On the Nose

Jewish Currents
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On the Nose is a biweekly podcast by Jewish Currents, a magazine of the Jewish left founded in 1946. The editorial staff discusses the politics, culture, and questions that animate today’s Jewish left.

  1. 1 DAY AGO

    Who’s Afraid of the Z-Word

    Recently, the Jewish Federation of North America released a poll they conducted last year that shows that while 88% of respondents said they “believe Israel has the right to exist as a Jewish, democratic state,” only 37% identified as “Zionist.” A small number identified as “anti-Zionist” and “non-Zionist,” 7% and 8% respectively, with a plurality answering “not sure” (18%) or “none of these” (30%). These numbers are confusing; they seem to indicate that while Zionist identification is waning—perhaps due to the stink of the term amid the genocide—the underlying commitment to a Jewish state, albeit one paradoxically imagined as “democratic,” is not. At the recent Conference on the Jewish Left at Boston University, nearly every presentation discussed or confronted questions about the terms “Zionist” and “anti-Zionist,” and whether they had enough of an agreed-upon meaning within the community to be useful terms to organize around. On this episode of On the Nose, editor-in-chief Arielle Angel speaks with Ari Lev Fornari, senior rabbi at Kol Tzedek in Philadelphia; Dove Kent, interim executive director of Diaspora Alliance and former executive director of Jews For Racial and Economic Justice; and Fadi Quran, the senior director at Avaaz and a Ramallah-based strategist and organizer. They try to make sense of the recent polling numbers and discuss different strategic considerations about using the Z-word in organizing contexts, including how to welcome newcomers to the Palestine liberation movement without coddling them. Thanks to Jesse Brenneman for producing and to Nathan Salsburg for the use of his song “VIII (All That Were Calculated Have Passed).” Media Mentioned and Further Reading JFNA Survey of Jewish Life since October 7 – Zionism Findings “The ‘Zionism’ gap: What JFNA data really shows about Jews, Israel and Zionism today,” Mimi Kravetz, JTA Combined Jewish Philanthropies’ 2025 Greater Boston Jewish Community Study “Do American Jews Really Know What ‘Zionism’ Means?,” Mira Sucharov, Haaretz Jewish Electorate Institute July 2021 National Survey of Jewish Voters Synagogues Rising 2026 Conference on the Jewish Left sessions on YouTube Transcript forthcoming.

    1h 1m

  2. 12 FEB

    Epstein and the Capitalist Conspiracy

    Recently, the Department of Justice released millions of files from disgraced financier and pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. Since their release, part of the discussion has revolved around the way Jewishness appears in the files. Epstein and his friends make clannish jokes about Jews and “goyim,” many of them simultaneously self-deprecating and chauvinistic. Epstein himself is extremely interested in genetics, sending out a number of DNA Kits to Jews and non-Jews alike, and referencing a natural Ashkenazi intelligence. The files also show close—and sometimes criminal—relationships to a number of prominent Jewish men. These details, along with information about Epstein’s role as fixer for former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, have fueled conspiracy theories about Jewish power. But what do we do with a story whose real-life details are so fitted to antisemitic conspiracy? In this episode of On the Nose, editor-in-chief Arielle Angel speaks with author, thinker, and activist Naomi Klein about how to make sense of the capitalist conspiracy outlined in the files, and the grave importance of holding our depraved elites accountable. Thanks to Jesse Brenneman for producing and to Nathan Salsburg for the use of his song “VIII (All That Were Calculated Have Passed).” Media Mentioned and Further Reading Doppelganger: A Trip Into the Mirror World by Naomi Klein Harsha Walia on Epstein and sexual violence A collection of Epstein’s comments on “Jews” and “goyim” from Tikkun Olam “Eugenics Isn’t Dead—It’s Thriving in Tech,” Julia Métraux, Mother Jones “Jeffrey Epstein’s assistant ordered so many 23andMe kits, the company asked why,” Ariana Bindman, SFGate “The Myth of the Chosen Nation: The Colonial Period,” Richard T. Hughes “The crisis in modern masculinity,” Pankaj Mishra, The Guardian Epstein in China “Epstein tells ex-Israeli PM Ehud Barak to speak with Palantir founder Peter Thiel in released audio,” Middle East Eye “Epstein celebrated Brexit and ‘return to tribalism’, newly released emails suggest,” Millie Cooke, Independent “Jewish Moneylending,” Norman Roth, My Jewish Learning Here Where We Live Is Our Country by Molly Crabapple “Latest Epstein files release unleashes wave of antisemitic conspiracy theories on social media,” Grace Gilson, JTA “Epstein trained as an Israeli spy, FBI document says,” Peter McNamara, Middle East Eye “How the men in the Epstein files defeated #MeToo,” Elizabeth Lopatto, The Verge “The Right Kind of Continuity,” Ari Brostoff and Noah Kulwin, Jewish Currents Origins of Totalitarianism by Hannah Arendt “DOJ Files Contain Alleged Epstein-Gates Discussion on 'Getting Rid of Poor People,'” National Today “Peter Thiel and the Antichrist,” Ross Douthat, The New York Times “What Barak-Epstein audio says about Israeli controlling demographics,” Al Jazeera “U.N. Says It’s in Danger of Financial Collapse Because of Unpaid Dues,” Farnaz Fassihi, The New York Times “Why would Elon Musk pivot from Mars to the Moon all of a sudden?” Eric Berger, Ars Technica “New data reveals how Jewish neighborhoods split between Cuomo and Mamdani,” Jacob Kornbluh, The Forward

