Ask Haviv Anything
"Ask Haviv Anything" is a podcast about history, shaped and directed by listeners. It covers big and painful topics, as well as beautiful and fascinating ones, including wars, identities, and painful history. Humor is also a key element, especially when facing tough subjects. The podcast is hosted by Haviv Rettig Gur.
פרקים
146: Israel's political system worked. Then we tried to fix it. With Dr. Shany Mor
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145: Waking up from our rage-filled slumber
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144: Inside the fight to change Haredi politics, with Rabbi Yehoshua Pfeffer
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143: How to win the Israeli election
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142: Can Gaza ever move on from Hamas? With Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib
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141: Why Western ideas crash and burn in the Middle East, with Simon Sebag Montefiore
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140: Van Jones returns - The hard questions of Black-Jewish relations
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139: Dara Horn’s final solution to the Jewish question
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138: Why antisemitism works, with Prof. Ruth Wisse
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137: What does Qatar want?
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136: Why not two states from the start?
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135: Why don’t Israelis trust the UN?
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134: Was Gaza still occupied after 2005?
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133: Mamdani and America’s new left, with Reihan Salam
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132: What is happening now in Gaza? With Dr. Shira Efron
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131: Why Christians are disappearing from the Middle East, with Amb. George Deek
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130: Here's to the next 250 years
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129: Iran is closer to freedom than you think, with Armin Navabi
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128: Iran, Gaza and the new American right, with Sohrab Ahmari
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127: Does Islam hate Jews? With Prof. Meir Litvak
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126: Will your kid's best friend be a robot? With Dr. Micah Goodman
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125: Did Netanyahu misread Trump? With Ross Douthat
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124: Vance, Iran and the fight inside Trumpworld, with Matt Continetti
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123: Batya Ungar-Sargon on why the left turned on the Jews
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122: When will the war with Iran end?
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121: Who blinks first? The battle for Hormuz, with Rich Goldberg
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120: Sam Harris on tribalism, religion, and what actually saves us
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119: Canada’s Jewish reckoning, with Prof. Gil Troy
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118: Is Israel a settler-colonial state? A historian’s honest answer, with Alex Yakobson
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117: The Palestinian insider who thinks Hamas is losing, with Samer Sinijlawi
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116: Simon Sebag Montefiore on the History — and Future — of British Jews
What does it mean to be Jewish in Britain? What happens when centuries of hard-won belonging is suddenly called into question by destabilizing events?In this conversation on history and identity, we sit down with bestselling historian Simon Sebag Montefiore to trace the extraordinary story of British Jewry: from the arrival of Jews with William the Conqueror in 1066, through medieval blood libels
115: Is Nicholas Kristof right?
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114: Why don’t we talk about Egypt?
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113: Will dumping Israel backfire on the Democrats? A conversation with Hussein Mansour
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112: Why the world Is obsessed with Zionism, with Alana Newhouse
The world feels unmoored. Identity is contested, nations are uncertain, and a technology-altered future feels increasingly abstract and vaguely threatening. So much is happening, so much is at stake. So why is everyone suddenly talking about the Jews?In this episode, Haviv sits down with writer and Tablet magazine founder Alana Newhouse to explore a striking idea: that the global obsession with Zi
111: How Somaliland and Israel became fast friends, with Amb. Mohamed Hagi
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110: Van Jones on what broke the Black-Jewish alliance
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109: The crisis no one is talking about in Canada, with Dr. Casey Babb
Canada has long imagined itself as one of the safest, most tolerant societies on earth. For generations of Jews, it felt that way too. But something has changed, suddenly and profoundly. Synagogues have been shot at. Jewish schools targeted. People are hiding their identities, looking over their shoulder, taking down mezuzahs.In this episode, we sit down with Dr. Casey Babb to ask a question few o
108: How personal grief built a nation
On the eve of Yom HaZikaron, Memorial Day, we explore the profound arc of Israel's national remembrance days -- from Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day) through Memorial Day, into Yom Ha'atzma'ut (Independence Day), and ending with the quiet, almost unknown commemoration of Theodor Herzl’s yahrzeit. It is an arc of memory, sacrifice, and renewal -- not abstract, but usually personal and intima
107: What does Ezra Klein get wrong?
