Podcasts about jewishness

Jews and Gentiles don't differ genetically or racially. Their difference is a qualitative one of kedusha. The kedusha of Jewishness is available to any human being. The way a Jew engages with kedusha and with the world through kedusha, is totally unique.Source Sheet

Film Festival Tickets: https://buytickets.at/thedopeyfoundation/2216905 PATREONL www.patreon.com/dopeypodcast Zoom: dopeyzoom.com This Week on the Wednesday Dose! The episode opens with Dave feeling sick but super inspired by the Knicks, community in general, and the way Dopey Nation sticks together. He talks about Dopey Zoom, putting up Dopey stickers carefully, and the psychedelic idea that listeners are all connected through the show. Dave also pays tribute to Rob Base and Sonny Rollins, then reads a brutal listener email from Sarah about broken ankles, losing housing, 7OH/Kratom struggles, and leaning on Dopey Nation. He reads Patreon and Spotify comments, talks about Skinny Vinny, drug dreams, Canadian bacon, Patreon tiers, Tom Shoes backlash, and then promotes the Dopey Recovery Short Film Festival. The main conversation is with Handsome Evan, who is celebrating six years sober and just had his second son on his sobriety anniversary. Sitting in the car by the Great South Bay, Dave and Evan talk AA politics, Jewishness in meetings, Anthony Spaghetti, recovery community, and Evan's story. Evan tells stories about smoking crack, driving dealers around Gordon Heights, trading belongings for drugs, stealing from his family, and eventually becoming a drug and alcohol counselor while still smoking weed and later using coke, booze, Xanax, and Ritalin. He talks about the shame of claiming recovery while secretly using, finally going back to rehab after his wife caught him, and how AA, structure, OCD, and fatherhood helped him build a real life. The episode closes with Evan opening up about anxiety around parenting, obsessive fears about his kids, family resentments, and the strange normal problems of sober life. Anthony Spaghetti makes a guest appearance to explain Prince Spaghetti Day.  All that and MORE! MORE! MORE! on a new wednesday dose of that good ol' dopey show.       Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Zach Windahl — author of The Bible Simplified — joins Levi and Jennie for a conversation about why so many believers still feel lost in scripture, what finally clicks when you see the whole Bible as one connected story, and the wild COVID wedding that required a cross-state drive with two hours to spare just to get a marriage license. They dig into making the Old Testament less intimidating, how 66 books become one story that changes everything, Bible memorization, and raising kids who love God's word. Plus: the chocolate chip cookie recipe Zach promised to share. Connect with us on social! Zach: @zachwindahl Levi: @levilusko Jennie: @jennielusko Fresh Life Church: @freshlife [Links] Check out Zach's book The Bible Simplified: https://bit.ly/3PX79Um Check out the Bible Simplified Study Guide: https://bit.ly/3NZs2O3 Zach's famous chocolate chip cookie recipe: https://bit.ly/4cii8k2 Spend "a Year In the Gospels" with us: Get the 5 Gallon Bucket:https://bit.ly/sdl4sHY Get the Lusketeer Sticker: https://bit.ly/sdl4sHY Subscribe for more exclusive content: https://levilusko.com/hitl-subscribe Time Stamps: 00:13:57 – Introducing The Bible Simplified 00:20:19 – Why you can't really understand the New Testament without the Old 00:25:07 – Theology for normal people 00:35:42 – If you could condense the entire Bible to a tweet... 00:38:57 – Zach's favorite book of the Bible and the Jewishness of Jesus 00:45:48 – Bible memorization, handwriting the whole NT, and honey on slates

Zach Windahl — author of The Bible Simplified — joins Levi and Jennie for a conversation about why so many believers still feel lost in scripture, what finally clicks when you see the whole Bible as one connected story, and the wild COVID wedding that required a cross-state drive with two hours to spare just to get a marriage license. They dig into making the Old Testament less intimidating, how 66 books become one story that changes everything, Bible memorization, and raising kids who love God's word. Plus: the chocolate chip cookie recipe Zach promised to share. Connect with us on social! Zach: @zachwindahl Levi: @levilusko Jennie: @jennielusko Fresh Life Church: @freshlife [Links] Check out Zach's book The Bible Simplified: https://bit.ly/3PX79Um Check out the Bible Simplified Study Guide: https://bit.ly/3NZs2O3 Zach's famous chocolate chip cookie recipe: https://bit.ly/4cii8k2 Spend "a Year In the Gospels" with us: Get the 5 Gallon Bucket:https://bit.ly/sdl4sHY Get the Lusketeer Sticker: https://bit.ly/sdl4sHY Subscribe for more exclusive content: https://levilusko.com/hitl-subscribe Time Stamps: 00:13:57 – Introducing The Bible Simplified 00:20:19 – Why you can't really understand the New Testament without the Old 00:25:07 – Theology for normal people 00:35:42 – If you could condense the entire Bible to a tweet... 00:38:57 – Zach's favorite book of the Bible and the Jewishness of Jesus 00:45:48 – Bible memorization, handwriting the whole NT, and honey on slates

Despite many warnings, Paul returns to Jerusalem at the end of his 3rd missionary journey. Plots stack against him, but he is eager to give a report on his ministry, willing to face persecution, ready to witness to the hope of the resurrection, and wise to use his Jewishness and his Roman citizenship for the gospel. The Lord is by his side encouraging him, as we witness how the Romans are now more open to the gospel than the Jews.

Feast on a Full English breakfast with Farah Mendlesohn as we discuss whether their Hugo-nominated Heinlein book changed the conversation about that author, if there's such a thing as an inverse of The Suck Fairy, why it might be wrong to chat about The Female Man while nibbling on toast, the reason Russ's novel took so long to get published, the probable purpose of the self-critique within the book, the difficulties in communicating with cross-cultural metaphors, why The Female Man is a version of The Christmas Carol, the reason the book isn't Postmodernist but Modernist, why I failed to pick up on the novel's Jewishness, what surprised them most during their rereading of the novel, the reason Considering The Female Man by Joanna Russ was so painfully hard to write, and much more.

Send us Fan MailIn this episode, we have for the 1st time a father & son Lon and Ryan Wiskell. Dr. Lon Wiksell and his son Ryan founded Our Father Abraham in 2016 to promote awareness of the Jewishness of Jesus and Christianity, as well as to educate churchgoers about Jewish festivals like Passover. This just so happens to be the topic of their first published work, a fiction/nonfiction hybrid entitled The Last Seder of James: A Journey Through Passover, published by Morgan James out of New York.In the 3rd part of our conversation, Ryan will answer the question where we left off from the last episode and that is the nature of the drama and/or with the relationship between James and John. You will also hear them educate us on what the four cups means during the Passover and why it is important to know what it means and what it symbolizes.Click the link to hear the last part of our conversation: https://buymeacoffee.com/cometojesus/s5-special-guest-47-last-part-the-passover-episodeTo purchase their book or to get connected with them you can do so by going to: https://ourfatherabraham.com/lastseder/We would love to hear from you so feel free to share with us your feedback on our episode. Feel free to answer and share with us your answer in any of our social media links.Connect with us in our social media links:FB: Come to JesusEmail us at cometojesuswithannette.mahal@gmail.comYou can also send us a voice message if you are listening in Spotify or by sending your questions or comments to (571)601-0067.Thank you again for listening and always remember to Come to Jesus Daily!Connect with us through our Social Media Links:Email us at cometojesuswithannette.mahal@gmail.comTwitter and Instagram: @AnnetteMahalFB: Come to JesusYou can also send us a voice message if you are listening in Spotify or by sending your questions or comments to (571)601-0067. Thank you again for listening and always remember to Come to Jesus Daily!

Names have significant meaning! Mitch Forman takes us through how just by looking at names, we see the Jewishness of Yeshua, His Messiahship, and His fulfillment of prophetic scriptures!

Send us Fan MailIn this episode, we have for the 1st time a father & son Lon and Ryan Wiskell. Dr. Lon Wiksell and his son Ryan founded Our Father Abraham in 2016 to promote awareness of the Jewishness of Jesus and Christianity, as well as to educate churchgoers about Jewish festivals like Passover. This just so happens to be the topic of their first published work, a fiction/nonfiction hybrid entitled The Last Seder of James: A Journey Through Passover, published by Morgan James out of New York.In the 2nd part of our conversation, they shared their journey being an author like when they started working together and how they came up with what to write & the authors that inspire them to write, what roles they play in writing and everything else that goes on their journey walking together. You will hear a few more stories about the Passover meal and also about the relationship of the apostles with one another like James & John.Make sure to follow us so you don't miss the answer to the question where we left off and to hear the rest of our conversation. To purchase their book or to get connected with them you can do so by going to: https://ourfatherabraham.com/lastseder/We would love to hear from you so feel free to share with us your feedback on our episode. Feel free to answer and share with us your answer in any of our social media links.Connect with us through our Social Media Links:Email us at cometojesuswithannette.mahal@gmail.comTwitter and Instagram: @AnnetteMahalFB: Come to JesusYou can also send us a voice message if you are listening in Spotify or by sending your questions or comments to (571)601-0067. Thank you again for listening and always remember to Come to Jesus Daily!

Send us Fan MailIn this episode, we have for the 1st time a father & son Lon and Ryan Wiskell. Dr. Lon Wiksell and his son Ryan founded Our Father Abraham in 2016 to promote awareness of the Jewishness of Jesus and Christianity, as well as to educate churchgoers about Jewish festivals like Passover. This just so happens to be the topic of their first published work, a fiction/nonfiction hybrid entitled The Last Seder of James: A Journey Through Passover, published by Morgan James out of New York, and hitting bookstores everywhere August 5, 2025.The Last Seder of James is the first book of the forthcoming Passover Trilogy. Lon and Ryan are excited to join us to talk with you about the impact of their first book, and what's in store for the future.In the first part of our conversation, they will share with us what Messianic Judaism means, and they will also talk about its history of when it started and how it was spread. You will also hear them briefly talk about the Jewish festival and Passover.Make sure to follow us so you don't miss the answer to the question where we left off and to hear the rest of our conversation. To purchase their book or to get connected with them you can do so by going to: https://ourfatherabraham.com/lastseder/Connect with us through our Social Media Links:Email us at cometojesuswithannette.mahal@gmail.comTwitter and Instagram: @AnnetteMahalFB: Come to JesusYou can also send us a voice message if you are listening in Spotify or by sending your questions or comments to (571)601-0067. Thank you again for listening and always remember to Come to Jesus Daily!

Today we are joined by Pavel Brunssen, a Research Associate and Alfred Landecker Lecturer at the Research Center on Antigypsyism at Heidelberg University and author of The Making of “Jew Clubs”: Performing Jewishness and Antisemitism in European Football and Fan Cultures (Indiana UP, 2025). In our conversation, we discussed the difference between Jewish clubs and “Jew Clubs,” the overlapping of antisemitism and philosemitism in football fan cultures, the language politics of clubs and supporter's organizations, and the inability to completely master the unmastered past. In The Making of “Jew Clubs,” Brunssen looks at four “Jew Clubs” – clubs that have been identified by either the organization, their supporters, or their opponents as having a Jewish identity. He focuses on Bayern Munich FC, FK Austria Vienna, Ajax Amsterdam, and Tottenham Hotspur. Each provides an angle into his deeply researched and theoretical discussion of how a club can become identified with Jewish identity, without necessarily having a significant number of Jewish members or supporters or even having identified as Jewish. His investigation into this phenomenon provides him a space to understand how postwar Europeans have attempted to come to terms with the unmasterable past of antisemitism and the Holocaust. In his chapter on Bayern Munich FC, Brunssen examines a club that has self-consciously adopted a “Jew Club” identity as a way of working through the club's complicated wartime history. Bayern Munich's administration and fans each promote the club's Jewish heritage, particularly expressed through the former president Kurt Landauer, as a way of creating a space between their association and German football's Nazi past. For the club, their celebration of Landauer demonstrates their cosmopolitan values, but for fans Landauer's legacy offers a space to critique the club's current engagement with organizations such as the Qatari government. FK Austria Vienna has long been associated with Jewishness because of the club's location in Vienna, its association with café culture, and its “modern” style of play. Today the club mobilizes its “Jew Club” identity to differentiate itself from its rival Rapid Vienna and to repudiate the actions of a radical right segment of its own supporters. Ajax Amsterdam became a “Jew Club” in response to the taunts of their rivals from Rotterdam – Feyenoord. Ajax supporters became “Super Jews” in response and the club's carnivalesque stadium atmosphere creates a “virtual Jewish space.” The fandom's philosemitism both opens the door for Jewish agency, including of fans from Israel, and normalizes antisemitic chants from rival fans. Tottenham Hotspur might be the most infamous “Jew Club” in the world. Its identity emerged in the 1930s and by the 1970s, the club's supporters adopted the Y-word as a form of linguistic reclamation. In becoming the Y-army, they take back the powerful taboo of the slur from their opponents, but Brunssen questions whether such linguistic triangulation works and points to the club's ongoing efforts to police against the Y-word in public forums. Brunssen's work is fascinating, well researched, and theoretically rigorous. It will be of interest to scholars interested in antisemitism, football, and memory culture. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/popular-culture

