The Free Press

This month, Dinaw Mengestu quit as president of PEN America—an organization dedicated to defending literature and free expression—to protest its publication of “A Silent Moratorium,” a report on Israeli and Jewish writers who described facing rising isolation and exclusion. The article featured interviews with some 30 writers, editors, and agents who described being ostracized, demonized, and silenced for failing to disavow Israel—and in some cases, for simply being Jewish. The piece was denounced by Mengestu, a novelist and journalist, as an “unethical” attempt to interfere with the “constitutional rights” of supporters of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement. He said the piece was part of PEN America’s “ongoing failure to defend free expression fairly and equitably.”

When he was hired in December, Mengestu declared that “If we do not make room for the plurality and range of voices embodied in our literature, we endanger not only our culture, but our democracy.” That noble aim is incompatible with the zero-sum logic of the BDS movement, which makes “freeing Palestine” contingent on erasing Israel, and insists on anathematizing voices at odds with its master narrative.

The word “Orwellian” has lost its sting in a world where the mayor of New York promises to enforce “international law” by arresting the prime minister of Israel—in compliance with a court that has no jurisdiction in the United States or Israel—and where an Ivy League student accuses Columbia’s administration of withholding “basic humanitarian aid” because it will not send snacks and water to students illegally occupying a building in the name of “freeing Palestine.”

But Orwellian is indeed the word, as William Kolbrener, who teaches creative writing at Bar-Ilan University in Israel, demonstrates below in his beautiful open letter to Mengestu. One of those interviewed for “A Silent Moratorium,” Kolbrener speaks in the name of the Israelis—Christian, Muslim, and Jewish—whose homeless writing he did his best to publish, and whose voices, like his own, testify that a commitment to free speech, literature, and democracy still matters.

—The Editors

Dear Dinaw,

You resigned this month as president of PEN America, an organization founded to defend writers, to protest a report it had published, “A Silent Moratorium.” The report documented something plain: Israeli and Jewish writers have been quietly pushed out of literary life since October 7, 2023—dropped from festivals, passed over for translation or publication, and struck from prize lists. You called this an “unethical” legal campaign that threatened the rights of those who wished to silence them.

Last week marked our second round of Supper Clubs, which bring Free Press subscribers together in real life—for dinner, conversation, and an introduction to people who might otherwise never cross paths. Thousands of you showed up again, in dozens of cities, on multiple continents. And some Free Press staff joined in.

Below you can find out what we discovered at our tables.

The next Free Press Supper Club takes place on August 20. See the full list of cities and get your ticket here. Last month’s dinners sold out quickly, and many August tables are already filling up. So if this sounds like your idea of a great night—book now! And remember: The Free Press Supper Club and The Free Press Forum are available exclusively to paid subscribers. If that’s not you yet, upgrade today.

—The Editors

Bari Weiss, co-founder and editor—Upper West Side, NYC

“Order the whole menu.” That’s what you say when you’re out with a dear friend who has just beaten back cancer and is in town to celebrate without her toddlers. Nellie, Suzy, our friends, and I were devouring said menu when our waitress came over to tell us that another table wanted to treat us to a round of drinks.

Is it possible we were being hit on? Alas. It was the next best thing: “It’s to thank you for The Free Press,” she said.

I hadn’t even realized there was a Supper Club happening on the other side of the room. Thanks to Julia, Elizabeth, Matthew, and Philip for making our night—and to all the Free Pressers, in Atlanta, Seattle, Denver, and everywhere else who came out to meet one another. It was such a thrill to see you out in the wild. Here’s a Free Press promise: If I’m dining at the same restaurant as Supper Club, the bill is on me! Can’t wait for more of these.

Frannie Block, investigative reporter—Atlanta, GA

On Wednesday night, I found myself sitting at a dinner table in metro Atlanta with a middle school teacher who shared her story of being adopted as a baby, a retired couple turning their love of travel into a second-act business, a Delta worker who spends her days off hiking trails in Patagonia and hopping on standby flights around the world, and a data engineer building an AI product inspired by his own climb out of credit card debt.

We talked about celebrating America’s 250th birthday and what we each love about our country—capitalism, freedom, and, surprisingly, hot dog–eating contests were the most popular answers. We traded theories about the future of artificial intelligence, went on tangents about loving libraries and how public spaces are becoming overrun by growing homelessness, and argued over whether FIFA and the World Cup have ruined the essence of sport—or whether sports have become a new kind of religion, especially for those who no longer practice a faith.

