The Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway - Raging Moderates - Dan Senor Breaks Down the Israel-Hezbollah Conflict

Episode Date: September 24, 2024

Scott and Jessica chat with Dan Senor, a leading expert on Israel and the Middle East. They discuss the latest escalations between Israel and Hezbollah, the strategic consequences of recent developments, and the potential for a broader conflict. Dan also shares his insights on the role of U.S. diplomacy in the region and reflects on the one-year anniversary of the October 7th Hamas attacks. Follow Jessica Tarlov, @JessicaTarlov.  Follow Prof G, @profgalloway. Follow Dan Senor, @dansenor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Innovation Fund's prospectus at fundrise.com slash innovation. This is a paid advertisement. Welcome to Raging Moderates. I'm Scott Galloway. And I'm Jessica Tarlow. Today we have a special episode. We're going to focus on Israel. We have an interview with, I would call him a friend and a colleague of Fox or Jess. He spends a lot of time on Fox, doesn't he? We're talking about Dan Senor. Yeah, he does. We love having him on our air. He makes all of us a lot smarter and a lot more thoughtful, no matter where you fall politically about thinking about Israel. Okay, let's bring in Dan to help us understand what's going on in the Middle East. Dan is an expert on politics in the Middle East and actually works at Elliott, a large hedge fund. Dan, where does this podcast find you?

New York City, Upper West Side of Manhattan. That's right. I saw an Instagram of you at a Jets game with your wife. It was date night, and I'm grateful that I am married to a woman who will go

to New York Jets games with me, as you can appreciate, Scott, as my boys get older and older, I'm imagining a world when they're no longer under a roof, and my company at Jets games will be my spouse. And the fact that she's a willing participant is a beautiful thing. She's a better woman than I. I'm married to a Jets fan, and I will not go to a Jets game. I was trying to imagine the response I would get, suggesting for date night, we go to a Jets game. Tell your husband that if he's an orphan during any Jets game. Oh, you want to

take him? Yeah, we'll take him. We will take him. We take orphans all the time. Actually, Jets nation has a lot of orphans. I've heard that about you people. Yeah, yeah. So we are happy to take those wandering Jets fans. Okay. So for those of you who don't know, Dan has sort of been our go-to on all things Israel. I see the Pager and the walkie-talkie operation as the most precise anti-terrorism operation in history. And I would just like to get your view on that event and then subsequently what you think is going on in the last two days, Israel's, I don't know what you would call it, more aggressive stance, or if you would want to call it preemptive, I don't know, an escalation, whatever term you want to use.

But I'd love to just get your thoughts on the state of play around the most recent events. Yeah. So, Hezbollah, which as many of your listeners know, is a proxy army of Iran that is in southern Lebanon. And it has been waging warfare against Israel for decades. And in 2000, Israel had had a presence in southern Lebanon. In 2000, Israel left southern Lebanon. And so there's been no Israeli forces in southern Lebanon. There's been no territorial dispute about the Israeli-Lebanese border. And yet, this fighting force, Hezbollah, which calling it a terrorist organization or terrorist proxy doesn't really capture it. It's like a light infantry

army of a sovereign nation, and they're sitting on about 200,000 rockets, many of which are precision-guided. And they have just been bombing Israel on and off over the last couple decades, which culminated in a war in 2006 when Hezbollah kidnapped three Israelis. And things had been quiet for certain periods, and then October 7th happened on Israel's southern border. And on October 8th, before Israel even responded to the Hamas attack, Hezbollah joined the fight. And the bombing from Hezbollah in Israel's northern communities has been unrelenting. Israel's had to evacuate tens of thousands, something like 70,000 to 80,000 Israelis from the northern part of the country who haven't lived there since October 8th, since the bombing from Hezbollah began. And so you have a whole part of Israel's northern communities

that are just, they become ghost towns. Places like Kiryat Shmona and Metula, towns I've been to, are just, it's totally depressing how these towns are empty and these people are scattered. They're internally displaced in their own country. And so where we are now is Israel is in the midst of basically what looks like a seven-front war. We tend to focus, for obvious reasons, on Israel's war with Hamas, operated on an analog level. They were very good about having no electronic communications, which has made, A, the detection of what Hamas was trying to do, and B, fighting with Hamas very hard. Hezbollah and Iran are different. They are

much higher tech, and they communicate a lot on semi-conventional devices. And so Israel is actually much more capable and effective in fighting Hezbollah, and I think they would be if they wind themselves up in a war with Iran. And in order to force Hezbollah to make some decisions, at a minimum, to de-escalate from their fighting on Israel's northern border. They had to ramp up their own operations. They've mostly been in defensive posture. Israel, now they've pivoted to an offensive posture. And what you're referring to, Scott, which was the activating the pagers and the walkie-talkies, I think that was a precursor to a much more formal and conventional war. I think you're seeing some of that right now.