Today we are joined by Pavel Brunssen, a Research Associate and Alfred Landecker Lecturer at the Research Center on Antigypsyism at Heidelberg University and author of The Making of “Jew Clubs”: Performing Jewishness and Antisemitism in European Football and Fan Cultures (Indiana UP, 2025). In our conversation, we discussed the difference between Jewish clubs and “Jew Clubs,” the overlapping of antisemitism and philosemitism in football fan cultures, the language politics of clubs and supporter's organizations, and the inability to completely master the unmastered past. In The Making of “Jew Clubs,” Brunssen looks at four “Jew Clubs” – clubs that have been identified by either the organization, their supporters, or their opponents as having a Jewish identity. He focuses on Bayern Munich FC, FK Austria Vienna, Ajax Amsterdam, and Tottenham Hotspur. Each provides an angle into his deeply researched and theoretical discussion of how a club can become identified with Jewish identity, without necessarily having a significant number of Jewish members or supporters or even having identified as Jewish. His investigation into this phenomenon provides him a space to understand how postwar Europeans have attempted to come to terms with the unmasterable past of antisemitism and the Holocaust. In his chapter on Bayern Munich FC, Brunssen examines a club that has self-consciously adopted a “Jew Club” identity as a way of working through the club's complicated wartime history. Bayern Munich's administration and fans each promote the club's Jewish heritage, particularly expressed through the former president Kurt Landauer, as a way of creating a space between their association and German football's Nazi past. For the club, their celebration of Landauer demonstrates their cosmopolitan values, but for fans Landauer's legacy offers a space to critique the club's current engagement with organizations such as the Qatari government. FK Austria Vienna has long been associated with Jewishness because of the club's location in Vienna, its association with café culture, and its “modern” style of play. Today the club mobilizes its “Jew Club” identity to differentiate itself from its rival Rapid Vienna and to repudiate the actions of a radical right segment of its own supporters. Ajax Amsterdam became a “Jew Club” in response to the taunts of their rivals from Rotterdam – Feyenoord. Ajax supporters became “Super Jews” in response and the club's carnivalesque stadium atmosphere creates a “virtual Jewish space.” The fandom's philosemitism both opens the door for Jewish agency, including of fans from Israel, and normalizes antisemitic chants from rival fans. Tottenham Hotspur might be the most infamous “Jew Club” in the world. Its identity emerged in the 1930s and by the 1970s, the club's supporters adopted the Y-word as a form of linguistic reclamation. In becoming the Y-army, they take back the powerful taboo of the slur from their opponents, but Brunssen questions whether such linguistic triangulation works and points to the club's ongoing efforts to police against the Y-word in public forums. Brunssen's work is fascinating, well researched, and theoretically rigorous. It will be of interest to scholars interested in antisemitism, football, and memory culture. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Today we are joined by Pavel Brunssen, a Research Associate and Alfred Landecker Lecturer at the Research Center on Antigypsyism at Heidelberg University and author of The Making of “Jew Clubs”: Performing Jewishness and Antisemitism in European Football and Fan Cultures (Indiana UP, 2025). In our conversation, we discussed the difference between Jewish clubs and “Jew Clubs,” the overlapping of antisemitism and philosemitism in football fan cultures, the language politics of clubs and supporter's organizations, and the inability to completely master the unmastered past. In The Making of “Jew Clubs,” Brunssen looks at four “Jew Clubs” – clubs that have been identified by either the organization, their supporters, or their opponents as having a Jewish identity. He focuses on Bayern Munich FC, FK Austria Vienna, Ajax Amsterdam, and Tottenham Hotspur. Each provides an angle into his deeply researched and theoretical discussion of how a club can become identified with Jewish identity, without necessarily having a significant number of Jewish members or supporters or even having identified as Jewish. His investigation into this phenomenon provides him a space to understand how postwar Europeans have attempted to come to terms with the unmasterable past of antisemitism and the Holocaust. In his chapter on Bayern Munich FC, Brunssen examines a club that has self-consciously adopted a “Jew Club” identity as a way of working through the club's complicated wartime history. Bayern Munich's administration and fans each promote the club's Jewish heritage, particularly expressed through the former president Kurt Landauer, as a way of creating a space between their association and German football's Nazi past. For the club, their celebration of Landauer demonstrates their cosmopolitan values, but for fans Landauer's legacy offers a space to critique the club's current engagement with organizations such as the Qatari government. FK Austria Vienna has long been associated with Jewishness because of the club's location in Vienna, its association with café culture, and its “modern” style of play. Today the club mobilizes its “Jew Club” identity to differentiate itself from its rival Rapid Vienna and to repudiate the actions of a radical right segment of its own supporters. Ajax Amsterdam became a “Jew Club” in response to the taunts of their rivals from Rotterdam – Feyenoord. Ajax supporters became “Super Jews” in response and the club's carnivalesque stadium atmosphere creates a “virtual Jewish space.” The fandom's philosemitism both opens the door for Jewish agency, including of fans from Israel, and normalizes antisemitic chants from rival fans. Tottenham Hotspur might be the most infamous “Jew Club” in the world. Its identity emerged in the 1930s and by the 1970s, the club's supporters adopted the Y-word as a form of linguistic reclamation. In becoming the Y-army, they take back the powerful taboo of the slur from their opponents, but Brunssen questions whether such linguistic triangulation works and points to the club's ongoing efforts to police against the Y-word in public forums. Brunssen's work is fascinating, well researched, and theoretically rigorous. It will be of interest to scholars interested in antisemitism, football, and memory culture. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/german-studies

Today we are joined by Pavel Brunssen, a Research Associate and Alfred Landecker Lecturer at the Research Center on Antigypsyism at Heidelberg University and author of The Making of “Jew Clubs”: Performing Jewishness and Antisemitism in European Football and Fan Cultures (Indiana UP, 2025). In our conversation, we discussed the difference between Jewish clubs and “Jew Clubs,” the overlapping of antisemitism and philosemitism in football fan cultures, the language politics of clubs and supporter's organizations, and the inability to completely master the unmastered past. In The Making of “Jew Clubs,” Brunssen looks at four “Jew Clubs” – clubs that have been identified by either the organization, their supporters, or their opponents as having a Jewish identity. He focuses on Bayern Munich FC, FK Austria Vienna, Ajax Amsterdam, and Tottenham Hotspur. Each provides an angle into his deeply researched and theoretical discussion of how a club can become identified with Jewish identity, without necessarily having a significant number of Jewish members or supporters or even having identified as Jewish. His investigation into this phenomenon provides him a space to understand how postwar Europeans have attempted to come to terms with the unmasterable past of antisemitism and the Holocaust. In his chapter on Bayern Munich FC, Brunssen examines a club that has self-consciously adopted a “Jew Club” identity as a way of working through the club's complicated wartime history. Bayern Munich's administration and fans each promote the club's Jewish heritage, particularly expressed through the former president Kurt Landauer, as a way of creating a space between their association and German football's Nazi past. For the club, their celebration of Landauer demonstrates their cosmopolitan values, but for fans Landauer's legacy offers a space to critique the club's current engagement with organizations such as the Qatari government. FK Austria Vienna has long been associated with Jewishness because of the club's location in Vienna, its association with café culture, and its “modern” style of play. Today the club mobilizes its “Jew Club” identity to differentiate itself from its rival Rapid Vienna and to repudiate the actions of a radical right segment of its own supporters. Ajax Amsterdam became a “Jew Club” in response to the taunts of their rivals from Rotterdam – Feyenoord. Ajax supporters became “Super Jews” in response and the club's carnivalesque stadium atmosphere creates a “virtual Jewish space.” The fandom's philosemitism both opens the door for Jewish agency, including of fans from Israel, and normalizes antisemitic chants from rival fans. Tottenham Hotspur might be the most infamous “Jew Club” in the world. Its identity emerged in the 1930s and by the 1970s, the club's supporters adopted the Y-word as a form of linguistic reclamation. In becoming the Y-army, they take back the powerful taboo of the slur from their opponents, but Brunssen questions whether such linguistic triangulation works and points to the club's ongoing efforts to police against the Y-word in public forums. Brunssen's work is fascinating, well researched, and theoretically rigorous. It will be of interest to scholars interested in antisemitism, football, and memory culture. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/sports

Today we are joined by Pavel Brunssen, a Research Associate and Alfred Landecker Lecturer at the Research Center on Antigypsyism at Heidelberg University and author of The Making of “Jew Clubs”: Performing Jewishness and Antisemitism in European Football and Fan Cultures (Indiana UP, 2025). In our conversation, we discussed the difference between Jewish clubs and “Jew Clubs,” the overlapping of antisemitism and philosemitism in football fan cultures, the language politics of clubs and supporter's organizations, and the inability to completely master the unmastered past. In The Making of “Jew Clubs,” Brunssen looks at four “Jew Clubs” – clubs that have been identified by either the organization, their supporters, or their opponents as having a Jewish identity. He focuses on Bayern Munich FC, FK Austria Vienna, Ajax Amsterdam, and Tottenham Hotspur. Each provides an angle into his deeply researched and theoretical discussion of how a club can become identified with Jewish identity, without necessarily having a significant number of Jewish members or supporters or even having identified as Jewish. His investigation into this phenomenon provides him a space to understand how postwar Europeans have attempted to come to terms with the unmasterable past of antisemitism and the Holocaust. In his chapter on Bayern Munich FC, Brunssen examines a club that has self-consciously adopted a “Jew Club” identity as a way of working through the club's complicated wartime history. Bayern Munich's administration and fans each promote the club's Jewish heritage, particularly expressed through the former president Kurt Landauer, as a way of creating a space between their association and German football's Nazi past. For the club, their celebration of Landauer demonstrates their cosmopolitan values, but for fans Landauer's legacy offers a space to critique the club's current engagement with organizations such as the Qatari government. FK Austria Vienna has long been associated with Jewishness because of the club's location in Vienna, its association with café culture, and its “modern” style of play. Today the club mobilizes its “Jew Club” identity to differentiate itself from its rival Rapid Vienna and to repudiate the actions of a radical right segment of its own supporters. Ajax Amsterdam became a “Jew Club” in response to the taunts of their rivals from Rotterdam – Feyenoord. Ajax supporters became “Super Jews” in response and the club's carnivalesque stadium atmosphere creates a “virtual Jewish space.” The fandom's philosemitism both opens the door for Jewish agency, including of fans from Israel, and normalizes antisemitic chants from rival fans. Tottenham Hotspur might be the most infamous “Jew Club” in the world. Its identity emerged in the 1930s and by the 1970s, the club's supporters adopted the Y-word as a form of linguistic reclamation. In becoming the Y-army, they take back the powerful taboo of the slur from their opponents, but Brunssen questions whether such linguistic triangulation works and points to the club's ongoing efforts to police against the Y-word in public forums. Brunssen's work is fascinating, well researched, and theoretically rigorous. It will be of interest to scholars interested in antisemitism, football, and memory culture. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

Today we are joined by Pavel Brunssen, a Research Associate and Alfred Landecker Lecturer at the Research Center on Antigypsyism at Heidelberg University and author of The Making of “Jew Clubs”: Performing Jewishness and Antisemitism in European Football and Fan Cultures (Indiana UP, 2025). In our conversation, we discussed the difference between Jewish clubs and “Jew Clubs,” the overlapping of antisemitism and philosemitism in football fan cultures, the language politics of clubs and supporter's organizations, and the inability to completely master the unmastered past. In The Making of “Jew Clubs,” Brunssen looks at four “Jew Clubs” – clubs that have been identified by either the organization, their supporters, or their opponents as having a Jewish identity. He focuses on Bayern Munich FC, FK Austria Vienna, Ajax Amsterdam, and Tottenham Hotspur. Each provides an angle into his deeply researched and theoretical discussion of how a club can become identified with Jewish identity, without necessarily having a significant number of Jewish members or supporters or even having identified as Jewish. His investigation into this phenomenon provides him a space to understand how postwar Europeans have attempted to come to terms with the unmasterable past of antisemitism and the Holocaust. In his chapter on Bayern Munich FC, Brunssen examines a club that has self-consciously adopted a “Jew Club” identity as a way of working through the club's complicated wartime history. Bayern Munich's administration and fans each promote the club's Jewish heritage, particularly expressed through the former president Kurt Landauer, as a way of creating a space between their association and German football's Nazi past. For the club, their celebration of Landauer demonstrates their cosmopolitan values, but for fans Landauer's legacy offers a space to critique the club's current engagement with organizations such as the Qatari government. FK Austria Vienna has long been associated with Jewishness because of the club's location in Vienna, its association with café culture, and its “modern” style of play. Today the club mobilizes its “Jew Club” identity to differentiate itself from its rival Rapid Vienna and to repudiate the actions of a radical right segment of its own supporters. Ajax Amsterdam became a “Jew Club” in response to the taunts of their rivals from Rotterdam – Feyenoord. Ajax supporters became “Super Jews” in response and the club's carnivalesque stadium atmosphere creates a “virtual Jewish space.” The fandom's philosemitism both opens the door for Jewish agency, including of fans from Israel, and normalizes antisemitic chants from rival fans. Tottenham Hotspur might be the most infamous “Jew Club” in the world. Its identity emerged in the 1930s and by the 1970s, the club's supporters adopted the Y-word as a form of linguistic reclamation. In becoming the Y-army, they take back the powerful taboo of the slur from their opponents, but Brunssen questions whether such linguistic triangulation works and points to the club's ongoing efforts to police against the Y-word in public forums. Brunssen's work is fascinating, well researched, and theoretically rigorous. It will be of interest to scholars interested in antisemitism, football, and memory culture. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/european-studies

