Tel Aviv Review

What did South African anti-apartheid activists once think about Israel and Zionism? The answer is more complicated than most seem to think.

Dr. Asher Lubotzky, research fellow at the University of Houston's Department of Political Science, takes us through the extraordinary—and often surprising—relationship between the South African anti-apartheid movement and Israel, from the birth of both countries in 1948 through the Cold War, the end of apartheid, and into the present.

Lubotzky is the author of Shifting Solidarities: The South African Anti-Apartheid Movement's Perception of Zionism.

In the early years, some of the movement's most prominent activists actually supported Israel. Jewish and non-Jewish communists saw the new Jewish state as an anti-fascist, socialist project. African nationalists found parallels between Zionism and their own struggle for national liberation. And Israel itself was actively reaching out to anti-apartheid movements in Africa.

So how did that relationship turn into today's association of Israel with apartheid? The answer involves the Six-Day War, Israel's growing military ties with Pretoria, the Cold War, South Africa's Jewish community, and shifting ideas about colonialism and national liberation.

It's a fascinating history of how political alliances change—and how today's certainties can look very different when viewed through the lens of the past.

What does soccer have to do with Zionism? More than you might think.

Today, competitive sports feel like an obvious part of Israeli culture. But when Zionism was taking shape in the early 20th century, sports were anything but obvious. Many Zionists actually preferred gymnastics, believing it would build a healthier, more disciplined—and more ideal—Jew.

So how did competitive sports win out?

In this fascinating episode, Dr Ofer Idels, fellow in Israel Studies at the University of Calgary, takes us back to interwar Palestine, when Jews were debating what kind of bodies, citizens, and society they wanted to create.

Along the way, we discover how sports became entangled with nationalism, Hebrew culture, masculinity, capitalism, the British Empire—and the very idea of what it meant to be a "new Jew."

And here's the intriguing part: Idels argues that even something as seemingly apolitical as sport can reveal the ideology shaping a society.

Read more in his book, Embodying the Revolution: The Hebrew Experience and the Globalization of Modern Sports in Interwar Palestine.

What separates an activist who changes the world… from one who simply makes noise?

Israeli-American lawyer, philanthropist, and disability rights advocate Jay Ruderman argues that lasting change isn't about shouting the loudest. It's about knowing when to provoke, when to persuade, and how to build unlikely alliances.

Drawing on decades of experience—from transforming disability representation in Hollywood to navigating today's deeply polarized political landscape—Ruderman shares why winning hearts and minds is often far more powerful than winning an argument.

His book Find Your Fight: Make Your Voice Heard for the Causes that Matter Most. Ruderman builds on his long years as an activist for disability inclusion to offer essential tips for the budding (and the experienced) activist.

Can films reveal what a nation really believes about itself?

For decades, Dutch cinema told one story about its Jews. Then, slowly, that story began to change.

This week, Dr. Eyal Boers, head of Film and Television at Ariel University, takes us on a fascinating journey through more than a century of Dutch cinema, showing how films have reflected—and shaped—the Netherlands' evolving relationship with its Jewish community, the Holocaust, national identity, and Israel.

Why did Jewish characters move from being outsiders to symbols of national guilt? Why does Anne Frank loom so large over Dutch filmmaking? And what does today's portrayal of Israelis reveal about contemporary Europe?

It's a conversation about cinema—but even more, it's about memory, identity, and the stories societies tell themselves.

Check out Dr. Boers book, The Jew in Dutch Cinema: Images, Stereotypes and National Identity.

Upon the publication of Autocorrect, his latest collection of short stories, Etgar Keret joins us to discuss his favorite literary form, the impact of AI on storytelling and the power of literature post-Oct 7.

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

The major turning points in Iran's nuclear program were not the JCPOA or the latest wars, but the Shah's defiance of Henry Kissinger and the Iran-Iraq War, says Dr. Sina Azodi, Assistant Professor of Middle East Politics at George Washington University and author of Iran and the Bomb: The United States, Iran and the Nuclear Question.

