The History Onion

This episode is the second installation in our series on the history of the Israel-Palestine conflict. Our first episode covered the very recent history of the conflict, looking at the round of violence that began in October of 2023 with a Hamas-led attack on Israel. The primary focus for that episode was the genocide that Israel has perpetrated against Palestinians in Gaza since the fall of 2023.

In this episode, we journey back to the early history of the conflict, looking at the linkages between Zionism and colonialism during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. As we investigate this early history, we introduce the overarching narrative put forward by Rashid Khalidi, a Palestinian-American historian, in his popular book The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine, about the history of the conflict: that this has been “a colonial war waged against the indigenous population, by a variety of parties, to force them to relinquish their homeland to another people against their will” (pg. 9). Our discussion focuses on the ways in which the early history of the conflict fits into this narrative framework.

Show Notes

False Messiahs: How Zionism’s dreams of liberation became entangled with colonialism (Boston Review, Winter 2024 issue)

Gaza in a Historical Perspective on Modern Genocide with Martin Shaw (ACMCU, 10/8/25)

The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine (Rashid Khalidi, 2020)

Credits

Theme music by our youngest brother Tate.

Cover art by Arthur Santoro.

Today we are excited to release our excellent conversation with Professor Kristoffer Smemo, author of Making Republicans Liberal: Social Struggle and the Politics of Compromise. Professor Smemo is a historian of labor, politics, and popular culture in the United States at the University of California - Los Angeles. Both hosts of the show were incredibly lucky to have been taught by Professor Smemo at Washington University in St. Louis.

Making Republicans Liberal details how a unique brand of liberalism developed within the Republican Party in response to mass movements of the mid-twentieth century. The book describes the contradictions and tension within this ideology, which we detail during our conversation. Importantly, we conclude the episode with a discussion of the lessons we can take away from the history of liberal Republicans as we try to regain control of our democracy today.

Show Notes

Purchase a copy of Making Republicans Liberal: Social Struggle and the Politics of Compromise here.

Past episodes from The History Onion mentioned during the show:

* Roosevelt’s Purge

* The Republican Evolution

Credits

Theme music by our youngest brother Tate.

Cover art by Arthur Santoro.

This episode marks the first installation of a new mini-series for the podcast. The series will cover the history of the Israel-Palestine conflict, and will take as a central text guiding us through this history a book titled The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine, which was written by the Palestinian-American historian Rashid Khalidi.

But before getting into the book, we wanted to start with an episode on the very recent history of the conflict—the round of violence that began on October 7th of 2023, when Hamas launched an attack against Israel that claimed the lives of roughly 1,200 people, and during which Hamas-led militants kidnapped about 250 people. As we discuss, what followed was an entirely disproportionate response by Israel, which, according to recent estimates, has left nearly 70,000 Palestinians dead. This response has risen to the level of genocide. That’s not just our opinion. This charge has been levied against Israel by a UN special committee, a UN commission of inquiry, the International Association of Genocide Scholars, as well as human rights groups including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Genocide Watch, and B’Tselem, among others.

Throughout this episode, we cover the death toll in Gaza, as well as other grim statistics about the current situation. We then get into the need for strengthening international institutions that can enforce international law effectively. And we break down in greater detail why it’s accurate to label the Israeli government’s assault on Gaza since October of 2023 a genocide. The episode concludes with some discussion of the current ceasefire in Gaza.

In the episodes following this one, we will return to the origins of the Israel-Palestine conflict and trace the conflict from there up through the present. The plan is to use Khalidi’s The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine to frame and inform these upcoming episodes to a substantial degree, but I’m sure we’ll end up incorporating plenty of other sources as well.

Show Notes

UNRWA Situation Report #195 on the Humanitarian Crisis in the Gaza Strip and the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem (UNRWA, 11/4/25)

The Human Toll of the Gaza War: Direct and Indirect Death from 7 October 2023 to 3 October 2025 (Brown University, 10/7/25)

For Cable News, a Palestinian Life Is Not the Same as an Israeli Life (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, 11/17/23)

Israel Is Committing Genocide in Gaza, U.N. Inquiry Says (New York Times, 9/16/25)

My U.N. Commission’s Finding: Israel Is Committing Genocide (New York Times, 9/16/25)

Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide

Where is the Gaza ‘peace process’ really going? (Guardian, 11/8/25)

Israel resumes Gaza ceasefire after 104 Palestinians killed in airstrikes (Axios, 10/28/25)

Credits

Theme music by our youngest brother Tate.

Cover art by Arthur Santoro.

For today’s episode, we spoke with Michael Foley, author of Citizen Cash: The Political Life and Times of Johnny Cash, for a wide-ranging discussion about Cash’s politics. We dissect Foley’s framework of a “politics of empathy” to describe how Cash navigated a complex political environment marked primarily by the various civil rights movements and the Vietnam War. Crucially, we consider the relevance of a politics of empathy in today’s climate, as well as the important role artists play in these increasingly troubling times.

Show Notes

* Find Citizen Cash: The Political Life and Times of Johnny Cash here.

* Michael Foley’s website

* Learn more about Farm Aid here.

* Johnny Cash sings “Man in Black” at Vanderbilt University

Credits

Theme music by our youngest brother Tate.