Today we are joined by Pavel Brunssen, a Research Associate and Alfred Landecker Lecturer at the Research Center on Antigypsyism at Heidelberg University and author of The Making of “Jew Clubs”: Performing Jewishness and Antisemitism in European Football and Fan Cultures (Indiana UP, 2025). In our conversation, we discussed the difference between Jewish clubs and “Jew Clubs,” the overlapping of antisemitism and philosemitism in football fan cultures, the language politics of clubs and supporter's organizations, and the inability to completely master the unmastered past. In The Making of “Jew Clubs,” Brunssen looks at four “Jew Clubs” – clubs that have been identified by either the organization, their supporters, or their opponents as having a Jewish identity. He focuses on Bayern Munich FC, FK Austria Vienna, Ajax Amsterdam, and Tottenham Hotspur. Each provides an angle into his deeply researched and theoretical discussion of how a club can become identified with Jewish identity, without necessarily having a significant number of Jewish members or supporters or even having identified as Jewish. His investigation into this phenomenon provides him a space to understand how postwar Europeans have attempted to come to terms with the unmasterable past of antisemitism and the Holocaust. In his chapter on Bayern Munich FC, Brunssen examines a club that has self-consciously adopted a “Jew Club” identity as a way of working through the club's complicated wartime history. Bayern Munich's administration and fans each promote the club's Jewish heritage, particularly expressed through the former president Kurt Landauer, as a way of creating a space between their association and German football's Nazi past. For the club, their celebration of Landauer demonstrates their cosmopolitan values, but for fans Landauer's legacy offers a space to critique the club's current engagement with organizations such as the Qatari government. FK Austria Vienna has long been associated with Jewishness because of the club's location in Vienna, its association with café culture, and its “modern” style of play. Today the club mobilizes its “Jew Club” identity to differentiate itself from its rival Rapid Vienna and to repudiate the actions of a radical right segment of its own supporters. Ajax Amsterdam became a “Jew Club” in response to the taunts of their rivals from Rotterdam – Feyenoord. Ajax supporters became “Super Jews” in response and the club's carnivalesque stadium atmosphere creates a “virtual Jewish space.” The fandom's philosemitism both opens the door for Jewish agency, including of fans from Israel, and normalizes antisemitic chants from rival fans. Tottenham Hotspur might be the most infamous “Jew Club” in the world. Its identity emerged in the 1930s and by the 1970s, the club's supporters adopted the Y-word as a form of linguistic reclamation. In becoming the Y-army, they take back the powerful taboo of the slur from their opponents, but Brunssen questions whether such linguistic triangulation works and points to the club's ongoing efforts to police against the Y-word in public forums. Brunssen's work is fascinating, well researched, and theoretically rigorous. It will be of interest to scholars interested in antisemitism, football, and memory culture. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/british-studies

In today's episode, Claire is joined by Ruben Buhner to talkabout his book Negotiating Jewishness: Paul's Ethnicity Between Continuity and Discontinuity. The assertion that Paul remained a Jew throughout his liferequires little further justification. However, questions remain, including: How can his relationship with Judaism be positively articulated? How was that relationship influenced by Paul's belief in Jesus as the Messiah? A particular difficulty arises here: reconciling the sometimes contradictory statements in Paul's epistles concerning his connection to the Jewish people and their beliefs and behavior. A lively discussion surrounding the Jewishness of Paul in the last fifteen years has yielded the "radical new perspectiveon Paul," or "Paul Within Judaism" perspective. Dismissing older conceptions that contrast the Christ-believing Paul with a monolithic and negatively characterized ancient Judaism, new approaches focus on the extent to which we should depict Paul as "within Judaism" or still torah observant.With Negotiating Jewishness, Ruben Bühner addresses these issues and offers a different, more balanced approach byconsidering three key aspects: ancient ethnicity, neglected sources, and scholarly debates. Drawing from studies in cultural science and ethnology, Bühner shows that ancient Jewish identity can be characterized as "mesomorphic" as it integrated diverse—even divergent—parameters in ethnic construction. With a focus on passages from the Pauline Epistles crucial for understanding Paul's Jewishness, alongside a thorough excavation of the realities of Jewish life in the Greco-Roman diaspora, the book aims to bridge the gap between English-speaking and continental European scholarship, with a particular emphasis on underrepresented German perspectives.Paul navigated his Jewish identity within the myriad cultural landscapes of the first-century Mediterranean world and in constant dialogue with his missional calling and interactions with other Jews. Traces of this process emerge from his writings amidst their diverse historical, social, and rhetorical contexts. Negotiating Jewishness probes these scattered glimpses into Paul's self-understanding to demonstrate that Paul's relationship to Judaism can be best understood as a reflection of ancient Jewish ethnic negotiation. Bühner contributes to the scholarly conversation with a new definition of what it means to read Paul (or any New Testament text) "within Judaism."Dr. Ruben Bühner is a postdoctoral researcher for New Testament Studies at the University of Zurich and the University of Bonn.

Send a textTime to cross off an item on my (Veronica) bucket list!  Ever since we started the podcast, it's been a dream of mine to get Lois Tverberg on the podcast.  We interviewed her over zoom and if you would rather watch us you can hope over to our YouTube channel.  In this conversation we talk about what started Lois down the road of the culture and Jewishness of Jesus.  She shared her upcoming projects (updating Listening to the Language of the Bible coming out in Fall 2026 and her untitled book about reading the Bible with an insider coming out Fall 2027).  She also listed books that are helpful when starting down the road of studying the culture of the Bible.She shares her favorite verses for showing how knowing the culture and language can help us better understand the Bible. If you purchase any of her books directly from her store, you get a discount for larger groups and Lois offers to do a zoom call with the group after they finish the study. Here's a link to her store.https://ourrabbijesus.com/store/Here's the link to her websites:- Our Rabbi JesusWelcome to En-Gedi... - En-Gedi Resource CenterOur website is The Context and Color of the BibleWe are on Facebook - The Context and Color of the Bible | FacebookWe are on Instagram - @contextandcolorofthebibleWe are on YouTube - The Context and Color of the Bible - YouTubeMusic: Tabuk by Kevin MacLeod Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4453-tabukLicense: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Welcome to The Daily, where we study the Bible verse by verse, chapter by chapter, every day. Our shout-out today goes to Kevin Kinney from Mahtomedi, MN. Thanks for your partnership in Project23. We cannot do this without donors like you. Our text today is 1 Corinthians 7:17-24. Only let each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him. This is my rule in all the churches. Was anyone at the time of his call already circumcised? Let him not seek to remove the marks of circumcision. Was anyone at the time of his call uncircumcised? Let him not seek circumcision. For neither circumcision counts for anything nor uncircumcision, but keeping the commandments of God. Each one should remain in the condition in which he was called. Were you a bondservant when called? Do not be concerned about it. (But if you can gain your freedom, avail yourself of the opportunity.) For he who was called in the Lord as a bondservant is a freedman of the Lord. Likewise he who was free when called is a bondservant of Christ. You were bought with a price; do not become bondservants of men. So, brothers, in whatever condition each was called, there let him remain with God. — 1 Corinthians 7:17-24 We often assume that spiritual growth requires a new setting. A new job. A new relationship. A new city. A new season. But Paul confronts that assumption head-on. He writes to believers who thought they needed to change their circumstances to live more faithfully. Paul says the opposite: God meets you where you are—not where you wish you were. Paul's command is repeated so often in this short section that it's impossible to miss: "Each one should remain in the condition in which he was called." Paul is not trapping people. He's freeing them. He points to examples that mattered deeply in the first-century world—circumcision and social status. Jews wanted to erase their Jewishness. Gentiles wanted to adopt it. Slaves wanted out. Free people wanted upward mobility. Paul's response cuts through all of it. Circumcision doesn't save you. Uncircumcision doesn't sanctify you. Status doesn't define you. Obedience is what you need. This is Paul's core conviction: "Neither circumcision counts for anything nor uncircumcision, but keeping the commandments of God." In other words, stop confusing change with calling. God is not waiting for you to upgrade your life before he works. He works in ordinary obedience—right where you are. That doesn't mean opportunities for change are wrong. Paul even says if freedom is possible, take it. But don't believe the lie that faithfulness is postponed until circumstances improve. Paul reframes identity entirely. A slave in Christ is free. A free person in Christ is owned. Everyone stands on equal ground at the foot of the cross. And then Paul reminds them—and us—why: "You were bought with a price." Your life isn't owned by culture. Your worth isn't assigned by status. Your calling isn't delayed by circumstances. God meets you where you are—and walks with you as you obey. So be obedient today, in the place where you are standing right now.

What do Tottenham Hotspur, Ajax Amsterdam, Bayern Munich and Austria Vienna have in common? They all, for better, or for worse, have come to be seen as “Jew Clubs” throughout their history. Sometimes more, sometimes less. Sometimes the club embraced it, often it didn't. "Jew Clubs" - not Jewish clubs, not founded as a Jewish sports society or anything like that. But clubs that have become a canvas for the performance of Jewishness, of antisemitism and also of philosemitism. What does that say about these clubs is one question. What does it say about Europe's broader cultural and political discourse? That's another. What it says about Jews in those clubs is one question - what it says about how Jewishness is constructed is another.Pavel Brunssen has written a fascinating book on it. He is a Research Associate and Alfred Landecker Lecturer at the Research Center on Antigypsyism at Heidelberg University. There are a lot of voices from fans, from media, from online discourse in this book - and it's an academic book as well. HELPFUL LINKS FOR THIS EPISODE:NEW: send me a text message! (I'd love to hear your thoughts - texts get to me anonymously, without charge or signup) Please leave a quick voicemail with any feedback, corrections, suggestions - or just greetings - HERE. Or comment via Twitter, Instagram, Bluesky or Facebook. If you enjoy this podcast and think that what I do fills a gap in soccer coverage that others would be interested in as well, please Recommend The Assistant Professor of Football. Spreading the word, through word of mouth, truly does help. Leave some rating stars at the podcast platform of your choice. There are so many sports podcasts out there, and only ratings make this project visible; only then can people who look for a different kind of take on European soccer actually find me. Artwork for The Assistant Professor of Football is by Saige LindInstrumental music for this podcast, including the introduction track, is by the artist Ketsa and used under a Creative Commons license through Free Music Archive: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Ketsa/

Send a textKen Corkins and pastor Rocky Ellison resume Season 18,  noting upcoming travel breaks, and finish Romans chapter 2 by reading verses 17–29 from the Revised Standard Version to capture Paul's deliberate word choices. They discuss Paul's harsh critique of Jewish Christians who rely on the law and circumcision as marks of superiority while failing their responsibility to teach Gentiles, citing Isaiah 42 and 52 to show Israel was meant to be a light to the nations and that God's name is blasphemed when they fail. They explain Paul's diatribe against hypocrisy and his argument that outward circumcision is meaningless without obedience, using a wedding ring analogy, and conclude that true Jewishness and “circumcision” are inward matters of the heart, ending with Paul's pun linking “praise” to Judah/Jew. Next episode covers Romans 3:1–8.NEW!: Rate us at Podchaser Find us at www.pondergmc.org. Feedback is welcome: PonderMethodist@gmail.com Music performed by the Ponder GMC worship team. Cover Art: Joe Wagner Recorded, edited and mixed by Snikrock

Video link to this episode: https://youtu.be/Nmw9jZM2aYUThe story of a Jew who grew up in the Soviet Union and learned little about his Judaism but some other hard lessons that would shape his life.Dan is a high-level interpreter and a thoughtful, intelligent man. He reached out to me after noticing how different his experience as a Soviet Jew was from mine. I grew up deeply engaged with my Jewishness, while he grew up almost entirely disconnected from it. Our conversation convinced me that Dan's story needed to be documented and shared, so I invited him onto my podcast. What I heard was remarkable: the horrors his family endured, the gripping archival material he inherited documenting his grandparents' ordeals, and his unique perspective from working inside contemporary human rights organizations and other governmental bodies. Dan believes the progressive mission, which he sees as well-intentioned, is nonetheless misguided and heading toward dangerous territory. He also reflects candidly on the antisemitism he's encountered in his work as a translator in a world increasingly hostile to Israel.If you would like to get in touch with Dan, you can write to him at: pr.pleischner@gmail.comWant more on Soviet Jewry?My interview with Anna Shternshishttps://youtu.be/hKN0_75EuqEMy interview with Igor Golyakhttps://youtu.be/E5_n3p3Oto0Leave a comment with your thoughts!Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-frieda-vizel-podcast--5824414/support.