Israel is now, through its air force, bombing parts of southern Lebanon, and they want to give Hezbollah an opportunity to withdraw from Israel's border and get about 10 kilometers north of Israel's border. If Hezbollah won't do that, then I think you may get a ground invasion. And so, and I think you're exactly right. I think there have been two reveals here over the last few weeks. The first reveal is what you said, which is Israel did not, you know, if it had to go after a lot of terrorists and terrorist operatives and commanders in Hezbollah, it could have just bombed whole towns and villages to do that, and there would have been a lot of collateral damage. Instead, Israel had a multi-year, I think close to 15 years in the making of this, of putting the capabilities in place to do the walkie-talkie and pager attack to hit the people that wanted to do hit with real precision and minimizing civilian casualties. So all the blowback against Israel right now for what it did is like a reveal, because what the blowback is saying, the criticism

of Israel is saying is you can't respond at all. Used to be Israel can't respond if there's a risk of collateral damage, which is holding Israel to a standard that no other country is held to in warfare, especially defensive war. And now when Israel hits back with precision against the terrorists, that's somehow not allowed either. And the other reveal is, I obviously am very supportive of Israel's response to Hamas. At the same time, I recognize there are some Palestinians, some moderate Palestinians, that believe there is a legitimate territorial dispute. I think the more moderate forces want to figure out a way to resolve that territorial dispute between Israel and the Palestinians. The way Hamas is approaching it is not a serious or let alone a moderate way of approaching that issue.

But you could argue there's a territorial dispute. With Hezbollah, there is no territorial dispute. Hezbollah itself is not saying, you know, if we can just have our own path to self-determination, if we can just have this piece of territory. They're not claiming there's any piece of territory in dispute. They are quite clear that the only objective is annihilation. That is their – of Israel and of the Jewish state, that is their raison d'etre. And so I think while this next front is going to be very hard for everyone, I do think for

the reasons you're saying and that I'm outlining, it's starting to reveal what's really going on here. You mentioned the term ground invasion, and I just wanted to pick up on that. Do you think that that's definitely going to happen? What kind of timeline are we operating on? And if you say that this is something that could have been planned, you know, over a decade, what was the impetus for doing it right this particular moment or last week? Yeah. So I think that the, when I say what I think was planned a decade, if not a decade and a half, was in the works, was just developing the communications capability.

So those pagers, Israel's coming up with the plan to sell Hezbollah, the pagers, Israel, and on this particular note, in terms of what Israel did, I want to be clear, this is all I've heard secondhand. So the IDF or the Israeli intelligence community have not confirmed these details. But my understanding is, it was years in the making to get Hezbollah, the pagers, develop the capabilities that Israel demonstrated, but we think Israel demonstrated over the last week. So that was very long in the making with the understanding that Hezbollah has been a constant threat for Israel. And if Israel is ever in a situation where it has to fight a war against Hezbollah, it would be important to destabilize the leadership of Hezbollah and destabilize the

commanders that would be commanding the Hezbollah and destabilize the commanders that would be commanding the Hezbollah forces into Israel. It would be effective to destabilize them in advance of a war. Now, the analogy I can give you is the 1967 Six-Day War, which Israel was surrounded and numerous countries leading. The pointy end of the spear were Egypt and Syria, but there were many other countries that joined the war against Israel. On the eve of the Six-Day War, Israel effectively took out the air forces, if you will, of Egypt and Syria, which made Israel's ability to fight the war much more effective. I think there's a comparison here. I think taking out the leadership through these devices and making them distrustful of how they can communicate, we're finding that right now, that there's now, there's all this confusion

about how they communicate with each other, was a step before the war Israel knew was going to have to fight. Now, I will, my only caveat to that is, you know, when I say to my Israeli friends, as I did as recently as this morning, does this mean the war is on? Like, is the war with Hezbollah on? Like, if you go on any Israeli press site right now, you will see Israel bombing southern Lebanon. They say, no, the war has been going on since October 8th. Hezbollah started bombing Israel on October 8th. So we are now finally responding. And so the communications, the Pager attack was the step right before the formal operation to kind of strengthen Israel's capabilities as they went in on the regular

operation. And what is the objective? The objective is, I mean, I'll just make it really simple. After the 2006 Lebanon war, the UN stepped in and the Lebanese armed forces stepped in. Because keep in mind, this is not a war against Lebanon. Hezbollah is occupying parts of Lebanon. Hezbollah is not the government of Lebanon. And the Lebanese armed forces and UNIFIL, these UN peacekeeping forces, agreed to create a buffer zone between Israel's border with Lebanon and what's called the Latani River, which is really just like a stream. And that buffer zone is called 25 kilometers. And the idea was if Hezbollah is not anywhere in that area between Israel's border and the