One of the reasons I love working at The Free Press is that we have the kind of readers who debate our stories and bring their own ideas to the comments section and The Free Press Forum. Which is why it was amazing to meet some of them in the flesh.

And the coolest part? While we dined in Atlanta, 2,350 other Free Pressers were doing the same thing in 34 cities across four countries. When I asked my tablemates why they signed up to eat with strangers, they all said the same thing: They wanted to meet people different from them, who shared the same hunger for intellectual curiosity and honest conversation. We started as strangers, but by the end, it was like we had been friends for years.

Sean Fischer, chief of staff—Soho, NYC

Sitting down to a Free Press Supper Club is like sitting down to a first date with a friend of a friend. There are some nerves, yes (what will they be like in person?), but more than that, there’s a sense of familiarity that comes from knowing you agree on a few basic facts (that Tough Love is the jolt our culture needs; that Nellie Bowles is the funniest woman in America; and that as long as Maya Sulkin and Olivia Reingold are reporters, the Ivy League will know no peace). And those shared facts (facts, yes) at a table made up of a psych grad student, a venture capitalist, an engineer, and three journalists are truly the only foundation you need for a raucous, fun, enlivening dinner. Did I order the most expensive dish on the menu under the mistaken impression that The Free Press was picking up the tab? Maybe. But it was 1,000 percent worth it to share a few hours with a new group of friends who I’ll undoubtedly see again soon.

Chelsea Jacobson, social media producer—Tel Aviv

Supper clubs aren’t just in America—I had a wonderful dinner in Tel Aviv! Our table was entirely women—all of whom had lived in at least one other country—and thankfully they helped me order because my Hebrew sucks. We talked politics, dating, life in America, life in Israel, and so much more. We’re still talking in a group chat. I feel very fortunate to have connected with such interesting, kind people who know so much about the world.

Tanner Nau, editorial fellow—Washington, D.C.

Over martinis and manicotti, my five dinner mates discussed how American politics went awry. A majority were retired, and recalled a time when ideas were debated, and political tribes weren’t as exclusive and sycophantic. They said one of the only places they can find that now is in the pages of The Free Press, and they subscribe in hope of returning to that bygone era.

Rafaela Siewert, executive producer—Soho, NYC

As the conversation jumped from potholes to the Han dynasty to whether Zohran Mamdani was actually a technocrat, I knew I was at a Free Press dinner. It was a night of political conversation, matchmaking, and shared plates. When we went around the table to answer “What’s the most unique thing to love about America?” some said diverse cuisines, beaches and mountains, and the Constitution (James Madison was a table favorite). I said air-conditioning, as it was 99 degrees that day. Where else would you round-robin that question, anyway?

Matt Ziegelstein, director of subscription growth—Washington, D.C.

A Hill intern, a philosophy degree holder, and a lobbyist walk into a bar. What do they have in common? They’re all Free Press subscribers from D.C. At our dinner we had real discussion about real issues—we shared opinions on gambling regulation, AI, and free speech on college campuses—all without getting (too) heated. We didn’t agree on everything. But we all respected one another and had a love of this country and what makes it great—and that to me is what made this a true Free Press dinner. And with the help of a couple of drinks, we had fun!

Alyssa Ajello, event manager—West Village, NYC

Each neighborhood has a secret after-party location revealed during dinner where every group dining in the area meets up to keep the fun going. When I excitedly walked up to West Village’s after-party spot, I was instantly met by Martha and George Washington—because you really never know what to expect at a Free Press party. Inside a packed bar, total strangers were already mingling like old friends, connecting over work, life, and love, and swapping ideas on how to fix the world one drink at a time. You leave with something rare these days: real hope and genuine IRL connection. I could tell the Washingtons were proud of their legacy that night. I left at 11:45 and the party was far from over.

“The goal of my entire career as an historian was to ensure that citizens learned the lessons of history—including the vital lesson that antisemitic rhetoric can be translated into genocidal reality if it is adopted by a modern state. Yet today, as AI permeates social networks, anti-history is spreading like a cancer.”

So wrote Free Press columnist Niall Ferguson after publishing, along with artificial intelligence researcher John-Clark Levin, a provocative essay titled “The Death of History.” In it, they argue that the institutions and methods that for decades have helped preserve historical truth are now being overwhelmed by AI and social media. Ferguson’s conclusion? “I have to admit: I have failed utterly.” It is an extraordinary admission from one of our nation’s leading historians, and one that has raised many questions in the days since: Have historians failed? Is truth itself losing its authority? Or is this just a new battlefield in an old fight?