Even those who do not know much Yiddish have probably heard the word “shtetl,” but what does that word mean exactly? Can we just say that it was a small town in Eastern Europe with a lot of Jews—and leave it at that? Or was the shtetl that nostalgic world of “tradition” so lovingly celebrated in Fiddler on the Roof? How are we to understand imaginary shtetls like Sholom Aleichem's Kasrilevke, where the “little people” ran around, talked non stop, and tried to make sense of a world they could no longer understand or control? Indeed the “shtetl” meant many things to many people. For many Zionists and Jewish leftists, the shtetl was a pathetic symbol of Jewish backwardness. Others cherished it as a place of real Jewishness, that fixed point that gave Jews in the diaspora the feeling of being home. The destruction of the Holocaust encouraged this nostalgia for the lost shtetl, especially as many Jews in the post-war world, newly comfortable and secure in their new homes, showed a new interest in their ethnic roots. In this lecture, YIVO Visiting Research Historian Samuel Kassow will explore the “real shtetl” and the “imagined shtetl,” which both formed an integral part of Eastern European Jewish peoplehood. Jonathan Brent is the Executive Director and CEO of YIVO. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Even those who do not know much Yiddish have probably heard the word “shtetl,” but what does that word mean exactly? Can we just say that it was a small town in Eastern Europe with a lot of Jews—and leave it at that? Or was the shtetl that nostalgic world of “tradition” so lovingly celebrated in Fiddler on the Roof? How are we to understand imaginary shtetls like Sholom Aleichem's Kasrilevke, where the “little people” ran around, talked non stop, and tried to make sense of a world they could no longer understand or control? Indeed the “shtetl” meant many things to many people. For many Zionists and Jewish leftists, the shtetl was a pathetic symbol of Jewish backwardness. Others cherished it as a place of real Jewishness, that fixed point that gave Jews in the diaspora the feeling of being home. The destruction of the Holocaust encouraged this nostalgia for the lost shtetl, especially as many Jews in the post-war world, newly comfortable and secure in their new homes, showed a new interest in their ethnic roots. In this lecture, YIVO Visiting Research Historian Samuel Kassow will explore the “real shtetl” and the “imagined shtetl,” which both formed an integral part of Eastern European Jewish peoplehood. Jonathan Brent is the Executive Director and CEO of YIVO. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/history

Even those who do not know much Yiddish have probably heard the word “shtetl,” but what does that word mean exactly? Can we just say that it was a small town in Eastern Europe with a lot of Jews—and leave it at that? Or was the shtetl that nostalgic world of “tradition” so lovingly celebrated in Fiddler on the Roof? How are we to understand imaginary shtetls like Sholom Aleichem's Kasrilevke, where the “little people” ran around, talked non stop, and tried to make sense of a world they could no longer understand or control? Indeed the “shtetl” meant many things to many people. For many Zionists and Jewish leftists, the shtetl was a pathetic symbol of Jewish backwardness. Others cherished it as a place of real Jewishness, that fixed point that gave Jews in the diaspora the feeling of being home. The destruction of the Holocaust encouraged this nostalgia for the lost shtetl, especially as many Jews in the post-war world, newly comfortable and secure in their new homes, showed a new interest in their ethnic roots. In this lecture, YIVO Visiting Research Historian Samuel Kassow will explore the “real shtetl” and the “imagined shtetl,” which both formed an integral part of Eastern European Jewish peoplehood. Jonathan Brent is the Executive Director and CEO of YIVO. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

Even those who do not know much Yiddish have probably heard the word “shtetl,” but what does that word mean exactly? Can we just say that it was a small town in Eastern Europe with a lot of Jews—and leave it at that? Or was the shtetl that nostalgic world of “tradition” so lovingly celebrated in Fiddler on the Roof? How are we to understand imaginary shtetls like Sholom Aleichem's Kasrilevke, where the “little people” ran around, talked non stop, and tried to make sense of a world they could no longer understand or control? Indeed the “shtetl” meant many things to many people. For many Zionists and Jewish leftists, the shtetl was a pathetic symbol of Jewish backwardness. Others cherished it as a place of real Jewishness, that fixed point that gave Jews in the diaspora the feeling of being home. The destruction of the Holocaust encouraged this nostalgia for the lost shtetl, especially as many Jews in the post-war world, newly comfortable and secure in their new homes, showed a new interest in their ethnic roots. In this lecture, YIVO Visiting Research Historian Samuel Kassow will explore the “real shtetl” and the “imagined shtetl,” which both formed an integral part of Eastern European Jewish peoplehood. Jonathan Brent is the Executive Director and CEO of YIVO. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/genocide-studies

Even those who do not know much Yiddish have probably heard the word “shtetl,” but what does that word mean exactly? Can we just say that it was a small town in Eastern Europe with a lot of Jews—and leave it at that? Or was the shtetl that nostalgic world of “tradition” so lovingly celebrated in Fiddler on the Roof? How are we to understand imaginary shtetls like Sholom Aleichem's Kasrilevke, where the “little people” ran around, talked non stop, and tried to make sense of a world they could no longer understand or control? Indeed the “shtetl” meant many things to many people. For many Zionists and Jewish leftists, the shtetl was a pathetic symbol of Jewish backwardness. Others cherished it as a place of real Jewishness, that fixed point that gave Jews in the diaspora the feeling of being home. The destruction of the Holocaust encouraged this nostalgia for the lost shtetl, especially as many Jews in the post-war world, newly comfortable and secure in their new homes, showed a new interest in their ethnic roots. In this lecture, YIVO Visiting Research Historian Samuel Kassow will explore the “real shtetl” and the “imagined shtetl,” which both formed an integral part of Eastern European Jewish peoplehood. Jonathan Brent is the Executive Director and CEO of YIVO. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/israel-studies

Even those who do not know much Yiddish have probably heard the word “shtetl,” but what does that word mean exactly? Can we just say that it was a small town in Eastern Europe with a lot of Jews—and leave it at that? Or was the shtetl that nostalgic world of “tradition” so lovingly celebrated in Fiddler on the Roof? How are we to understand imaginary shtetls like Sholom Aleichem's Kasrilevke, where the “little people” ran around, talked non stop, and tried to make sense of a world they could no longer understand or control? Indeed the “shtetl” meant many things to many people. For many Zionists and Jewish leftists, the shtetl was a pathetic symbol of Jewish backwardness. Others cherished it as a place of real Jewishness, that fixed point that gave Jews in the diaspora the feeling of being home. The destruction of the Holocaust encouraged this nostalgia for the lost shtetl, especially as many Jews in the post-war world, newly comfortable and secure in their new homes, showed a new interest in their ethnic roots. In this lecture, YIVO Visiting Research Historian Samuel Kassow will explore the “real shtetl” and the “imagined shtetl,” which both formed an integral part of Eastern European Jewish peoplehood. Jonathan Brent is the Executive Director and CEO of YIVO. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/sociology

Even those who do not know much Yiddish have probably heard the word “shtetl,” but what does that word mean exactly? Can we just say that it was a small town in Eastern Europe with a lot of Jews—and leave it at that? Or was the shtetl that nostalgic world of “tradition” so lovingly celebrated in Fiddler on the Roof? How are we to understand imaginary shtetls like Sholom Aleichem's Kasrilevke, where the “little people” ran around, talked non stop, and tried to make sense of a world they could no longer understand or control? Indeed the “shtetl” meant many things to many people. For many Zionists and Jewish leftists, the shtetl was a pathetic symbol of Jewish backwardness. Others cherished it as a place of real Jewishness, that fixed point that gave Jews in the diaspora the feeling of being home. The destruction of the Holocaust encouraged this nostalgia for the lost shtetl, especially as many Jews in the post-war world, newly comfortable and secure in their new homes, showed a new interest in their ethnic roots. In this lecture, YIVO Visiting Research Historian Samuel Kassow will explore the “real shtetl” and the “imagined shtetl,” which both formed an integral part of Eastern European Jewish peoplehood. Jonathan Brent is the Executive Director and CEO of YIVO. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/eastern-european-studies

התוכן נאמר במגילה על מרדכי "איש יהודי הי' בשושן הבירה": גם בשושן הבירה הכירו אותו (לא בתור "מרדכי, אלא) בתור "יהודי"! בניגוד לשיטה שצ"ל "יהודי [רק] באהליך" אבל בחוץ בין הגויים אין להבליט היותו יהודי כדי לא להרגיז אותם וכו' – נאמר במגילה שלא זהו הסדר, אלא דוקא מי שגם ב"שושון הבירה" ניכר שהוא "יהודי" מצליח לעמוד מול "שושן הבירה", עם מלך "מושל בכיפה", ושרים כמו "ממוכן זה המן" וכו'. ועד"ז בסיום המגילה נאמר "כי מרדכי היהודי משנה למלך אחשורוש וגו'": גם כאשר זה כבר לא עת צרה, אין "מרדכי" טוען שכעת ניתן וצריך להתנהג עפ"י שכל, לפי הסדר של המדינה, ואין צורך להכריז בכ"מ שהוא "יהודי" – אלא גם אז, כאשר נתמנה להיות "משנה למלך", ה"ה "מרדכי היהודי"! ואין צריך עצה אחרת להצליח ולהשאר "משנה למלך" – לא רק כי כך אומרת התורה, אלא גם "אחשורוש" מסכים שמרדכי יהי' "משנה למלך" רק מפני שרואה שהוא איש אמת ואינו מתפעל מאף א' ונשאר "יהודי".משיחת פורים ה'תשכ"ח ל"הנחה פרטית" או התרגום ללה"ק של השיחה: https://thedailysicha.com/?date=25-02-2026 Synopsis The Megillah says of Mordechai, “There was a Jewish man in Shushan the capital,” meaning that even in Shushan the capital, he was seen as a “Jewish man.” This contrasts with those who argue that one should be a “Jew [only] in your tent,” whereas one should avoid emphasizing one's Jewishness in public, so as not to provoke the gentiles etc. The Megillah makes clear that specifically one who is seen as a Jew even in Shushan the capital can stand strong against “Shushan the capital,” against a king who “rules over the entire globe” and ministers like Haman etc. Similarly, the end of the Megillah says, “For Mordechai the Jew was second to King Achashveirosh…” Meaning: even after the danger has passed and Mordechai is second to the king he doesn't say that now one should follow the norms of society and that it's no longer necessary to publicly proclaim that one is a Jew. Rather, he continues to behave as Mordechai the Jew, and he needs no other strategy to succeed and to remain second to the king. Not only is this what the Torah says, but even Achashveirosh agrees that Mordechai should be second to the king precisely because he sees that Mordechai is a man of truth who remains a Jew and isn't swayed by anyone.Excerpt from sichah of Purim 5728 For a transcript in English of the Sicha: https://thedailysicha.com/?date=25-02-2026

Jewish Journeys, an unprecedented population study of Jewish Americans' perspectives on psychedelics, explores the attitudes, practices, and needs of the emerging Jewish psychedelic community in the United States. Zac Kamenetz and Josh Lipson join Dan and Lex for a conversation about this study, its implications for American Judaism, and how we might take lessons from the field of psychedelics and apply them to contemporary Jewish life. Head to JudaismUnbound.com/classes to check out our up upcoming courses in the UnYeshiva! This time around we are offering courses on an Intro to Judaism (Judaism Inbound), the book of Genesis, the Magic & Medicine of Psalms, Jews and Revolution, and a Jewish embrace of Fatness! Access full shownotes for this episode via this link. If you're enjoying Judaism Unbound, please help us keep things going with a one-time or monthly tax-deductible donation -- support Judaism Unbound by clicking here! Join the Judaism Unbound discord, where you can interact with Judaism Unbound's hosts, and with fellow listeners all around the world, by heading to discord.judaismunbound.com. 

Recently, the Department of Justice released millions of files from disgraced financier and pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. Since their release, part of the discussion has revolved around the way Jewishness appears in the files. Epstein and his friends make clannish jokes about Jews and “goyim,” many of them simultaneously self-deprecating and chauvinistic. Epstein himself is extremely interested in genetics, sending out a number of DNA Kits to Jews and non-Jews alike, and referencing a natural Ashkenazi intelligence. The files also show close—and sometimes criminal—relationships to a number of prominent Jewish men. These details, along with information about Epstein's role as fixer for former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, have fueled conspiracy theories about Jewish power. But what do we do with a story whose real-life details are so fitted to antisemitic conspiracy? In this episode of On the Nose, editor-in-chief Arielle Angel speaks with author, thinker, and activist Naomi Klein about how to make sense of the capitalist conspiracy outlined in the files, and the grave importance of holding our depraved elites accountable.Thanks to Jesse Brenneman for producing and to Nathan Salsburg for the use of his song “VIII (All That Were Calculated Have Passed).”Media Mentioned and Further ReadingDoppelganger: A Trip Into the Mirror World by Naomi KleinHarsha Walia on Epstein and sexual violenceA collection of Epstein's comments on “Jews” and “goyim” from Tikkun Olam“Eugenics Isn't Dead—It's Thriving in Tech,” Julia Métraux, Mother Jones“Jeffrey Epstein's assistant ordered so many 23andMe kits, the company asked why,” Ariana Bindman, SFGate“The Myth of the Chosen Nation: The Colonial Period,” Richard T. Hughes“The crisis in modern masculinity,” Pankaj Mishra, The Guardian

