The “Going, Going, Gantz!” Edition

Allison Kaplan Sommer, Noah Efron and Wunderkind writer, critic & activist Ohad Zeltzer-Zubida discuss three topics of incomparable importance and end with an anecdote about something in Israel that made them smile this week. --Going, Going, Gantz!-- Blue-and-White head Benny Gantz failed to form the “secular, Liberal, national-unity government” he sought. Did we dodge a bullet? --Politics by Other Means-- We hate to even ask, but: Is it possible that Israel’s recent skirmish with the rocket-firing Islamic Jihad in Gaza was timed for PM Netanyahu’s political purposes? --Fear and Firer-- Controversy ignites over a benefit concert for an ultra-Orthodox-run NGO that helps people navigate Israel’s health care system. What should we make of it? --Are Settlements More a Moral Problem Rather Than a Legal One?-- For our most unreasonably generous Patreon supporters, in our extra-special, special extra segment, we will discuss an essay in the Forward by Peter Beinart headlined, “Settlements Is Not That They Are Illegal. It’s That They Are Immoral.” This apropos the sound-and-fury-and-signifying-nothing statement by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo that, following Ronald Reagan, the Trump administration does not hold that civilian settlements in the occupied territories contravene international law. --Music-- Jasmin Moallem Leftovers Yoter Mi-Dai Call Me Noetzet Mabat, with Ari Brinker