Latani River, it will be harder for Hezbollah to wreak havoc in Israel because there's just a big buffer. And the parties that were supposed to secure that buffer zone were UNIFIL, the UN, peacekeepers, and the Lebanese armed forces. They both have basically scattered since 2006. Hezbollah's back in there. There is no buffer zone anymore. So Israel's saying, at a minimum, we need to reestablish a buffer zone here, get Hezbollah

right off our border from breathing down our throats and move their 200,000 rockets and rocket launchers and all their capabilities back if we have a shot at bringing some peace and quiet to our border and avoiding full-out regional war. And I think what Israel's communicating both to the White House, what Israel's communicating to other players in the region, we are doing what we're doing now. This looks like war. It is war, but it is to head off a full-on regional war. So I'm curious, I thought of you this morning on the way back from Madrid. I opened the New York Times and the lead article is a guest essay by a gentleman named

Michael Walzer. And I just want to read you an excerpt and get your response. Yes, the devices most probably were being used by Hezbollah operatives for military purposes. This might make them a legitimate target in the continuous cross-border battles between Israel and Hezbollah. But the attacks, which likely killed at least 37 people and wounded thousands of others, came when the operatives were not operating. They had not been mobilized. They were not engaged. Rather, they were at home with their families, sitting in cafes, shopping in food markets, seeing civilians who were randomly killed and among civilians who were randomly killed and injured. Israel has neither confirmed nor denied responsibility for the attacks, but is widely believed to be behind them.

If these allegations are true, it is important for friends of Israel to say this was not right. Your response? My friend Dara Horn wrote this book a few years ago, which I've been thinking a lot about books as we approach the one-year anniversary of October 7th. I get approached a lot by people who say, I want to learn more about how October 7th happened, what led to October 7th, the history of Israel, the history of anti- 7th, the history of Israel, the history of anti-Semitism, the history of the Jewish people. I get that. And I've been thinking about books to recommend to people. And this woman, Dara Horn, an academic, wrote this book called People Love Dead Jews. And her point is, if you strip away many of the criticisms of

Israel and what Israel does, what you often hear is a version of, Israel has a right to defend itself, but don't defend yourself too much, is basically what they're saying. They don't say that, but that's what they mean. Meaning, we have empathy. We sympathize for suffering Jews. As long as Jews are being slaughtered, they are David and not Goliath, and we want to be with David. But the moment Israel strikes back to defend itself, suddenly all those deaths that were averted by Israel striking back are forgotten, and Israel is somehow viewed as the aggressor. So to bring back this piece that you're referring to here, Scott, or that you're quoting from, what he's basically saying is it would only be okay for Israel to activate their pager attack

once those Hezbollah operatives are actually pulling the trigger, once they're actually loading the rocket into the rocket launcher and launching it into Tel Aviv. That's when it's okay for Israel to strike. But the reality is at that point, it's probably too late. Because if the Hezbollah operative is sitting there with the rocket launcher and he activates a rocket, that rocket's probably gone and it's probably landing somewhere, you know, in the center of Israel and slaughtering a lot of people, and maybe not even the center of Israel.

You remember this attack against this Druze village that killed 12 children on a soccer field in northern Israel a few weeks ago. On Friday, Israel conducted an attack, an operation against a meeting of the leadership of the Radwan force. The Radwan is the most elite fighting force of Hezbollah, and the senior officers were having a meeting because they were planning an October 7th-like attack in the Upper Galilee in northern Israel. They were planning to do another version of October 7th in the north. So what was Israel supposed to do? Should Israel have waited for them to actually be gone to launch that attack? Or when

they have intelligence that the meeting is happening, should they actually take these guys out before the attack happens? My bet is if they do it the way they did it, fewer Israelis will be killed for sure, and fewer Lebanese civilians will be killed as well. So none of this stuff is pretty. None of it is elegant. None of it is purely clinical in terms of its execution. But if you want to make a judgment on how you reduce the possibility or the numbers of Israeli civilian casualties, and in this case, Lebanese civilian casualties, Israel preemptively striking the terrorists who are planning to attack Israel just before the attack begins, rather than during the attack, is probably the best way to do it. I wanted to jump off of that point and ask you about the role that Bibi Netanyahu plays in all

of this, especially in the perception of the attack here. I think that the piece that Scott just quoted from, if Netanyahu wasn't the head of the government, that piece might not exist in the same way. He's someone who's unpopular here with American Jews, and he's unpopular in Israel with the Jews and the Arab population that live there. So what is Bibi's role in all of this? Look, Bibi is a complicated figure. I've known him for a long time. I have been in touch with him since the war began, including with some of the other leaders, including those who served in the war cabinet with him, who are real political enemies of his in the best possible way. A political enemy in the best possible way, meaning not actually like

