Tel Aviv Review

The nationalist-populist wave of the 21st century has affected Western liberal democracies, as well as countries from a very different political background. Julius Rogenhofer of the University of Cambridge studies manifestations of populism and democratic erosion in deeply divided societies. Rogenhofer identifies the causes and consequences of populist-driven democratic erosion in Turkey, India an...

Rabbi Dr Tal Sessler, the incoming Dean of the Rabbinical School at the Academy of Jewish Religion in California, discusses his forthcoming book,  Leibowitz and Levinas: Between Judaism and Universalism,  juxtaposing the political and theological thought of two of the most prominent Jewish philosophers in the 20th century.

Dr Arik Rudnitzky, a research fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute and Tel Aviv University's Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies, analyzes the changing voting patterns in the Arab community ahead of Israel's fourth general election in two years. This episode is made possible by the Israel Democracy Institute , an independent center of research and action dedicated to stre...

Navigating queerness in the West Bank, Gaza or Israel, in refugee camps or as a Palestinian in the West Bank? It's complicated. Why is the LGBTQ global movement intensely invested in the Palestinian cause, and when does a social movement grow or plateau? Sa'ed Atshan asks and answers these questions in Queer Palestine and the Empire of Critique .

When Robert Berman, an American Jewish immigrant to Israel began studying Arabic, he didn't stop until he had written a book full of idioms. Together with language expert Christy Bandak as editor, the linguistic duo wrote  Min Taq Taq: A Collection of Arabic Idioms , in which they explain what "his face is good on me" conveys in Arabic, and why they included a whole chapter on fingers.

Ahead of a fourth general election in under two years, Yohanan Plesner, President of the Israel Democracy Institute, joins us to discuss what needs to be done to come out of the ongoing political crisis that has left Israel without a stable government, a state budget for three years on end, and an effective response to the Covid pandemic. This episode is made possible by the  Israel Democracy Inst...

In their documentary film  King Bibi: The Life and Performances of Benjamin Netanyahu , Dan Shadur and Liran Atzmor get to the bottom of Benjamin Netanyahu's magic, which has made him the longest-serving Prime Minister in Israel's history and a prominent fixture in Israeli politics for the past four decades, and counting.

It took the world's most advanced digital pioneers, when the computer as we know it was barely born, to stave off Nazi conquest of the Middle East. And it took Gershom Gorenberg to write the true history of the " War of Shadows: Codebreakers, Spies, and the Secret Struggle to Drive the Nazis from the Middle East " – as if it was a novel. This episode is part of a series made possible by the German...

At times reminiscent of European Jewry in the 19th century, at others of American Jewry in the 20th, the modern history of Iran's Jews varies radically from contemporary Jewish histories in the Middle East. The new book  Between Iran and Zion: Jewish Histories of Twentieth-Century Iran  by Lior Sternfeld, assistant professor of history and Jewish Studies at Pennsylvania State University, focuses o...

Musa Hadid is an all-around nice guy; he's determined to fix up the old town, re-brand his city, and have a Christmas celebration for everyone. But being the Mayor of Ramallah is no ordinary job and a new documentary,  Mayor , is no ordinary film about Palestine. David Osit , the director, explains why. This episode is part of a series made possible by the German Government which examines Israel's...

If a former White House coordinator for the Middle East, North Africa, and the Gulf, who served as special assistant to President Obama concludes that you shouldn't undertake regime change in the Middle East, you probably shouldn't. But nothing is ever quite that simple. In  Losing the Long Game, The False Promise of Regime Change in the Middle East ,  Philip Gordon examines what went wrong. This...

Prof. Karnit Flug, Vice President of the Israel Democracy Institute and former Chancellor of the Bank of Israel, assesses the effects of the COVID pandemic on the Israeli economy. Does the fact that Israel is a small and centralized economy work in its benefit? To what extent was the relative robustness of the Israeli economy squandered by the mishandling of the pandemic response by decision maker...

