Think Twice with Jonathan Tobin

The global surge of antisemitism that followed the Hamas-led Palestinian Arab terror attacks on Israel was no spontaneous outburst of hate. According to JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin, it’s clear that it was not only the product of years of preparation by ideologues recycling Soviet-era propaganda aimed at delegitimizing Israel and Jewish rights. It was also the direct result of funding and planning carried out by Islamists in Qatar and other Middle sources as well as UN agencies, NGOs, non-profits, and charities who were behind this effort.   He’s joined in this week’s episode of Think Twice by Canadian political consultant Warren Kinsella, author of the new book, The Hidden Hand: The Information War and the Rise of Antisemitic Propaganda. Kinsella asserts that the best way to understand the insidious effort to rationalize and/or defend Hamas and demonize the Jewish state and its supporters is to think of it as the moral equivalent of a political campaign. He argues that this is a story that the mainstream media has ignored as it became the willing stenographer for antisemitic terrorists.   Kinsella points out that this plot to destroy Israel is a highly sophisticated plan that relies heavily on social media algorithms aimed especially at influencing young people. The author, who isn’t Jewish, believes it's imperative to recognize the threat Islamist hate poses to the West, not just Israel.   He worries that despite the fact that it has a great story to tell and has the truth on its side, the state of Israel is failing to get its message across to those being indoctrinated in the antisemitic narrative in the West. He believes it is imperative for Jerusalem to start taking this threat seriously. Just as important, he thinks all people of goodwill must push back against the blood libels being spread about Jews in the media. Kinsella believes what's at stake is not just Israel and the Jewish people, it's democracy and civilization itself.   Listen/Subscribe to weekly episodes on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube Music, iHeart Radio or wherever you listen to your podcasts.   Watch new episodes every week by subscribing to the JNS YouTube Channel.

Is it possible for America to defeat its Islamist enemies like the Iranian terror regime when they resort to asymmetrical warfare? And does President Donald Trump truly understand that diplomacy will  never convince Tehran and its terrorist proxies to give up their war on the West? Those are the questions posed by JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin about whether the United States will resume efforts to stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons and spreading terror around the world.   He’s joined in this week’s episode of Think Twice by Jonathan Schanzer, the executive director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. According to Schanzer, the “rules-based international order” created in the aftermath of World War II” appear to be “binding the hands of the United States” and preventing it from conclusively defeating enemies like Iran. The answer, he says, is that, “if our hands are tied, we're the stronger power and we have justice on our side, but yet cannot take the action that is necessary in order to win based on rules that we created,” that’s a problem. “It may be time to revise them,” he concludes.   He argues that the efforts of Trump envoys and advisers Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, backed by Vice President JD Vance, to get Iran to agree to give up its nuclear program or to persuade Hamas and Hezbollah to lay down their arms in Gaza and Lebanon is “not feasible.” They can’t be won over by diplomacy, something that was proved by the failures of the Obama and Biden administrations. Instead, they can be defeated. What Trump needs, says Schanzer, is a “new strategy” that will offset the advantages Iran has gained because of the rise in the price of oil and the American shortage of munitions.   The stakes in this conflict, Schanzer asserts, are enormous. If Iran is defeated, it will help facilitate the creation of IMEC—an Indian-Middle East energy corridor—that will connect the subcontinent to Europe via moderate Arab nations and Israel that will transform the international situation for the better. The alternative would be the advance of the so-called STEP alliance of Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Egypt and Pakistan, that will be an Islamist obstacle to regional stability, American influence and normalization of relations between the Arab and Muslim world with Israel.

Though overlooked because of the impact and fame of his charismatic successor, the sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn was one of the most impactful figures in 20th century Jewish history. And he’s the subject of a new biography, Undaunted by Rabbi David Eliezrie, who joins JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin for this week’s episode of Think Twice.   Eliezrie, the founder and leader of North County Chabad/Congregation Beth Meir HaCohen in Yorba Linda, California has written the first scholarly biography of Schneersohn and acknowledges that although he was considered a major figure during his lifetime, he has been eclipsed by the seventh Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneersohn. But the transformation of Chabad from a small sect of Hasidic Jewry to its current status as one of the most important forces in modern Jewish life was only made possible by the sixth rebbe’s successful struggles to save Soviet Jews and reimagine American Judaism.   The story of this rebbe is, as Eliezrie notes, a saga that encompasses the key struggles of 20th century Jewish history. Displaced from its traditional home in the Russian town of Lubavitch by the First World War, Schneersohn and Chabad found themselves the center of resistance against Communism efforts (led by Jewish Bolsheviks) to eradicate Judaism. Eliezrie’s book tells the story of, despite ill health, threats, imprisonment and a death sentence against him handed down by Moscow, the rebbe stubbornly insisted on fighting to keep Jewish education and practice alive in the Soviet Union.   After a narrow escape from the Nazis at the start of the Second World War, the rebbe came to the United States. There, he first supported efforts for rescue of European Jewry, which was opposed by the American Jewish establishment that feared offending President Franklin D. Roosevelt. He also chose, unlike other Orthodox movements who felt maintaining their own communities was the priority, to emphasize outreach and bringing Judaism and Jewish learning to all Jews, regardless of their affiliation and observance. In this way, Eliezrie says, he helped transform American Jewish life and set the stage for his successor’s subsequent successful revolutionary international outreach campaign.   Perhaps just as important was Schneersohn’s willingness to put aside past disagreements with Zionism after the birth of the modern state of Israel in 1948. Though not formally Zionist and opposed to secular nationalism replacing Judaism, the rebbe took a stand that opposed the Haredi world’s efforts to remain separate from modern Israeli society. As a result, as Eliezrie says, “We want to be engaged with that society. The previous Rebbe told his followers everybody has to share in the defense of the country, that we have to go to the army.” The author notes that surveys of American Jewry show that the largest percentage of American Jews who identify as Zionists are actually those who affiliate with Chabad synagogues.