In this episode of the 18Forty Podcast, we talk to journalist Matti Friedman, author of Who By Fire: Leonard Cohen in the Sinai, about how the Israel-Hamas war is (mis)understood globally.

Additionally, we speak to a series of students and educators about the state of antisemitism on school campuses. Special thanks to these guests: Moshe, Micah Greenland, Derek Gormin, Ben Spanjer, Nati Stern, and Celeste.

In this episode we discuss:

• What gets lost in translation when we superimpose Americanized notions of racism and colonialism onto the Middle East?
• What drew Leonard Cohen to go to Israel during the Yom Kippur War?
• What help is being offered right now to Jewish students in American public schools?

Tune in to hear a conversation about Jewish identity, moral clarity, and human resilience in times of crisis.

Interview with Matti Friedman begins at 11:45.
Campus interviews begin at 37:46.

Matti Friedman’s work as a reporter has taken him from Lebanon to Morocco, Cairo, Moscow and Washington, D.C., and to conflicts in Israel and the Caucasus. He has been a correspondent for the Associated Press, and his writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, Tablet Magazine, and elsewhere. He grew up in Toronto and lives in Jerusalem. The Aleppo Codex, his first book (Algonquin, 2012) won the 2014 Sami Rohr Prize and the ALA's Sophie Brody Medal, among other honors. His second book, Pumpkinflowers: A Soldier's Story (Algonquin, May 2016) won starred reviews in Kirkus, Booklist, Publishers Weekly, and Library Journal, and was compared by the New York Times to Tim O'Brien's masterpiece The Things They Carried.

References:

Spies of No Country: Secret Lives at the Birth of Israel by Matti Friedman

Who By Fire: Leonard Cohen in the Sinai by Matti Friedman
“Who by Fire” by Leonard Cohen

“Who by Fire” by Rufus Wainwright and Amsterdam Sinfonietta

The Aleppo Codex: In Pursuit of One of the World’s Most Coveted, Sacred, and Mysterious Books by Matti Friedman

“An Insider’s Guide to the Most Important Story on Earth” by Matti Friedman

“Israel’s Problems Are Not Like America’s” by by Matti Friedman

Anti-Judaism: The Western Tradition by David Nirenberg

“The Decolonization Narrative Is Dangerous and False” by Simon Sebag Montefiore

“Leonard Cohen speaks about G-d consciousness and Judaism (1964)”

“The Anguished Fallout from a Pro-Palestinian Letter at Harvard” by Eren Orbey

“We Stand Together With Israel Against Hamas”

“Modernity and Messiah: On Parshas Noach and the Human Capacity for Revolution” by David Bashevkin

“Why Jews Cannot Stop Shaking Right Now” by Dara Horn