belligerence of one another. I think Netanyahu personally, there's been a major breakdown in trust inside Israel. I'll leave what Jews outside of Israel think of him because I think it's just less relevant. They don't get a vote for him. Their children are not serving the army that's being led by him or commanded by him. So I focus on Israelis because he's very unpopular with Israeli Jews. And I think there's been a breakdown in trust for a variety of reasons. We could point to some of the characters in his government, his own government today, that I think do a lot to discredit Israel in the international scene. I think some of what his government did in this debate over judicial reform in 2023 did a lot of damage to his government in

the eyes of the Israeli public. But I also think he's been in office for a very long time. I mean, he was elected in 1996. He left office in 99. He then got elected again, 2008, formed a government in 2009, was in office until 2022, then came back into office in the beginning of 2023. I mean, this is, you know, you think about leaders in any Western-style democracy that have stayed in office, remained in office for a very long time. I think the public gets very tired of him. Think of Margaret Thatcher, someone I admire her of. I mean, even she left with a sense that she had stayed too long. Then when you add to it that under Netanyahu's watch, October 7th happened. And so even before you get into any of the current issues, you can understand why people are exhausted, exhausted with his government, exhausted with

his leadership, and wanting a change. I think, though, Jessica, that people often mistake a lack of trust in Netanyahu for lack of confidence in his government strategy in the war. So I think they're tired of him and they do not trust him. Yet when you look at what he articulates as the objectives in the war, what you look at in terms of what he's doing right now in the North, there's broad public support for it. And even when he had a war cabinet before it dissolved, as I said, there are members of his war cabinet who were very hostile to him politically, and yet they were in agreement. They had over 90 votes in the war cabinet when it existed, and there was like over 90% of the votes were unanimous. By and large, I think that people are tired of him. There's a trust issue with him,

but the overall strategy in what Israel needs to do in fighting this multi-front war, I think there's wide support for it. Now, again, it's a huge problem to have a leader in wartime who people don't trust. And I don't know how sustainable it is. I think he's going to be, but I don't think it's a problem with the overall strategy. Yeah, Dan, I think you're being generous with that and Yahoo. And I want to acknowledge that we don't get a vote and sovereign nations get to pick their own leader. My fear as someone abroad looking at the situation is you have an individual who kind of cut a deal with the far right to save his own political ass, put these wild extremist bigots in the Knesset in exchange for this kind of implicit

promise, yeah, I'm further right. You may not like my government, but I'll keep you safe. And he didn't. And my second reaction to hearing the Gaza envelope and the kibbutz there, the first was horror. The second was, how the fuck did they let this happen? You have a huge field, some motion sensor detectors. I just can't figure out how helicopter gunships were not deployed within seven to 10 minutes from someone who said, you may not like my politics, but I'll keep you safe. And then the fear is that this guy knows that if he calls for an election, he's out of office and there's a reckoning coming, perhaps even jail for him, and that he has a motivation to create a forever war, hoping that at some point they rally around him from a nationalist standpoint, and he doesn't end up in jail. worlds for Jews abroad who see us having gone from David to Goliath and a guy in power that seems to be very politically motivated to the point of kind of a diabolical fear that this guy is going to make decisions solely on how do I extend a war, whether it makes sense or not,

to save my own ass your thoughts yeah so i you you had me for most of that riff uh except for the last part and and the reason i part ways with you scott on that on the last part is is the following i do not believe uh natanya who is prolonging the war to avoid jail time which is the gist of of what what you're saying i actually think these cases against him um are not going anywhere uh i think if there's only one actually of the of the cases that the three cases uh that i think has legs and even that he has the capacity to appeal it. And no matter what happens, whether he's in power, whether he's not, the legal process is going to go on for a long time. He is not a young man. The idea that even if he's out of power, that the Israeli judicial

system is going to send him to jail in his, what, his 80s? I mean, I just, the whole thing, the idea that he's being motivated by fighting a war so he can stay in power to avoid a legal process, I just think it's, I don't buy it. I think Netanyahu. Why wouldn't he call for elections? Because he doesn't want to lose, because he's an ambitious politician. I've worked with a lot of politicians over the years, and I will tell you that my sense with most of them, not all of them, but most of them have some combination of a real sense of public spiritedness. They want to be public servants. They are serious-minded about it, and complete megalomania bordering on narcissism.