In this episode, we're joined by Dr. Ruben Bühner, who is a postdoctoral researcher for New Testament Studies at the University of Zurich and the University of Bonn, and the author of Negotiating Jewishness: Paul's Ethnicity Between Continuity and Discontinuity (Baylor University Press). Over the course of our conversation, we talk about key passages in the interpretation of Paul that relate to matters of continuity and discontinuity with respect to Paul's Jewish identity and observance of the Torah. Team members on the episode from The Two Cities include: Dr. John Anthony Dunne. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ralph welcomes Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson to discuss a wide range of topics, including NATO, Greenland, Gaza, and more. Then, Ralph speaks to Rabbi Alissa Wise (founding director of Rabbis for Ceasefire) about the “Jews for Food Aid for People in Gaza" campaign. Finally, Ralph and the team address some current events.Lawrence Wilkerson is a retired U.S. Army colonel. Over his 31 years of service, Colonel Wilkerson served as Secretary of State Colin Powell's Chief of Staff from 2002 to 2005, and Special Assistant to General Powell when he was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 1989 to 1993. Colonel Wilkerson also served as Deputy Director and Director of the U.S. Marine Corps War College at Quantico, Virginia, and for fifteen years he was the Distinguished Visiting Professor of Government and Public Policy at the College of William and Mary. He is currently a Senior Fellow at the Eisenhower Media Network, senior advisor to the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, and co-founder of the All-Volunteer Force Forum.You aren't a newspaper, not really, if you don't have the guts to go out and get the news wherever it's happening. And you're reporting, nonetheless, to the American people [on the truth]. And it's nothing about the truth. It's as bad as what Netanyahu does in his own country in Hebrew. It's propaganda. And in many cases, it's not even accurate propaganda. It's falsified propaganda. You know, there used to be a law. And the law prohibited anyone in the Defense Department, for example, but any of the government agencies (Defense Department was the most guilty) that said: you cannot propagandize the American people. You can propagandize foreign audiences—even in wartime, you can propagandize those audiences, but you must not propagandize the American people. You have to tell them the truth or tell nothing at all. And if you're a media outlet, you should be telling them the truth, or the truth as you best can determine it. We don't honor that law anymore.Colonel Lawrence WilkersonI think [NATO and the EU are] gone, but I think the prospect for the future ought to be that we replace them. We don't just let them go and not have a replacement. And the replacement should be a European security architecture, which includes the Russians. And last time I checked a Rand McNally map, Russia (at least from the Urals inward) was a part of Europe. And it needs to be based not on spheres of influence, but on economic and financial and other needs that all of that group of people have. That's how you create something that will keep Europe and Russia together and not at loggerheads.Colonel Lawrence WilkersonI've said this a number of times (publicly I've said it) —the January 6th attempt to overthrow the United States government in favor of Donald Trump didn't fail because the system held. It failed because the coup plotters were incompetent, and their incompetence was most visible in not having the military (or a sizable segment thereof). They will not do that again.Colonel Lawrence WilkersonRabbi Alissa Wise is the Lead Organizer of Rabbis for Ceasefire, which she founded in October 2023. She was a staff leader at Jewish Voice for Peace from 2011-2021 and co-founded the JVP Rabbinical Council in 2010. She is co-author of “Solidarity is the Political Version of Love: Lessons from Jewish Anti-Zionist Organizing”. She is also one of the organizers of the “Jews for Food Aid for People in Gaza” campaign.I think there is a lot of support in the Jewish community for living up to core liberatory values that there are within Jewish tradition. This is true in every religious tradition and it's true in Judaism, where you can open the sacred text and find a justification for oppression or you could open a sacred text and find a pathway to liberation. And so what we're inviting people into is to pull the thread of liberatory Judaism. And making the conscious choice that those are the threads of the tradition that we want to pull on.Rabbi Alissa WiseThere's nothing Jewish about what the state of Israel is doing—about the state of Israel at all. It's not actually a fulfillment of Jewish practice or tradition or Torah. It's not a Torah-based government. It's government. It's a nation state. It's a military. And it uses—as I was saying before, one could open the Torah and identify justification for endless war or justification for freedom. And I think they often use their Jewishness as a fig leaf in order to shield themselves from criticism because “when you criticize them, you're being anti-Semitic.” And they pull on certain quotes or elements of Jewish teachings that either seem to uphold what they're doing while at the same time being palatable and accessible to the Christian Zionists that actually have for a long time been empowering US foreign policy.Rabbi Alissa WiseNews 2/6/26* Last week, we discussed the showdown in Congress over forcing Bill and Hillary Clinton to testify before the House Oversight Committee regarding the Epstein probe. Despite pressure from Democratic House leadership, many Democrats broke ranks to vote in favor of holding the former President and former Secretary of State in contempt of Congress. If this vote had gone to the full House, it is possible the couple could have been jailed until they agreed to testify. Instead, this week, Bill and Hillary Clinton agreed to appear before the Committee. Bill Clinton's relationship with Epstein is well-documented through the flight logs and photos that have emerged since the passage of the Epstein Files Transparency Act. Hillary Clinton claims never to have met or spoken with the late sex offender and financier, per the BBC. Former President Clinton will appear for a deposition on February 27th; the former Secretary of State will appear the day before. This piece notes that this will mark the first time a former president has testified to Congress since Gerald Ford did so in 1983 – marking a watershed moment for Congress reasserting its constitutional authority.* In more news of Congress asserting its authority vis-a-vis the Epstein scandal, Representatives Ro Khanna and Thomas Massie appeared on “Meet the Press,” this week and said that while the release of the latest batch of files is “significant,” it “is not good enough.” Khanna estimates that only about half of the Epstein files have been released so far. Given how much we have learned from the files so far, it is anyone's guess what lurks in the files they have yet to release. Crucially, withholding the files is in direct contravention of the law authored by the two lawmakers. Khanna stated plainly that “If we don't get the remaining files…Thomas Massie and I are prepared to move on impeachment,” of Attorney General Pam Bondi. This from CNBC.* The Epstein scandal has contributed to growing fissures in the MAGA movement. Perhaps the most notable defector from that camp is retired Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. This week, Greene sat for an interview with conservative radio personality Kim Iversen, and said that President Trump's Make America Great Again slogan was “all a lie…a big lie for the people,” adding “What MAGA is really serving in this administration, who they're serving, is their big donors,” per the Hill. Elaborating further, Greene said that Trump's financial backers are the real beneficiaries of the supposedly populist movement, saying “They get the government contracts, they get the pardons, or somebody they love or one of their friends gets a pardon.” While Greene has resigned her seat in Congress, she shows little sign of disappearing from the public eye. Many speculate she could seek political office in the future, even the presidency, charting a path forward for a post-Trump GOP.* Another major fight in Congress has to do with checking the out of control Department of Homeland Security. While congressional Democrats' response to the events in Minneapolis leaves much to be desired, Senate Democratic leadership is pushing for reforms to “rein in” ICE and Border Patrol, including “body camera requirements, an end to roving patrols, elevated warrant requirements and a measure to ban officers from wearing masks,” per the Hill. While these reforms fall far short of what is needed, they would go a long way toward checking the worst excesses of these out of control organizations that have come to resemble nothing so much as secret police.* At the state level, the New York Times reports New York Attorney General Letitia James announced that her office will “deploy legal observers to document raids conducted by federal immigration authorities across the state.” These observers, who will be outfitted with clearly identifiable purple vests, are intended to serve as “neutral witnesses on the ground,” and will be “instructed not to interfere with enforcement activity.” This piece highlights that California and New York have already “unveiled online portals for residents to upload photos and videos of misconduct by federal agents that could be used in state lawsuits against the federal government.” A similar effort is being launched by New Jersey Governor Mikie Sherrill. It remains to be seen whether these attempts to step up oversight of ICE and CBP activity will check the flagrant misconduct we have seen in places in Minneapolis.* In more state and local news, the Root reports the Gullah-Geechee people – descendants of enslaved Africans who formed unique communities including a distinct culture and even language on the coasts of states like Georgia, Florida and the Carolinas – have scored a victory against gentrification on Sapelo Island, the only surviving Gullah-Geechee community in Georgia. In 2023, developers came in and, with local commissioners in their pockets attempted to “eliminate special zoning laws… [and] double the maximum home size on the island…to 3,000 square feet.” In response, local activists and groups like Keep Sapelo Geechee collected thousands of signatures to force a community vote on the matter. This measure passed late last month by a margin of 85%. While small in scale, this victory shows that when residents organize to protect their communities they can win, even in the face of long odds.* A more disturbing story of the American periphery comes to us from Bolts Magazine. This story concerns a family from American Samoa, an unincorporated U.S. Pacific territory where residents are “American Nationals” but not citizens of the United States. This family – Tupe Smith, her husband Mike Pese and their children – moved to Whittier, Alaska in 2017 to be close to Pese's mother. Smith, a pillar of the local community, was recruited to run for the school board and won unanimously. However, because she is only a National and not a citizen, despite having a U.S. passport and Social Security number, she was in fact not eligible to run for office or even vote. Smith was arrested and indicted on two charges of felony voter misconduct. The irony of this story is that “The Alaska DMV, which doubles as a voter registration office…did not [even] include [the option to identify as a non-citizen U.S. national on official forms] until 2022” and the state has admitted that it “registered an unspecified number of non-citizens to vote between 2022 and 2024.” Now, because of Alaska's own mistakes, some Nationals are beginning to be deported over their erroneous registrations. Beyond the bureaucratic incompetence, this is a story about the American empire designating people outside of U.S. mainland second-class citizens, or more precisely, Nationals, for no discernible reason other than keeping them as a permanent colonial underclass.* Speaking of American imperial expansion, the Financial Times reports Trump administration officials held covert meetings with fringe separatist groups from Canada's oil-rich province of Alberta, such as the far-right Alberta Prosperity Project. According to this report, separatist leaders have met with US state department officials in Washington three times since April 2025, and the separatists are seeking another meeting next month with state and Treasury officials to ask for a $500 billion credit line to help keep the province afloat financially if an independence referendum is passed. This blatant undermining of Canadian sovereignty triggered outcry in the country, with British Columbia premier David Eby saying “To go to a foreign country and to ask for assistance in breaking up Canada, there's an old fashioned word for that, and that word is treason.” This from another story in the FT.* In more Trump news, after a slew of embarrassing incidents including composer Philip Glass pulling his new Lincoln symphony from the Kennedy Center in protest and the arts director resigning after just days on the job, NPR reports the president announced he will close the center for two years for “Construction, Revitalization, and Complete Rebuilding.” As the NPR piece notes, this announcement has sent ripples of confusion through the D.C. arts world, including everyone from performers in long running shows like Shear Madness, which is currently booked at the center through October as well as unions with Kennedy Center contracts, such as the musicians of the National Symphony and backstage crew. Moreover, technically Congress would have to approve of this overhaul, though considering how deferential Republican congressional leaders have proven, they would likely rubber-stamp any proposed changes. Regardless, a long-term closure of the Kennedy Center would be a tragic loss for the cultural landscape of Washington and a humiliating acknowledgment of Trump's own mismanagement of the venerable institution.* Finally, we turn to the tiny island nation of Cuba, which has held out against imperialist pressure from the United States for so many decades. This week, President Trump told reporters “Mexico is gonna cease sending [Cuba] oil,” though he did not explain why, per Reuters. At the same time, the Guardian reports Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has pledged to send humanitarian aid to Cuba adding that Mexico is “exploring all diplomatic avenues to be able to send fuel to the Cuban people,” despite the pressure campaign by the United States. She further claimed that despite Trump's comments, “We never discussed…the issue of oil with Cuba.” The Reuters piece however notes that “Trump has privately questioned Sheinbaum about crude and fuel shipments to Cuba,” and Sheinbaum “responded that the shipments are ‘humanitarian aid,'” and that Trump “did not directly urge Mexico to halt the oil deliveries.” On Sunday, the Hill reported Pope Leo XIV weighed in to beseech that the two nations engage in a “sincere and effective dialogue in order to avoid violence and every action that could increase the suffering of the dear Cuban people,” echoing a call by the Bishops of Cuba.This has been Francesco DeSantis, with In Case You Haven't Heard. Get full access to Ralph Nader Radio Hour at www.ralphnaderradiohour.com/subscribe

Many Christians traditionally celebrate the presentation of Jesus in the Temple, forty days after Christmas. In Luke's gospel, we are told five times that Joseph and Mary acted in accordance with the law of the Lord. In an age of increasing anti-Semitism and the rush to deny the Jewishness of Jesus, this passage serves as a powerful reminder of the Jewish identity and mission of the Messiah and the urgent need to stand against those who use the New Testament as a weapon against the Jewish people.

Daniel and Harry welcome Nabil Ayers - music industry entrepreneur, podcaster, musician, and author to discuss Martin Scorsese's 1985 dark comedy "After Hours" starring Griffin Dunne, Rosanna Arquette, and Linda Fiorentino.They discuss SoHo in the 1980s, Scorsese's exploration of temptation and punishment, how this film fits into the "Yuppie Nightmare" canon of films alongside others like "Fatal Attraction" and "American Psycho,” and how tough it was to get into a walkup apartment when the buzzer wasn't working.As always, they end the episode by ranking the film's Jewishness in terms of its cast & crew, content, and themes.IMDb - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088680/Trailer - https://youtu.be/LQRawYZl-lsJoe Frank's NPR Monologue that partially inspired "After Hours"- https://youtu.be/MIG636ri4r8Check out Nabil's podcast, IdentifiedCheck out Nabil's book - My Life in The SunshineConnect with Jews on Film online:Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jewsonfilm/Twitter - https://twitter.com/jewsonfilmpodYouTube- https://www.youtube.com/@jewsonfilmTikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@jewsonfilmpod

“Marty Supreme” is a box office and critical hit. The film just received nominations in many of the most coveted Oscar categories — best picture, director and actor. And Wesley is glad about all of it. He loved the movie and its shameless protagonist, Marty Mauser.But it turns out that a lot of people going to see this movie don't share his feelings. In fact, a lot of them hate it. And much of that seems to have to do with a hatred of Marty himself.Wesley's friend and a culture editor at The New York Times Magazine, Sasha Weiss, thinks people may be missing the point. Which, to her, has a lot to do with the Jewishness of the film. She joins Wesley to talk it out. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher.