Cover art by Arthur Santoro.

In this episode, we dig deep into the slop of AI discourse. We start by looking at the culture of hype that’s sprouted in Silicon Valley, then turn to the strange world that this hype has produced, and finally present a more sober view of AI, one that’s deeply historically grounded.

Show Notes

Silicon Valley Braces for Chaos — The Atlantic, 5/13/2025

Sam Altman, Tim Cook, and other tech leaders lauded Trump at a White House AI dinner — Business Insider, 9/4/25

AI Is a Mass-Delusion Event — The Atlantic, 8/18/25

AI as Normal Technology — Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, 4/15/2025

Credits

Theme music by our youngest brother Tate.

Cover art by Arthur Santoro.

Today we are thrilled to release our interview with Melat Kiros, a progressive candidate for Congress in Colorado’s 1st District. Kiros is running to unseat the longest-serving representative of Colorado’s current congressional delegation, Democrat Diana DeGette, and she is doing so with an unabashedly progressive platform. She has centered issues of affordable housing, healthcare, and money in politics throughout her campaign, and she has been outspoken against the genocide being perpetrated by Israel against Palestinians.

Topics discussed include:

* How to get money out of politics and fix corruption

* Why Democratic resistance to Trump thus far has been largely ineffective

* How the Democrats have failed on the genocide in Gaza and what to do about it

* Why the free market isn’t what the right-wing says it is

Show Notes

Melat Kiros for Colorado

Credits

Theme music by our youngest brother Tate.

Cover art by Arthur Santoro.

Today we are joined by Jack Meyer, an economics masters student at Oxford, as well as an aspiring political economist and economic historian. His current areas of study include innovation, development and inequality. You can find him on Twitter/X @jackbmeyer and on Substack, where he publishes the newsletter Public Works.

On this episode, we take on Abundance, a bestselling book published earlier this year by the liberal commentators Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson. Jack has written a great review of the book on his Substack, which you can check out here. We use his review as a jumping-off point for an expansive discussion of the book and contemporary American politics.

Topics discussed include:

* Abundance and state capacity

* The policy program implied by Abundance, and its limits

* The cross-ideological appeal of Abundance

* Zohran Mamdani as an Abundance candidate

* How Abundance could figure into the future trajectory of the Democratic Party

Show Notes

A Note on Abundance (Jack Meyer, 9/15/25)

The thesis statement of Abundance: “This book is dedicated to a simple idea: to have the future we want, we need to build and invent more of what we need. That’s it. That’s the thesis.” (pg 3)

The Meager Agenda of Abundance Liberals (Washington Monthly, 3/23/25)

For a critique of the Abundance approach to state capacity: To Get Abundance, We Need to Discipline Capital (Jacobin, 6/17/25)

Credits

Theme music by our youngest brother Tate.

Cover art by Arthur Santoro.

Today we are joined by Ross Barkan, an award-winning journalist, novelist, and essayist. Ross is the Editor-in-Chief of The Metropolitan Review, a contributing writer to the New York Times Magazine, and a columnist for New York Magazine. He is also active on Substack, where he publishes his newsletter Political Currents. And he has a new novel, titled Glass Century, that is out now.

On this episode, we discuss Ross’s recent book Fascism or Genocide: How a Decade of Political Disorder Broke American Politics. The book focuses on the decade or so of American politics leading up to the 2024 presidential election, and the first part of the title comes from a quote from the director of an influential Palestinian advocacy group, who is quoted in the front flap of the book as saying of the 2024 election: “It’s a choice between fascism or genocide.”

Credits

Theme music by our youngest brother Tate.

Cover art by Arthur Santoro.

We are happy to announce our first interview episode, featuring friend of show Spencer Hacker! Spencer is a social worker, an activist, and a political content creator. He is based out of Denver, Colorado, and he is making waves with his show Spencer on the Street, which you can find on Instagram and TikTok!

On this episode, we talk with Spencer about his political journey and about the case for left-wing populism in America. We touch on the history of the populist movement, the failures of the Democratic establishment, and recent successes of left-wing populists such as Zohran Mamdani.

Show Notes

Previous eps on populism:

* The Pessimistic Style in American Politics

* The Paranoid Style in American Politics

* Listen, Liberal

Credits

Theme music by our youngest brother Tate.

Cover art by Arthur Santoro.

We ended our last episode with the United States contemplating its next move against the Chilean left. The socialist Salvador Allende had just won the Chilean presidency in the 1970 election in spite of the US’s covert actions throughout the decade prior and its “Spoiling Operation” in the 1970 election.

In today’s Part 2 of “The US in Chile,” we discuss how the US maneuvered to try to prevent Allende from being confirmed by the Chilean Congress, including their involvement in the assassination of General Rene Schneider. We then turn to the US’s posture towards Allende once he is confirmed by the Congress and remind our listeners of the US’s attempts to make the Chilean economy “scream.” Finally, we consider the US’s role in the 1973 coup that ousted Allende and installed General Augusto Pinochet as the head of a brutally repressive military dictatorship.

Show Notes

National Security Archive on the Schneider Assassination

60 Minutes Segment on Kissinger

Interview with Peter Kornbluh of the National Security Archive

Credits

Theme music by our youngest brother Tate.

Cover art by Arthur Santoro.