How does a Western-educated king survive — and thrive — in the political chaos of the Middle East for more than 25 years?

Aaron Magid, a journalist formerly based in Jordan, discusses his book The Most American King: Abdullah of Jordan, exploring the fascinating story of Jordan's King Abdullah II: a monarch shaped by American culture, dependent on American support, yet ruling one of the region's most fragile and strategically vital countries.

From Georgetown and Star Trek to Gaza, the Arab Spring, ISIS, Trump, Obama, and the future of the Hashemite Kingdom — this conversation dives deep into the balancing act that has kept Jordan stable while the region around it burns.

A timely conversation about power, survival, diplomacy, and the quiet importance of Jordan in Middle Eastern politics.

Olga Gershenson, professor of Jewish and Near East Studies and Film Studies at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, explains how a generation raised on VHS, torrents, and global cinema reinvented horror in Israel—turning familiar tropes into sharp, funny, and deeply local cultural critique. From "Hebraizing" zombies to exposing the absurdities of military life, Israeli horror is anything but escapist—it's subversive, original, and long overdue.

Why did it take so long for horror to emerge in Israeli cinema—and why did it suddenly explode in the 2010s?

Her book, New Israeli Horror: Local Cinema, Global Genre, is available here: https://websites.umass.edu/newisraelihorror

Oz Frankel, professor of American history at the New School for Social Research in New York, discusses his book Coca Cola, Black Panthers and Phantom Jers: Israel in the American Orbit 1967-1973.

A thought-provoking episode exploring how early Zionist thinkers engaged deeply with Arabic language and Islamic culture, challenging conventional views of identity and "Orientalism" in the Middle East.

Dr Mostafa Hussein, Assistant Professor of Jewish-Muslim Relations at the University of Michigan, discusses his book Hebrew Orientalism: Jewish Engagement with Arabo-Islamic Culture in Late Ottoman Palestine.

Did you know that a Yiddish newspaper once had a larger circulation than The New York Times?

At the turn of the 20th century, the Yiddish press in America wasn't just a news industry — it was the beating heart of immigrant Jewish life. Newspapers didn't just report the news; they offered advice, shaped politics, and helped newcomers navigate a bewildering new society.

In this week's episode, historian Ayelet Brinn joins us to discuss her award-winning book A Revolution in Type: Gender and the Making of the American Yiddish Press.

Among the fascinating stories we explore:

• Why men sometimes wrote under female pseudonyms just to get published • How "women's columns" became unexpected spaces for radical political ideas • The strange linguistic world of early Yiddish journalism — where the same word might be spelled differently in the same article • And how immigrant newspapers became guides to everyday life, with readers even showing up at editorial offices for personal advice.

What emerges is a portrait of a vibrant media ecosystem where journalism, politics, gender, and immigrant identity collided in surprising ways.

If you were a newly arrived immigrant a century ago, would you trust a newspaper to guide you through daily life?

Amir Naaman and Dr Ran Heilbrunn, Israeli writers based in Germany, discuss their new collection of essays Inversion: Gay Life after the Homosexual. What are the next steps for queer theory after the impressive gains made by gay rights activism over the last few decades?

For Michael Sfard, one of Israel's most prominent human rights lawyers and author of the forthcoming book Occupation from Within: How Israel's Oppression of the Palestinians Turned Inwards, the government's anti-democratic proposals, collectively known as the "judicial overhaul", are a culmination of the decades-long occupation of the Palestinians.

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

How will the much-touted special relationship be affected by President Trump's overhaul of many aspects of American governance? Alon Pinkas, former Israeli diplomat and author of the forthcoming book An Unnatural Alliance, reflects on his time as Consul-General in New York in the early 2000s - how has Israeli diplomacy in the US evolved since?

