Call Me Back - with Dan Senor

Over the past 16 weeks, Israel has experienced one of the biggest protest movements since its founding. On the surface, these protests were about proposed judicial reforms. But was something deeper going on -- for both sides of this debate? On a recent trip to Israel, Dan sat down with Dr. Micah Goodman to better understand the forces shaping this debate. Micah, who has been on our podcast before, is on the speed-dial of a number of Israeli political leaders. He hosts the most downloaded podcast series in Israel and his books include bestsellers like Catch-67: The Left, the Right, and the Legacy of the Six-Day War and, most recently, The Wondering Jew: Israel and the Search for Jewish Identity.

Today we sit down in Israel with Mark Dubowitz, who is the CEO of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD), at a time that Saudi Arabia is reopening its embassy in Tehran, and Iran's relations appear to be flourishing with Beijing, Moscow and much of the Sunni Arab Middle East. Six months ago, Iran was under enormous pressure. What happened? In his role as CEO of FDD, a nonpartisan think tank based in Washington, DC, Mark has advised the Bush, Obama, Trump and Biden administrations and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, and he has testified more than twenty times before the U.S. Congress and foreign legislatures. A former venture capitalist and technology executive, Mark has a master’s degree in international public policy from Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies. According to The New York Times, “Mark Dubowitz’s campaign to draw attention to what he saw as the flaws in the Iran nuclear deal has taken its place among the most consequential ever undertaken by a Washington think tank leader.” According to The Atlantic, “Dubowitz has been helping design and push forward sanctions on Iran…establishing the FDD as D.C.’s ground zero for research and policy recommendations aimed at highlighting and fixing what Dubowitz saw as the flaws in the nuclear agreement.”

"Brokenism", by Alana Newhouse - https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/brokenism-alana-newhouse“The Vanishing”, by Jacob Savage - https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/the-vanishing 

Yaakov Katz – Editor-in-Chief of The Jerusalem Post and a former advisor to Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett – returns to our podcast. Earlier, Yaakov Katz served as The Jerusalem Post’s military reporter and defense analyst. He is the author of "Shadow Strike: Inside Israel's Secret Mission to Eliminate Syrian Nuclear Power" and co-author of two books: "Weapon Wizards - How Israel Became a High-Tech Military Superpower" and "Israel vs. Iran - The Shadow War" "Shadow Strike: Inside Israel's Secret Mission to Eliminate Syrian Nuclear Power" – shorturl.at/adioS "Weapon Wizards - How Israel Became a High-Tech Military Superpower" - shorturl.at/fhIJ3

In this special episode we play a conversation that Dan recently had on the Commentary Magazine podcast on the current crisis, how Israel got here and where it goes from here. Be sure to subscribe to Commentary Magazine and its podcast: https://www.commentary.org/

Is the US Government trying to re-engage and bring down the temperature with China? Why right now? And what about the resurgent findings on the possible lab leaked accident (on the origin of the pandemic)? Where does this fit into the de-escalation dynamic? Josh Rogin is a long-time foreign affairs journalist, currently a columnist for The Washington Post. He’s also a Political Analyst for CNN. He’s the author of the bestselling book: “Chaos Under Heaven: Trump, Xi, and the Battle for the Twenty-First Century” Josh's columns discussed in this episode: "The State Department is wrong to play down China’s bad actions"- https://tinyurl.com/3dxtm9a3 "The investigation into covid’s origins must continue" - https://tinyurl.com/3j3ubz4v Ukrainians are begging for cluster munitions to stop the Russians - https://tinyurl.com/yr9vhe7k

Twenty years ago this past week, on March 19, 2003, the United States invaded Iraq, marking the second time the U.S. fought a war in Iraq in just over a decade. What is the legacy for U.S. foreign policy, for the Middle East, and for domestic public opinion on America's role in the world? Journalist Eli Lake traveled to Iraq six times since the invasion 20 years ago. He is contributing editor to Commentary Magazine and a columnist for The New York Sun. He was formerly a columnist for Bloomberg. He is also the host of "The Re-education with Eli Lake" podcast. Items discussed in this episode: "The Iraq War, 20 Years Later" -- https://tinyurl.com/yzx7juzc "Saddam Hussein's Demise" -- https://tinyurl.com/bdhdu2et

China just announced that it had brokered a deal between Saudi Arabia and Iran to restore diplomatic relations, for the first time since they were officially severed in 2016. But this news begs more questions than it answers. To help us understand what it means for Washington, Jerusalem, Beijing, Tehran, and Riyadh, Rich Goldberg joins the podcast. Rich is a senior advisor at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. From 2019-2020, he served as a Director for Countering Iranian Weapons of Mass Destruction for the White House National Security Council. He previously served as a national security staffer in the US Senate and US House. He was a founding staff director of the House U.S.-China Working Group and was among the first Americans ever to visit China’s human space launch center. A leader in efforts to expand U.S. missile defense cooperation with Israel, Rich played a key role in U.S. funding for the Iron Dome. Rich is an officer in the U.S. Navy Reserve with military experience on the Joint Staff and in Afghanistan.

Eric Cohen is the CEO of Tikvah. He was the founder and remains editor-at-large of the New Atlantis, and he serves as the publisher of Mosaic. Eric has written for The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and Commentary, He is the author of In the Shadow of Progress: Being Human in the Age of Technology. He previously worked for the U.S. President’s Council on Bioethics. Eric's work can be found at: TikvahFund.org The Mosaic essay we discuss in this episode: "The Spirit of Jewish Classical Education", by Eric and Cohen & Mitchell Rocklin https://mosaicmagazine.com/essay/history-ideas/2023/02/the-spirit-of-jewish-classical-education/ Column by Tyler Cowen: "Wokeism Has Peaked" https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-02-18/wokeism-has-peaked-in-america-but-is-still-globally-influential#xj4y7vzkg The New Atlantis https://www.thenewatlantis.com/

On the topic of geopolitics, international flashpoints and the state of the war, a surprisingly optimistic Richard Fontaine returns to our podcast. Richard is the CEO of the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), a bi-partisan foriegn policy think tank in Washington, DC. Prior to CNAS, he was foreign policy advisor to Senator John McCain and worked at the State Department, the National Security Council, and on the staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He serves on the Biden administration’s Defense Policy Board – which advises the Pentagon. Richard’s oped discussed in this episode: https://warontherocks.com/2023/02/of-strategy-and-schnitzel-munich-security-conference-2023/