This week, were covering two things youll never hear about on corporate media – or if you do, theyll be demonized: whistleblowers, and targeted boycott movements. First up, were joined by a Capital One whistleblower who talks about how the companys internal dealings with Israeli weapons manufacturers chafes against the companys external PR campaign of progressive and diversity politics. The whistleblower outlines the so-called proper channels they attempted to utilize in addressing their concerns, and what organizing work theyre doing now to hold Capital One accountable to not only their clients but to international law. Next up, were joined by two organizers with the Eject Elbit campaign focused on decoupling the Israeli weapons manufacturer from the financial institutions it relies on. Scotty and Liza share the BDS precedent for their work, recent wins, and upcoming goals. They talk about the medias framing of their work, not least of all using and twisting their Jewishness while continuing to silence and obscure Palestinian voices and calls for justice. The News That Didn't Make the News. Each week, co-hosts Mickey Huff and Eleanor Goldfield conduct in depth interviews with their guests and offer hard hitting commentary on the key political, social, and economic issues of the day with an emphasis on critical media literacy. The post Project Censored – January 23, 2026 appeared first on KPFA.

This week, Daniel and Harry are joined by Temim Fruchter, author of "City of Laughter" out now! They discuss the classic 1989 film "When Harry Met Sally..." starring Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan directed by the late Rob Reiner.First, they touch on why the film has sustained as one of the best Rom-Coms, pointing to the improvisation and natural conversations that drive the film's narrative. Then they discuss coincidence and synchronicity related to Harry and Sally's run ins throughout the film.They also answer one of the most controversial questions in food lore: What is your bagel order?As always, they close out the episode by ranking the film's "Jewishness" in terms of its cast & crew, content, and themes.When Harry Met Sally TrailerWhen Harry Met Sally on IMdBTemim's LinksCity of Laughter on Bookshop.orgTemim Fruchter on TwitterTemim Fruchter on InstagramConnect with Jews on Film online:Jews on Film Merch - https://jews-on-film.printify.me/productsInstagram - https://www.instagram.com/jewsonfilm/Twitter - https://twitter.com/jewsonfilmpodYouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@jewsonfilmTikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@jewsonfilmpod

Mike was atheist-Jewish, then Buddhist/Taoist, and then Protestant before God showed him the truth about the Catholic faith. Now he runs a Catholic fashion company: https://HighGothicCasual.com In this powerful interview, Mike opens up about the struggles, questions, and surprises that led him to embrace the fullness of the Catholic faith. This is an honest, thoughtful conversion story that speaks to skeptics, seekers, former atheists, and anyone wrestling with truth, meaning, and God's existence. In this interview, Mike shares: Why his Jewishness prevented him from considering Christianity as an option — and the surprising ways God prevailed over this What Protestant Christianity couldn't handle The Catholic teachings that finally made sense of reality Advice for those discerning Catholicism If you've ever asked "Is God real?", "Why Catholicism?", or "Can faith be reasonable?"—this conversation is for you.

As migration carried Yiddish to several continents during the long twentieth century, an increasingly global community of speakers and readers clung to Jewish heritage while striving to help their children make sense of their lives as Jews in the modern world. In her book, Modern Jewish Worldmaking Through Yiddish Children's Literature (Princeton University Press, 2025), Miriam Udel traces how the stories and poems written for these Yiddish-speaking children underpinned new formulations of secular Jewishness. Udel provides the most comprehensive study to date of this corpus of nearly a thousand picture books, chapter books, story and poetry collections, and anthologies. Moving geographically from Europe to the Americas and chronologically through the twentieth century, she considers this emerging canon in relation to the deep Jewish past and imagined Jewish futures before reckoning with the tragedy of the Holocaust. Udel discusses how Yiddish children's literature espoused political ideologies ranging from socialism to Zionism and constituted a project of Jewish cultural nationalism, one shaped equally by the utopianism of the Jewish left and important shifts in the Western understanding of children, childhood, and family life. Modern Jewish Worldmaking Through Yiddish Children's Literature shows how Yiddish authors, educators, and cultural leaders, confronting practical limits on their ability to forge a fully realized nation of their own, focused instead on making a symbolic and conceptual world for Jewish children to inhabit with dignity, justice, and joy. Interviewee: Miriam Udel is associate professor of German Studies and Jewish Studies at Emory University. Host: Schneur Zalman Newfield is an Associate Professor of Sociology and Jewish Studies at Hunter College, City University of New York, and the author of Degrees of Separation: Identity Formation While Leaving Ultra-Orthodox Judaism (Temple University Press). Visit him online at ZalmanNewfield.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

As migration carried Yiddish to several continents during the long twentieth century, an increasingly global community of speakers and readers clung to Jewish heritage while striving to help their children make sense of their lives as Jews in the modern world. In her book, Modern Jewish Worldmaking Through Yiddish Children's Literature (Princeton University Press, 2025), Miriam Udel traces how the stories and poems written for these Yiddish-speaking children underpinned new formulations of secular Jewishness. Udel provides the most comprehensive study to date of this corpus of nearly a thousand picture books, chapter books, story and poetry collections, and anthologies. Moving geographically from Europe to the Americas and chronologically through the twentieth century, she considers this emerging canon in relation to the deep Jewish past and imagined Jewish futures before reckoning with the tragedy of the Holocaust. Udel discusses how Yiddish children's literature espoused political ideologies ranging from socialism to Zionism and constituted a project of Jewish cultural nationalism, one shaped equally by the utopianism of the Jewish left and important shifts in the Western understanding of children, childhood, and family life. Modern Jewish Worldmaking Through Yiddish Children's Literature shows how Yiddish authors, educators, and cultural leaders, confronting practical limits on their ability to forge a fully realized nation of their own, focused instead on making a symbolic and conceptual world for Jewish children to inhabit with dignity, justice, and joy. Interviewee: Miriam Udel is associate professor of German Studies and Jewish Studies at Emory University. Host: Schneur Zalman Newfield is an Associate Professor of Sociology and Jewish Studies at Hunter College, City University of New York, and the author of Degrees of Separation: Identity Formation While Leaving Ultra-Orthodox Judaism (Temple University Press). Visit him online at ZalmanNewfield.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

As migration carried Yiddish to several continents during the long twentieth century, an increasingly global community of speakers and readers clung to Jewish heritage while striving to help their children make sense of their lives as Jews in the modern world. In her book, Modern Jewish Worldmaking Through Yiddish Children's Literature (Princeton University Press, 2025), Miriam Udel traces how the stories and poems written for these Yiddish-speaking children underpinned new formulations of secular Jewishness. Udel provides the most comprehensive study to date of this corpus of nearly a thousand picture books, chapter books, story and poetry collections, and anthologies. Moving geographically from Europe to the Americas and chronologically through the twentieth century, she considers this emerging canon in relation to the deep Jewish past and imagined Jewish futures before reckoning with the tragedy of the Holocaust. Udel discusses how Yiddish children's literature espoused political ideologies ranging from socialism to Zionism and constituted a project of Jewish cultural nationalism, one shaped equally by the utopianism of the Jewish left and important shifts in the Western understanding of children, childhood, and family life. Modern Jewish Worldmaking Through Yiddish Children's Literature shows how Yiddish authors, educators, and cultural leaders, confronting practical limits on their ability to forge a fully realized nation of their own, focused instead on making a symbolic and conceptual world for Jewish children to inhabit with dignity, justice, and joy. Interviewee: Miriam Udel is associate professor of German Studies and Jewish Studies at Emory University. Host: Schneur Zalman Newfield is an Associate Professor of Sociology and Jewish Studies at Hunter College, City University of New York, and the author of Degrees of Separation: Identity Formation While Leaving Ultra-Orthodox Judaism (Temple University Press). Visit him online at ZalmanNewfield.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/literary-studies

In today's episode, we're talking about something I've really felt the Lord pressing on my heart lately, getting back to the roots of Christianity.So much of what we believe and practice today has been shaped by culture, tradition, and even convenience. But when we slow down and return to God's Word, we start to see our faith more clearly and more deeply.A big part of that is understanding Jesus in His full context, not just as we've come to know Him through modern Christianity, but as who He actually was. Jesus was Jewish. He lived within Jewish culture, observed Jewish feasts, taught from the Torah, and spoke in ways that made sense to the people of His time.When we take the time to understand Jesus' Jewishness, Scripture opens up in a new way. Parables make more sense. His teachings carry more weight. And our faith becomes less about surface level belief and more about true discipleship.This episode isn't about changing who Jesus is, it's about knowing Him more fully. It's an invitation to dig deeper, to study God's Word with intention, and to let truth, not tradition, shape our walk with Him.If you've ever felt like there's more to your faith than what you've been taught, this conversation is for you.Books I recommend in this episode:Reclaiming Our Forgotten Heritage: How Understanding the Jewish Roots of Christianity Can Transform Your FaithKnowing Jesus Through the Old Testament ──────────────FOLLOW JUDITH:Judith Rios: TikokJudith Rios: InstagramGoodness Club: ServicesGoodness Club: Instagram──────────────All Promo CodesAMAZON STOREFRONTall for his glory

Actor, activist, and “Being Jewish” podcast host Jonah Platt joins Mosheh for a wide-ranging conversation about Jewish identity, politics, culture, and the intense pressures facing American Jews after October 7th. Platt reflects on the fear, confusion, and polarization running through the community, and why so much of today's antisemitism shows up not through slurs or symbols, but through omissions, framing, and coded language around Israel. He argues that this moment requires clarity, context, and calm engagement — not panic and not denial. The episode also explores the creation of Platt's podcast 'Being Jewish,' which aims to expand how people understand Jewishness — as a people, culture, history, and set of values, not just a religion. Platt takes listeners inside Hollywood, an industry where many Jews have had to historically hide their identity. He also talks about the impact of October 7, and why some are now pushing forward Jewish and Israeli stories despite fear of backlash. Also in the interview: Breaking down where Jewish institutions have fallen short in educating younger generations about Israel, and how better storytelling could counter both misinformation and apathy. Mosheh Oinounou (⁠⁠⁠⁠@mosheh⁠⁠⁠⁠) is an Emmy and Murrow award-winning journalist. He has 20 years of experience at networks including Fox News, Bloomberg Television and CBS News, where he was the executive producer of the CBS Evening News and launched the network's 24 hour news channel. He founded the @mosheh Instagram news account in 2020 and the Mo News podcast and newsletter in 2022.

Actor, activist, and “Being Jewish” podcast host Jonah Platt joins Mosheh for a wide-ranging conversation about Jewish identity, politics, culture, and the intense pressures facing American Jews after October 7th. Platt reflects on the fear, confusion, and polarization running through the community, and why so much of today's antisemitism shows up not through slurs or symbols, but through omissions, framing, and coded language around Israel. He argues that this moment requires clarity, context, and calm engagement — not panic and not denial. The episode also explores the creation of Platt's podcast 'Being Jewish,' which aims to expand how people understand Jewishness — as a people, culture, history, and set of values, not just a religion. Platt takes listeners inside Hollywood, an industry where many Jews have had to historically hide their identity. He also talks about the impact of October 7, and why some are now pushing forward Jewish and Israeli stories despite fear of backlash. Also in the interview: Breaking down where Jewish institutions have fallen short in educating younger generations about Israel, and how better storytelling could counter both misinformation and apathy. Mosheh Oinounou (⁠⁠⁠⁠@mosheh⁠⁠⁠⁠) is an Emmy and Murrow award-winning journalist. He has 20 years of experience at networks including Fox News, Bloomberg Television and CBS News, where he was the executive producer of the CBS Evening News and launched the network's 24 hour news channel. He founded the @mosheh Instagram news account in 2020 and the Mo News podcast and newsletter in 2022.