I mean, how else? I mean, many people who think they could be the leader of the free world take people who run for president. They tend to have an elevated sense of themselves. And it's usually some combination of both. And it's like, that's okay. And so I think Netanyahu, I know he believes that he's got this like Churchillian complex, that he is like going to be the person to dig Israel out of this, you know, in Israel's historical sense,

is like a World War II like existential threat. And so I think, and he wants to protect his legacy, by the way. I also think he feels for for the reasons you said, that this happened on his watch, which is a catastrophe. And he wants to—he doesn't want that to be how he goes out. He wants to be the one that this happened on his watch, and he turned things around and secured things. And, you know, not only was the man who negotiated the Abraham Accords and got Israel normalization in parts of the Sunni Gulf, but expanded it, and he's the one who got normalization with Saudi Arabia. I mean, he wants to, he's the one who neutralized Iran, the threat of Iran.

I mean, he's got these grand visions of what his legacy could be, and he wants to stick around to be able to execute on them. I don't, like, I think that's a normal, I think there's a lot of politicians who fall into that category. I don't think it's all about his own survival. I don't think that's a normal, I think there's a lot of politicians who fall into that category. I don't think it's all about his own survival. I don't think he's conducting the war for the sake of his own survival.

And secondly, what he's actually doing in Gaza, what he's actually doing in the north is supported by most Israelis. In fact, he's been a calming presence. So, at least in the north, I'm critical of him for this. I think he should have dealt with the north sooner. He did not want to deal with the north. After October 7th, his defense minister, Yoav Galant, was arguing for Israel to go conduct a preemptive strike against Hezbollah immediately because Hezbollah, Galant was right, was going to join the war anyways.

Netanyahu argued against it. He was arguing for restraint. I don't think he's been like some inflammatory force in Israeli politics in the middle of the warfighting in ways that are completely out of sync with where most of the Israeli public is on the warfighting strategy. And I don't think whatever he's doing is just motivated by political survival to keep himself out of jail. Do I think that he's the best spokesman in the international community? Absolutely not. At least not right now.

We'll be right back. What does victory look like, if possible? And are we close to it, whether that's through a U.S. brokered ceasefire deal. John Kirby, the spokesman for the Biden administration's National Security Council, was on the Sunday shows saying that Hamas is not serious about it. I was meeting with a senior administration official two weeks ago who's very involved with hostage negotiations, and he basically laid out 10 issues that are holding up a deal, and nine of them were all centered around Hamas just not being serious about it. So I don't see how, and this is heartbreaking for me because for all the obvious reasons, not the least of which is I know many of these hostage families personally. I know two of the families that had loved ones among the six that were executed just a few weeks ago. And by the way, three of those families, three of those hostages, of the six who were executed, were on a list that Israel and Hamas were negotiating over about being released in the first phase of a deal if it were to happen. I do not think there's a deal. The U.S. doesn't think there's going to be a deal. And so how this ends, I think it ends

with Israel has killed or captured most of the leadership of Hamas. It would be very good if they were able to kill or capture Sinwar. I think it would give Israel a basis to say this war is over. It's sort of like Israel's bin Laden. I think they're close to getting him. And then the question is, do they have a plan, and they are working on one, to get someone else in control of Gaza who can govern it? Obviously, you want Palestinians to govern it. I think some of the governance and some of the security will have to be provided by a third-party Arab country. There are a number of governments that are talking about playing a role. The one that's been most visible is the UAE. Here's the catch. It's very unlikely you can get Palestinians to

step forward and play a role if they believe that Hamas can return to power. It's just that Hamas has made a name for itself in Gaza for retribution against anyone that's seeming to cooperate with Israel or cooperate with moderate Arabs. And the Palestinian population, those who could be responsible actors, need to know that Hamas is gone and is not coming back. And I think Israel's getting close to that, but it's not there yet. A. B, there needs to be an understanding that whatever replaces Hamas and Gaza, Israel, unless it can find a third party to do this, but I don't think they'll be able to, Israel will be responsible for security of its

own border, security of the border between Gaza and Egypt, and that there will be no sovereign airspace above Gaza. And so, I mean, you know, if all the relevant parties, a moderate Palestinian leadership can emerge and third party Arab countries can get involved and Israel can all agree to what I just described, I think you will have some kind of end to the conflict, quote unquote. I don't think the conflict will ever fully end, but some kind of, you know, some kind of cessation. With a hostage return. God willing, but I don't think the conflict will ever fully end, but some kind of, you know, some kind of cessation. With a hostage return. God willing, but I don't know, to be honest, and I hate talking about this, this is the problem, right? So let's just say, you know, the government, the Netanyahu just said over the last few days, they think over half of the, you know, some 100 hostages are alive. Okay, so there's another theory that half of those hostages are somewhere around Sinoir, Yahya Sinoir. The other half are scattered. In a formal end of the war, who knows where all these people are? Ideally, there is some formal handover. I'm not convinced that anyone is in a position in Gaza right now to find all these hostages. I'm talking about Palestinians. I'm talking about Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the other big terror group there. I don't think anyone is in a position to find all these hostages and be able to hand them over. I hate to be so grim, but I'm just— It's realistic.

