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The UN Security Council will hold an emergency session today (it’s now Sunday in Paris) to discuss the Israeli security cabinet’s approval of a plan to seize Gaza City. The hostages’ families have called for a general strike over the decision.

I spoke to Vivian Bercovici and Judith Deborah Levy to ask how they feel about this.

In short: not good.

It’s a long podcast—we had a lot to talk about—so I’ve posted a transcript below if you’re in a hurry.

* Bucking IDF warnings, security cabinet approves Netanyahu planto conquer Gaza City. Residents will have until October 7 to evacuate; proposal more limited than PM’s previously-stated intention to take over entire Strip, but official indicates IDF will later move on to other areas.

* Masses rally against Gaza City takeover plan, urge soldiers to refuse, seek general strike. Tel Aviv’s Ayalon highway shut down as protesters light bonfires in the road; relatives of hostages bewail “eternal war-mongers” for choosing to “sacrifice” their loved ones.

Claire: This is the Cosmopolitan Globalist. And I’m Claire Berlinski. I’m here with two North American Israeli women, and we’re going to talk about everything that’s been happening in Israel and Gaza. Vivian Bercovici is the author of the State of Tel Aviv, which I’ve cross-posted frequently. One of the best newsletters on Substack, if you’d like to keep up with events in Israel, Tel Aviv and Judith Lee-vee is a guest on our podcast—

Judith: Leh-vy, Leh-vy.

Claire: Leh-vy. I’m never gonna say that, Judith. I’m sorry. It’s too late. I’ve known her for, what, 35 years and I still can’t get her name right. I didn’t introduce Vivian as Ber-co-vee-chee at least.

Vivian: No, but I do have to mention that I no longer live in Tel Aviv. So it’s now called State of Tel Aviv and Beyond. I moved a year ago to a kibbutz in Southern Israel near Sderot, and not too far from the Gaza border. So, that’s where I live now, Claire.

Claire: So, Judith and Vivian are both long-term Israelis. How long have you both been there? Actually, Vivian, you’re pretty recent compared to Judith.

Judith: I’ve been here about 24 years-ish.

Claire: Vivian was the former Canadian ambassador to Israel. So she has a lot of insight into what’s going on on the Canada side of this.

I just wanted to ask how you’re both doing?

Judith: Oy. Um, you know. I feel like I say the same thing each time. That we are living this bizarre kind of duality where we are living our normal lives to the best of our ability. And so we go to the movies, and we make dinner, and we have friends over, and we cook, and we go to the cafe, and we—you know, like normal—but there is this underlying insanity, and despair, and terror that's right underneath.

And so for me personally, it’s this wave, where sometimes what I’m constantly pushing down just comes roaring up. There are moments when it just comes roaring up and, then I really kind of … fall apart. Now, this I also think is an American thing, because all the Israeli-Israelis around me, they also are very aware of everything under the surface, everything that’s above the surface, but they don’t freak out the way I do and the way other Americans I know do. I’ve been here such a long time, and that will never change—that not having grown up with this kind of stuff. I will never, ever get used to it. So, the last time this occurred for me was when the snuff video of Evyatar David came out, the video of him being forced to dig his own grave.

And I—the combination of the event itself and the reaction to it, or non-reaction to it, sent me into a complete tailspin for a couple of days, you know, and then I just have to shove it back in my mental closet and get on with life. And that’s what it’s been like for almost two years—for all of us.

Claire: Vivian?

Vivian: It’s so hard to articulate the agony that I think we’re all living with. I’m not sure that, Judith, your reaction has to do with being American or not, or it’s just maybe who you are. Most of my social and day-to-day interactions here are with Israelis, what I call real Israelis, unlike me, the people who, you know, the seventh-generation types, the kibbutznik types, the people who have lived here all their lives, the real salt of the earth.

And privately, I find they feel every bit the same way as you do. I think that the level of, uncertainty, worry, concern, panic, fear about where this country finds itself today is unbearable. And one of the things that I try to do—I’m not just gonna deflect, Claire, and speak about Judith's reaction. I mean, my own is: I feel that I am living on truly on a knife edge every moment.

I feel like a bunch of raw exposed nerves. And one of the things that is so important that I try to convey, in my writing and in my podcasts to people outside of Israel, is: Whenever there’s a crisis in the world, politicians and media and NGOs go out of their way to say, “It’s not the people of, let’s say, Iran, we have a problem with. It’s the government and the leadership with which we have a problem.” But no one seems to cut us that slack.

And I would say that based on polls, over 80 percent—this isn’t me making things up; there are successive polls that have been coming out for months, really since the last hostage-release agreement in February—over 80 percent today of Israelis want the war to end now, all the hostages to be released, even if Hamas is left standing.

And we’re never given that room to breathe. We’re all demonized as being these horrible, evil people. And our evil, of course extends to Jews around the world, right? So I feel like Judith. I mean, we go through our days, and sometimes, often, I find myself sitting there thinking, “How can you do this?”

It happened last week. I went—actually, I moved to a new house, and I’ve been here for a year now, and I really need a dining set. And I entertain a lot and I like to cook. And I went and I chose a set. Then, in the store, I thought, “How can you do this? How can you even think of doing this?” And this was, Judith, days after, of course, we saw those horrific videos of Evyatar David and Rom Braslavski.

And I just—I came home. I couldn’t buy it. I mean, it sounds so stupid, but it’s very hard to live and breathe when so much is at stake.

Judith: I find something that helps me with that—because I have that all the time—this kind of dissonance between the small cheerful minutiae of my day, which feel like—feel like I don’t deserve to be experiencing that because I can’t solve this greater problem.

Vivian: Yeah.

Judith: So something that really helps me with that is actually getting out and being with Israelis. You know, hardcore, old-school, seven-generation, real-deal Israelis, because—I’ll give you an example. A couple of months ago I got invited to—do you know what urban sketching is? It’s when a bunch of artists go to a city together and just plop themselves on benches with their watercolors and their ink, and they just draw stuff, you know, draw buildings, draw people. It’s really, really fun. It’s really fun. And so I got invited to do some urban sketching in Tel Aviv. And so we went to the city and we went to the Yemenite quarter. And this was on—

Vivian: Paradise, paradise for a sketch. Okay.

Judith: —Friday morning. Friday morning. And I’m telling you, the place was absolutely jam-packed. And it was like every single cafe is just spilling over with cool young people with their tattoos. It was just this vision of healthy, healthy young people everywhere, singing, like suddenly, like spontaneously getting up and dancing to the music coming from the next restaurant down.

It was the most wonderful thing. And this is, of course, in the middle of what’s going on. Everyone has somehow decided, “We are going to not just find a way to push it aside, but we’re going to celebrate the life that we actually are still fortunate enough to have.”

And so I look at these kids—we stopped off somewhere to get something to eat. And the staff was changing over. And the new guy coming in behind the counter was a drag queen who hadn’t gone home to change, right? And he was magnificent with his gold and his leopard skin. He was magnificent. Magnificent. And he comes in and the music is playing and everybody’s dancing and we’re all stuffing our faces with this wonderful food. And it was just so unbelievably healthy. And I thought, “You know, the world doesn’t want to believe that this is us.”

The world doesn’t want to believe that—this is the kind of culture that we—we’re something entirely different from this. And I, at this point, have given up on trying to convince anybody of anything because it’s too big now. It’s just too big. And so all that I can do is just jump right into the middle of that and celebrate it along with them. It’s the best I can do.

Vivian: You know, it’s so interesting for so many reasons. I want to share an experience that was very intense that I had yesterday, but before that, I had been living—after my service as ambassador—in the center of the universe, the beating heart of Tel Aviv at Gordon and Rabin Square, and was deeply involved in the protests regarding judicial reform.

And then disaster struck. And it changed after October 7th. So in spite of all this kind of vitality that you’re describing, which is there, it’s, it is a shadow of what it was, Tel Aviv. People have, actually, a lot of them have left the hardcore Tel Aviv who were my friends, many journalists, artists, they've left

Claire: Really?

Vivian: Mm-hmm. Since October 2nd. Yeah. Because we—those of us who were really living in it—it felt very gloomy. It wasn’t the real Tel Aviv. It became almost like a bridge and tunnel thing, you know?

Judith: Mm-hmm. Right.

Vivian: I know, for Canadian, I laid quite a metaphor on you, huh? But what I wanted to share with you guys is yesterday, at five o’clock, there was a gathering on a moshav in central Israel called Kfar Ahim—and it’s where the Minister of Defense, Israel Katz lives.

And it was convened by the Hostage Family Forum, which of course is the main support NGO for the hostage families. And I’ve been working with them a lot since October 7th. And I sat here in my house and I was kind of tired. I didn’t sleep very well on Thursday night, ‘cause I haven't slept well since those videos came out.