To explore those questions, we turned to a group of leading historians, writers, and public intellectuals. Below, Victor Davis Hanson, Deborah Lipstadt, Bernard-Henri Lévy, Ben Shapiro, and others weigh in on whether we really are witnessing the death of history—and what, if anything, should come next. —The Editors

Niall Ferguson is, of course, correct that AI and social media supercharge sensationalized pseudo-history offered by the half-educated. He is also correct that the spread of pernicious lies allows a fake past to alter a real present.

But these dangers hardly suggest history is dead, and that historians are now defeated. The message of history is timeless, the medium of the new technologies transitory. Just because modern pumps deliver 3,000 gallons of water per minute versus 19th-century hand pumps that strained to produce three gallons does not mean the essence of water itself was changed by radically new delivery systems.

The nature of war remains understandable because human nature is constant—despite the bewildering new technologies of death that each generation conjures to supposedly “reinvent” war. In other words, figures such as Darryl Cooper, an online historian and Holocaust revisionist, have no monopoly on such methods of dissemination, some of which could equally be used to correct his nonsense—if there were a will to do so.

One reason why these electronic provocateurs succeed is the silence of historians. Too many are reluctant to wade into the online miasma and use their expertise for the public good. Academics as a species are not adverse to publicity—in fact, they yearn for public recognition—but rarely at the expense of crossing the internet mob. Daryl Coopers proliferate because the university turned history into melodrama and campus historians, too often, into nodding human bots.

“Too many are reluctant to wade into the online miasma and use their expertise for the public good.” —Victor Davis Hanson

Similarly, the farce that was The New York Times’ 1619 Project lived on far longer than it should have, since only a few American historians took the time and the heat to dismantle the faddishness and incoherence of its progenitor, Nikole Hannah-Jones.

But as the university continues to lose credibility with the public, and as renegade podcasts proliferate, historians must accelerate their own public outreach through online courses, intellectually honest historical podcasts, and, yes, new technologies that can crowd out the chaff of counterfeit history.

To suggest this is impossible is not just to surrender history to electrified ignorance, but to surrender learning itself.

Victor Davis Hanson is the author of hundreds of articles, book reviews, and newspaper editorials on Greek, agrarian, and military history. He has written or edited 24 books, including The Second World Wars: How the First Global Conflict Was Fought and Won.

Historian Niall Ferguson has just published, in The Free Press, together with the researcher John-Clark Levin, one of those essays that the United States has a particular talent for producing and which, like those of Francis Fukuyama or Samuel P. Huntington before it, shifts the center of public debate.

The article is entitled “The Death of History.”

It describes an America caught in the grip of a double antisemitism which, on the right, no longer bothers to conceal its nostalgia for Nazism and, on the left, believes it has found, in the denunciation of “genocidal Zionism,” the ultimate weapon.

It shows that Holocaust denial, the keystone of the whole edifice, has emerged from the sewers where it had languished for decades to become a force in history.

And it emphasizes the effects of artificial intelligence, which—with its fabricated voices and content orchestrated from digital farms—has given this torrent of lies and hatred an unprecedented power of dissemination.

Max Anderson is 13 years old and lives in Winnipeg. Like most Canadian teenagers, he uses social media. But he isn’t using it primarily to keep up with friends. Max watches videos on YouTube about fixing dirt bikes because he would like to get one someday, and he searches online for answers that “aren’t taught in school.”

That’s why Max is worried about Bill C-34, the crackdown on social media use proposed by the government last month. Of all the changes that would be imposed on social media platforms if the bill becomes law, perhaps the most sweeping is a prohibition on social media accounts for anyone younger than 16. The platforms would have to implement age verification or estimation procedures “adequate” enough to enforce the age restriction.

The idea seems widely popular among Canadian teenagers. Over 80 percent of those surveyed by market research and polling firm Ipsos said they support a minimum age requirement. Nearly 70 percent said they saw “content that was not appropriate for their age” between 11 and 15. Older teenagers were more apprehensive about what younger teenagers might be exposed to on social media than those younger teenagers were.