    41 min

  3. 29 JAN

    Fighting the ICE Occupation of Minnesota

    In December, ICE agents began arriving in Minneapolis under the Trump administration’s “Operation Metro Surge.” As of late January, 3,000 agents are on the ground in the city, outnumbering local police officers three-to-one, pursuing a campaign defined by its cruelty: ICE has abducted children as young as two, and agents have used those children as bait to draw out and arrest their families. To counter these efforts, locals have organized vast mutual aid and rapid response operations, with block-by-block networks mobilizing to deliver supplies and run errands for undocumented people who can’t leave their homes without fear of detention. These locals have been met with violence. On January 7th, Renee Good, a mother and poet, was shot in the face by an ICE agent while she attempted to turn her car around. On Saturday—one day after a general strike brought tens of thousands to the streets in subzero temperatures—Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse, was murdered while observing ICE, with agents firing at least ten shots at close range. On this episode of On the Nose, Jewish Currents editor-in-chief Arielle Angel speaks with three organizers on the ground in Minneapolis: Lily Cooper from UNIDOS’s rapid response team, which has conducted legal observer trainings for almost 30,000 people across Minnesota; Kandace Montgomery, a local organizer, trainer, and movement strategist who co-founded Black Visions in 2017; and Jesse Meisenhelter, an organizer with Minneapolis Families for Public Schools, whose current campaign aims to build sanctuary school teams across the state. They discuss the legacies of local organizing since George Floyd’s murder in 2020, the opportunities for the left-liberal coalition in this moment, and navigating the steep risks involved in this resistance work. Thanks to Jesse Brenneman for producing and to Nathan Salsburg for the use of his song “VIII (All That Were Calculated Have Passed).” Articles Mentioned and Further Reading “Organizing for Abolition in the Spotlight,” Kandance Montgomery and Hahrie Hahn, Hammer & Hope “Ten years ago, killing of Jamar Clark prompted wave of Twin Cities activism,” Danny Spewak, Kare11 The St. Paul Principles Minneapolis Families for Public Schools ICE OUT OF MN Toolkit UNIDOS MN and Monarca “ICE Is a Virtual Secret Police,” Jamelle Bouie, The New York Times “Minnesota National Guard mobilizes around Minneapolis following fatal shooting,” Jonathan Limehouse, USA Today “Minneapolis City Council votes unanimously to strengthen separation ordinance,” MPRnews “Minneapolis schools cancel classes after Border Patrol clash disrupts dismissal at Roosevelt,” Elizabeth Shockman, MPRnews “How Should Activists Relate to Risk?” Aryeh Bernstein and Maya Rosen, Jewish Currents “‘I heard screaming, I heard crying:’ Inside ICE detainment at the Whipple Building,” Katelyn Vue, Sahan Journal “ICE Making List of Anyone Who Films Them,” Ken Klippenstein, Substack “‘Trumped-Up Charges’: Out of Jail, Nekima Levy Armstrong Faces Prosecution for Anti-ICE Church Protest,” Democracy Now! “Whose Concentration Camps?” Noah Kulwin, Jewish Currents US Holocaust Museum tweet about Minneapolis “Trump ousts Biden-appointed Holocaust Museum board members, including Doug Emhoff,” Ed O’Keefe and Kathryn Watson, CBS News “Walz Invokes Holocaust, Calls ICE Agents ‘Modern-Day Gestapo,’” Lonny Goldsmith, TC Jewfolk An Open Letter from Catholic, Evangelical, and Jewish Community Leaders to Minnesota’s Federal, State, and Local Elected Officials Transcript forthcoming.

    1h 7m

  4. 15 JAN

    What Makes Marty Run?