For many Christians, the divide between the church and the Jewish people feels ancient and immovable. But every divide has a story - and far too often, it's a story Christians never heard.  In this episode, we sit down with long-time friend and ministry leader Murray Tilles of Light of Messiah Ministries to uncover why Jesus remains such a point of pain for many Jewish families, and why the church's calling toward Israel is more urgent than ever. Murray shares his own journey from a deeply religious Jewish upbringing in North Carolina to the moment he prayed “in Jesus' name” - words he never imagined he would say.  His story isn't abstract.  It's threaded with family tension, synagogue life, anti-Semitism, and the surprising power of Scripture to reshape identity. And it's a window into the very real barriers Jewish people face when confronted with a “Christian” Jesus who feels historically disconnected from their people. Together, we explore why the New Testament is far more Jewish than most Christians realize, why Paul's “to the Jew first” mission still matters today, and how today's rising anti-Semitism is creating unexpected openness among Jewish communities - if the church knows how to build trust.  Murray helps believers move from abstract support to real relational bridge-building, from sentiment to substance, from generic evangelism to meaningful connection rooted in God's covenant faithfulness. Key Takeaways Many Jewish people associate Jesus with centuries of suffering done “in His name,” making belief in Him feel like a betrayal of their people. Murray's journey began not with pressure but with Scripture - especially Isaiah 53 - leading him into a relationship with Israel's own Messiah. Paul's model was never “either Israel or the nations.” His strategy was always “to the Jew first,” expecting the church to carry that mantle. Replacement theology remains one of the biggest obstacles preventing Christians from seeing Scripture as one unified story. Today's cultural moment - including post-October 7 Jewish vulnerability - has opened new doors for relationship and witness. Simple gestures - apples and honey, Hanukkah blessings, relationship-first approaches - create space for meaningful spiritual conversations. The continued existence of the Jewish people is itself a testimony to God's covenant promises and ongoing plan for Israel and the world. Chapter Markers 00:00 – Welcome & Introduction 00:19 – Meeting Murray & Ministry Connections 00:58 – Growing Up in a Religious Jewish Home 03:15 – Encountering Scripture for the First Time 04:19 – Discovering Jesus in the New Testament 05:28 – Family Tension, Cost, and Reconciliation 07:43 – Why Jesus Is Hard for Jewish People 09:57 – Anti-Semitism, History, and Misunderstanding 14:37 – The Jewishness of Jesus 17:39 – The Church's Calling “To the Jew First” 22:51 – How Light of Messiah Reaches Jewish People 26:56 – Openness Since October 7 30:22 – Conspiracy Theories & Rising Confusion 33:06 – God's Faithfulness to Preserve Israel 36:22 – How to Connect With Murray & Next Steps Explore more resources, episodes, and guides at thejewishroad.com. Connect with Murray Tilles and Light of Messiah Ministries at LightofMessiah.org and on Instagram @LightOfMessiahATL. Learn about the Lausanne Consultation on Jewish Evangelism at lcje-na.org, including the upcoming Atlanta conference. Become one of The Few who stand with us and help advance this work at thejewishroad.com.

