Allison Kaplan Sommer, Don Futterman and Noah Efron discuss two topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week.
Trolley Problems
If the two goals of the war – crushing Hamas and returning the captives home – turn out to be at odds, what should Israel do?
Ceasefire
What is the answer to the question, “Why not stop the war right now?”
What the Large Demonstration in DC Looked Like From Tel Aviv
For our most unreasonably generous Patreon supporters, in our extra-special, special extra discussion: 300,000 Americans, mostly Jews, demonstrate at the Mall in DC in support of Israel and against anti-Semitism. What was it like seeing that from Tel Aviv?
All that and a temporary, new high-rise kibbutz in Tel Aviv, and a tribute in memoriam to Vivian Silver, z”l. Also, buy Don’s book, and if you already did, buy another two copies!
Songs
- Dana Weiss — Od Nirkod
- Yoav Yitzhak, Yaakov Schwecky, Ma’or Edry Benjamin Buzaglo, Sagiv Cohen, Kevin Rubin, Yagel Oshri, Omri Sasson, Ben Tzur, Eli Keshet, and Ofir Cohen — Am Ehad
- Assaf Harush — Lo Mefahed
Thank you for your words about Vivian. We are holding a little memorial out here in San Francisco among Vivian’s friends in the Bay Area (mostly former Gezerniks and Gezer-adjacent).
And thank you for the continuing blessing of this podcast. Every morning I arise, pick up the newspaper (which we troglodytes still receive in paper form) and open various news sources on my phone (NYT, Haaretz, Times of Israel, etc.) in the vain hope that somehow, somewhere, I will find good news. And alas, each morning, nothing good.
So, I’m grateful for The Promised Podcast, which also does not deliver good news but somehow, inexplicably, makes me feel better.
It is so lovely of you to write, David, and especially to write so kindly. I would feel this way about anyone who troubled to take the time to write a kind word — it’s a rare thing, I don’t have to tell you — but it has special meaning coming from you. I was still a kid the first time I heard your name (I was a kid from a family that cared about Soviet Jews). I now know that basically you were a kid, too, though then you seemed like an adult and a damn hero, too. What a thing it is to hear from you after all this time, so that you are no longer, in my bestiary, some great mythological creature, but a real person, and such a generous one, too!
(If you have any texts from your Bay Area remembrance of Viv Silver, I would be delighted to see them.)