and culture industry world, I don't know how you want to characterize it, to see protests as an excuse to silence speech. And I think we saw that most powerfully, and unfortunately with the Toronto International Film Festival who canceled a film about October 7th made by a Jewish filmmaker and then had to reinstate it based on counter-rightfully counter-protests and counter-demands that that film go forward with just one screening, unfortunately, during the festival.

were never going to be cowed by the protesters. And similarly, Ricky, I got to say, let's talk about the evening itself because this was not protest-free. Unfortunately, it was not arrest-free. Unfortunately, there was an attempt, I believe, by one individual to assault a police officer. And that person, a man from Oakville, obviously at this point, charged and still has to go before the courts and we'll let him and the courts work through their process. But that suggests, Ricky, that there are people out there who are part of that protest movement, a minority, I want to stress that, who simply are not interested in civil and substantive debate. They are stepping outside of the law to try to shut down events like ours. Yes. And, you know, there's, there are a lot of

those very loud, sometimes violent, a group of people. And, you know, there are a lot of those very loud, and, we will not be intimidated by them. I think the moment that organizations start to change their programming based on the threat of being, of offending people or the threat of backlash is when that organization becomes less effective in what they're doing. Recently, the Monk debates hosted a fascinating debate about the two-state solution. But 90 minutes on this contentious topic can also barely scratch the surface. After all, Israel is a hotbed of conflicting ideologies, identities, interests, and historical narratives.

Even for experts, that's a lot to keep up with. And it's not just Israel. The Middle East is changing fast. Alliances are shifting. New power centers are emerging. And longstanding assumptions are being rewritten in real time. If you want to understand what's really going on, I'd like to invite you to join me on the Call Me Back podcast. I'm Dan Cynor, host of Call Me Back.

Our mission is to give you the facts, context, and insights you need to make sense of Israel and the region. Our contributors include some of the best source journalists in Israel like Nadavail and Amit Segal and top thought leaders in the U.S. like Sam Harris and Scott Galloway. So if you're ready to go deeper, find me on Call Me Back. wherever you get your podcasts. See you there. Thank you for listening to the first half of the Friday Focus podcast. To access the full episode, consider becoming a monk donor. For just $50 a year, that's less than dollar a week,

you get exclusive access to full-length editions of our weekly monk dialogues with Andrew coin, exclusive access to the live streams of our main stage debates and all kinds of other great perks and privileges. Simply go to our website, triple-w monk debates. That's MUNK Debates with an S.com and click on the join button on the top right-hand corner of our homepage. Again, that website, www.munkdibates.com. Well, let's talk about what happened in the debate hall itself because there were protesters that infiltrated the hall. We went through a very U.N. through particularly an excruciating process to make sure that,

that we sold tickets first to our membership and then to other groups who we knew could in a sense be trusted partners when inviting their membership to attend the event because we knew, again, that the protesters were waiting to purchase whatever tickets they could in order to get inside the hall to be as disruptive inside the hall as not. They wanted to, in their words, shut down the debate, stop the debate from happening. We did have, you know, a few interruptions. How did you characterize that? What was your feeling watching the night unfold with, you know, the odd protester popping up literally live during the event? Yeah.

So going in, we didn't know. We couldn't know how many people bought tickets that were protesters. So it was kind of a wait-and-see situation. We did have plans just in case the protesters were able to disrupt it to the point where we couldn't go on. Luckily, we never had to exercise those plans. as an audience member, what was comforting was that the majority of the audience wanted this debate to go on, obviously, and turned on the protesters. In a relatively polite way, I would say. Yes.

There was no fist's thrown or anything of that sort. So, yeah, I salute the monk membership, especially who were there and kind of bought into the idea that, you know, these people were going to be removed and they were removed efficiently and effectively. And hats off to the security at Meridian Hall for getting those protesters out with minimal disruption to the debate. Yeah. Well, just as we wrap up this section of Friday focus, you are a Jewish woman. It's one aspect of many aspects of your identity that I've got to known as a co-worker. We've been working together for years now. you were in a sense targeted at the event on social media afterwards.

And personally, Ricky, I feel badly about that. I feel badly that, again, people are singling you out, not simply because you're the organizer of this debate, which is where, as an organization, I feel obviously that is your merit. That is what you do for us. And now, unfortunately, on social media, some of these protesters taking pictures of you, evoking your Jewish heritage as a criticism of the debates

and your role in it. How do you feel about that? I will not let them intimidate me. This is, that's what they want. They want to silence me. I will not let them. I'm not going to engage with them. I obviously, you know, I don't want it to continue,

but we live in a country of free speech, So they have their right as long as it's not threatening my safety. I will say just on the topic of being Jewish and putting on this debate, we got a lot of pushback within the Jewish community as well for hosting this debate. There are people who did not want it to necessarily go on because it was showing both sides of a very contentious topic. Inside Israel, between different groups inside Israel. Yeah. Yeah.