Join us on Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/telavivreview

Dr. Murat Yildiz, a historian of the Middle East at Skidmore College, discusses his book, The Ottoman World of Sports: Refashioning Bodies, Men and Communities in Late Imperial Istanbul. (Forthcoming, University of Texas Press).

Robert Malley, a former US negotiator and president and CEO of the International Crisis Group, and currently Senior Fellow and Lecturer at Yale University's Jackson School for Global Affairs, discusses his book (co-authored with Hussein Agha) Tomorrow is Yesterday: Life, Death and the Pursuit of Peace in Israel/Palestine.

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

Dr Balazs Berkovits, a Hungarian-born sociologist and philosopher, and Dr. Sara Hirschhorn, an American-Israeli historian, discuss the complexity – and adverse effects – of attributing the "whiteness" category to Jews.

This series is made possible by the Elizabeth and Tony Comper Center for the Study of Antisemitism and Racism at the University of Haifa.

Steven E. Zipperstein, the director of the Nazarian Center for Israel Studies at UCLA, discusses his book, Zionism, Palestinian Nationalism and the Law: 1939-1948.

Dr Dikla Yogev and Dr Shlomi Balaban, two Israeli academics based in Canada, reflect on Oct. 7 and its aftermath in their professional and personal circles.

This series is made possible by the Elizabeth and Tony Comper Center for the Study of Antisemitism and Racism at the University of Haifa.

Rabbi Dr Michael Marmur, Professor of Jewish Theology at Hebrew Union College in Jerusalem, discusses his book Living the Letters: An Alphabet of Emerging Jewish Thought.

Izabella Tabarovsky and Prof. Khinvraj Jangid, fellows at the Elizabeth and Tony Comper Center for the Study of Antisemitism and Racism at the University of Haifa, discuss the landscape of antisemitism in two non-Western environments: the Post-Soviet and the Indian.

This series is made possible by the Elizabeth and Tony Comper Center for the Study of Antisemitism and Racismat the University of Haifa.

Amos Goldberg, Professor of Jewish History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and a renowned historian of the Holocaust, explains why he believes Israel is committing genocide in Gaza and weighs in on the role of historians and public intellectuals in addressing it.

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

Lior Sternfeld, Associate Professor of History and Jewish Studies at Penn State University, discusses his book, "Iran: Life itself. History, politics, culture and trauma," a Hebrew-language primer for Israelis curious about their country's arch-enemy.

Hear the full episode on Patreon

Prof. Guy Ben-Porat, political scientist at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, discusses his co-written book Usual Suspects: Minorities, Police and Citizenship in Israel.

Adam Kirsch, poet, critic and editor at the Wall Street Journal, discusses his widely debated book, On Settler Colonialism: Ideology, Violence and Justice. The settler-colonialism prism, especially in the wake of October 7, is a textbook example of the use and abuse of academic theories for political ends – how and why has it come to be? Kirsch offers an historical genealogy as well as a contemporary analysis.

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

Guy Miron, professor of modern European Jewish history at the Open University of Israel, and the director of the Center for the Study of the Holocaust in Germany at Yad Vashem and a board member of the Leo Baeck Institute in Jerusalem, discusses his most recent book, Space and Time Under Persecution: The German-Jewish Experience in the Third Reich.

Dr Ido Yahel, a postdoctoral fellow at Tel Aviv University's Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies, is a historian of modern Syria. An ethnic hodgepodge, was the decades-long stability provided by the brutal Assad regime an exception rather than the rule? Can Syria reinvent itself under the leadership of a reformed (at least partially) radical Islamist?

Hear the full episode on Patreon

Prof. Jonthan Dekel-Chen, Rabbi Edward Sandrow Chair in Soviet and East European Jewry at the Hebrew University and the academic chairman of the Nevzlin Center for Russian and East European Jewry, takes a long view on the history of Jews in Russia and its past and present territories, from the turn of the 20th century to the 21st.

This episode is made possible by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Leonid Nevzlin Research Center for Russian and East European Jewry.