And I thought, “Oh, I want to stay home and cook.” And again, I’m like, “How dare you? How dare you.” There were going to be released hostages there, and family members, how do you not go? And so I called one of my neighbors and I said, “How would you like to join me?” Real Israeli, never goes to these things, works on detaching because she feels this sense of powerlessness—“What can I do?”

And she said, “Sure, Viv, I’ll come with you.” And we went. It was—and I’ve been to so many events that are pulled together for so many different reasons. But there I was, standing feet away. They set up this long table and it was set with chairs, with the photograph of each hostage who remains in captivity.

So 50 chairs, and a plate with a quarter piece of pita at each place. And I was literally on one side of this long table, and just across it, three feet away, four feet away, was Iair Horn who was released and torn from his brother’s arms in February. His mother Ruti who spoke with me for a brief interview, the parents of Matan Angrest, an IDF soldier, there were many others that—I’m sorry if I don't recall all the names at the moment—but there were Ohad Ben Ami, who was also released in February. And his wife.

And they spoke so movingly, Ohad Ben Ami is from Be’eri. He was taken hostage in his underwear, literally. And he said, “I’m not religious. I don’t pray. I don’t do any of these things. But when I was in captivity, I did. And we all turned to faith in some way.” And this was before he did the blessing over the wine and this pita, and it was just so moving.

He said, “Friday nights were the hardest for us, and also the most uplifting. And they were the hardest because of course we would all think of where we should be, and wanted to be—with our families. And yet we were in this hell. And it was the most uplifting because we all shared our favorite memories, our favorite food, how we liked the fish to be cooked, the really simple, beautiful parts of life.” And he said that that communal caring that they were able to maintain, shackled and starving underground in these tunnels, is what sustained them.

But some of them are alone now, and they’ve been alone now for over 170 days. And we’ve seen Evyatar David, unfortunately. Who was digging his own grave in a video that was released last week. It’s thought that he’s not alone. He’s still with his best friend from childhood, but others are. So it was—

Judith: —we didn’t see Guy [Gilboa Dalal] though. We didn’t see Guy.

Vivian: No. He was behind a curtain. We think he was behind a curtain. That’s what the intelligence commentary has been saying. Okay. But the thing is, like, I’m standing there in this beautiful kibbutz, surrounded by so much pain, and I don’t want to use the word “resilience,” because I really, really cringe at that word now. I really do. We’re not superhuman here. We’re not superheroes. We’re getting ground down. And I think people need to also understand that. But my friend said, “Thank you so much for opening my eyes. Thank you for taking me.” Because we can’t run away from this. And we can’t. We all have to take it to the streets. I think millions of us have to take to the streets to end this insanity.

Judith: Will it it accomplish anything though? I mean, we go to the streets and what happens? You know the nature of the system. Sorry—

Vivian: Not millions.

Judith: Yeah.

Vivian: I think we need to—

Judith: —well, the other thing that could actually force a change? If the Chief of Staff says, “You know what? I’m not doing this.” That would force a change. Because then, because all the parents of all these reservists, and all these young soldiers would say, “The Chief of Staff is saying, ‘Don’t go. Stay home.’ And that changes everything.

Vivian: The Chief of Staff has said that.

Judith: He didn’t say, “I’m not doing this.”He said, “I think this is a bad idea.”

Vivian: Yeah. He’s come pretty close. And we know that the Chief of Staff and most of the top brass in the IDF, and this, of course—it’s important for your listeners to understand, Claire—this is a Chief of Staff appointed by Netanyahu five months ago. So it’s not like he can say, “Oh, this is one of those lefties from the other government.” No, this is his guy.

And he’s not alone. And I think that it is the IDF top brass saying, “We can’t do this. They’ve said publicly, “We’re going into a black hole. We’re going into a trap. This is gonna be our Vietnam.” So we’ll see what happens. But I think that he’s been very bold, the Chief of Staff, in challenging Prime Minister Netanyahu openly.

Vivian: Sorry, Claire, you were about to say something.

Claire: What I was going to say was I was very struck listening to you, because obviously, when you talk about the agony you’re experiencing, one of the things that is most agonizing, clearly, is the fate of the hostages and your awareness of the hostages, at all time. I saw, the other day—do you know who Azealia Banks is? She’s a rapper.

Vivian: The name is familiar, yeah.

Claire: I came across a tweet in which she said, “I didn’t realize there were American hostages.”

And that’s not surprising, actually, given the way the media has covered it. I just find that significant. Both as a sign of the strange way that the media has covered this, and the degree to which Americans have lost a sense of solidarity with one another. I am certain that had this happened 30 years ago, people would’ve known there were American hostages.

Vivian: They were Jewish Americans.

Claire: Even then.

Vivian: But today, yeah—that’s because we have become the personification of all things evil. I’m sorry I can’t remember his name, no matter how much of a celebrity he is, there’s an African American podcaster, Myron Gaines, something like that, who recently had on a number of his peers, and they were just saying, you know, “Hitler was right.” And it went viral.

Claire: I saw that, yes. I thought the only thing that was comforting was that they were so obviously stupid that I figure they could never pull off a genocide.

Vivian: Well, they’re obviously stupid on many levels because they clearly don't understand how Hitler felt about black people. They might have actually been a lower form of life in his eyes than Jews. You know, I was—a week or two ago, I went in with the IDF spokespersons unit. They took a group of journalists. There were about 15 or 20 into just inside Gaza where they stage the aid distribution.

Right. So all this aid is inspected in Israel to make sure there’s no weapons or other contraband sort of stuffed in the sacks of flour. And then it’s allowed to pass through the border to the other side. And it waits on the Gaza side for the UN—not UNRWA, other UN organizations and other NGOs. They have trucks.

They’re supposed to come pick it up and take it to distribute to the population. And the big guys were there, you know, the big American media. And I use “guys” loosely because some of them, of course, were women. And one of them was obsessed. Obsessed. And she was on a major American network. With the fact that Israel allowed trucks to enter and come out.

And then often they would be directed to enter again on a similar route. And this just outraged her because how could Israel do that when they knew that, you know, gangs and others were waiting to ambush and steal the food. And the real issue is, exactly how many routes do you think there are? 30 years, super- experienced journalist who’s covered every famine in the world.

How many routes do you think there are from here into Gaza on which a truck can drive safely? There are three, I asked. She assumed there apparently were 300, and this became the obsessive focus of her coverage that day, which so missed the point. The point was that the food is here. It is not a food shortage. The issue is Hamas, criminal activity.

Claire: So hold on a second. She allowed, however, in her report that the food was being stolen? Because recently, the media line has been, “There is no evidence that Hamas is stealing the food.”

Vivian: She allowed, she didn’t specify it was Hamas. She said, you know, criminal gangs, whoever, civilians also are in desperation, ambushing these trucks, right?

I mean, pick your poison. But not that I’m equating civilians with Hamas, ‘cause I’m not, or with criminal gangs. But her concern was that the trucks are being ambushed and the food aid isn’t making it to those who need it. And on that point, she’s right. But with respect to the number of passable routes available in the midst of a very kinetic war ongoing, and the fact, you know, she says, “Well, you IDF—you’re responsible. This is your war.” And it’s like, “No, actually, we’re trying to prevent the trucks from being ambushed. We are not responsible. That is the UN’s job.” And they’re the ones who liaise with Hamas—like, this effort that the media seems to make, to avoid imputing any responsibility to Hamas is just breathtaking. It’s—

Claire: —it’s really spooky. It’s as if there’s some central—I’m not saying there really is, I’m saying it is as if there is some central coordinating committee sending out the new line every day. As I said just a moment ago, including, “There is no evidence that Hamas is stealing the food.”

And when you read that, I’m sure it sounds perfectly plausible, if you haven’t been reading about this carefully for a while. “Well, there’s no evidence—of course, the Israelis are lying about this. They just want to starve Palestinians.” But if you’ve been paying close attention, you know that there is tons of evidence—and videos of Hamas themselves, sitting there, stuffing their faces and laughing about it and filming themselves. What more evidence do you need? So why all of a sudden does every media outlet say this? Are they repeating each other? Is that all it is?

Judith: Well, it’s not exactly all of a sudden. I mean, right at the beginning of the war, at the very, very beginning of the war, one of the big machers, I can’t remember which one, said—from underground—“The welfare of the Palestinians above us is the responsibility of Israel and the UN.

Claire: Yep. I remember.

Judith: And everybody said, “Oh, okay.”