Right. the U.S. to want to assign something to the left or to the right? And, you know, is anti-Semitism coming from the far left? Is it coming from the far right? And my thesis would be that the answer is yes. And I'll just cite AOC's recent comments that essentially she's argued that the detonations are a war crime. She condemned the attacks of October the 7th, but didn't call them a war crime and then cited an article in the Geneva Conventions and conveniently skipped over the fact that there's actually an amendment protocol that says booby traps can be lawful if the devices are being used for military purposes like Hezbollah's communications. And then on the right, as represented by President Trump, Trump suggested that if he lost the election, Jewish voters would be partially to blame. He stated that the Jewish people would have a lot to do with the loss. A comment that

Jewish organizations and political figures have condemned as reminiscent of historical anti-Semitic scapegoating. It seems as if the far left and the far right come together around anti-Semitism. And I see real echoes of early 30s Germany in the United States. And people accuse me of being an alarmist and a catastrophist. One, do you see the same echoes or hear the same echoes I hear? And what are your thoughts about anti-Semitism converging? It seems to be the one thing the far left and the far right can agree on. Yeah. So among the reasons antisemitism is called the oldest hatred is because it manages to survive and thrive no matter what environment it's in. So, you know, the fascists called Jews, you know, they weren't pure enough, they weren't white enough. The communists called the Jews money-grubbing you know cosmopolitan elites like whoever's in charge whatever the dynamic if you just look throughout history the jews are always um it's like they're like this shape-shifting targets of blame for whatever the ills are going

on in any political moment or any political environment. And yes, the extreme left and the extreme right historically often meet up on targeting the Jews one way or the other. I will tell you that today, Scott, while I worry about anti-Semitism on both extremes, from a policy standpoint, when I think of what is going to result in more Jews being killed in the near future, I hate to put it in those terms, but I will, I worry much more today, that could change, about the policies of the extreme left, because they actually have policy implications. If you look at, you know, some of the stuff coming from Trump or people around him, I say, okay, so what's the policy they would pursue? What's the actual policy? Tell me the policy. Maybe I can't think of it, or maybe I'm not being clever enough. But the policies from the extreme left, they're very clear. I mean, they want to suspend arms to Israel so Israel no longer has the capacity

to defend itself. They do not want to prosecute those waging basically pogroms against Jews in major cities and in American college campuses today. They want to tolerate low-level antisemitism. And those are the actual policies. Look at what's happening on college campuses and look at what's happening in terms of the debate about how the-Semitic violence and other incidents has gone up 70% relative to the year before. Okay? There's actual, you know, violence against Jews all across the U.S., all across the U.K. where you are right now, and many other countries around the world. And I worry is when I look at my political leaders, right? Like, I say, what are you doing about that? Or I look at that at governors and mayors and say, and district attorneys and say, what are prosecutors doing

about those crimes? What's law enforcement doing about those crimes? And I'm very worried about the message that is being instructed to them by the left in the United States, and I guess the UK and elsewhere, that pull back, that the Jews don't need the real policy implications of what it means to pull back from protecting against anti-Semitism and the policies of many on the left. And I hope leaders on the left confront it. I think it's a huge opportunity, political opportunity for them to truly confront it. Do you think Kamala has done a decent job at doing that? Because I understand, I mean, a Rashida Tlaib presidency would be the end of the world for Jews. But I felt that Kamala has spoken very strongly in support of Israel, as well as her husband has. Her husband's not in a policymaking role. So some of the sentiments

coming from Doug Emhoff are perfectly nice, but it's not clear to me that he has any influence on policy. What Kamala Harris repeatedly says is Israel has a right to defend itself, and how Israel defends itself matters. Well, of course, how Israel defends itself matters. But I think what most reasonable people looking at this without a hint of bias, would say Israel has sought to defend itself in the most responsible way any modern Western small-L liberal country could and would be expected to do. So saying how Israel defends itself matters as though you're like, you know, nodding to the criticisms that Israel's response has been disproportionate, or people have suffered as a result of the nature of Israel's response, I think feeds this narrative that Israel is overshooting in its response. I think that's

dangerous, A. B, I, you know, Harris has repeatedly said, including in recent days, that when she hears those college students protesting against Israel, she hears them. She wants them to know her words. She wants them to know that they have been heard. I do not think that is the appropriate response. That is going to encourage them. It is not going to discourage them. I want to see a Democratic leader, whether it's Kamala Harris or someone else, confront the base of their party, much like Bill Clinton did in another era, confronted the base of his own party. I think on this issue, Harris has not confronted the base. She has legitimized it. She has said that they have a point of view, they have a legitimate point of view, and they need to be heard.