And so sometimes I try to think, like, when we plan these debates, if we're not offending both sides, then we're not doing our job. And so that's kind of how I felt with this. Like, it wasn't as if we were taking a pro-Israel stance. We were trying to have an important discussion with different viewpoints, and I think that really came through. So, yes, I am Jewish, but I put on this debate as a, you know, not because of my Jewish heritage, but because I felt that this was an important debate that the world needed to see.

And I'm really proud of it because I think that, look, Israel has, I think people see Israel as this, like, monolithic entity. Right. They see this Benjamin Netanyahu. Yes. And this debate conveyed the complexity within Israeli politics, within Israeli society. I showed the humanity within Israel that I think is,

not been, that has not been, that has not come across in the reporting about Israel in the past two years. Yeah, well said. I mean, Israel, like any country, has its problems. And boy, does it right now. But last night, that debate, Wednesday night, it feels like last night is still recovering. But it, you know, it showed the diversity of opinion, the extent to which Israel is, despite it's all those problems. It remains a vibrant democracy, which, you know, sharply conflicting points of view that are expressed, at least on our stage on Wednesday night, freely and effectively. And one thing I wanted to add is that, you know, after the debate, we got so much feedback about the intensity,

the intensity on stage. You could really feel the emotions of the debaters. And I think it's because the people on stage feel it. This is so central. This is an existential threat to them. the outcome of what happens with a two-state versus one-state solution. And so they have skin in the game. It's not intellectual.

No, it is personal. Yeah. And Michael Oren mentioned that in his closing statement. He's like, this is not an academic argument. This is personal for us. Life and death. Yes. Yeah.

And the other thing is that I thought kind of set this debate apart is that oftentimes we will have people on stage who are academics or who are commentators, columnists, and, you know, they're wonderful. and they provide really important insight. But the four people we had on stage on Wednesday night were people with the lived experience. They were in government when big negotiations happened. They led government through wars, through peace, through peace, through Intifada.

So they could kind of explain things in a way that others couldn't. Yeah, lived experience was important. And I'll just end Ricky by saying, addressing the issue of, you know, why for Israelis on stage debating a two-state solution. And again, just as I said on CBC Metro morning here in Toronto on Wednesday, this is one piece of a much larger debate that will unfold over months and years. And we thought it important because Israel is a prime mover in whether a two-state solution happens or not to chunk off or segment a portion.

portion of this much larger, again, complicated debate that can and should and will involve the Palestinian people to focus on the Israeli peace. We didn't do that to exclude Palestinians. We did it to focus on a critical piece of the larger debate. It could well be possible that in the months and years to come that we will do more debates on the two-state solution. And if we feel the time is right and it is warranted that absolutely we could have Palestinians on our stage debating, Israelis or other policy experts who are not Jewish and are not Israeli. That was really beside the point. So I want to make that point to our membership because I think it, I think once you watch the debate, you understand the value of that internal conversation to test where is Israel's

public opinion, where are the thinking and ideas at inside Israel, given how essential Israel will be to any kind of future peace negotiation or conversation with the Palestinians. So I just recommend, congratulations again, Ricky, on a great debate. And I recommend to our audience that if you've not watched this debate, it is, look, I've done 15 years of these. I would put it in like the top five for the last decade and a half. So you've got to watch this debate. And congratulations on your masterful moderating of four Israelis. That was not an easy feat.

And you really called it off. Someone could have warned me, Ricky, a little, you've spent some time in Israel. You could have warned me a little bit more just about the buzz saw that I was walking into with four high-powered Israeli politicians on stage. Well, you did, you knocked it out of the park. Hey, thanks a lot. We're going to say goodbye to Ricky Gerowitz, managing director of the Monk Debates, and join Janice Gross Stein now to do what we do every Friday focus,

which is talk about breaking issues and international news. And we'll do that exclusively for our paid members and donors. So back to you after this short break. Thanks for listening to this excerpt of the Friday Focus podcast. To get full-length editions of each and every episode of this program, simply go to our website, www.w. The monkdebates.com. Click on the Friday Focus tab in our navigation on the top right of the site.

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