Claire: The context in which he said that is particularly important because he was being asked, “You know, you have 500 kilometers of tunnels under there, which, you know, that’s a really good bomb shelter. Why don’t you let people take shelter under there?” “No, no. That’s for fighters. Taking care of the people up there? That’s for someone else. The fact that he said that says everything—

Judith: —and the fact that it was swallowed, it was swallowed as perfectly reasonable—

Claire: And the circumstances he describes, 500 kilometers worth of bomb shelters that they won’t let the civilians into—yet everyone pours scorn on the idea that Hamas is using the civilians there as human shields. I don’t know what more you could ask for as evidence of this fact—

Vivian: —I don’t think—sorry, Claire—I don’t think anyone’s—there’s this collective hysteria that has just kind of taken over and seeped into so many institutional mindsets. Media. Many governments. They don’t want evidence. They don’t—in my view, it’s a different iteration, but it’s very similar to what happened in the ‘30s in Europe. There are people who know it’s wrong, but they’re scared to speak out, for all kinds of reasons. But there are many, many people who want to believe the worst of us, of Jews and Israelis.

They want to demonize us, and they will believe anything that is served up that does that. I mean, that’s very fatalistic, but it’s the only conclusion I can come to, because I’m watching otherwise, you know, rational, intelligent people, like the journalists who were there.

The other thing that’s lost in this, it’s really, really important, that the 30-year-veteran of famines and wars working for a major network in the US was promoting—the thing that she was not addressing is that this is the first—and I’m relying on experts, many of whom do not support Israel, who have said this—this is the first conflict where humanitarian aid is needed and the humanitarian workers are forced to operate in an active war zone. Why? Because Hamas has refused to allow the civilians to separate and to be segregated in a safe zone.

They have stopped and blocked that, actively, since October 7th, and they were aided and abetted in that by UNRWA leadership: “No, no, we will not move them. They will stay in their homes.” Israel was desperate to move them to an area in southern Gaza, into Egypt. This is what happens in wars like this, even in Sudan, in the most horrible wars.

There is a land area made for humanitarian safe zones, but not here. And that’s a really important point that Hamas and Pidge have blocked that. And these humanitarian workers, many, they’e heroes—

Claire: Hamas and who?

Vivian: Palestinian Islamic Jihad—PIJ, we call it for short.

Judith: Yeah, I read that. I’m not a lawyer by any means, but according to international, humanitarian law in times of war, the two sides in a conflict agree to a safe zone called a safe zone, S-A-F-E. And the problem is that throughout the war, Hamas, exactly as you say, has refused to agree to any safe zones whatsoever for any Palestinians, anywhere in the strip. And so Israel has taken the next best thing, which is called a safer zone, which is a zone that’s declared, basically, unilaterally by only one of the parties.

Now notice here, this is us declaring the safer zone for them. So it’s not to protect our people, it’s to protect their people. And then bad things happen—and it’s all our fault. I mean, we’re—

Vivian: —we can’t win. We can’t. And this is a really huge issue that has been absolutely ignored by the media, by the best of the media. The other issue that’s been totally ignored is Qatar.

Judith: Yeah.

Vivian: Qatar hosts the largest American military base in the Middle East. Qatar finances Hamas. Qatar hosts Hamas leaders in Doha. Just this last week, Qatar spoke out and said that it did not support the goal of demilitarizing Hamas and Gaza. And yet nobody is talking about that. Nobody talks about Qatar.

Qatar has donated so generously to top American universities, invested in media. I was reading something yesterday about how the Qataris own more prime real estate in London than the Royal Family. Their holdings are massive, and astonishing. And that’s just one city. But nobody talks about this. Why? Why?

Claire: The formulation “Nobody talks about this” is—it’s a little bit … conspiracy theory. I think the simple answer is that foreign news coverage has almost disappeared. The only subject that ever gets covered is Israel, and—Anne Applebaum published a really well-reported piece on Sudan in The Atlantic the other day, which I want to draw everyone’s attention to.

And I would be surprised if it received a tenth the attention of any of the dozen-odd articles they’ve published about Israel recently. Because once you’ve started focusing obsessively on a certain thing, people become interested in it, and they want to read more about it . People feel like they know something about this conflict.

Most people, I don’t think, are—I don’t think that most people are desperately eager to view Jews as villains. I think that they’ve been reading media coverage written by people who are desperately eager to portray Jews as villains. And I think if you are an unsophisticated consumer of news, a very decent person who has other things going on in his or her life, a family, a job that has nothing to do with international news, then you see these headlines over and over and you come to the conclusion, “This is monstrous. These Israelis are starving these Palestinian children.”

Judith: Well, it’s this combination of confirmation bias plus the ease of groupthink. So if you don’t know anything about something, and then somebody who is in a position of authority says X is true, then every time you see anything that seems to confirm that X is true, you say, “Well, it must be true. I mean, they said it’s true.” And then, of course, when you notice that everyone around you who is on the side of the Good, on the side of the underdog, and on the side of opposition to oppression and all, they’re all saying the same exact thing—it’s easier, it’s just easier to go along.

Why do any due diligence? Why check anything? Why read anything? Why second guess? It feels good.

Claire: Most people—sorry—most people don’t even know how to do that. They would have no idea where to start in thinking about, “Does this newspaper article—does it employ a framing that’s biased? Are all the facts in it correct? What facts have been omitted?” That’s not something most people can do.

Judith: I read that Bibi wants to sue The New York Times for blood libel for that photograph that they put above the fold.

Claire: Good luck with that.

Judith: No, but I mean the louder we are about this, the better.

Claire: That was a disgrace. That was a disgrace. Perhaps you should tell listeners what you’re referring to, because I’m not sure everyone knows.

Judith: Okay. Um, some journalists went into Gaza and were running around looking for ways to spin the Israel-starves-Palestinian-children story. So they found a mom with a child—

Claire: It was the Turkish state news agency that went in.

Judith: Oh, so the New York Times used the Turkish—oh, I didn’t even know that, that’s a nice little detail. I didn’t even know that. Okay. So this poor young Palestinian mother is cradling an infant who is in very, very bad shape. You can see the bones of his spine sticking out. He is very, very, very unhealthy.

Clearly, definitely, looks like a starving child. They take the photographs. The New York Times publishes this above the fold in a big picture. It’s like a quarter of the page. Huge picture. With this story about, you know, illustrating the fact that we’re starving Palestinian children. What they did not include in the article was the fact that the child had either cystic fibrosis or cerebral palsy—

Claire: Cystic fibrosis.

Judith: Yeah. Cystic fibrosis. Who had been in treatment. And so it was a complete fabrication, essentially. And the other other thing that they left out of the story is that the mother, when she was being interviewed, she said, “My child has cystic fibrosis. We really need help. Can you please help us? We really need help. My child has cystic fibrosis.” She’s not complicit in this scam at all. When the story was published, all of that was edited out. And it was just “Poor, tragic mom with her starving child, being starved to death by the Jews.”

Claire: They also edited out the part of the photo that showed his perfectly healthy brother—

Judith: —perfectly healthy brother. You know, and then there was another child, they did a similar thing with another child that looked, very, very gaunt. And this kid has another ailment, and he’s in Italy getting treated.I mean, it’s all fabrication!

Claire: It was the Israelis who enabled him to get to Italy for treatment.

Judith: Yes, yes. I mean, the number of times, the number of times—backing up a little, there have been reports, when the Israelis go into homes inside Gaza during this war, into terrorist homes, and they find papers from Israeli hospitals from where that family had taken their kid to be treated in the Israeli hospital. It just, it makes your head spin.

Vivian: There’s one of the guards who was with the group guarding Ohad Ben Ami, and the other five, his child was treated for cancer and cured in Israel. And the former hostages said that he was the cruelest, the cruelest and most sadistic with them. I just—I have to just push back very briefly on the suggestion that I was a conspiracy theorist. I’m saying that with a smile, for people who can’t see me. With respect to my comments about Qatar, you know, why is no one covering this? And I’m going to stick to that, because Qatar is not being covered. Qatar is not being held to account by this extremely diligent media that jumps on and creates false narratives about Israel.

And I think that this continued kind of refusal to cover Qatar and ask the tough questions is very revealing, with respect to that particular photograph and the disgusting story around it. Whereas Netanyahu may be correct, I actually think he should stick to his day job, and perhaps this is not widely known, develop a really capable, resourced media arm of the Prime Minister’s office in order to handle communications. Because right now there is nothing.

Claire: Who in the world has not said this already! I mean, for goodness sake, everyone is telling them this. Everyone. Even people who don’t like Israel are telling them, “You can’t do this. You’re a modern nation-state. You need to have an English speaker, in a press office, who can answer journalist’s queries. What is the thinking there? What is the thinking?

Vivian: Can I jump in? ‘Cause I'm pretty familiar with—

Claire: —Yeah, please.