It’s Tuesday, July 21. This is The Front Page, your daily window into the world of The Free Press—and our take on the world at large. Today: Jonathan Swan on how Trump decided to go to war. Aaron Renn on why America needs a new kind of public intellectual. Masih Alinejad on the Iranian killing machine operating in plain sight. And much more.

But first: The fight for American progressivism.

There are a series of consequential political fights raging in America at the moment. The midterm battle for the Senate and the House, of course. The arm-wrestle for the MAGA crown after Trump departs. The civil war in the Democratic Party. Within that third contest is another clash, and it may be the most intense of them all. It’s over control of the left wing of the Democratic Party, and what it means to be a progressive in 2026.

The stakes are huge. How it plays out will not only define the future of one of our major parties but the outer limits of mainstream politics in America. It could end somewhere constructive—or somewhere very dark. (Only yesterday, one of the leading media figures on the left, the streamer Hasan Piker, praised the mass murderer Mao Zedong as “one of the great leaders of this world.”)

Today, we are bringing you three dispatches about this fight.

First, Peter Savodnik reports from Maine, where Democrats are set to nominate another progressive to replace Graham Platner, the scandal-ridden Senate candidate who dropped out of the race after an ex-girlfriend’s rape allegation earlier this month. The oysterman is out; a logger, Troy Jackson, is in. Platner built a powerful movement brimming with anger. Peter reports from anti-ICE protests and the campaign trail. He talks to voters who “trust no one,” and are setting the running in the Democratic party, not just in Maine but nationwide.

Up next, River Page profiles a group he calls the “Anti-Platners.” While the disgraced faux-oysterman painted a false picture of himself as a blue-collar populist and relied overwhelmingly on a base of college-educated supporters, other left-populists on the ballot this fall aren’t quite so inauthentic. River travels to Nebraska to meet mechanic-turned-candidate Dan Osborn, and digs into other races where the Democrats have nominated a progressive candidate who is neither a socialist nor a fake. Read River’s piece on what he thinks the party could learn from a mechanic, a smoke jumper, and an ordinary firefighter.

Candidates are one thing. The most important organization on the far left of our politics is the Democratic Socialists of America. They are on the march, with membership surging and their candidates winning primaries from New York to Colorado. But what they actually believe is the subject of much debate. The president calls them communists, plain and simple. Some of their defenders say they just want European-style welfare spending and an end to forever wars. There’s a simple way to settle the debate: Let the DSA explain itself. The group released a policy platform last week. We asked Jake Altman, who was once a DSA member himself before moving to the right, to read it and explain exactly what kind of a future the DSA wants.

—Oliver Wiseman

• On Monday, the U.S launched strikes on Iran for the 10th consecutive night, as gas prices climbed to $4 a gallon nationally and Yemen’s Houthi rebels threatened to cut off Red Sea oil exports—potentially closing off the last major alternative shipping route to the blocked Strait of Hormuz. Pakistan’s interior minister said diplomatic talks with the U.S. and Iran are underway.

• Trump levied a 50 percent tariff on most Canadian imports yesterday, including cars, alcohol, and dairy, citing longstanding trade disputes and retaliatory measures Canada took against earlier U.S. tariffs. The move covers goods that had been shielded under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, which expired earlier this month.

• The Food and Drug Administration rescinded its finding that Taylor Farms lettuce tested positive for cyclospora—a parasite that causes severe diarrhea and stomach pain—saying the result was a false positive. It continues to advise consumers not to eat recalled lettuce, and officials say evidence tying the company’s produce to thousands of reported illnesses remains compelling despite the lab error.

• A U.S. Army veteran was arrested after lighting off fireworks and starting a fire outside a federal building in Manhattan that houses the FBI, ICE, and other agencies. Authorities said Andrew Arrabaca, 43, allegedly arrived with axes, knives, and a cart bearing an anti-ICE slogan; three people suffered minor injuries.

• Darline Graham Nordone, the sister of the late senator Lindsey Graham and his appointed placeholder, confirmed she will run in the special election to hold the seat for a full term. Trump has endorsed Nordone ahead of the August 11 Republican primary.

• A California federal judge temporarily blocked the proposed $81 billion merger of Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery, issuing a 14-day restraining order while the courts weigh an antitrust challenge brought by a dozen states. The deal, which had sailed through federal regulators, now faces a new hurdle with a preliminary injunction hearing set for early August.

• Andy Burnham was sworn in as Britain’s new prime minister, becoming the country’s seventh leader in a decade after Keir Starmer stepped down following two turbulent years in office. Burnham, the former mayor of Greater Manchester, pledged to cut the cost of living and restore public trust in government, saying that politicians “need to be better.”

