Episode Details

This week’s Zoom call will be at our regular time, Friday at 1 PM Eastern. Our guest will be Diana Buttu, a Palestinian lawyer and political analyst based in Israel. Since this war began, I’ve struggled to understand why most Israeli Jews support it. I discussed this last week with the Iranian, Jewish, and Israeli writer and translator Orly Noy. But sometimes, the people who best understand a society are those who live within it as outsiders. It’s that experience of marginality, of seeing things from below, that often animates the insights of Black writers in the US and long animated the insights of Jewish writers in Europe. That’s why I’m turning to Diana, a Palestinian citizen of Israel, to help understand Jewish Israeli society in this awful moment. She’s someone I’ve been learning from for a long time. And I’m grateful to have the chance to do so again this Friday. Please join us.

Things to Read

(Maybe this should be obvious, but I link to articles and videos I find provocative and significant, not necessarily ones I entirely agree with.)

In Jewish Currents (subscribe!), Alex Kane explains AIPAC’s attack on liberal Zionist politicians.

Greg Sargent on how the Iran War is hastening the end of the Trump coalition.

An insightful discussion with Esfandyar Batmanghelidj on the American Prestige podcast about how this war might change the long term trajectory of the Gulf countries.

Last week I spoke to Bob Wright (whose newsletter I strongly recommend) about Israel, antisemitism and this war.

On March 26, Jason Stanley will speak with Nikole Hannah-Jones in Brooklyn about his book, Erasing History.

Appearances

On March 17, I’ll be speaking at George Washington University.

On March 30, I’ll be speaking at the State University of New York at Stony Brook.

See you on Friday,

Peter

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT:

I want to say two things about this terrible attack on a synagogue in Michigan. The first is that no matter what Israel does, no matter how immoral or brutal or horrifying, it doesn’t justify attacking a synagogue or justifying attacking American Jews in any way. There’s a basic principle here. The principle is that Americans are not responsible for the actions of foreign governments or foreign organizations just because they share a religion, an ethnic, national ancestry, a race, with that state or foreign organization.

So, by that principle, it is just as wrong to target a synagogue because you’re upset at what Israel did, as it was when people attacked Chinese Americans because they were angry at the Chinese government during COVID, or when people attack Muslim Americans because they’re angry at Al-Qaeda, or ISIS, or Hamas, or Iran, or as when the United States government itself held Japanese Americans responsible and pu