Vivian: This is something that we have seen kind of develop. There’s a continuum over the period of Netanyahu’s service and tenure, and it’s become very pronounced over the last 10 years or so. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, it’s very widely known, is pretty defanged. Much of the communication would come from them, in a properly, I’m going to say functioning, government. They simply have neither the resources nor the room. Okay. Also, the really important foreign relationships are all managed under the Prime Minister’s office. And so all roads really lead to two people in this government. And that’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Minister of Strategic Affairs, and Bibi’s right-hand, closest advisor, and most trusted advisor, Ron Dermer.

You know, we see the outlets that they choose to meet with and the independent podcasters, and almost, I think 100 percent, they’re foreign. They are American. They do not challenge the Prime Minister when they meet with him. And he likes that. He’s very good, in his mind, at messaging. I think he’s a brilliant orator. He’s an absolute genius. And his facility with language is peerless, probably among Western leaders.

Claire: It’s not a high bar.

Vivian: He’s a beautiful speaker. He speaks and communicates very, very effectively. But what’s kind of veered off course, in my view, is the message. And understanding the importance of having interlocutors for the media who are independent, truly independent, obviously working with, but independent of the Prime Minister’s office, who understands media, whose first language is English, who understand the nuance of Western culture and journalism, cause it’s very different from the way it’s practiced here. And who can provide the right information. But regrettably, I think that we’ve come to a point where these two top officials in the government trust no one but themselves to do that job. And this is the outcome, unfortunately.

Claire: Do they have, in your view, an understanding of what is going on in the media universe, in the social universe beyond Israel?

Vivian: Do they realize what—no, no.

Claire: So, they are unaware of the gravity of the problem, which means that they’re living in a total fantasy land about something—

Judith: How can that be? How can it be? Bibi Netanyahu doesn’t know what’s being said about us? How can that be?

Vivian: Oh, he knows. He knows what’s being said and I’m sure Dermer does as well. That’s not what I meant. Do they understand how critical it is that we develop some kind of plan to manage and respond in an organized, purposeful, strategic way? No, I think they think they can handle it. And Exhibit A, in support of my contention, is that they don’t have a media team. They do clearly seem to think that they are the answer.

Judith: Well, now I’m gonna say something that really is conspiracy-theorish, which is that we also have the X factor of Sara. Because we have had Noa Tishby, we have had Eylon Levy. These people have all been—poof—vanished because she can’t stand them. So I’m just gonna throw that out there. We can move on now.

Claire: We’re talking about Bibi’s wife, the execrable Sara. Do Israelis understand how serious a problem this is? Both the problem of the media coverage of Israel in the world at large, and the lack of a strategic response to it?

Judith: I would say yes. Both problems. I would say the people that I’ve talked to, yeah.

Vivian: I agree.

Judith: I mean, we can’t—we can’t not see an entire bridge in Australia packed, heaving with people screaming jihad. I mean, we can’t not see that. And, also the fact that, like, there was an article that I read just this morning that we’re being warned about Greece, because there is now a movement, an organized movement in Greece to harass all Israeli tourists everywhere in Greece because we are all from the IDF and therefore we are all child killers.

This is what I read. And so, Greece will not welcome the Jewish child killers and say—we can’t miss this. I mean, we know there’s a big problem here, a big problem.

Vivian: There’s all, yeah, there have been a number of cruise ships with Israeli passengers that have been refused, not allowed to dock in at Greek ports.

There have been Israeli tourists who have been beaten up. This is in Greece, but this is actually all over Europe too. This is happening, and in fact, I’m going to be traveling with my daughter, in a few weeks, to Europe. And of course, you know, we speak flawless English and have Canadian passports, but we’re also talking about how to hide the fact that we are who we are.

And, you know, my children who have been raised—my father was a survivor, and my children have been raised by me to try to kind of, you know, diminish the burden that we live with, that my dad lived with, that I lived with, and to be proud. And so they look at me and they say, “You? You’re telling us to do this?”

Judith: Wow.

Vivian: And I’m like, listen, it’s not shameful. This is how they survived in the war. This is how people survived, as they had to be clever about where, when, if, and how they disclose their true identity. I think that it’s important to mention at this point as well, you know, regarding your question about “Do Israelis see and feel and understand this,” Claire, over 80 percent—I said this at the beginning of our discussion—over 80 percent of Israelis oppose the government’s decision- making and conduct.

Even Likud supporters, the majority of Benjamin Netanyahu’s political supporters, oppose what this government is doing. And what is widely understood here, that may not be widely understood outside of Israel, is that the decision-making that has been taken since March with respect to how to handle the hostage issue, how to handle the war, they are absolutely, transparently political decisions meant to appease the right-wing nationalist extremists in his government who hold a very small number of seats in the Knesset, but wield enormous power because if they leave the coalition, they bring down the government, and Bibi cannot abide that.

And so he is, you know, literally, they’ve got a knife to his throat. And he caves. And if you look at this last decision—“We’re going into Gaza, we’re gonna occupy”—and initially, you know, on Monday or Tuesday when they first said it, they were saying, “We’re going to fully occupy. We’re going to not bring in the PA or Hamas. We’re going to bring in a multilateral force led by Arabs.” It’s changed—every day it changes five different times. We’re now at the point where we’re maybe gonna, sort of, kind of, totally, somewhat occupy Gaza City and then move on here.

But what’s important is, who supported that? And who supported that openly, from the outset, were Benjamin Netanyahu, Ron Dermer, and the two extreme right-wing nationalists, Bezalel Smotrich, Itamar Ben-Gvir. Who opposed it? The IDF Chief of Staff, the head of Mossad, the Minister of— darn, it’s slipping my mind for a moment. I’m sorry. Everyone else in the security cabinet, …. the head of Mossad is not in the security cabinet. Everyone else in the security cabinet opposed it.

And there was a 10-hour meeting yesterday, 10-hour meeting at which apparently there was very significant tension. And the IDF Chief of Staff said things to the effect that, “I cannot do this. I can’t lead these people. I will do what the government orders, but you must understand what you’re asking me to do here. You’re asking me to lead our soldiers into a battle that will be ruin us for us. And my oath is to protect the security of this country and the people.” And basically what he’s saying is, “You, Prime Minister, are putting me in a position where I have to choose between my oath and your political directives. Please, please, engage in some sober reflection.”

Now, we know that the outcome of that meeting was inconclusive last night, so, and we know that Netanyahu has kind of pulled back. It’s really important for people in Greece and everywhere to understand that we have this government with which we profoundly disagree.

Claire: What percentage of Israelis, according to polls, say that they profoundly disagree with this?

Vivian: Over 80 in polls, because polls—it started at around 70 in February, March, when that big chunk of hostages was released. And I personally think there were two things that shook this country and also many Americans and foreigners to their core.

One was what I call the Auschwitz weekend. I was actually on live television covering that for six hours, and that was the day that Ohad Ben Ami, Or Levy, and Eli Sharabi were released. And they looked like survivors of Auschwitz. And that was a very, very difficult moment. And in that same period, of course, the bodies of Shiri Bibas and her two beautiful, orange-haired babies who had been murdered by Hamas or PIJ, we’re not sure exactly whom, with their bare hands. They had been murdered with the terrorist’s bare hands. And the return of those bodies was another just unbearable moment for this country. And those two events, coming so close to together, shook this country.

And we know that they, they kind of fortified the resolve of President Trump and Steve Witkoff to do everything possible. They have been the champions of the hostages and the civilians in this country, not Benjamin Netanyahu. That is the widespread perception, understanding, feeling. The polls, immediately after the release of those three hostages—emaciated, skeletal—went to 70 percent immediately, and 60 percent, at that time, of Likud supporters said, enough. Khalas, in Arabic. Enough, we have to stop this now. That has not changed. It’s only gotten worse for the government. It’s now well over 80 percent. And Judith’s nodding as I speak—

Judith: Everything you’re saying. Everything you’re saying. And also, another really important factor here is that in addition to the desperation to get the hostages back, we have a population where everyone we know has a reservist who has gone in and in, over and over and over and over—the number of soldiers I know personally who need mental health treatment now, because first of all, what they have seen is so horrible, that they have had to do this over and over and over again, that their lives that they had, they were forced to leave behind by reserve duty, have collapsed.

And this is—it’s a national crisis. And this is part of Zamir’s—the Chief of Staff— this is part of his consideration and should be part of his consideration. It is not just a matter of sending more 18-year-olds in as cannon fodder, which is disgusting, and sickening enough as it is, but to say to all these reservists, “Okay, pack up again.”

This is a little country, and we, the proportion of young, young men and women who have been pushed beyond their limits by this war, is much, much greater than you can imagine.

Vivian: There have been men—I mean, if you’re over the age of, depending on your unit, but usually 40 for combat, 45 for some other units, you’re exempted from military service. So many men in their late 40s, in their early 50s, have shown up and are doing combat duty. And some have fallen. And so I just want to add to what you were saying, Judith, because it’s such an important point. We need 250,000 combat soldiers to support this renewed … adventure, I’m going to call it.