Welcome to another installment of our short-form episodes that dive into often-asked questions about Israel, Jews and the Middle East.Our current episode tackles the New York Times’ Ezra Klein’s recent video about the “one-state reality” of Israelis and Palestinians, which many listeners have asked us to respond to. We watched it and were disappointed. We ask the question: What does Ezra Klein get
106: After October 7, can Israeli politics be rebuilt? A conversation with Dr. Einat Wilf
A new Israeli election is coming -- and it may reshape everything. In this opening episode of our election series, I sit down with former MK and political thinker Dr. Einat Wilf, now leading the new Oz party, to ask a fundamental question: Has October 7 broken Israeli politics as we knew it? We dive into voter realignment, the possible collapse of old “tribes,” the Haredi draft crisis, and whether
105: Why don’t we talk about Jordan?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East.Our current question: why don’t we talk about Jordan? If you like what we do here, please join our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/AskHavivAnything. There you can ask the questions that guide the topics we cover on the podcast, join in o
104: The Iran war isn’t over
Everyone’s asking who won. That’s the wrong question. This episode explains why the war isn’t over -- and what the real lessons of this conflict mean for Israel, Iran, and the future of war.--This episode was sponsored by an anonymous sponsor in honor of all those we lost on October 7 and in the ensuing years of war.--If you like what we do here, please consider joining our Patreon community at ht
103: Why is the two state solution so difficult to achieve?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East.Our current question: why is the two state solution so difficult to achieve? If you like what we do here, please join our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/AskHavivAnything. There you can ask the questions that guide the topics we cover on
102: Freedom under missile fire, the Passover story, with Rabbi David Stav
Passover is just around the corner. So we sat down with the ever-wise Rabbi David Stav to dig into the inexplicable contradictions at the heart of the holiday's traditional Seder meal -- and of Jewish life writ large.In the Seder's text, the Hagaddah, we are commanded to declare that “now we are slaves, but next year we shall be free” -- even if we live in freedom and prosperity. And we ar
101: Will Trump finish the job in Iran? With Prof. Dan Schueftan
Trump says a deal may be coming to end the Iran war. Netanyahu says it could protect Israel’s interests. Iran’s regime says little that can be trusted. So what is really happening? Prof. Dan Schueftan returns to the podcast to help us step back from the daily headlines to ask the much bigger question: If this war ends now, who actually wins? And what’s at stake? From the Strait of Hormuz to the id
100: They escaped Europe — then parachuted back in, with Matti Friedman
In 1944, as the gears of the Holocaust turned toward Hungary, 32 young Jewish volunteers did the unthinkable: they parachuted into the genocide. They were a motley bunch, including a celebrated poet and a nearsighted 40-year-old pacifist. They were sent by the British to rescue downed pilots and by the Zionist leadership to save Jews. They stood almost no chance of success, and by every military m
Episode 99: Are we winning?
The rules of engagement just shattered. From the death of Ali Khamenei to the elimination of wartime mastermind Ali Larijani, Iran’s leadership hasn't just been eroded—it’s been erased. As the regime retreats into a fractured "mosaic" of local commanders and a collapsing barter economy, the US-Israeli coalition is pivoting to a final, surgical strike on the regime’s last lifeline: it
Episode 98: What Israel’s founding fathers knew about terrorism, with Dr. Bruce Hoffman
Terrorism scholar Dr. Bruce Hoffman joins the podcast to guide us through one of the most morally explosive chapters in Zionist and Israeli history: the Irgun, Lehi, the British Mandate, and the violent campaign that helped force Britain out of Palestine. Moving from Allenby’s conquest of Jerusalem to the King David Hotel bombing, the Lord Moyne assassination, the hanging of the British sergeants,
Episode 97: Can America and Israel finish the job? A conversation with John Spencer.
