the promised podcast

The Reparation, Palliation and Adjuration Rumination

For decades, once hapless immigrants to Israel from Yemen, Iraq and other Mid-eastern countries have said that, 70 years ago, their babies were taken and never returned. Some say that, until there is hard-and-fast evidence, these claims must be treated with suspicion. But shouldn’t we switch the default to trusting the victims?

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(Jewish) Might Makes Right?

A once-mild religious Zionist party joins forces with a far-far-right religious party. What’s this say about the soul and politics of religious Zionism today?

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Boys, Girls and Boys-and-Girls

Tel Aviv parents go ballistic when they learn their high-school kids are gender-segregated for a one-off meeting with visiting religious kids. Are they right to be so upset?

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Dour of Pisa

Israeli 15 year olds do third-worldishly lousy on an huge international standardized test. What accounts for the mediocrity in math, science and reading? Is Israel destined to become the “Dumbed Down Nation”?

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Primary Importance?

Netanyahu is almost sure to win next week’s Likud leadership primary, and yet it still feels like maybe end of one era and the beginning of another. What’s happening in the Likud?

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Rashamon of Rashomons

Is the love-him-or-hate-him acrimony over Prime Minister Netanyahu really a struggle between “First Israel” (well-heeled, secular Ashkenazim) and “Second Israel” (pretty much everyone else)?

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Déjà Vu All Over Again?

What are Israel’s third-time-this-year Knesset elections about, anyway? Did we learn anything from our failed first two elections?

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Next Station-Stop Is…

Who should decide the names of the stops on Tel Aviv-Jaffa’s new light rail system: bureaucrats, corporate overlords, or local residents?

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Teacher, Is the Prime Minister a Crook?

A kindergarten teacher posts a viral video of her taking down a classroom photo of PM Netanyahu because in her classroom, men charged with bribery, fraud and breach of trust are not honored. How are teachers and principals supposed to deal with the sad spectacle of a Prime Minister under multiple indictments?

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