That is most of the Reserve Army compliment in this country. And the reservists are the backbone of the army and the reservists have—they typically serve 30 to 60 days, depending on their unit a year. That’s understood. That’s part of what we call the social contract in this country. The majority of reservists have served over 500 days since October 7th.

That means their businesses have gone under. They’ve lost their jobs. Their wives are left to take care of children who are beyond traumatized. It’s really incredible how profoundly October 7th and the aftermath has impacted us. And what we’re starting to talk about now is a surge in the suicide rate among reservists and newly discharged soldiers that is just starting to be spoken about. The IDF, it seems, has suppressed that data. I’m hosting on my kibbutz, very soon, 150 soldiers reservists who have served over 500 days. They’re due to be released in a few weeks. We are hosting them for a pool party here on the kibbutz that I’m working to arrange with someone else.

They’re getting call up notices again. I have a friend who was just up north for a ceremony for her son, who’s in the army, who was supposed to be discharged now. And instead of discharging these kids, they handed them—they said, four months, you’re being called up for reserve duty now. You’re going back to Gaza.

And what the IDF Chief of Staff is trying to make the Prime Minister understand, which he does not seem to be processing fully, is we don’t have the soldiers. We simply don’t have the soldiers. And in the meantime, we have this crisis with the ultra-Orthodox in this country. There are 70 to 80 thousand men of service age who are ultra-Orthodox, who are not being called up.

And so you have the kind of combustion of this moment. Those videos, right, Judith, coming out last week. The ultra Orthodox rioting, one of the leading rabbis saying, “We will wage global war, go to war all around the world. We’ll wage war on Israel.” And the Prime Minister, in that same week, saying, “We’re going back in.”

All we want is to get those hostages who are clinging to life out.

Claire: I have a question. Is there any chance that this is a bluff? Because Israel’s negotiating leverage was so significantly harmed by the trio of Western leaders who announced that they would recognize a state of Palestine unless there was a ceasefire. Well, that was Keir Starmer, in particular. Which created an incentive, a positive incentive, absolutely to refuse to negotiate and release hostage. Given that, did Bibi feel, “We just need to do something to show that this isn’t going to work for them?”

Vivian: First of all, it was Macron who came out first, and it was on the day that Macron made his statement, “Hey, I’m gonna recognize Palestinian state,” that Hamas said, “Yeah, we’re walking away from the table.”

And then Starmer, and then Carney. And Carney, as he’s always doing, every time he tries to one up his buddies. He just takes it to the next level. Here’s the quandary with that. Is this a bluff? I don’t buy the bluff theory. And here’s another problem. Prime Minister Netanyahu talks about—and he’s right—Hamas is a suicidal death cult.

They don’t give a toss about the wellbeing of their civilians. They say so themselves. They openly say that they will martyr the civilian population in order to defeat the Zionist enemy. And they celebrate the martyrs. They are the Taliban, they are ISIS, they are horrible. And they don’t care. They are completely hardened.

They don’t let their own people into the tunnels to take shelter when the Israeli Air Force is bombing Gaza. Well, okay, well then you can’t turn around and say, “We’re gonna really put the squeeze on them and hammer them into submission,” because they don’t care. It won’t work.

Claire: But they do have objectives, among which is they’d like to stay alive to fight another day

Vivian: To remain standing. Yeah. The UN is helping them in that objective, as is Qatar.

Claire: They may think that if Israel takes full control, they're not going to survive that.

Vivian: They know Israel can’t.

Judith: Israel will never be allowed to.

Vivian: We don’t have the soldiers anymore. We, also, our logistics chains are deeply, deeply challenged.

Judith: Yeah. I don’t think it’s a bluff, Claire, because Bibi himself wants the war to continue.

Claire: Does he want it to continue only for political reasons, or is he—

Judith: Yes.

Claire. Okay. Well, the other theory which I was about to voice, but you’ve already said no, is that this is him saying, “We have achieved neither of the objectives that we set out to achieve. We have neither rid the area of Hamas nor have we rescued the hostages, which means this war is a complete strategic and moral failure. I can’t just say I give up now, because that makes the situation unredeemable and unforgivable. I have to think of something that allows me to at least realize one of those objectives, which won’t be retrieving the hostages.” Is it possible he’s thinking—

Vivian: A lot of lively discussion here over the degree to which Netanyahu was ever genuinely engaged by the hostage issue, the degree to which that was a priority for this government. And I don’t just make that up out of thin air. We have senior government ministers, again, Smotrich and Ben-Gvir, who have stated openly, and even this week: “It’s not a priority to bring out the hostages. The priority is to fully occupy Gaza and establish Israeli settlements in the territory.” So, to your question, is this, on the part of the Prime Minister, are his actions of this week coming from a purely political place? Again, I hate to sound like a broken record, but I think that the response of 80 percent of Israelis to that is, “Yes, we need to end this war.”

And it’s not—I mean, the hostages are so much more than hostages. The hostages have become symbols of the social contract, of the ethos of this country, which is that this country exists on the promise that it will be safe for Jewish people. And that promise was shattered, destroyed on October 7th. Every single person who survived, and every single hostage who has returned, says the same thing: Where was the IDF?

And we need to rebuild trust in the most basic, fundamental institutions that allow Israelis to cohere and to have faith. And I speak to people all the time who have young sons who are being recruited into combat units, and they do not have confidence in the IDF at this time. I stood feet away from Matan’s parents yesterday at this Kabbalah Shabbat, and they spoke, and that’s exactly what they said: Our son is an IDF soldier. He fought like a lion, and he remains there. Even after the War of Independence, when so many fighters were taken prisoner by the Arab armies, it was eight or nine months later, they were all repatriated. Every single one. This is a stain on Prime Minister Netanyahu’s tenure.

And I have to—I’m sorry I have to say this because it’s really, really important—because I speak to people who are very plugged into the system, the central nervous system of this government. And a conversation over a year ago with one, and I said—this was at the time when we thought we were on the verge of getting the hostages out in June, July, 2024. And we ran into one another at an event and I said, “You guys have to stop this. It has to end. You have to bring them all home.”

And this person voiced to me that, “Well, you know, the Prime Minister and his team are very concerned with his legacy that if the war ends right now, his legacy will be October 7th.”

And I said, “You could conquer Mars and Saturn and his legacy will be October 7th, because he was Prime Minister on October 7th. End of discussion.” Now let me just bring that forward because right after the attack on Iran, I think it was still ongoing maybe, but near the end, and I think it’s fair to say that the Prime Minister was feeling euphoric, and perhaps justifiably so.

He sat down with an Israeli journalist, finally, Ayala Hassan, and it’s an interview in Hebrew, but very, very telling. Because in that interview he spoke of himself in the arc of history, to the point that he invoked Cyrus the Great, King Cyrus of Persia from 2,500 years ago. And he said, King Cyrus, he liberated the Jews. He emancipated them, he gave them freedom. David Ben-Gurion, 2,500 years later, came along and established the State of Israel, a formidable task. I, Benjamin Netanyahu, I, by what I have just done, am liberating the Persians 2,500 years later. But not just that, I am ensuring the longevity, the survival of the Jewish state. So, I’m no psychotherapist, but—the words of the man himself.

Claire: There’s a touch of grandiosity there.

What do Israelis—beyond wanting the hostages back, and wanting the war to end, how do Israelis envision what would happen after that, with Hamas still in control of Gaza?

Vivian: There’sa great post this morning on X, Twitter, by Peter Lerner, former IDF spokesperson, Lt. Col. in the reserves, where he elaborates, very articulately and knowledgeably, on what that might look like. But what we do know is that this sloganeering of total victory is meaningless. No one knows what it means, and we simply are not very interested in continuing down this path that has not been terribly productive.

And what Peter says, and I think he’s right, is that we are in a war of attrition now, and we have been for well over a year, and that requires a sea change in the thinking, strategic thinking, and planning of both the IDF and our political leaders. This is not going to be a quick war, and the truth is it’s decades of decisions that got us to the point of October 7th. These are not going to be undone in five minutes. And that is a sea change for Israelis to come to terms with, but more importantly, the leadership. I think that the people here understand that much better than the leadership does right now.

Judith: Vivian, what do you think are the odds that there’s going to be a change in leadership? And if so, what do you think are Bennett’s chances?

Vivian: Yeah. I don’t do … that’s a high risk sport, political forecasting. I do like high risk sports, but … nobody knows. I don’t know if it’s Bennett. I don’t—maybe it’s—there are others. There’s a lot of backroom talking, and wheeling and dealing.