What is this war really about, and how does it end? We sit down with warfare scholar John Spencer to explore not just the military campaign itself, but the larger stakes of this war: Whether the US, Israel and their growing list of regional allies will be able and willing (two separate questions) to carry this war to a comprehensive conclusion, one that begins the process, even if it is slow and d
Episode 96: The first war Israel fought in English, with Yaakov Katz
Military analyst Yaakov Katz joins the show to break down the "first Israeli war fought in English" -- a total merger of Israeli and American military might against Iran. From the high-stakes testing of futuristic US weapon systems designed to intimidate China to the "criminal negligence" of Israel's failed PR strategy, Katz exposes how this conflict is a global chess match
Episode 95: The idea that broke the Middle East, with Dr. Micah Goodman
In the middle of war sirens and missile attacks, Haviv Gur sits down with Israeli philosopher Micah Goodman for a sweeping conversation about one of the biggest questions of our time: Why have some societies declined while others thrive? They trace the ideological roots of modern Islamist movements, the “politics of blame” that has hollowed out regimes like Iran, and the deep miscalculation that l
Episode 94: America's war, not Israel's
As missile sirens wail over Jerusalem and families crowd into bomb shelters on the eve of Purim, this episode steps back from the noise and the slogans to ask a harder question: What war are we actually watching? In a moment when pundits argue over Israel, regime change, and partisan loyalties, I lay out a different frame -- two chessboards, one regional and one global -- and argue that what looks
Episode 93: How to win Iran's forever war
The conflict with Iran isn’t just about nukes. It's about a revolutionary martyrdom ideology hiding in plain sight. In this explosive deep dive, we uncover the ideological engine behind the “Muqawama,” the Iran-led "resistance axis" — a fusion of Marx, Mao, martyrdom, and Shiite theology that teaches its followers that suffering is strength and devastation is victory. From Hamas to H
Episode 92: Why does Israel hate UNRWA?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East. Our current question: Why does Israel hate UNRWA?If you like what we do here, please join our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/AskHavivAnything. There you can ask the questions that guide the topics we cover on the podcast, join in our g
Episode 91: Is the Iran war about China? A conversation with Melissa Chen
In this episode, we confront a critical "blind spot" in the Israeli (and too often broader Western) consciousness: The role of the People’s Republic of China as the silent architect behind the Middle East’s most volatile threats. Guest Melissa Chen, managing director at Strategy Risks, pulls back the curtain on a sobering reality where China acts as the sole guarantor of Iran’s survival,
Episode 90: Is it "fascist" to believe a state can belong to a specific people?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East. Our current question: Is it "fascist" to believe a state can belong to a specific people?If you like what we do here, please join our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/AskHavivAnything. There you can ask the questions that guide the topic
Episode 89: Who benefits from continuing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East. Our current question: Who benefits from continuing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?If you like what we do here, please join our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/AskHavivAnything. There you can ask the questions that guide the topics we
Episode 88: America's "24% problem" with young antisemitism, with Jonah Platt
Is American Jewish identity weakening before our eyes? Are American Jews, caught in a whirlwind of hatred directed both at Israel and at the Jews themselves, turning their backs on their Jewish identity?Jonah Platt joins the podcast to talk about the growing numbers of Jews moving in the opposite direction: From quiet assimilation to unapologetic, intentional pride. We confront the sobering data o
Episode 87: How can you support a better Palestinian future?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East. Our current question: How can you support a better Palestinian future?If you like what we do here, please join our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/AskHavivAnything. There you can ask the questions that guide the topics we cover on the p
Episode 86: Alliances and rivalries in a new Middle East, with Dan Schueftan
The inimitable Prof. Dan Schueftan joins Haviv to break down a "profoundly dangerous" turn in the Middle East. With Saudi Arabia shifting away from its alliance with Israel and the Emirates and Turkey consolidating a "puppet state" in Syria, the regional map is being redrawn. Schueftan warns that the "moderate axis" has blinked, leaving Israel to face a sophisticated Turkish adversary that is ideo
Episode 85: How knowing your story makes you invincible, with Noam Weissman
In these strange times, it is easier than ever for a Jew to learn -- and easier than ever to remain ignorant. We sit down with Dr. Noam Weissman, executive vice president of the educational nonprofit OpenDor Media, to tackle a looming crisis: a generation of Jews who no longer know their own story. From Harvard Law students paralyzed by campus slogans to the staggering reality that 62% of Jewish d
Episode 84: Why soldiers wept when Ran came home, lessons from Tu Bishvat
This week, Israel finally brought home the remains of its last hostage, 24-year-old Ran Gvili. To outsiders, the sheer scale of the national sacrifice and the collective exhalation of relief that followed his return can seem like a mystery. Every nation honors its fallen, but few go to the lengths Israelis do to reclaim a body from the hands of the enemy.In this episode, we use the upcoming holida
Episode 83: From ideology to narcotics, Hezbollah's business model, with Matt Levitt
The fall 2024 Israeli operations that decimated Hezbollah’s missile arsenal and leadership structure marked a pivotal turning point for the Middle East. To understand the wreckage left behind and the organization's resilient global web that is already hard at work helping it to recover, I am joined by Matthew Levitt, one of the world’s leading experts on counterterrorism. Levitt pulls back the
Episode 82: 'From the River to the Sea' - Lost in Translation?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East. Our current question: 'From the River to the Sea' - Lost in Translation?If you like what we do here, please join our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/AskHavivAnything. There you can ask the questions that guide the topics we cove
