The Promised Podcast

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Don Futterman and Noah Efron discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? --What Just Happened?-- Tuesday's elections feel like they changed everything and nothing at all. What can we make of their odd, inconclusive results? --What Next?-- Building Israel's ne...

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Don Futterman and Noah Efron discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. --Smile!-- Some Israelis think that PM Netanyahu's plan to have cameras in polling places will destroy democracy, while others think it will save it. Why the Rashamon? --What, Me Vote?-- Seven in ten Israelis vote. Wh...

A weeks and a bit before elections, Don Futterman, Noah Efron and Haaretz uber-reporter Judy Maltz, in an act of political empathy and imagination, ask for each of the parties to the Left of the Likud, why might someone vote for them. Looking for the extra segment? --Why Vote for the Joint List?-- Has the Joint List just violated Israel's longest standing taboo, the one that says Jewish Israelis a...

Two weeks and a bit before elections, Allison Kaplan Sommer, Don Futterman and Noah Efron, in an act of political empathy and imagination, try to figure who votes for each of Israel's right-wing parties, and why. (Next week, we do the same thing for the parties on the left.) Looking for the extra segment? Who the Hell Would Vote for Shas?!? Why will hundreds of thousands of Israelis vote for the u...

Haaretz-writer and media-whiz Ohad Zeltzer-Zubida, Allison Kaplan Sommer, and Noah Efron discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? Is Netanyahu Done? Hemingway said, folks go bankrupt gradually, then all at once. Has PM Netanyahu lost his political power in the same way? Brits, C...

Israel Studies scholar and professor Sara Sara Hirschhorn, activist, Haaretz-writer and media-whiz Ohad Zeltzer-Zubida, and Noah Efron discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? Carmen and the Devil Is Israel's Labor Party, once the epicenter of toxic Ashkenazihood, the new Shas?...

Roving Mid-East Reporter Naomi Zeveloff, Tel Aviv Review host Gilad Halpern and Noah Efron discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? The Elephant Has Left the Building One thing not being debated ahead of Israel's elections is the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. The elephant in the...

Don Futterman, Noah Efron and Human-Rights Attorney, Emily Schaeffer Omer-Man discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? Left Behind? Are two parties on Israel's left better than one? Right Fever Is one party to the right of the Likud better than two? Free to Be You and Me A Jerus...

Don Futterman, Noah Efron and journalist and host of the spectacular " The Branch " podcast about Jewish-Palestinian Coexistence, Dina Kraft discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? Labor Unions and Disunions The Labor Party says "Yes" to merging with a party on the center-right...

Don Futterman, Noah Efron, and the scholar-host of the brilliant feminist Yiddish podcast Vaybertaytsch , Sandy Fox discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment?   Everyone from Benny Gantz to Ayman Odeh Is a true Jewish-Arab partnership possible on the Israeli Left?   Goodbye to All...

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Don Futterman, and Noah Efron discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? You Don't Have to Be Religious to Be Religious, but It Helps Can Israel's religious right be led by a very secular, very feminist woman? Eilat: Hot, Fraught & Overwrought What, if anyth...

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Don Futterman, and Noah Efron discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? Parties Like It's 1999 Israel's Left recombobulates itself by returning to yesterday's leaders, all of whom are men. What explains this sudden lurch to the Father-Knows-Best ghosts-of-p...

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Don Futterman, and Noah Efron discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? Black & Blue & White The Blue & White party are facing a dilemma: Should they attack the ultra-Orthodox, whom they may want as coalition partners after the election? What should Blue &...

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Don Futterman and Noah Efron discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? The Center Will Hold? Avigdor Lieberman – head of the secular, right-wing Yisraeli Beiteinu Party – made a bombshell announcement that, after our do-over elections, he will force the Lik...

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Noah Efron and journalist and educator Ittay Flescher discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Labor Savers Young Turks, Old Guard, and Stern Generals battle for control of Israel's Labor Party. Who has the best chance of saving from extinction the party of David Ben Gurion, Golda Meir...

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Don Futterman and Noah Efron discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra-special, special extra segment? The Small Matter of the Bill New elections may cost Israel as much as 5 billion shekels. Should politicians take into account the small matter of the bill? Friedma...

Don Futterman, Noah Efron, and Times of Israel Ops-&-Blogs editor Miriam Herschlag discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Over Again What just happened? Why is Israel going to new elections, just a month and a half after the last elections? Center-Left 2.0 Israel's Center-Left just staged one of the most su...

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Noah Efron, and Don Futterman discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra-special, special extra segment? Sa'ar in a Storm What does once-and-future Likud leader, Gideon Sa'ar, PM Netanyahu's nemesis on the premises, promise for Israeli politics? Pains in the Glass An...

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Noah Efron, and Don Futterman discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? "Natural Partners" How are pork-loving former Soviets and God-fearing ultra-Orthodox Jews "natural partners" in a Netanyahu government? Credit where Credit is Due Starting now, every Is...

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Noah Efron, and Don Futterman discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? Your Services are No Longer Needed More than 40% of Knesset representatives are new to the job, and turnover among legislators is at an all-time high. Why? What does this augur for Isra...

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Noah Efron, and Don Futterman discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? The Holocaust Will Not Be Tweeted Dramatizing the Holocaust on Instagram so phone-addicted kids will pay attention? Seriously? Sins of the Fathers' Grocer When a supermarket chain uses...

Noah Efron, Don Futterman and Times of Israel Ops & Blogs editor Miriam Herschlag discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. Looking for the extra segment? The Solidarity Singularity Has the time come for Israel's Jewish (and Zionist) left to join forces with Israel's Arab (and anti-Zionist) left? If so, how? S...

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Noah Efron and Don Futterman discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. The Kids are All Right It's accepted wisdom that Israeli young people are more right-wing than their older sisters and brothers, parents and grandparents. But are they really? And if they are, why? What We Learned at...

For our most extremely generous Patreon supporters, we discuss in our extra-special, special extra segment a remarkable new Brookings Institute Policy Brief called " Is Israel in Democratic Decline? " by Tamara Cofman Wittes and Yael Mizrahi-Arnaud. In a moment of I-happen-to-have-Marshall-Mcluhan-right-here, Mizrahi-Arnaud joins us to say, "You understand nothing of our work, how you ever got a p...

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Noah Efron and Don Futterman discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. What Just Happened?!? The votes are counted. What the hell just happened? The Via Media Given the alternative, is a coalition of the center and the Likud really such a bad idea after all? Getting Out of Bed in the Mor...