I think that Bennett is seen to be the most likely consensus candidate who can bring together elements of even the religious right. Even some of the ultra- Orthodox, in particular Shas, Aryeh Deri. And an interesting kind of thing about the Shas voters, typically Jews of North African and Middle Eastern descent—who feel, quite rightly, that they were mistreated in the early years of the state and they were marginalized and alienated, even though many of the things that went on in the early years have been alleviated, almost totally—but Aryeh Deri is an ultra-Orthodox man from Morocco who studied in a Lithuanian Yeshiva, which is about as different from Moroccan as you can get.

And his base, they’re traditional people. They observe Shabbat, they keep kosher, but they’re not extremists. They serve in the army, they work. And so he’s a very, very kind of paradoxical leader to have this base. And he’s very mindful of the fact that his base is serving and is feeling the full impact of this war.

So he’s the most likely to cross over to support someone like a Bennett. And I think that the main factor is how long Benjamin Netanyahu can keep Ben Gvir and Smotrich placated, and in the coalition, and supporting the coalition. And as long as he leaves them with the belief and feeling that they will survive until tomorrow—and which he does so artfully—then we won’t have elections for some time. The best estimates that I’ve read—with kind of knowledge and backing, like intellectual backing, and knowledge of the system—is March 2026, is when we’re most likely to,

Judith: Okay. Okay. Okay. And Vivian, maybe you can explain something to me that I’ve never understood, which is Smotrich, also, his constituency has paid a very, very high price in this war. So I don’t understand his lockstep alliance with Bibi and Ben-Gvir. Because his people are out there dying in Gaza. I don’t understand it.

Vivian: And—so exactly, his base has taken a huge hit. And for that reason, in the polling—this has been consistent for a very long time now—Smotrich does not cross the threshold. Okay? So if there was an election held tomorrow, he’s out. Ben-Gvir, on the other hand, has increased his base significantly. And that should be concerning to all of us. So it seems that many of Smotrich’s supporters, Religious Zionist supporters, are probably moving into the Ben-Gvir camp, which is deeply concerning.

So why does Smotrich stay? Because he wants to survive. You know, there have been so many red lines that have been crossed in the last while, but Judith, as you of course will recall, and Claire, I expect you were aware of this as well, about a month ago, maybe a month and a half now, it was on Shabbat, a large group of so-called Hilltop Youth, which are generally young, ultra orthodox men who are often engaged in criminal activity, who establish illegal outposts, who tend to go to Palestinian villages and burn and loot and terrorize—and there seem to be little, if any, legal consequences. And this has just, this kind of conduct has really proliferated since October 7th, because the whole country’s been distracted by Gaza. It’s horrifying. About a month and a half ago, a large group of them in, I hate to say it, white pickup trucks and motorcycles, which evokes a very different image that is horrifying, on Shabbat—so they’re breaking Shabbat—they approached an IDF base that was being staffed by reservists in the West Bank, and there were physical altercations and quite a number of youth were arrested. , And the pushback from the Smotrich camp was intense and insane.

And I happen to be in a chat group where I don’t participate, but I do observe. And there are many Smotrich supporters in this chat group, and the discussion that was ongoing in those early days was horrifying. I won’t even say what it was here. But they were deeply critical—scornful—of the IDF in any way laying a finger on these men and boys, who had come to attack an IDF base.

That is just crossing so many red lines. A base that was being staffed by reservists who had been doing over five hundred days of duty. And within days, the IDF was exonerated because they had video evidence of what really happened. And the Smotrich camp went quiet. But … I mean—we have allowed this really open wound to fester. And we haven’t even begun to reckon with it, because they’re the ones wielding the balance of power.

Claire: It seems the only conceivable way for sane people to take power again is if … to ostracize what we could call the nationalist right, the religious right and the liberals need to be in an alliance.

Vivian: I think that there is a large segment of Likud, historically, a kind of right- wing secular but very heterogeneous party, in which there were also religiously observant people. It was a big, big tent. And so I think a lot of Likud voters could support a Bennett-led government. The thing with Likud though that’s really tricky is, I hate to put it this way, but it’s kind of like mafia-level like loyalty. Loyalty in that party is insane. And it goes back to the days of the founding of the state. When Ben-Gurion went after the Irgun, and Menachem Begin, and I won’t get into all that, but it’s a real—I mean, we just saw one of the jewels of the Likud party, in my view, Yuli Edelstein, who was working terribly hard to forge some kind of agreement with the ultra-Orthodox to begin to serve in the IDF. And Yuli Edelstein, he was number two on the Likud list, just a few years ago. A former prisoner of conscience in the Soviet Union, an extraordinary man. And he was dumped. He was just dumped by Netanyahu because the ultra-Orthodox say “Can’t work with the guy. He’s against us.” And Yuli Edelstein is also religiously observant.

So, you know, it’s really hard. I don’t know, Judith, what you think, but like it’s really hard to gauge where the rank-and-file of Likud are. In terms of religious Zionists, I think it would be tough. I think most of them would go to Ben-Gvir over more mainstream. The religious Zionists too. They, I think, are something like 70 percent of the officers in combat units now, aren’t they?

Claire: Are they?

Judith: Wow.

Vivian: Something—I’m gonna hedge just, but this was a stat I was told a couple years ago.

Claire: That’s a really interesting figure.

Vivian: It is. There aren’t quite, they’re not quite as represented, or they weren’t, a couple years ago, in the Air Force and intelligence units. These Religious Zionists, they are literalists.

Judith: But if that’s the case, Vivian, if 70 percent feel this way, can you imagine, —approximately—can you imagine that they’re defying Zamir? That Zamir could end up all by his lonesome? If the officer corps—this is …

Vivian: I’m gonna, I’m gonna let that question just hang in the air. Because I think there are a lot of questions that are being asked now that are hanging in the air.

You know, the son of Prime Minister Netanyahu, Yair Netanyahu, who has been living in Miami throughout the war, also this week, he put out on social media and a tweet, a comment basically accusing Eyal Zamir, the Chief of Staff, of plotting a military coup. And he said it. And Zamir, in a cabinet meeting, I think on Wednesday, Bibi challenged Zamir, he said, you know, “If you wanna resign, resign, right? But don’t do it in the media.” You know, kind of being critical of him for speaking, from time to time, in the media. And Zamir reportedly—because, as you know, all cabinet meetings in Israel are leaked, and if they’re not, then we get really worried—and Zamir replied to the effect, he said something like, “Why don’t you tell your son?” Like, to tone it down and to stop critiquing me openly in social media. To which Netanyahu responded, “My son’s 33 years old, I can’t control him.” I think that if I had tweeted out something like that, I might have been arrested by now. Just sayin.’

So. There’s so much going on, so much going on. And we do know that the Likud Party is not thrilled with the way in which the son holds forth. And there were stories about him, a couple years ago, being told to just, like, dial it down. Go off social media, go into exile in Miami for a while, cool your heels.

But it seems he hasn’t returned—so, who knows what’s going on there. But we do know what he’s saying publicly. And I think that there is open—I don’t think, I know there is open speculation, I was listening to it on the news last night—I don’t know if you saw it on Channel 12, but wow—about what Eyal Zamir may do.

I don’t think he’s going to initiate a coup. But there are many things he could do. And the Commander in Chief, the IDF Chief of Staff, if he’s going to lead these young men and reservists, he has to do it with integrity, with this guy. We know he feels that way. He said it, and he takes his oath very, very seriously.

So, I don’t know. I think that we’re all at the real, real, really pointy edge of a spear right now. What do you think?

Judith: Yeah.

Vivian: What do you think, Judith?

Judith: This whole thing with the Chief of Staff, I mean—when he took over from the other Chief of Staff, I remember thinking at the time that honestly, my heart went out a little bit to the previous Chief of Staff, because he had the misfortune of being the Chief of Staff on October 7th, after 18 years of Bibi’s decision-making that had led to this catastrophe. And I felt that he was doing his best. It was unfortunate he had to go though this.

New guy came in, didn’t know anything about him, and when—and now, it would be such a monumental thing for—even if he were to resign at a moment like this, as you say, this is the tip, the pointiest point of the spear that we’re at. I think that could have historic repercussions in terms of the response of the people.

There are many things with reference to—like, we were talking about the social contract that has changed completely in this country since October 7th. One of them is not serving, which used to have a certain stigma attached to it. And now, I mean, I know parents who advocate for their kids not to, try to talk their kids out. This is unheard of. This was not … such a thing was very rare. And if it ever happened, it was not public. And now it’s a very common thing. I think, if he were to resign on principle, there could be a tremendous ripple effect in who shows up. It could be huge. And he seems to have integrity, this guy. We’ll see. We’ll see. This could be a big moment.

Vivian: Yeah. I feel the same way.