Jonathan Swan, a White House reporter for The New York Times, joins School of War to discuss the reporting behind his new book, Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump, co-authored with Maggie Haberman. How does Donald Trump make geopolitical decisions? What drove him to join Israel’s war against Iran? How has his thinking on Ukrai…

Candidates backed by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) keep racking up primary victories, and skeptics and fans alike are struggling to determine what the organization actually believes. President Donald Trump says they are “communists.” One prominent DSA member, Jacobin publisher Bhaskar Sunkara, says they are a “milquetoast organization” seeking Scandinavian social democracy, with no interest in violent revolution.

I was a member of the DSA from the 2010s until 2022. During that time, I witnessed a rise in extremism, ranging from an eagerness to collaborate with Leninist groups to a growing animosity toward the U.S. and the West. My final departure was prompted by a DSA statement that attributed Russia’s aggression against Ukraine to American “imperialist expansionism.”

So what does the DSA stand for? An answer to that question arrived last week in the form of a new platform. Among the DSA’s core aims are ending the presidency and Supreme Court. Abolishing prisons. Universal free housing. The elimination of all debt. Closing all U.S. military bases overseas. Lifting all sanctions from Cuba, Venezuela, and Iran. And so much more.

Yesterday, I woke up to a message that broke my heart. Erfan Esfandiari had been hanged. He was 18 years old, and his parents’ only child. His crime, according to reports circulated by Iranian journalists and human rights activists, was opening a door. Specifically, he opened his door to let terrified protesters in as they ran from security forces during the January 2026 uprising against the Iranian regime.

That act of compassion was enough to send him to the gallows.

On that same Sunday morning, the regime hanged Gol-Mohammad Mohammadi, a 23-year-old Afghan refugee who had fled to Iran seeking safety. His crime, according to those same reports, was identical: He opened his door for protesters fleeing bullets. He was arrested, thrown into a show trial, and forced to endure three hearings, each lasting one hour. There was no independent lawyer.

Erfan and Gol-Mohammad were two of 59 men arrested together during the January uprising, in what has since become known as the Alikhani Square case. The two of them, alongside 10 others, were sentenced to death. Last week, all 12 were moved to quarantine. That is the signal: For the 10 still alive, execution is likely imminent.

On Sunday, the chess champion Garry Kasparov posted a comment on X about the executions. “How tragic that these executions became the norm in Iran and accepted as such by the Free World,” he wrote.

He’s right. The world is not paying enough attention. While diplomats negotiate, bombs fall, and flimsy ceasefire agreements are signed, the Islamic Republic of Iran has been running a quiet, systematic execution campaign against the young people who dared to stand up for their freedom. And they are using the world’s distraction as cover.

During the war, President Donald Trump publicly urged the Islamic Republic’s leaders to stop executing protesters. He even said they promised they would. But we Iranians knew better. We knew that the regime was only buying time to turn mass arrests into mass executions. That is exactly what has happened.

SEWARD, Nebraska — Just three days after Graham Platner officially withdrew from the Maine Senate race in the wake of allegations that he’d raped an ex-girlfriend, another candidate 1,500 miles away was quick to set the record straight: He has nothing to do with the men who helped make that dumpster fire of a campaign possible. At least, not anymore.

“They don’t work for me,” said Dan Osborn after a town hall in Seward, Nebraska, a small farming town near Lincoln. The independent Senate candidate, who has the official backing of the Nebraska state Democratic Party, is referring to Morris Katz and Daniel Moraff, two prolific young Democratic consultants who helped recruit both Platner and Osborn, among other nontraditional stars of the left. After Platner’s campaign imploded, a group of 15 Republican female Nebraska state senators had demanded that Osborn fire the campaign boosters.

“Daniel Moraff stopped working for me before all this happened in June,” said Osborn, a former industrial mechanic and labor leader who outperformed Kamala Harris by 14 points in Nebraska during his first run for Senate in 2024, which he lost. “[Moraff] was a minor consultant on the campaign and he just kind of outwore his worth to me. Morris [Katz] hasn’t worked for me since 2024. . . . He made ads for me. There’s a lot of people who make ads. I wouldn’t hire him again.”

Osborn was even more emphatic when he distinguished himself from his former counterpart in Maine. “I don’t share the same values as Graham Platner.”