Dr Amit Levy, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Haifa's Department of Israel Studies, discusses his book, A New Orient: From German Scholarship to Middle Eastern Studies in Israel.

The October 7 events seemed, initially at least, to put the government's plans for a judicial overhaul on the back burner. But under the guise of wartime emergency regulations, the government has slipped back to its old habits.

As Prof. Suzie Navot, a scholar of constitutional law and Vice-President of the Israel Democracy Institute, explains, the judicial overhaul is now returning in a much more circumspect (and therefore ominous) manner than before.

Dr Rona Aviram, a scientist, and Omer Benjakob, a journalist – both fellows at Brandeis University's Institute of Advanced Israel Studies – discuss Wikipedia's bumpy road towards becoming the go-to source of knowledge online.

This episode is part of a series in partnership with the Institute of Advanced Israel Studies at Brandeis University.

Dr Anna Kushkova, an anthropologist, postdoctoral fellow at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Leonid Nevzlin Research Center for Russian and East European Jewry, discusses her research on Jewish underground entrepreneurial networks in the Soviet Union.

This episode is made possible by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Leonid Nevzlin Research Center for Russian and East European Jewry.

Hear this Patron-Exclusive Episode on Patreon

William Kolbrener and Ronit Eitan, literary scholars at Bar Ilan University, are the founders of Writing on the Wall, an online platform for an open and diverse conversation, and co-editors of Balagan, a magazine of Art, Poetry and Perspective that launched earlier this year. What is the power of literature and writing to mitigate times of crisis?

Neta Shoshani's documentary film 1948: Remember, Remember Not was commissioned by Kan, Israel's public broadcaster for the country's 75th Independence Day. Almost two years on, it has yet to be broadcast, in the wake of a right-wing campaign that claims that it defames Israel. In this episode, she talks about the interplay between history, memory and public knowledge.

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

Tom Eshed, postdoctoral fellow at the Hebrew University's Jacob Robinson Institute for the History of Individual and Collective Rights, discusses knowledge production on Antisemitism in the wake of the Second World War in Israel and abroad.

This episode is made possible by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Jacob Robinson Institute for the History of Individual and Collective Rights.

Adam Shinar, Professor of Constitutional and Administrative Law, at Reichman University, discusses the recent return of Israel's Film and Theatre Review Board from oblivion, to serve the government's political goals. How did Israel's censorship laws evolve over the years?

Dr Lee Mordechai, a historian at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, discusses Bearing Witness to the Gaza War, a comprehensive database of facts and figures that he meticulously collected since October 7, 2023. How did a Byzantine historian come to meticulously collect evidence about the atrocities of the current war, still ongoing?

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

Elyakim Rubinstein has had an incredibly prolific career in academia, politics, diplomacy and the judiciary. Among his many accomplishments, he served as cabinet secretary, attorney general, chargé d'affaires in Israel's embassy in Washington, and deputy chief justice until his retirement in 2017. He is the only living Israeli who has taken part in peace negotiations with all of Israel's five neighboring countries, in which capacity he led the Israeli delegation to the peace negotiations with Jordan that culminated in an accord that recently marked its 30-year anniversary.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Dr. Yael Dekel, a literary scholar at the Open University and Ben Gurion University of the Negev and a lead fellow at Brandeis University's Institute of Advanced Israel Studies, talks about the Literary Laboratory: how can digital methods be used to study the canon of Hebrew literature - and redefine it, along the way?

This episode is part of a series in partnership with the Institute of Advanced Israel Studies at Brandeis University.

Prof Nir Arielli, Professor of International History at the University of Leeds (UK), discusses his book The Dead Sea: A 10,000 Year History.