Claire: Okay. So we’ve been talking about what’s going on in Israel so far, but I think the people who are listening probably have a lot of questions about what’s going on in Gaza, which I certainly can’t answer because I’m not there. And you’ll have trouble answering because you’re not there. But you might have more insight.

The reports from Gaza make it sound like hell on Earth, which I have no doubt it is. But I’m hearing really conflicting things about how it came to be that there’s not enough food. A lot of things I’m hearing are not getting reported in the mainstream English-language press at all, even though they should be.

The prevailing attitude in the mainstream media is that, of course Israel is just starving people deliberately—which seems insane to me, but that is what people believe. And I wonder if you could both tell me what you think, what your best understanding of what happened with the food situation is.

Vivian: You want me to go?

Claire: Go.

Vivian: So we know that there has been more than adequate food that has entered the Gaza Strip since October 7th. We know that during the ceasefire period, last winter, when hostages were released, even more food and humanitarian supplies were allowed in, with respect to food alone. The allocation was 3,000 calories per day, per person, in the Gaza Strip, which is excessive. The IDF and the government have relied on that statistic when justifying the cessation or the closure of the border in April and May. So there was a period when the ceasefire talks broke down and Netanyahu said, “Forget it. We’re going to shut the border. We’re not going to allow food in, and we’re going to try to break Hamas in that way.”

We’ve already dealt with that kind of paradox, so even still—with no food going in—given what had entered the Gaza Strip, there was a surplus. People have done these calculations in and outside of Israel. Even the UN admitted this, there was a surplus of food. So where did all the food go? We know that the food is stolen by criminal gangs and by Hamas and PIJ, and we know that it’s hoarded in warehouses and there’s been video released of these warehouses.

Claire: Yeah.

Vivian: We also know that there is a not-insignificant population that is not receiving food, there are civilians for whom food insecurity is extreme, and that many of them are going for periods of time—1, 2, 3 days—without adequate food and water. And we have that from multiple sources. We have that from IDF sources on the ground. They’ve said it.

Now, what they don’t concede is famine. There is a very specific legal, international legal definition of what constitutes a famine. There also is not a policy of starvation at the national level. There may be grotesquely insensitive comments made by political leaders like Ben-Gvir, but that does not constitute a policy of intentional starvation.

And this is the thin edge of the wedge in which Israelis find themselves. understanding that notwithstanding the fact that more than adequate calorie counts and food stocks are in the Gaza Strip, there is a not insignificant number of civilians that are not receiving adequate food. And I can only speak for myself—that is absolutely intolerable.

I cannot live with that in any way. I cannot live with it ethically, morally—and I am no, like, “woke leftist.” And I know that many Israelis, most Israelis feel the same way. We simply cannot bear it.

So is there food? Yes. What is the problem? Distribution. Hoarding by Hamas, PIJ, and criminal gangs and, UNRWA facilitating and allowing, or looking the other way, when they were doing that, which is why Israel said, “All right, we're not working with UNRWA anymore. We’re going to set up this new Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. We’re going to take all control of food away from UNRWA, the United Nations Relief Works Agency. We’re going to allow—we will work with other UN agencies that we trust, like UNICEF and World Food Program. And they can distribute”—that gets into the other problems we were discussing earlier.

So the issue is distribution of food. UNRWA had over 4,000 distribution points, GHF has four. The journey to get to these aid sites is treacherous, it’s difficult. But the focus, again, has always been on, for the last two months, “Israel’s starving, Israel’s not allowing in food, Israel’s preventing distribution”—no. That is not true. And I would urge your listeners to look at the feed of my very good friend, on X, Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib. He is fantastic. He’s been on my podcast a number of times. And we speak about this all the time.

Claire: I have—I was in touch with him because I wanted him to come and speak to my class and, we’ve meant to organize that. He’s very impressive. I wonder how many more are like him.

Vivian: Well, more than we think, I think.

Claire: Yeah? I hope so. I hope so.

Vivian: He’s extraordinary. He’s extraordinary. But there are people like Ahmed out there—and for your listeners, just so you know, he’s born in Gaza City. He was raised there. He totally by accident left when he was 15 years old on an exchange trip to study at high school in the US. It was supposed to be for one year. And for reasons he explains in one of my podcasts, it turned out to be for life. He has family there. It was just What’sApping with him this morning, I said, “Where’s your brother?” Cause his brother had been based in Gaza City. He said, “He got out, he’s in the south now. But we have family stuck there and we’re trying to figure out what to do.” I mean, he’s someone you can talk to, but he openly—and it takes tremendous courage, ‘cause he has family there—openly accuses Hamas of hoarding food and depriving civilians. He doesn’t exonerate Israel, but he’s very clear-eyed on what’s going on on the ground.

Claire: What’s most remarkable—he has lost 19 family members in this war.

Vivian: More.

Claire: More?

Vivian: More in terms of his extended family. Yeah. Big family, and they’re close, and he grew up with them. They grew up in these family compounds. They all live in each other’s houses. I think it’s over 50. It was very early on.

Claire: Terrible.

Vivian: Terrible.

Claire: But he is a remarkable voice of clarity about what’s going on in Gaza and what Hamas has been doing, and how little Hamas cares about civilians in Gaza. And I’d really like to speak to him. Really like to have him on the podcast. He’d probably be a much better person for me to speak to about what’s going on in Gaza than—well, he hasn’t been there himself, as far as I understand. He’s getting all of this from his family, right?

Vivian: Family and friends. I had him on a few weeks ago, and he spoke about seeing a friend of his, also from Gaza, in the States, saying, “My family’s desperate. They have no food. They have no money. Can you please help?” He sent $500. And he explains this whole corrupt chain of kickbacks. And by the time the money gets in their hands, it’s $330, and they buy provisions that would’ve cost $10 before the war for—like something crazy. The corruption, the exploitation of desperate civilians by people in Gaza and outside …

But yes, he is in touch with all kinds of people on the ground. He has friends, he has family, and he speaks to them directly on a daily basis. So he is the best person to speak to this.

Claire: The thing is, you completely dismissed the idea that Bibi could have any kind of motive beyond the utterly base and self-serving. But when you think of just declaring the war of failure, strategically … all of this suffering in Gaza has been for nothing. As is the entire world’s reaction to it. It’s leaving Hamas in place, it’s …

Vivian: IDo you know what could have stopped it all? On October 8th? If the United States and all the Western governments had frozen Qatari assets.

Claire: You think that would’ve stopped it?

Vivian: The question is, why did they not do it?

Claire: Well, I don’t rightly know, but I expect it’s because Qatar has bought off everything that’s buyable in Europe and the United States. I mean, if I say “Qatargate,” you could think of four separate scandals that would be called that. No, but literally—there are four separate scandals now being called Qatargate—the one at the seat of the European Union, the—goodness, I mean, with someone like Trump, especially, who has his hand open for bribes and kickbacks, you think he’s going to turn on Qatar?

Vivian: I am just asking the question. I’m not the conspiracy theorist, I’m just asking the question.

Claire: How many members of Congress do you think they own?

Vivian: I’d love to know. I’d also love to know, and this apparently is not required to be disclosed, and I don’t understand why—even in private educational institutions in America—I’d love to know how much Qatar has donated.

Claire: Oh, it’s a fortune. It’s an absolute fortune. They own Georgetown.

Vivian: But they’re not required to disclose that. And why not? I mean, these are educational institutions. I understand they’re private, but there are a lot of blurred lines here.

Claire: Mm-hmm.

Vivian: You know, a friend of mine made a very, very astute comment to me a while ago. He said, “When Jewish people donate to these institutions,” which they do, very generously, and hospitals, “They love to see their names on buildings, right?” Park benches, you name it. Well, you don’t have the Sheik this and that, or this and that building—”

Judith: —wing.

Vivian: Exactly. What they do, the Qataris, is they endow chairs and departments, and then they dictate the kind of scholar that may sit in those chairs and the kinds of things that they may teach. And interestingly, all of those people in the West, and in America, who are so overheated about intrusions on academic freedom by the Trump administration—and I’m not carrying water for them, I’m just saying, pointing out a contradiction—they seem completely nonplused by the fact that a foreign government may be bankrolling universities and chairs and dictating what may or may not be said and taught in that capacity. And if that's not an intrusion on academic freedom, I don’t know what is.

Claire: It is, although it doesn’t have the force of the state dictating what may and may not be said. I mean, it’s a voluntary—it’s just scuzzy, that’s all. It’s scuzzy and it’s deceptive, in so far as students and their parents aren’t being told, “By the way, the curriculum is going to be Qatari-approved.”

Vivian: Yeah. It’s scuzzy. I think it’s also threatening the foundations of our democracy as we’ve known it

Claire: The integrity of the university, certainly. And it is threatening, at the very least—it’s a threat to Jews. I mean, because kids at these schools are being taught. a version of events that is—that allows for eruptions of antisemitism like the kind we’ve seen.

