Ask Haviv Anything

Abandoning the Democrats is a losing strategy for Israel, says Rep. Ritchie Torres, perhaps the most outspoken supporter of Israel in the US House of Representatives. The fight over Israel inside American politics is a proxy for a much larger battle over the future of the Democratic Party and the character of America, he argues. Those who don't like Israel, he says, tend to take a dim view of...

Warfighting has resumed in Gaza. Israel's message is clear: Gaza's future depends on Hamas releasing hostages and surrendering its control of the territory. But there is a larger pivot underway, a regional strategic realignment. Hamas once hoped its attack on Israel would trigger a broader regional war. In a sense, it succeeded, relegating Gaza to a marginal arena in the larger strategic struggle....

This is a podcast about history, but also about this moment in history. Today's episode is a special one. Many of you asked about the hostages, about the activism of their families, about their shattering experiences on October 7 and how they have worked to piece their lives back together since. I can think of no better way to begin to answer these questions than by posing them to our good friend...

Israeli Jews are the last surviving remnant of dozens of devastated Jewish communities across three continents. How did this history shape them? What do they understand about the world that few others see? Join Haviv Rettig Gur for a deep dive into the historical experience that shaped this largest community of Jews ever. Thank you to Joe and Shira Lieberman for sponsoring this episode in honor of...

In our first interview episode, Haviv Rettig Gur sits down (virtually) with Prof. John Spencer of West Point, one of the foremost experts in urban warfare who has made a special study of Israeli warfighting tactics and strategy. Many subscribers to this podcast have asked us why Israel doesn’t seem to have won this war, why Hamas is still standing after 17 months of fighting and why Israel must st...

Recorded Thursday, February 20th Israelis watched horrified on Thursday, as Hamas gunmen conducted a ceremony handing over four coffins, two of them with the bodies of Kfir and Ariel Bibas, aged 1 and 4, when they were murdered in Gaza, along with their mother Shiri. Oded Lifshitz, 83, was the fourth body handed over to Israel. Around the ceremony, Gazan civilians cheered and threw rice, people br...

American Jews constitute the biggest, wealthiest, most influential and safest Jewish diaspora community in Jewish history, and also among the most Jewishly illiterate and profoundly anxious about their future. There's a good reason this immense and powerful community is also culturally weak and unsure of itself. There is deep history behind its illiteracy, a story of tragedy and trauma, rebell...

It’s hard for a modern Jew to grasp the depth of marginalization and ostracism that even the most assimilated of Austrian Jews experienced in the 1890s. Theodor Herzl, the founder of modern political Zionism, began his journey as a passionate assimilationist, a deep believer in European modernity and Germanic culture. It was only when these hopes were dashed that he turned, as a drowning man to a...

*Recorded Saturday night, February 8, 2025*First reflections in response to Hamas's hostage release ceremony in Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza on Saturday, when Israelis discovered the extent to which the hostages had been tormented and starved. Episode first aired Sunday on Patreon (https://www.patreon.com/AskHavivAnything).

"Ask Haviv Anything" is a podcast about history, a podcast you, dear listener, will help to shape and direct, focusing not just on what I want to talk about but on what you want to learn and discuss. Nothing is off limits. We're going to talk about big and painful things, and also beautiful and fascinating things, wars and identities and painful history. And also more light-hearted t...