Dr. (Col. res.) Eran Shamir-Borer, Director of the Center for National Security and Democracy at the Israel Democracy Institute and formerly the head of the International Law Department of the IDF's Military Advocate General, analyzes Israel's legal standing in relation to the Gaza War and the occupation of the Palestinian Territories.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Yehuda Shenhav Shaharabani, Professor Emeritus of sociology at Tel Aviv University and the editor in chief of Maktoob books, a series of Hebrew translations of Arabic literature, discusses the life and writing of Elias Khoury, the great Lebanese novelist who died in September, aged 76. Shenhav Shaharabani single-handedly translated ten of Khoury's novels, and was a close personal friend of his.

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

Dr Brandon Friedman, a research fellow at Tel Aviv University's Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies specializing in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf countries, discusses the future of Middle Eastern geopolitics in the wake of October 7th and ahead of Donald Trump's inauguration.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

The climate crisis is a global issue with very concrete strategic consequences: on food security, energy and more. Galit Cohen, Director of the Program on Climate Change at Tel Aviv University's Institute for National Security Studies and the former Director General of the Ministry of Environmental Protection, discusses the implications of the climate crisis on national security and the importance of policymaking in moving forward.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Daniel Lörcher, the founding director of What Matters, an organization that tackles racism, antisemitism and discrimination on the soccer field and elsewhere, discusses his work on reducing antisemitism among soccer fans and how sports culture can – and does – help create an atmosphere that promotes tolerance and pluralism.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Ricarda Louk, the mother of Shani, a tattoo artist who became one of the most iconic victims of the Nova festival massacre, talks to us upon the one-year anniversary of the October 7 attack.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Dr Tammy Hoffman, a research fellow and the Head of the Education Policy Program at the Israel Democracy Institute and a lecturer at Hakibbutzim College of Education, explains how public education can tackle the erosion of democratic norms and the adverse effects of social media on society.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Historian Dr Nimrod Lin, Managing Editor of the Journal of Israeli History, discusses his forthcoming book People Who Count: Zionism, Demography and Democracy in Mandate Palestine.

This interview is part of the "Democracy and Its Alternatives: The Origins of Israel's Current Crisis" conference, held at Brandeis University and organized in partnership with the Center for Jewish History in New York.

Roni Stauber, Professor of Jewish History at Tel Aviv University, discusses his book Diplomacy in the Shadow of Memory: Israel and West Germany, 1953-1965.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Dr Matthias Becker, research fellow at Reichman University and the University of Cambridge, discusses his Decoding Antisemitism project, using novel scholarly and technological tools to monitor and analyze online hate speech.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Eran Halperin, professor of psychology at the Hebrew University and the founding director of aChord, a leading research center dedicated to promoting social change in Israel through the tools of social psychology, discusses his new book, Warning: Hate Ahead.Why is hate such a powerful emotion, and what can be done to contain it?

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

Dr Yoav Fromer, a senior lecturer at the Department of English and American Studies and the head of the Center of US Studies at Tel Aviv University, discusses his new book (co-edited with Ilan Peleg), The Americanization of the Israeli Right.

Joshua Leifer, an American journalist (Dissent, The New York Review of Books, The Guardian) and PhD candidate in history at Yale University, discusses his new book Tablets Shattered: The End of an American Jewish Century and the Future of Jewish Life.

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

Eviatar Zerubavel, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Sociology at Rutgers University, discusses his new book "Don't Take It Personally: Personalness and Impersonality in Social Life."

Prof. Orit Rozin, a historian at Tel Aviv University, discusses her new book Emotions of Conflict: Israel 1949-1967, analyzing the efforts of the Israeli establishment in the 1950s and 60s to control the people's emotional response to the impending sense of insecurity.

Liora Halperin, Professor of International Studies and History and Distinguished Endowed Chair of Jewish Studies at the University of Washington in Seattle, discusses her book The Oldest Guard: Forging the Zionist Settler Past.

Yael Zerubavel, Professor Emerita of Jewish Studies and History at Rutgers University, discusses her new book Desert, Island, Wall: Symbolic Landscapes and the Politics of Space in Israeli Culture, which has just been published in Hebrew and is an updated version of her 2019 book Desert in the Promised Land.