And I, you know, by the way, I say this as a Jewish American, like I not only find that offensive, but I think there are many non-Jews who see what's going on on this debate over Israel as a proxy for a broader breakdown in order in our society. And they would like to see a democratic leader, whether it's Kamala Harris or someone else, confronted head on. And it makes me nervous that she won't. Dan C. Knorr is one of the go-to experts when it comes to Israel and the broader Middle East. He's a former advisor to the U.S. government, worked closely on foreign policy during the Iraq War, co-authored Startup Nation, which is all about Israel's tech and innovation boom, as well as last year's The Genius of Israel, the surprising resilience of a divided nation in a turbulent

world. Today, he's known for breaking down the region's complex issues on his podcast, Call Me Back, and he's a frequent commentator on how these conflicts are shaping U.S. politics. Thanks for your time, Dan. Thank you, guys. Thank you so much. Stay with us. Jess, what did you think? i'm glad we did it i i don't necessarily agree with everything but that was my expectation coming from a different political background as dan but it's such a privilege to be able to talk to someone who's so fluid in every aspect of the conflict and can

actually tell you about all seven fronts that the war is being conducted on. And what I appreciated the most, I guess, is the realism about Bibi. I tend to think more like you do about him and the people that I'm close to in Israel feel the same. But that dichotomy between, you know, the thousands in the streets protesting and what Dan was saying, that people are actually broadly supportive of how he's fighting this war was something that really stuck out to me and something I want to dig into further. What about you? Well, I'm just an enormous fan of Dan. I've become friends with him over this issue. I mean, this issue is kind of a catalyst for us to re-engage after 25 years. And I just think a

lot of him. I'm actually quite worried that, and this is some of my bias here, that I have a lot of friends who are Jewish. I was in a Jewish fraternity at UCLA, and I would describe most of them as center-left. And I feel as if they've become, for a lot of women, bodily autonomy has become a one-issue thing, like they could never support Trump. For a lot of my Jewish friends who are center-, I worry it's taken them center right and they become one issue voters and they see Trump as being more resolute, even if it's like a little bit too empathetic and understanding of what are seen as pretty just blatantly by Jews, anti-Semitic activities on campus, that it's going to cost us some moderate Jewish voters in, I don't know if it's Philadelphia or Arizona. I was kind of curious. I wanted to do some analysis on where they're, I mean, we're 2% of the population,

so I'm not sure we matter, but I guess every vote counts if it's going to hurt us. What are your thoughts? My expectation is that it's electorally not going to hurt us. And we talked about this in the reverse as well with the kind of pro-Palestinian vote. I mean, these are very small voting blocks, but small but mighty. And I hate to, you know, to go there, but Jews give a lot of money during political cycles. And AIPAC is extremely powerful. And we've seen the implications of that in primaries around the country. Like, Cori Bush is not going to be on the ballot come November because of the impact of AIPAC. You know, I totally see what you're saying, and I felt that too. My friends who, for instance, were not Fox News viewers, and now it's all that they watch, that they are not

interested in hearing any equivocating about how Israel is prosecuting, I don't want to say prosecuting this war, but working to bring back innocents that were stolen and avenge the death of over a thousand murders. And they say Fox is the network that is talking about this in terms that resonate with me. But the big problem, well, I have many problems with how Donald Trump speaks about this issue and how he feels about it beyond the dual loyalty issues and saying it's going to be our fault. But Donald Trump never talks about a two-state solution. He never talks about what peace could look like or really giving a rat's ass about what happens to the Palestinian people. I understand Hamas terrorist organization needs to be eradicated, There are going to be people left over there. And the broad

majority of Jews here and abroad support some sort of two-state solution and a rolling back of the settlements that you mentioned when you were talking about what Bibi has been doing in kowtowing to the far right. And I think that that is something that does keep a lot of American Jews centered around the Democratic Party. Plus, to me at least, being Jewish is about being a Zionist and a proud Zionist and caring about Israel and its future, but also caring about other underrepresented and other groups that have experienced trauma and slavery, etc., and that we're part of a coalition of underdogs. And that's something that is only represented on the Democratic left to me and makes the Republican Party a complete nonstarter, even if sometimes I really appreciate how unequivocal

they are about abuse of these protests or abuse of the First Amendment. You know, they just come out and they say this is straight up anti-Semitism. Yeah, I worry that I think it's a thoughtful nuance to you. That's where I end up. I end up that I think Harris and Biden or Biden and Harris were actually more supportive of Israel than any nation in the world. Within moments or hours, within hours of the attacks of October the 7th, more than words, they deployed two carrier strike forces and basically told all the other nations, Iran on its proxies, Iran on its proxies, to basically sit down. That if you're hoping to instigate a multi-front war here,