Join host Manya Brachear Pashman for a powerful conversation about Red Alert, the Critics Choice Award-nominated Paramount+ docu-series that confronts the October 7 Hamas massacre with unflinching honesty. Producer Lawrence Bender (Pulp Fiction, Good Will Hunting) shares why this project couldn't wait—launched in real time to push back against denial, disinformation, and a world struggling to absorb the scale of the tragedy. Bender reflects on the courage and trauma of the ordinary Israelis whose stories anchor the series, including survivors like Batsheva Olami, whose resilience changed the production team forever. Hear how filming during an active war shaped the storytelling, the emotional toll on everyone involved, and why capturing these true accounts is essential to ensuring October 7 is neither minimized nor forgotten. Key Resources: AJC.org/Donate: Please consider supporting AJC's work with a year-end gift today. Right now, your gift will be matched, dollar-for-dollar, making double the impact. Every gift matters. Every dollar makes a difference in the fight for a strong and secure Jewish future. Listen – AJC Podcasts: Architects of Peace The Forgotten Exodus People of the Pod Follow People of the Pod on your favorite podcast app, and learn more at AJC.org/PeopleofthePod You can reach us at: peopleofthepod@ajc.org If you've appreciated this episode, please be sure to tell your friends, and rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Transcript of the Interview: [Clip from Red Alert] Manya Brachear Pashman:   Academy Award nominated film producer Lawrence Bender has quite a repertoire for both feature films and documentaries: Pulp Fiction, Inglorious Bastards, Good Will Hunting and Inconvenient Truth. In fact, his works have earned 36 Academy Award nominations.  His most recent TV miniseries is a more personal project on the second anniversary of the October 7 Hamas terror attacks on Israel, Paramount Plus began streaming a four episode series called red alert about the attack on festival goers, innocent passers by and families waking up to terrorists inside their Israeli homes that day, a tragedy that many of us, either on this podcast or listening have watched with overwhelming grief for the last two years. Lawrence is with us now to talk about how he grappled with this attack on Israel and the rise of antisemitism that followed.  Lawrence, welcome to People of the Pod. Lawrence Bender:   Thank you, Manya, it's good to be here.  Manya Brachear Pashman:   So that clip that we played at the top of this episode, it's one of the few clips in English. Most of the dialog in this show is in Hebrew with subtitles. But that scene is a woman, Bathsheba and her two daughters. They're walking across a field trying to return home, and her son has been taken. Her husband is gone. This series weaves together her story and three or four other ordinary civilians fighting for their lives on October 7, 2023. You know, as someone personally who's been immersed in this subject matter for two years, to be honest, I had to muster the energy to watch this, and I'm so glad that I did. But why are, I mean, as we're still waiting for the last hostage to be returned, why was it important for this show to air now? Lawrence Bender:   Well, thank you so much for doing this with me, and thank you for playing that clip. I have to tell you first, I love that clip. I love that scene because one of the things about the show and the stories that we portrayed is that even with the horrific things that happened on that day, people still were able to fight back. People were still able to be strong. A mother with her daughter and her infant stood in the face of a terrorist and stood him down in real life, this happened.  Now, not everybody was so fortunate, and her husband Ohad was not fortunate, and her son was taken hostage, as you mentioned, but it does show her personal power in this horrific situation. And I just thought, you know, this woman is a real hero. I've spent a lot of time with her, Batsheva Olami, she's really an extraordinary human in all ways. So thank you for playing that clip.  So in terms of the show, I felt on October 8, it's just amazing how quickly, before Israel did anything, the entire world quickly turned against the very people who were the victims and having spent subsequently, a lot of time with people on the set, because, as you mentioned, this show was about real people, and those real people spent a lot of time on the set with us. And the very people that were traumatized, felt isolated, they felt alone, and they're the very ones that need to be loved, that need to be hugged, they need to be supported. Anyway, I just felt like I needed to do something fast to try to show the world what really happened. AndRed Alert is the result of that. Manya Brachear Pashman:   Do you fear that the world has already moved on? Lawrence Bender:   Oh, that's a good question. It feels like we've passed a tipping point, actually, in terms of Jew hatred and anti-Israel and antisemitism. Even as we are now trying to have a peace process, right, that somehow we are stumbling forward, and if that's going to happen, people need to understand why we're here and why we're here happened on October 7. And if you watch the show, hopefully you're pulled into the show, and you have a, you know, you have an emotional journey, and then you understand, oh, this really happened. And you understand that's the truth. And only when you really understand the truth of October 7 do I really think that you can really get some sort of peace. Manya Brachear Pashman:   So is this different from other historical events? You know, a lot of movies and television shows commemorate historical events, like the Holocaust, for example, but they happen years later. They're made years later. I kind of call it the never forget genre. But is October 7 unique in that it's not a question of whether people will forget or move on. It's a question of whether they believe that this present is actually true. Lawrence Bender:   That's right, there's the deniers. There's people that just don't know. There's people that forgot, maybe you know, there are people who I know that I had to explain. Like, you know, it's interesting. As an example, when you see the show and you see all these Hamas terrorists invading the kibbutz, and Ohad says to her, his wife, Bathsheva, he whispers in her ear, I just saw about 20 terrorists, and someone said to me, who's not unintelligent, I didn't realize there are that many. I didn't realize that. And if you're not really paying attention, maybe you don't really know. And look, they're the haters, haters which are never going to change. But I think there's a large group of people that just don't really understand, and they're the ones that I feel we have a shot at showing this to and having a conversation with. Manya Brachear Pashman:   In fact, are you actually introducing or experimenting with a new genre of truth or facts in the face of fiction. Lawrence Bender:   I guess that's true. I mean, this just happened. And some people ask over this last, you know, when I released, and we were paramount, released the show. You know, I've been asked a question, is it too soon? And my answer is, I feel like it's not soon enough. And I felt like immediately I needed to work on something, and this is the result of that. For me, personally, there are many collaborators of people on this show that incredible Israeli partners, my American partners. I mean, there's a lot of amazing people that came together to work on this, to make this show, but we really felt like time was of the essence, because the world was shifting so quickly, we wanted this to get out there, to show the world what really happened. Manya Brachear Pashman:   One of the reasons I'm pressing you on this, this was not a fiction film. This was based in reality. You said you met Bathsheba, the actors prepared for their roles by meeting with the very real people who they were portraying in this show whose stories they were recreating. I'm curious what some of the takeaways were for you, for your colleagues, from your encounters with these victims, with these survivors, and did anything about the production ever change after they got involved? Lawrence Bender:   It was truly a life changing experience for myself, but really for everyone involved, of course, myself and my partner, Kevin Brown and Jordana Rubin, and we were basically the only non Israelis that were full time producing the show. And everyone else was a citizen of the country. Everyone else, you know, was affected dramatically, everything but from like our key grips brother ran the kibbutz Raim, where we filmed that area that was a kibbutz overrun by terrorists, right? His brother survived. So it was really like every single person at some point, you know, we call it triggered, but it really happened quite often where you have a scene and people just have to stop for a second and take a moment, whether it's an actor finishing a scene or a crew member, you know, partaking in the making of the scene. But lots of things happen. I'll tell you one story which was, you know, quite interesting. We're working at the Nova festival scene, and one of the actors, Moran, her niece, was on vacation in Greece, and her niece told her, if a red headed police woman shows up on the set, she's the one who saved my life. And indeed, her name was Bat, she showed up, and we said, we need you to meet somebody. And we FaceTimed Moran's niece with Bat, and the young lady she's like in her early 20s, said, You're the one who saved my life. You're the one I was hiding by your feet while you were firing. And we asked, Did you remember the people that you saved? And she said, I really only remember the people I didn't save. You really felt the pain that she is still at that point a year and a half later, this is. In April, May, suffering from what she went through. RPG hit nearby her. She went flying through the air. She had had half reconstructive surgery, on and on and on. It was obviously an extremely traumatic day for her to you know, a moment where there's a woman on the set whose daughter was murdered, and someone on my crew, actually, Mya Fisher, has said, you know, there's someone here I want to introduce you to. It's after lunch. And I spent some time with her, and I asked her, you know, like, how do you go? Fine, I can't, you know, I can't imagine losing my son in this way. It's just unimaginable. And I asked her, do you have a rabbi? What do you do to survive?  And it was a very difficult emotional exchange. And sometime later, she had sort of retold that encounter to somebody else on the set who came to me and said, you know that woman you're talking to. She told me what happened, you know this conversation? And she said, You know this Hollywood producer came all the way from California, she doesn't know me, from Adam, and sat down with me for an hour to hear my story, and it clearly meant a lot to her. And again, you realize that the very people who are traumatized directly are not getting the love, are so isolated and people are against them, and it made me feel even more determined to tell these stories for the world to understand.  Every day we had these type of difficult, emotional and to be honest, I was extremely honored every time I met someone. I spent every Saturday night at Hostage Square because we were making the show, I got to spend time backstage with all the families who had loved ones in the tunnels. There was a deep dive into this. Now, I have to tell you, on the other hand, the filming while a war is still going on is quite it's like things you don't have to think about normally, right? So, as an example, we were in a town and we're shooting a shootout. We're filming a shootout between the IDF actors and the Hamas actor. They're actors. I keep saying they're actors, right? Because they are actors. But the mayor and the chief of police in the town were extremely worried, because they look real, right? They look like real people. And unfortunately, the cemetery is littered with people who have been murdered and killed by the Hamas. And all the other men who are there, they have guns, they carry, and if something's happening, they're going to run towards the problem. So he's worried, what if someone walks by, or someone's up in a building. He looks down and they see an actor who looks like Hamas, they are going to shoot him. So we literally had speakers every 10 yards, like all up and down the street, and every like 15-20 minutes, saying, don't worry, in Hebrew, of course, this is a movie, everything's okay. We had a drone up in the air, never coming down, on a tether with a police officer. They're a full big screen watching case someone walks down the street.  We dressed up the Hamas actors as they're walking from the holding area to the area where they're filming, we put them in these kind of white hazmat-like suits so that they couldn't confuse them, and when they got done filming, we put them right back in these hazmat white suits and brought them back to the holding area. We all had to dress up, and we had to wear these very, very light blue shirts the entire crew, so nobody looked like anything but a crew member. It was something, right?  Manya Brachear Pashman:   I did not even think about that. I mean, I knew that you had filmed on location in Israel, and I knew you had filmed during the war. In fact, I was going to explain to listeners who don't know Red Alert is what Israelis call the sirens and the phone alerts when there are rockets being fired upon Israel and they have time to seek shelter. I was going to ask you if you had been there during a red alert and had to seek shelter, but I didn't even think about the possibility of people confusing the filming with actual war activity. I imagine you were there during a red alert, and did have to seek shelter, yes? Lawrence Bender:   so there's different types of alerts in the south. We did shoot in the guys called the Gaza envelope. We shot within less than a mile away from the Gaza border. So a scene that comes soon after the one that you showed. They're resting under a tree, and we are in the Gaza envelope. And this is a scene where they're running from the Hamas. They're running, they're bare feet, and they're out of breath, and they stop under this tree that's hot, and so forth. And you can hear, just a mile away, the war going on in Gaza. Hear the bombs and everything, and we weren't worried about we're going to be attacked, but it was eerie hearing a war go on, and we're filming a scene where they're running from that war, right?  So it was dramatic every week or so still at that point, the Hamas would lob a missile bomb into southern Israel and an alert would go off. You have 15 seconds to. Get into. So we had to bring these portable concrete safe rooms with us so that crew, at any given moment can run quickly into one of these concrete things. We couldn't always do it. So there's always this conversation, and by the way, it costs a lot of money, so everything you're always carrying these things. There's a lot of planning that went on. But I have to tell you, as an American showing up in Israel for the first time after October 7, I wasn't used to these alarms going off, so we were fortunate that while we were filming in the south, no missiles were lobbed at us. However, my first day there, I'm in a meeting on the eighth floor. It was a Friday morning. I got in there on a Thursday evening, 10 o'clock in the morning, the alarm goes up. I mean, just like that, right? And it's loud.  And you have these buzzers. Everyone's phone is buzzing, not like the Amber Alerts we have, like, really buzzing loud. And everyone stops and looks at me, and they apologize to me. They apologize and they go, Oh, we're really sorry, but it's an alert. We have to go into a safe room. Oh, don't worry, it's just from the Houthis. It takes eight minutes to get here. Now it's an intercontinental ballistic missile. These are real big missiles. They can really do bad damage. Don't worry, the Iron Dome usually gets them. It's really okay. So we go, you know, we go into and they pick up their danish and their coffee, and of course, I take out my cell phone and I'm videotaping. And then we go in there, and when it's off, we go back to the meeting. The meeting starts as if it never happened. And then they stop, and they go, Oh, how was that for you? And then I just didn't realize, what with the emotion that was going on because we're not used to having missiles shot at us. It's not normal. And I started to bubble up with emotion, and I had to, like, stop myself, I didn't want to cry in front of all these people that I barely knew. So I had to suppress my feelings. Like, don't worry, it's okay. You're having a normal reaction, right? And that happened quite often while I was there.  Now, you do get used to it. And the last night I was there, I was having dinner outside, tables outside, you know, in restaurants everywhere. So we're having a typical outside dinner, and they're handing the fish, and the alarm goes off, and we go, let's eat. And we don't go into the restaurant where they're called maamads. You don't go into the safe room. So that's kind of the quote, unquote normal life. Now you imagine here in the United States we get a missile from Mexico or Canada or wherever. No one's going to put up with that. That's just insane. It's insane what people in Israel have to go through. Manya Brachear Pashman:   it really is. But it's interesting that you've kind of adopted the nonchalance that your colleagues had at the very beginning of the trip, and wow, certainly no apologies. I want to know if there's a missile headed my way. Thank you. It does sound like October 7 changed you personally. And I'd like to know as a progressive Jew, on what level did it change you as a human being. I mean, how did it change you the most? Lawrence Bender:   I've been an active Jewish person for maybe 20, somewhere, 2025, years. I went to Israel My first time. I was ready. As far as I'm concerned. I was too old already to go for the first time. It was like 2003 I went with the Israeli policy forum, and we met with a lot of people there, and we ended up going to Ramallah, met with Abu Mazen, we went to Cairo and met with the president there, Barak, and met with a lot of people in Israel and so forth. And I've been involved one way or another for quite a while. But of course, October 7 was dramatic. Of course, I was safe in my house in Los Angeles, but I still watched in horror. And of course, October 8, it's just hard to understand what happened. It was the latent antisemitism, Jew hatred, that sits there. I still don't quite understand that.  It feels like antisemitism never went away, but it was underneath, and it just gave a good excuse to come out, and now the world is where it is. So yeah, for me, I became much more active than I was before. It became much more important to me, my Jewishness, my relationship to Israel. I want to protect Israel as much as I have that power to you know, whatever my ability is, like a lot of people, I know it's become a really important part of my existence, and it's like a new chapter in my life. I'm absolutely looking for more Jewish or Israeli projects. You know, I'm looking to do as much as possible in this area. Manya Brachear Pashman:   A number of your colleagues in Hollywood have proposed boycotting Israeli film festivals, institutions, projects, they're going the opposite direction that you are. And I'm curious if you had difficulty finding an American network to air this series, and what do you say when you confront colleagues who do want to boycott and are hostile toward Israel? Lawrence Bender:   You know, there's different groups of people. They're the true haters. I don't think that you can ever even have a conversation with them. There are people who just don't understand, and there's people you can and there are people who you know they're trying to be good people. They're trying to understand, like, What don't you understand about women being brutally raped and murdered? It's a little hard for me to understand that, actually. But there are a lot of good people who just are either confused or got too much of the wrong message.  But the one thing I would say straight up is, let's take an analogy. You know, there's very few people that I know that you see on TV, on any news show, that is very empathetic with the regime in Iran as an example, right? That means a brutal regime. If you're a liberal or if you're a conservative, there's very few people who support that regime here in this country, right? But they don't boycott their filmmakers, right? They actually give their filmmakers Academy Awards. So why is that with Israel? I feel like there's something very misguided here in Hollywood. Now, we got really lucky when it came to distribution. I just have to say, because we were supposed to go out to sell the show like it was fully financed from equity and from Keshet, who's the local Israeli. This is the biggest network in Israel, by the way. It's the biggest drama in Israel in the last decade. It really performed well there. But now we're going to go sell it here in the United States and the rest of the world, and it's early September, which is our deadline to do that, and Israel bombs Qatar, and then this boycott letter is signed. And I have to tell the investors. You know, it's like, this is not a good time. We cannot go sell. We're just gonna fail, and there's no second chances.  And you know, I was getting into dramatic arguments with my investors because they really felt strong. You got to be like that character in your show, the police officer is going to save his wife and you know, nothing's going to stop you. And I said, Yes, I'm with you. I developed that character I know in the Middle East arguments. I was at Skip Brittenham's memorial. Skip is like this beautiful man who was like the Mount Rushmore of lawyers here in LA. He's just a great human and one of those guys that wants to make deals, not just take everything and have the other guy get nothing. He was just like a he's just a real mensch, right? And well, loved anyway. Unfortunately, he passed, but I was at his memorial, and I ran into David Ellison. Now, I know David a little bit, not well, but I know him a little bit, and I also know that, you know, he loves Israel, from what I've read and so forth. And so I went up to him and said, Hey, man, we talked. I said, you got to know what I'm doing. And it probably got three words out of my mouth, and you can see him go, I'd love to see this. This sounds amazing, and sounds like it's exactly the timing we need.  And we sent him the material, and he watched every episode himself, and then he gave it to Cindy Holland, who runs paramount, plus his main person. And you know, they said, we do this. We want this. It would be an honor to be your partner in this is actually quite humbling. And it was an incredible moment for us to have David Ellison, Cindy Holland, say, hey. You know, we want this now. Then they said, We need to drop it. We want to drop all the episodes on October 7? Well, by the time they got those episodes, it was like two weeks to go before October 7, or a couple days before, because we couldn't give it to them in the midnight before October 7, obviously. And they had pretty much final picture edit, but we had temporary sound, temporary music, temporary effects, and so we had to work double triple shifts to get it done. But of course, we did. Manya Brachear Pashman:   This actually reminds me of a conversation I had with playwright, screenwriter, Oren softy for the Forgotten Exodus, which is a podcast series we did about Jews from the Middle East. He spoke about his father's side of the family, which hails from Aleppo, Syria, and he shared a lot of his frustrations with the modern anti Israel movement and sentiments in Hollywood, the protests which he's been trying to combat in theater and on the stage. And he actually said that investors had pulled out of a film project about Israel when tensions flared. So it's interesting to hear your investors took the opposite approach, but he told me in our conversations, he told me that being Jewish is about stepping up. That's how he sees it. It's about stepping up. And I'm curious if that rings true to you, and do you feel like this series and your plans to do more, is that your way of stepping up? Lawrence Bender:   Hmm, that's beautiful, and I'm so glad to hear you recount that story with him. I'd love to talk to him about that I feel like, without really understanding that it's built into me genetically, right? My grandparents, far as you go back, my family is Jewish, right? From Romania, from Hungary, from Minsk Belarus. So it's the way that you're brought up as a Jew. It's just always been a part of our lives, and we're pretty much taught that that's part of being Jewish, right? So, you know, I've always felt like it's important for me.  Now I tell you, you know, it's interesting, and I think about as we're talking so in the 90s, when I was getting started, and I was actually doing pretty well this one year, I had Good Will Hunting and Jackie Brown and a price above Rubens, those three movies, and things were going well, but I felt like something was missing in my life. And then we screened Good Will Hunting and Camp David in 1998 and it was an amazing moment. And that was like one of these light bulb moments for me. You know, I met the President and Mrs. Clinton and Madeleine Albright, Secretary of State, and Secretary of Defense, Sandy Berger and the Chief of Staff and Senate Majority Leader, and on and on, right? They're all there.    And it was Matt Damon, Ban Affleck, Gus Van Zant, Robin Williams, et cetera, et cetera, right? And I felt like these guys are making a difference, and that's what was missing in my life. And so since 1998 I've been always looking for ways that I'm and that's that's that becomes like a more of a fulfilling way of living right for myself. So yes, I would answer that. That's a long way to get to yes. Manya Brachear Pashman:   Wow, Camp David, that's awesome. Lawrence, thank you so much for joining us and for talking about the impetus behind this series. I encourage everyone to take some time, brace yourself emotionally, but do sit down and watch Red Alert. It is really quite worthwhile. Thank you so much. Lawrence Bender: Thank you. Manya Brachear Pashman:   If you missed last week's episode, be sure to tune in for my conversation with AJC colleague, Dr Alexandra Herzog, the granddaughter of Chaim Herzog, Israel's Irish born sixth president. She shared how an attempt by Dublin officials to strip her grandfather's name from a community park illustrates how criticism of Israel can veer into an effort to erase Jewish memory. As I mentioned in my conversation with Lawrence, it took some degree of wherewithal to watch Red Alert, as we've spent the last two years on this podcast speaking with the families of hostages, former hostages themselves, and survivors of the October 7 massacre. I've wanted nothing more than to make sure their voices are heard. We end this week's episode with the voice of Orna Neutra, the mother of Omer Neutra. Orna recently spoke at the AJC Long Island meeting, shortly after the return of her son's remains more than two years after his death, followed by a word from AJC Long Island Director Eric Post. Orna Neutra: When Omer was taken, our world collapsed. But something else happened too. People stood up. People showed up. And many of you here showed up. This community, the broader Long Island Jewish community, AJC, our friends, colleagues, neighbors, complete strangers, carried us. You wrote, you marched, you advocated, you pressured you called you consoled and refused to let the world look away. To our personal friends and honorees here tonight, Veronica, Laurie, and Michael, your leadership has not been symbolic. It has been practical, steady and deeply felt by our family.  Like you said, Veronica, on the first days when we were barely understanding what was going on, you connected us to Senator Schumer's office, and Michael, you helped us write a letter to the White House on October 8, and that was the first sign from hostage families that the White House received. We know that Secretary Blinken had the letter in his hands on October 8, indicating that Omer was probably a hostage.  And AJC as an organization, beyond your many actions and advocacy, I want to specifically acknowledge your DC team. It was mentioned here tonight, throughout our many, many, many visits to Capitol Hill, AJC professionals were instrumental. They arranged meetings, they walked us through endless hallways, opened doors, prepared us and stood beside us, and they're still doing that for us, and we will see them this week. Always professional, with purpose and humanity, and we will never forget that. Over these two years, we learned something essential: that when Jewish families are in danger, the responsibility belongs to all of us, across movements, across generations, across continents. This work is the work that AJC does every day. This is the work that everyone here in this room understands. Eric Post:  Since the horrors of October 7, AJC has been empowering leaders around the world to take action against antisemitism and stand with Israel. But we cannot succeed alone. Please consider supporting AJC's work with a year-end gift today. Right now, your gift will be matched, dollar-for-dollar, making double the impact.  Every gift matters. Every dollar makes a difference in the fight for a strong and secure Jewish future. Donate at AJC.org/donate – that's www - dot - AJC - dot org  slash donate.

Jews against Israel have been front and centre in the antizionist movement, their voices featured regularly in media coverage about the conflict. Their very existence lends credibility to the assertion that antizionism is not antisemitic. (To donate funding so we can complete this series, email jesse@canadaland.com) But how representative are they of the Jewish community as a whole? Is their presence being weaponized against Jewish institutions, or are they willingly weaponizing their own Jewishness? And what do these individuals have to say about the presence of antisemitism in their movement? Dave Meslin is a self-described antizionist Jew. He sits down for an in-depth interview. CORRECTION (November 27, 2025): an earlier version of this episode mistakenly reported that a group of protesters shouted racist slogans while marching with Palestine Youth Movement at their October 4th, 2025 demonstration. While these protesters were demonstrating on October 4th at the advertised site of the PYM event, they did not in fact participate in the march.Credits: This series is a co-production of Canadaland and The Canadian Jewish NewsMade possible by the generous support of The Bissell Family Foundation, George Burger, Dan Debow, Daniel Klass, Nanette Okun, Leslie Scanlon, Marjorie Skolnik, Lee Zentner, and others. George Burger, Dan Debow, Daniel Klass, Marjorie Skolnik, and Lee Zentner.Written and Reported by Jesse BrownResearch and Story Editing by Kate MinskyOriginal Music by SocalledSound Design, Mixing and Mastering by Caleb ThompsonEditorial Input from Michael Fraiman For a list of sources cited in this episode, visit our website.To support Canadaland, visit http://canadaland.com/join Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.