Dr. Jonathan Grossman explores Israel's evolving attitude and discourse toward Israeli emigrants, shifting from viewing them as selfish deserters to embracing them as loyal partners, fostering a legitimate and valuable diaspora community abroad.

This episode is made possible by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Jacob Robinson Institute for the History of Individual and Collective Rights.

Anne Rethmann examines post-1945 human rights discourses, highlighting the concept of justice by the Austrian-Jewish lawyer Franz Bienenfeld. Comparing it with T. W. Adorno's notion of maturity, she emphasizes the significance of dignity within the framework of human rights.

This episode is made possible by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Jacob Robinson Institute for the History of Individual and Collective Rights.

Prof. Rotem Giladi discusses his book "Jews, Sovereignty, and International Law: Ideology and Ambivalence in Early Israeli Legal Diplomacy" (Oxford 2021), which explores the role of ideology in shaping Israel's early attitudes towards international law.

This episode is made possible by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Jacob Robinson Institute for the History of Individual and Collective Rights.

Dr. Timo Aava examines Estonia's establishment of non-territorial autonomies during the interwar period, with a particular focus on the Jewish self-government case, thereby providing intriguing insights into Estonia's treatment of minorities.

This episode is made possible by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Jacob Robinson Institute for the History of Individual and Collective Rights.

Dr. Eran Shlomi discusses Zionist diplomacy and representation at the League of Nations, the UN predecessor, during the interwar period. He analyzes the League's role in the Zionist path to statehood.

This episode is made possible by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Jacob Robinson Institute for the History of Individual and Collective Rights.

Dr. Iris Nachum introduces the jurist Jacob Robinson (1889-1977), emphasizing his activism for minority rights and compensation for expulsion. A research institute in his name has recently been established at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

This episode is made possible by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Jacob Robinson Institute for the History of Individual and Collective Rights.

Prof. Jeffrey Herf, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of History at the University of Maryland, College Park, discusses his book, The Three Faces of Antisemitism: Right, Left and Islamist.

What common ground do these three markedly different worldviews hold when it comes to the Jews?

Dr Roni Mikel-Arieli, a postdoctoral and teaching fellow at Ben Gurion University's Department of Sociology and Anthropology and until recently the academic director of the Oral History Division at the Hebrew University's Avraham Harman Research Institute of Contemporary Jewry, discusses her book Remembering the Holocaust in a Racial State: Holocaust Memory in South Africa from Apartheid to Democracy (1948-1994).

Katharina von Schnurbein, the European Commission's Coordinator on Combating Antisemitism and Fostering Jewish Life, talks about the EU's response to anti-Jewish hate crimes and speech. Despite the alarming increase in cases, she says that the Union has taken many measures (some of them long before October 2023) that have begun to bear fruit.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Dr Andrew Port, a historian at Wayne State University, discusses his new book Never Again: Germans and Genocide after the Holocaust, analyzing German responses to cases of genocide from the 1970s to the 1990s.

A special collaboration with the Jerusalem Unplugged podcast, where host Robert Mazza and the Tel Aviv Review's Gilad Halpern discuss the current moment for Israel domestically and internationally.

Dr Lihi Ben Shitrit, the director of the Taub Center for Israel Studies at NYU and editor of the forthcoming The Gates of Gaza: Critical Voices from Israel on October 7 and the War with Hamas, and Dr Dahlia Scheindlin, author of The Crooked Timber of Democracy in Israel: Promise Unfulfilledassess what lies ahead for Israel: A sea change, or more of the same?

Dr Ben Shitrit and Dr Scheindlin (and Dr Agbaria, in the older ep) are fellows at the Institute of Advanced Israel Studies at Brandeis University's Schusterman Center for Israel Studies. The interview was recorded on the sidelines of the "Democracy and Its Alternatives: The Origins of Israel's Current Crisis" conference, held at Brandeis University and organized in partnership with the Center for Jewish History in New York.