think twice, because we've deployed the firepower of England and France in the Mediterranean, and we're ready to use it. So I think actually they've been—the reality is I think they've been very supportive of Israel. Now, we've got to hope, and I do think Vice President Harris and her team at the convention were very smart to bring up the parents of— Hersh's parents. Yeah... Hersha's parents. Yeah, Hersha's parents. And it was very powerful. And the bottom line is, there were just more, quite frankly,

there were just more Jews on stage at the DNC than there were at the RNC. But having said that, I worry that some of the stuff that's come out of the far left, I worry there's this zeitgeist or perception of a zeitgeist on the left that they conflate the struggles of the Palestinian people and the residents of Gaza

with the civil rights movement. And their go-to is to assume that rich white people are likely to be oppressors and there's no one richer and whiter than Jews. And I've been just flummoxed at some of the rhetoric that has come out of the far left. And not only the far left and the Democratic Party, that kind of the institutions outside of the Democratic Party that represent liberalism or the far left would be my industry, academic institutions, and their inability to condemn this. Even today, I'm advising the regents of the University of California, and they are reticent to suspend or expel students for things that if blacks or gays

were on the other side of this rhetoric, I think would be out the same day. It wouldn't even be a conversation. Yeah, it would just be- Pack your things and go. You're out, you're out. And if you're not out in 24 hours, we're arresting you. My fear is that the Democratic Party has become so focused on representing people they see as oppressed that there's this knee-jerk reaction to stereotype and unwittingly become very bigoted towards Jews.

And that a lot of Jews feel very much unseen and even threatened right now by the Democratic Party. That perception is our threatened right now by the Democratic Party. That perception is our reality right now. And I'm not sure that Harris has done enough to counter that reality. I think that's right. I think if we had had more time with Dan, I wanted to talk to him about how he feels in terms of his own personal vulnerability. He was on, Dana Perino, my colleague on The Five's podcast after 10-7. He said he had never felt personally vulnerable before, and now he does. I have a very good friend who told me that he doesn't let his sons wear their yarmulkes on the subway anymore. They wear baseball caps instead, something that he never envisioned

could be the reality here. And I think that your point is well taken about what's going on, obviously, on the far left, but that it becomes this sheen over all of our conversations. Like, Governor Whitmer was on one of the Sunday shows, and Rashid Shalib had made a comment, and Jake Tapper wants Governor Whitmer to respond to this. And it eats up all of the space because we don't have a clear answer. There is no democratic clear line. That's like, this is anti-Semitism. This isn't anti-Semitism. This is what Zionism is. This isn't what Zionism is. And it allows a conflation of such important issues that people can then hide behind. I see a darker people that are having a bad time, and I see a lighter people that appear to be in a position of power. And I did think that

it was pretty masterful of Bibi when he came to address Congress that he brought soldiers who were Arabs with him to show the world that Israel is a melting pot. This is not people with lily white skin. These are Middle Easterners fighting for their existence. So what you said, I addressed the Goldman Sachs Israel, I know what you call it, team conference here in London. And there were probably a dozen people in yarmulkes. And I went down the elevator with probably five of them, and they all in unison when they were getting off the elevators put on hats and they said you can't you can't your heart you can't be on the tube in London with a yarmulke and I don't think they were being alarmist or

they've just seemed like fairly reasonable guys and I thought Jesus that's that's where I don't know that much about your religious beliefs just as a Jew I know you're Jewish or do you feel threatened do you feel like I haven't been in America in the last two years, do you feel like anti-Semitism fervor has gotten to a point where Jews are, regardless if it's legitimate or not, if they perceive a threat, it's real. Do you think Jews perceive a real threat? Definitely. Almost everybody, and that's across the denominational scale that I interact with from is being severely inhibited, not just from getting on the subway, but wanting armed guards outside of schools and temples. And I think a lot about when I first came to London to go to London School of Economics, and my grandmother, who had

fled Hitler, she was originally from Vienna, they went to Paris and then managed to get out of there before he took over. And she told me, you're going to London. There's a lot of anti-Semitism. And I said, nanny, you're crazy. That's not a thing. And one of the first things that happened at the LSC Student Union is that they voted to abolish the state of Israel. And I begrudgingly called her and I said, I guess you were right that this is a thing. And I've lived, cocooned, bubbled, whatever it is. If someone had asked me on October 6th what the state of anti-Semitism was in the US,

I would have said it doesn't exist. I was totally naive to it. I just didn't even- Like Tree of Life, synagogue shooting was just a complete aberration. Yeah, just a crazy, crazy insane person. And my friends who were saying anti-Semitism is always in the reads, always waiting. I thought you're just being paranoid. I understand your paranoia, but that has primarily been starched from our society. And I

was flummoxed and wrong and didn't have a grandmother to call. But yeah, I absolutely hear you. All right, Jess, we will see you next week. Thanks, everybody, for tuning in.