Episode 81: Israel's future and the ticking Gaza clock, with Andrew Fox
Andrew Fox is a frontline conflict researcher who has visited Gaza, Syria and Lebanon to study Israeli deployments and strategy there.He joins the podcast to talk about what he calls Israel’s ticking diplomatic clock — the inevitable moment when Israel finds itself where Europe is now: suddenly shorn of American backing and having to navigate an increasingly chaotic region and world. We discuss Is
Episode 80: Who is Hamas and what do they want?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East.Our current question: Who is Hamas and what do they want? If you like what we do here, please join our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/AskHavivAnything. There you can ask the questions that guide the topics we cover on the podcast, join
Episode 79: Breaking Iran's machinery of oppression
Iran is burning. The streets are full of marchers demanding an end to the regime. Thousands of protesters have been murdered by the regime in recent days — we may never know exactly how many. President Trump is threatening military action. But is all this enough to bring down the regime?How do you dismantle a revolutionary Islamist government that has proven impervious to domestic protest and inte
Episode 78: Do you still want to globalize the intifada?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East.Our current question: What was the First Intifada? What was the Second Intifada? What does it mean to “globalize the intifada?”If you like what we do here, please join our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/AskHavivAnything. There you can a
Episode 77: Did Israel intentionally target civilians in Gaza?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East.Our current question: Did Israel intentionally target civilians in Gaza? If you like what we do here, please join our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/AskHavivAnything. There you can ask the questions that guide the topics we cover on the
Episode 76: How elites drive Jew-hatred, with Hussein Aboubakr Mansour
From Manchester to Bondi Beach to Denver, from Tucker Carlson to Nicolas Maduro to Zohran Mamdani to the most significant and mobilizing political ideologies of today’s Muslim world, Jews seem to loom large in the imaginations of elites. They’re attacked physically and verbally and politically. The old obsession has well and truly returned.What does this return mean for the future of these societi
Episode 75: Power, fear, and the survival of the Iranian regime, with Roya Hakakian
Iran’s streets are in tumult. The latest protests are of a scale not seen before. New sections of Iranian society are in the streets — middle class merchants, the elderly and others. The protestors have more strident demands than in the past. And a regime that knows its legitimacy has been compromised by rampant corruption, systemic state failure, the collapse of the currency and economy and the 1
Episode 74: Why the global outrage at Israel's Somaliland recognition?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East.Our current question: Why the global outrage at Israel's Somaliland recognition? If you like what we do here, please join our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/AskHavivAnything. There you can ask the questions that guide the topics we
Episode 73: Is military aid to Israel a good deal for America?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East.Our current question: Is military aid to Israel a good deal for America? If you like what we do here, please join our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/AskHavivAnything. There you can ask the questions that guide the topics we cover on the
Episode 72: The women fighters behind the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, with Elizabeth R. Hyman
The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising stands as one of the few shining moments of (temporarily) successful Jewish resistance in the bottomless evil and despair that was the Holocaust. Heroes of the uprising like Mordechai Anielewicz and Yitzhak “Antek” Zuckerman form part of the national civic religion of Israeli Jews, and of Jewish commemoration ceremonies worldwide.But the men of the uprising didn’t do it
Episode 71: Why the heck does America support Israel?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East.Our current question: Why the heck does America support Israel?If you like what we do here, please join our Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/AskHavivAnything. There you can ask the questions that guide the topics we cover on the podcast,
Episode 70: The warrior Jews who terrified Rome, with Barry Strauss
Between the outbreak of the Jews’ Great Revolt against Rome in the year 66 CE and the final suppression of the Bar Kochba Revolt in 135, the Jews of the Roman Empire constituted the empire’s single biggest headache. None of the countless conquered peoples controlled by that world power had ever rebelled quite so often or for so long.Jewish memory, largely forged by the rabbinic account of these re
Episode 69: Israel's great divide - An insider's look at the judicial reform, with Moshe Koppel
Until October 7, Israel’s politics were consumed by the fight over the government’s judicial reform proposals. The issue drove hundreds of thousands of Israelis to the streets in protest. It triggered all the anxieties of right and left, to sharpen class and ethnic and cultural divides, to raise fears over minority rights and the future of Israeli democracy.But in all those stormy months, there wa
Episode 68: Antizionism is inherently violent, with Adam Louis-Klein
After the massacre at Bondi Beach, anthropologist Adam Louis-Klein returns to the podcast to help us make sense of the new Jew-hatred.Antizionism, Adam argues, may be a form of hatred of Jews, but it's a far cry from the classical antisemitism of the 19th and 20th centuries. It's also not mere criticism of Israeli policies or governments. So what is it? And how do you fight it?Adam Louis-K
Episode 67: Miracles in the dark. A response to Bondi.
This Hanukkah began in darkness, in the brutal massacre of Jews in Sydney, Australia. Our hearts are broken, but our light is not dimmed.In this episode, we dive into the meaning of Hanukkah in the Jewish tradition and draw lessons from it for these painful times.This episode is sponsored by Donna Silbert and Kevin Foley and dedicated to the memory of Thomas Irwin Glasser. Tom Glasser was murdered