The already volatile situation of the Palestinian citizens of Israel has been exacerbated by the October 7th massacre and the war with Hamas that ensued. Dr Ahmad Agbaria of the Department of Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Texas, Austin, talks about how their status and democratic rights have been affected, and what role they might play in its aftermath.

The interview was recorded on the sidelines of the "Democracy and Its Alternatives: The Origins of Israel's Current Crisis" conference, held at Brandeis University and organized in partnership with the Center for Jewish History in New York.

Adam Shatz, author and writer, US Editor for the London Review of Books and a visiting professor at Bard College, discusses his book The Rebel's Clinic: The Revolutionary Lives of Frantz Fanon.

The October 7th attack undermined some of the basic assumptions Israelis have had about the tenets of their sovereignty. Will the crisis send the country into a post-nation-state phase?

Dr. Julie Cooper, Senior Lecturer in Political Science at Tel Aviv University, and a fellow of the Institute of Advanced Israel Studies at Brandeis University's Schusterman Center for Israel Studies, shares her thoughts at the "Democracy and Its Alternatives: The Origins of Israel's Current Crisis" conference.

Dr Dafna Hirsch, senior lecturer at the Open University of Israel's Department of Sociology, Political Science and Communication, discusses her edited book, Entangled Histories in Palestine/Israel: Historical and Anthropological Perspectives.

Dr David Barak-Gorodetsky, Lecturer in Israel Studies at the University of Haifa and the Director of the Ruderman Program for American-Jewish Studies, discusses his book Judah Magnes: The Prophetic Politics of a Religious Binationalist, a biography of one of the more unusual characters in the history of Zionism.

Dr Avi-Ram Tzoreff, a Polonsky Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, discusses his new book R. Binyamin, Binationalism and Counter-Zionism,dedicated to one of the most unusual Jewish and Zionist intellectuals of the 20th century.

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

Yaroslav Trofimov, chief foreign affairs correspondent for the Wall Street Journal, discusses his new book Our Enemies Will Vanish: The Russian Invasion and Ukraine's War of Independence. What parallels can be drawn between Ukraine's war with Russia and Israel's with Hamas?

Dr Geoffrey Levin, Assistant Professor of Middle Eastern and Jewish Studies at Emory University, discusses his book Our Palestine Problem: Israel and American Jewish Dissent, 1948-1978.The book looks at a network of early anti-Zionist and pro-Palestinian thought leaders, active in the immediate aftermath of the establishment of the State of Israel.

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

Yael Sternhell, Professor of History and American Studies at Tel Aviv University, discusses her book, War on Record: The Archive and the Afterlife of the Civil War, a historians' history which looks at Washington's Civil War archive, rather than throughit.

Yosef Halper, a legendary Tel Aviv bookdealer, discusses his book The Bibliomaniacs: Tales from a Tel Aviv Bookseller.

Dan Rabinowitz, Professor of Sociology at Tel Aviv University, discusses his book The Power of Deserts: Climate Change, the Middle East and the Promise of a Post-Oil Era, analyzing the role of the Middle East as both a major generator and a primary victim of climate change, the dashed and renewed hopes for a coherent climate policy, and the role of social science in policy-making.

Jonathan Huppert, Professor of Psychology and the director of the Laboratory for the Treatment and Study of Mental Health and Well Being at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, discusses mental health response in the wake of the October 7th attack. Is Israel, a society riddled with trauma, facing unprecedented challenges?

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Benjamin Balint, an award-winning American-Israeli writer based at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, discusses his book Bruno Schulz: An Artist, A Murder, and the Hijacking of History. The literary legacy of Schulz, the so-called Polish Kafka, has been the subject of an international legal, cultural and diplomatic debate.

Hilary Falb-Kalisman, Professor of History and Jewish Studies at the University of Colorado-Boulder, discusses her book, Teachers as State Builders: Education and the Making of the Modern Middle East.

