Think Twice with Jonathan Tobin

Why is the US Jewish Establishment focused on causes that have so little to do with Jews? Has the Jewish leadership betrayed the Jewish community? In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin spoke with Charles Jacobs and Avi Goldwasser, editors of a new collection of essays titled Betrayal: the Failure of American Jewish Leadership to discuss these issues.

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin spoke with Tablet Magazine’s Liel Leibovitz who argues that the battle over Israeli judicial reform is an “existential crisis” and not just a political dispute about Netanyahu or the Supreme Court. Is Israel to be a Jewish state or a state for the Jews? They also discuss a recent article penned by Leibovitz in which he describ...

Are the policies of equity, diversity quotas and defunding the police really helping Black people? In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin discussed the new secular religion of anti-racism and the woke catechism of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) with Heather Mac Donald, author of the new book, "When Race Trumps Merit: How The Pursuit of Equity Sacrifices Exce...

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin talks with columnist Stella Morabito about her new book “The Weaponization of Loneliness: How Tyrants Stoke Our Fear of Isolation to Silence, Divide and Conquer”.Morabito outlines how the pandemic highlighted the way isolation could induce Americans to abandon their belief in individual rights. Was this an isolated incident? A...

President Joe Biden may have come into office as a purported foreign policy expert but according to JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin he’s maintained his streak of being wrong on every issue for the last half-century. Tobin is joined by Hudson Institute scholar Michael Doran to talk about the far-reaching consequences of Biden's weakness.

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin discussed the coronation of Britain’s King Charles and its significance for the larger struggle for Western civilization with British journalist and JNS columnist Melanie Phillips.

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin discussed the partisan divide over Israel with former Senator Norm Coleman, who is currently national chairman of the Republican Jewish Coalition. They discuss Polling suggesting how Democrats have stopped supporting Israel How and why this has happened? The dire state of campuses for Jews and Pro-Zionists. Coleman's journey f...

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin discusses the way American Jewish groups are recklessly intervening in Israel’s political battle over judicial reform. He also speaks with journalist Heather Robinson on What is the role of American Jews vis-a-vis Israeli government policy? Can the struggle for judicial reform and the opposition in Israel be compared to the Am...

JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin is joined by scholar and host of Young Heretics podcast Spencer Klavan, author of the new book "How to Save the West, Ancient Wisdom for Five Modern Crises".Klavan posits that at a time when free speech and basic principles of equality and liberty are under attack from woke progressives, the best answer to the crisis may not be so much political as it is educatio...

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with Kohelet Policy Forum founding chairman Moshe Koppel about the group’s efforts to promote judicial reform in Israel. What’s next for the Kohelet foundation? Will judicial reform ever happen? Find out on this week's episode!

The ADL’s attempt to inject the question of antisemitism into the debate over a potential indictment of the former president undermines the real battle against Jew-hatred. Listen to the full story now!

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with JNS columnist Ruthie Blum about the ongoing fight over judicial reform in Israel. Blum says the point of the pushback against the reforms isn’t just to topple Netanyahu. They’re also attacking his voters. She characterized the battle over the issue as one that wasn’t solely one about religion but also about class a...

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with Breitbart News senior editor-at-large Joel Pollak who discussed the famous insight of the publication’s founder Andrew Breitbart about “politics being downstream of culture.” In this far-reaching interview, they discuss Why do liberal Jewish institutions only see antisemitism on one side? How the ADL has made commo...

Do Jews have a role to play in saving Western civilization? Can Jewish values pave the way to repairing today’s society? In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with Tikvah Fund executive director Eric Cohen who argues that “the West and Israel are under assault.” Part of the answer must be a revival of classical Jewish education that will allow Jews, "to con...

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with historian Oren Kessler, the author of the new book, Palestine 1936: The Great Revolt and the Roots of the Middle East Conflict. While Tobin puts the recent surge of Palestinian terror and Jewish debate about how best to respond to it in the context of the history of the conflict, Kessler explains that the events of...

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with authors Bethany Mandel and Karol Markowicz about their new book, Stolen Youth: How Radicals Are Erasing Innocence and Indoctrinating a Generation. The two, who are both journalists and mothers, discussed how the coronavirus pandemic weaponized the woke left’s efforts to use tactics to silence dissent. Both point ou...

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with law professor and author David Bernstein about his new book, Classified: The Untold Story of Racial Classification in America. According to Berstein, the hope that America might transcend its past history of racial division is being prevented by the efforts of critical race theorists and the vast number of people w...

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with journalist Tom Gross about the biased coverage of Israel as well as the debate about the Netanyahu government’s proposals for judicial reform.

JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with Middle East Forum President Daniel Pipes who believes that the failure of Israel and its supporters to insist that the Palestinians concede defeat in their efforts to destroy the Jewish is the reason why the conflict continues. Pipes also argues that the main challenge to Israel is not Palestinian terrorism, terrible though it may be. Palestinian abil...

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with entrepreneur and philanthropist Bernie Marcus, the founder of the Home Depot chain of stores, to his new book, Kick Up Some Dust: Lessons on Thinking Big, Giving Back, and Doing It Yourself. Marcus believes that Americans need to rediscover capitalism and hard work and reject woke socialist myths. He’s just as angr...

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with legal expert Jerome Marcus about the controversy over plans to reform Israel’s judiciary. The two take a deep dive into the almost unlimited power that the Israeli Supreme Court has seized. They also talk about the need for legislation that would restore some checks and balances to a system where the justices have...

In this week’s episode of Top Story, JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with historian Gil Troy about the legacy of Theodor Herzl, the founder of the Zionist movement and critiques how understanding his journey can help inform our view of Israel today. Tobin and Troy discuss Herzl’s relevance to contemporary Jewish life as well as the way it should influence our view of Jewish nationalism,...

JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with Malcolm Hoenlein, vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, about the uproar over Israel’s new government and the surge in antisemitism. Tobin argues that there are three reasons why the predictions that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition will cause permanent damage to the U.S.-Israel alliance and...

JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with author and JNS columnist Fiamma Nirenstein about antisemitism in Europe. Nirenstein says that accusations about new Italian Prime Minister Georgia Meloni being an antisemite or fascist are untrue. She argues that the left now constitutes a greater threat to Jews than the right. In her view, the United Nations is a factory for antisemitism and the so-c...

JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin speaks with Commentary magazine executive editor Abe Greenwald about the future of conservatism. They discuss the need for Republicans to get to the post-Trump era as soon as possible while holding on to his populist spirit and not reverting to the policies of the failed establishment the former president displaced. Both think that Trump was the only person who c...