Judith: Almost more heartbreaking than that is I have talked to parents of college-age Jewish kids in the US whose children are turning against us. Their Jewish children are turning against us because of what they’re learning in class and what their classmates are allowed to say about us. And they’re good, good children. And they come home and they say, “Why didn’t I know? Why did you never tell me how we—the terrible things that we have done to the Palestinians,” you know, that’s where their head is—post-October 7th, post-October 7th. It’s very deep. It’s very deep. This poisoning of the academy, in the States is very, very profound.

Claire: And that, I think is the source of what’s gone—a lot of the source of what’s gone wrong with the journalism. And you’ve got people coming right out of that educational environment.

Judith: Yeah.

Claire: And there are a lot of other things that have gone wrong with the journalism, including some that are just—that have nothing to do with antisemitism or hostility to Israel, but are just artifacts of the news business. Israel is a place where journalists are very comfy.

Vivian: Mm-hmm.

Claire: There aren’t a lot of conflicts as intense as what’s going on in Gaza where journalists can report on it from the comfort of a four-star hotel where they’re perfectly safe. And there’s a ton of interest in Israel, and that becomes a flywheel. So lots of—was in that really good series of articles by Matt, Matty, what is his name, Matty, he used to work for—

Vivian: Friedman

Claire: Matti Friedman, where he pointed out that at the time he was working for AP, there were more AP correspondents in Israel than there were in all of China, than in the entire African continent?

Vivian: Yeah. Not only, it’s not only the journalists, it’s also many of the humanitarian workers and NGO employees.

Claire: Yeah.

Vivian: They much prefer to be based in Tel Aviv or in Herzliya, just north of Tel Aviv, than in the areas where they actually do their jobs. When I began my tenure here as Canadian ambassador, in 2014, and my younger daughter was in grade 12 and she went to the American school. And the irony was just so incredible, because until grade seven, she’d been in Jewish day school in Toronto, a very liberal one. And then she was in art schools in Toronto, in the public system. And then she comes to Israel, and she’s going to the American school, and it is full of the children of diplomats, and NGO workers, and some corporate people. It’s a very, very privileged group of young people. And the environment was not terribly understanding or sympathetic towards Israel among the students. You know? So the irony of course being, you don’t go to public school in Canada, you go to Jewish day school, because there’s hostility, and there are challenges. And then you come here, where you expect to kind of just feel at home, and you’re in the environment I try to protect you from there.

Claire: Yeah. Well, there’s a lot that I wish people understood, which the media could be explaining and doesn’t, about the many aid and humanitarian organizations and their relationship—their necessary relationship—with Hamas, the one they’ve had to have in order to be able to do their jobs.

Vivian: Yep.

Claire: Because people will tell me, “But look at this report by Amnesty! Don’t you trust Amnesty?”

Judith: But there’s also this—there’s also this echo chamber of wrong information. And if you trace it back, right at the beginning of the war, [UN Secretary-General António] Gutierrez, our old friend, made a statement that 500 trucks of food are needed a day to adequately feed the population of Gaza—which has nothing to do with reality. Not remotely. The actual number is between 130 and 150, which is what they had been getting.

But he put it out there, this complete falsehood—500 trucks. That number, 500 trucks, has been quoted and quoted and quoted and quoted and quoted and used as the baseline for all these studies and calculations that are done by these NGOs and that are done by—it’s unbelievable. And you could just trace it right back to a lie told right at the beginning of the war. And so it’s all self-referential. “Well, this refers to Amnesty, and that refers to Human Rights Watch, and that refers to”—and it all traces back to the same falsehood.

Claire: Like a game of telephone.

Judith: Yeah.

Vivian: Yeah. I just wanna make a point that also, on this, that I think is really important. It was when I was serving as ambassador, and one of the hot issues at the time was a village in the West Bank, one village, and I’m sorry the name escapes me at the moment, that the Israeli government had decided to demolish, raze, for a long period of time. And it had been built illegally. And it became the cause of the moment for Western activists. This was in, like, 2014, 2015.

And the State Department also put out a report on this village, and said, “This is terrible. This can’t be done. These—of course, the Obama era—this can’t be done.” And I was presented with this report by one of my staffers in the Canadian embassy, urging me to sign a letter that had been signed by all the others. And I said, “Well, I can’t do that without verifying what I’m signing. It’s making some pretty strong statements.”

And this particular staff person was not overly sympathetic to Israel. And so I said, “Why don't you go and I’ll arrange for you to meet with, you know, senior people.” And they did. And, “I want you to come back and report to me what you see.” To this person’s credit, they came back and reported the truth. And the truth was that nothing that was verified in the State Department report could be verified by her. None of these assertions. I said, “Well, on that basis, I can’t sign this letter then, can I, demanding X, Y, and Z.”

And I did speak to my American peers, at the time, and what shocked me was that they had been presented with the evidence by an NGO. They had not done any due diligence on it. I was shocked. Maybe I’m naive. So talking about, to Judith’s point, about the echo chamber, this information is taken as gospel, and that I had the temerity to question the State Department horrified my staff person.

Judith: Mm-hmm.

Vivian: But I’m a lawyer by training. That’s what we do.

Judith: Well, I have read, I have actually read of cases where researchers trying to get to the bottom of famine and Gaza are criticized for simply asking the question, because to do so is contemptuous and dismissive of the suffering of the children of Gaza. And this is done with an absolutely straight face. And it has real consequences, where people can’t get their questions answered and they’re treated like pariahs within the little world of researchers. You simply can’t ask certain questions.

Claire: How many times has The Washington Post or The New York Times had to issue an embarrassing retraction because they took a Hamas press release and ran with it as gospel truth? And then within days it was completely debunked. And then they do it again.

Vivian: I’m not counting, but I will say this: I’m a New York Times subscriber, through it all, because I do find value in a lot of what they produce. I am about to cancel my subscription. And the reason for that is the disgraceful interview that Ezra Klein did with Mahmoud Khalilthis week.

Claire: Oh, I didn’t listen to that. That bad, huh?

Vivian: Hen Mazzig did a very good analysis. I frankly could not listen to more than half. It was absolutely revolting. I think that interview lays bare everything you need to know about the ignorance or malevolence of that publication and people who seem determined to whitewash Hamas. … I don’t know Ezra Klein. He could be the nicest, most well-meaning person in the world.

Claire: He certainly seems like it.

Vivian: I’m sure he is. But he either did not have proper research done to prepare him for that interview, or he chose not to challenge outrageous statements that his interview subject was making.

Claire: Perhaps for the benefit of listeners who might not know which statements were outrageous and how they should have been challenged, just give us a quick rundown, if it’s not too disgusting.

Vivian: There are so many, but … perhaps the most chilling is his repeated comment that October 7th simply couldn’t be avoided. And Ezra Klein did not press him on that, and why he said that. He refused to respond in any meaningful way to the violence that was perpetrated on the 7th. And let’s not forget, it went on for a few days. It could not be avoided, and it was justified and justifiable. I could drill down into some of the things that I heard—like his continued insistence that the so-called March of Return that was this weekly exercise that was—

Claire: —totally peaceful, right?

Vivian: Yep.

Judith: Yeah.

Vivian: Totally peaceful. Yeah.

Judith: All those incendiary balloons were really peaceful. Yeah.

Vivian: Yeah. It was just kind of fabrication, outright fabrication after fabrication. And Ezra Klein, as I heard it, was much more concerned with demonstrating deep empathy with the Palestinian cause and with what Khalil went through when he was in ICE detention.

He also—Ezra Klein—chose to allow Khalil to present all of his activity, both before arriving in America and after arriving in America, as being peaceful in nature, focused on the dignity of the Palestinian people, and not in any way intending to promote the annihilation and destruction of the state of Israel. And I think that—Hen Mazzig does a very good job of picking it apart, so no need for me to reinvent the wheel. But I think that Ezra Klein should do some reading and very, very deep soul searching.

Claire: Yeah. Sounds like it. I didn’t read it, but I saw his byline over an article about how divided American Jews are and how awkward conversation was at the family table. And I’m suspecting that might be based on a personal experience there. I should read the article before discussing it. …

Okay. That was a good conversation—

Judith: It sure was.

Vivian: I think we had a wonderful conversation.

Claire: Yeah.

Vivian: Very candid and very honest.

Claire: I hope it gives people who are listening a sense of the real human beings about whom these headlines are written. Clearly, these are not two génocidaires.

Vivian: No.

Judith: Thank you.

Vivian: Thank you for bringing us together, Claire. What a lovely, really cathartic and—thank you for this free therapy session.

Claire: I want people to hear what people who really are going through this sound like, not the caricature.

Vivian: Alright. Bye girls!

Judith: Bye!

Claire: Bye!

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