Dr Limor Yehuda, lecturer in law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, discusses her book Collective Equality: Human Rights and Democracy in Ethno-National Conflicts. Taking national identity seriously, she charts a new way of thinking about statehood and partition.

Amir Tibon, diplomatic correspondent for Haaretz newspaper and a resident of Kibbutz Nahal Oz, survived the October 7th massacre with his wife and young daughters. He talks about his harrowing story, about Israel's systemic failure to protect its citizens, what it will take for them to return to live less than a mile from Gaza City, and why he doesn't regret having done it in the first place.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Dr. Dotan Halevy, environmental and social historian of the late Ottoman Empire and the Modern Middle East at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, discusses the history of Gaza from the mid-19th century until today. How did Gaza come to encapsulate 1948, and the essence of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Dr Michael Milstein, head of the Palestinian Studies Forum at Tel Aviv University's Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies and the former Head of the Palestinian Department for the IDF intelligence, analyzes what Israeli military leaders and political decision-makers got – and are still getting – wrong about Hamas.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Dr Oded Adomi Leshem (rethink-hope.com), political psychologist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, discusses his new book Hope Amid Conflict: Philosophical and Psychological Explorations.The book was published in eerie proximity to Hamas' Oct. 7th attack, which many see as having delivered a tremendous blow to the hope of a peaceful resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Dr Leshem's facts and figures paint a more complex picture.

Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib/Flash90

Dr Marik Shtern, political geographer and a research fellow at the Jerusalem Institute for Policy research, discusses his co-authored paper "Shared Spaces in Contested Cities: A Model for Analysis and Action."

Jerusalem is, at the same time, the most segregated and most integrated urban area in Israel/Palestine – what lessons can be drawn from the city's experience?

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Professor Oren Yiftachel discusses more than a decade of his scholarship on colonial regimes, identities and futures in Israel and Palestine through the lens of geography and urban planning.

Daniel Bar-Tal, professor (emeritus) of social psychology at Tel Aviv University, discusses his new book, Sinking into the Honey Trap: The Case of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. How can social psychology contribute to our understanding of a conflict that never ends?

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

Abbot Nikodemus Schnabel, the head of Jerusalem's Dormition Abbey, in conversation about Christian life in Israel (including of thousands of migrant workers), the nature of interfaith dialogue amid mounting extremism, the role of religion in diplomacy and conflict resolution, and more.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Dr Karma Ben-Johanan, religion scholar at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, specializing in modern Christianity and Jewish-Christian relations, discusses her new book Jacob's Younger Brother: Christian-Jewish relations after Vatican II. What were the implications of the Vatican's new approach to Judaism, announced in the 1960s, across the Catholic world and among Jewish theologians?

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.

Dr Nechumi Yaffe of Tel Aviv University's School of Social and Policy Studies, the first ultra-Orthodox woman to serve as a faculty member in an Israeli university, discusses her research on ultra-Orthodox "capabilities" – a tool used by social scientists to measure the well-being and opportunities afforded to people – as well as the relationship between a Haredi lifestyle and higher education.

The episode is sponsored by the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History at UCLA and co-hosted by Prof David N. Myers.

Tamir Sorek, professor of history at Penn State University specializing in Palestinian politics and culture in the State of Israel, discusses his book The Optimist: A social biography of Tawfiq Zayyad, the story of one of the foremost Palestinian politicians and intellectuals in Israel of the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s

Dr Rob Geist Pinfold, a lecturer at Durham University's School of Government and International Affairs, discusses his book Understanding Territorial Withdrawals: Israeli Occupations and Exits, offering a cross-section examination of several cases of territorial expansion and realignment throughout Israel's history.

Joseph Berger, formerly a New York Times journalist, discusses his book Elie Wiesel: Confronting the Silence, the first English-language biography of the iconic Jewish intellectual and Holocaust author.

Isabel Kershner, Israel reporter for the New York Times, discusses her new book The Land of Hope and Fear: Israel's Battle for its Inner Soul.

This episode is made possible by the Israel office of Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political education.