In her bestselling  Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism , acclaimed journalist and historian Anne Applebaum examines how a wave of nationalist populism swept through the western world – and tore apart her own circle of friends. This episode is made possible by the Israel office of  Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung , which promotes peace, freedom, and justice through political edu...

German-Jewish poet, political scientist and sometimes-provocateur Max Czollek examines the complex dance between modern Germany and German Jews, Holocaust memory, minority identity, radical diversity, art and politics. His book "De-integrate Yourselves" has launched a thousand conversations. This episode is part of a series made possible by the German Government which examines Israel's relationshi...

Dr. Gilad Malach, Director of the Ultra-Orthodox in Israel Program at the Israel Democracy Institute, discusses how the Covid pandemic has affected internal dynamics within the Haredi community in Israel, as well as their relationship with their political leadership and the state. This episode is made possible by the  Israel Democracy Institute , an independent center of research and action dedica...

Yuval Feldman, professor of law at Bar-Ilan University and a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, utilizes behavioral analysis of regulation, enforcement and compliance to discuss how trust in the state has affected the response to the Covid pandemic, in Israel and beyond. This episode is made possible by the  Israel Democracy Institute , an independent center of research and action de...

Social media has corrupted the truth, spawned fake news and contributed to the collapse of polite political norms – right or wrong? A systematic, in-depth study of American news media before and after Trump takes a deeper plunge into the right-wing ecosystem at large, with surprising findings. Yochai Benkler of Harvard University, co-author of  Network Propaganda: Manipulation, Disinformation, and...

Dr. Moran Zaga was studying the Persian Gulf countries long before it became fashionable for Israel to make peace with them. She explains the historic and political background to a series of unlikely diplomatic deals between Israel and certain Arab states, what's in it for them, and why the United Arab Emirates seeks to position itself as the moderate actor between competing extremist forces throu...

Ksenia Svetlova's story is gripping: she moved to Israel as a teen, grew up to become a journalist, and eventually served as a Member of Knesset. In her book: "Reporting the Middle East on High Heels," Ksenia brings her story to her beat, giving readers an over-her-shoulder view of the Middle East from Egypt, Tunisia, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, to the Palestinians areas much closer to home. This episo...

In  The Management of Hate: Nation, Affect, and the Governance of Right-Wing Extremism in Germany , Dr. Nitzan Shoshan travels with the marginalized, outcasts and left-behind members of German society today to find out what drives some to the far-right – and how the state tries to contain them. This episode is made possible by the Israel office of  Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung , which promotes peace,...

Prof. Havi Dreifuss of the Department of Jewish History at Tel Aviv University and the International Institute of Holocaust Research at Yad Vashem, discusses her book  Relations Between Jews and Poles during the Holocaust: The Jewish Perspective , laying out the myriad views and feelings Polish Jews harbored for their country and their non-Jewish compatriots. This episode is made possible by Tel A...

Dr. Scott Ury, the outgoing director of Tel Aviv University's Stephen Roth Institute for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism and Racism, and Guy Meron, Prof. of Jewish History at the Open University of Israel, discuss their collected issue entitled  Antisemitism: Historical Concept, Public Discourse . This episode is made possible by Tel Aviv University's  Stephen Roth Institute for the Study o...

Prof. Bashir Bashir of the Department of Sociology, Political Science and Communication at the Open University of Israel, and Prof. Amos Goldberg of the Department of Jewish History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, discuss their edited volume The Holocaust and the Nakba: A New Grammar of Trauma and History . This episode is made possible by the Israel office of  Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung , wh...

The Israeli Palestinian conflict is among the most prominent and complex foreign policy challenges for the European Union. Anders Persson looks at the evolution of EU policy towards the conflict through the EU's own documentation, from 1967 to the present. This episode is part of a series made possible by the German Government which examines Israel's relationship with the EU and European countries...

In  The Sword is Not Enough: Arabs, Israelis, and the Limits of Military Force  Jeremy Pressman challenges the notion that violence is the best way to win concessions in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, or in the Israeli-Arab context more broadly. His research shows that diplomacy, negotiations, and shared interests are no less important for making genuine progress towards peace – and often more....