    On Christmas, director Josh Safdie released his new film, Marty Supreme, starring Timothée Chalamet as a young table-tennis player bent on global recognition. Like Safdie’s previous film—Uncut Gems, co-directed with his brother Benny Safdie—Marty Supreme focuses on an American Jewish antihero and unfolds in a deeply Jewish milieu. But while Uncut Gems takes place in present-day New York, Marty Supreme transports us back to the Lower East Side of 1952, examining American Jewish ambition in the immediate aftermath of the Holocaust and amid assimilation into whiteness. This mid-century setting is complicated by various anachronistic elements, including a soundtrack rooted in the ’80s and, perhaps most notably, Chalamet’s conspicuous lack of a period-accurate accent. On this episode of On the Nose, Jewish Currents editor-in-chief Arielle Angel, senior editor Nathan Goldman, contributing editor David Klion, and contributing writer Mitch Abidor discuss what, if anything, the film has to say about American Jewishness then and now. Thanks to Jesse Brenneman for producing and to Nathan Salsburg for the use of his song “VIII (All That Were Calculated Have Passed).” Media Mentioned and Further Reading Uncut Gems, dir. Josh and Benny Safdie “An Unserious Man,” Jewish Currents “Marty Supreme’s Megawatt Personality,” Richard Brody, The New Yorker What Makes Sammy Run? by Budd Schulberg Erik Baker’s Letterboxd review Marie Antoinette, dir. Sofia Coppola Anti-Semite and Jew by Jean-Paul Sartre “Marty Supreme Is the Moment, With Josh Safdie!,” The Big Picture Tough Jews by Rich Cohen Mari Cohen on Sally Rooney’s Beautiful World, Where Are You, Jewish Currents Shabbat Reading List “Demon Doubt,” Vivian Gornick, interview by Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow, Boston Review “Is This Anything?,” Mitchell Abidor, Jewish Currents

    54 min

  5. 9 JAN

    The Imperial History Behind the Raid on Venezuela

    On Saturday, January 3rd, President Trump announced that a military raid on Caracas had captured Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro, and brought him back to the US to face drug charges. The operation followed months of deadly US strikes against boats purportedly ferrying drugs from Venezuela and a military buildup off its coast. But even after Maduro was seized, the administration still could not, or would not, clearly explain its intense interest in Venezuela any more than it could explain its plans for the country. And beyond the practicalities of “running” Venezuela, as Trump said the US would be doing, are even more disturbing questions about what comes next under the “Donroe doctrine”—the administration’s update of the 202-year-old Monroe Doctrine, which was used to justify generations of US interventions throughout the Western Hemisphere. This episode of On the Nose turns to a foremost expert on US interference in Latin America, Greg Grandin, to help us understand the historical context of Trump’s surge—and what it may suggest about his military adventures going forward. A Pulitzer Prize-winning history professor at Yale, Grandin has written several books on the tangled history of the US and Latin America, including his sweeping 2025 chronicle, America, América: A New History of the New World. Jewish Currents editor-at-large Peter Beinart asks Grandin to break down the political situation in Venezuela and the history of its nationalized oil reserves—and to explain what Trump’s new doctrine of pure power may hold in store for the US and the Americas. This episode originally appeared on The Beinart Notebook on Substack. Thanks to Daniel Kaufman for editing help and to Nathan Salsburg for the use of his song “VIII (All That Were Calculated Have Passed).” Books Mentioned and Further Reading America, América: A New History of the New World by Greg Grandin Empire’s Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Making of an Imperial Republic by Greg Grandin The End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America by Greg Grandin “What the ‘Donroe Doctrine’ is and where Trump could use it next,” Rebecca Falconer and Julianna Bragg, Axios “After Venezuela, Trump Offers Hints About What Could Be Next,” David E. Sanger, The New York Times “The Trump Doctrine,” Patrick Iber, Dissent Transcript forthcoming.

    41 min

  6. 17/12/2025

    Processing the Attack at Bondi Beach

    On December 14th, two gunmen opened fire on a celebration marking the first night of Hanukkah at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia, killing 15 and injuring more than 40. The gunmen, a father and son, have since been linked to the Islamic State. Immediately, as observers near and far were just beginning to process and mourn, bad actors rushed in to claim the narrative. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu offered a rebuke of Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, linking the antisemitic attack to Albanese’s call for a Palestinian state. Australian antisemitism envoy Jillian Segal similarly linked the attack to a peaceful August 3rd Palestine solidarity march over Harbour Bridge attended by 300,000. She used the opportunity to promote her controversial 20-point plan to combat antisemitism, which would necessitate the broad adoption of the flawed IHRA definition of antisemitism, mandate Trumpian funding cuts to universities, and crown herself arbiter of acceptable speech related to Israel/Palestine in the media. American politicians quickly weighed in to express solidarity with the state of Israel and link the violence to the nonviolent Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement. Some prominent American Jewish figures like New York Times columnist Bret Stephens and former US antisemitism envoy Deborah Lipstadt claimed—without evidence and before anything was known about the shooters—that the attack was downstream from use of the phrase “globalize the intifada,” a dig at New York City mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani who chose not to condemn the phrase. On this episode of On the Nose, Jewish Currents editor-in-chief Arielle Angel and senior editor Mari Cohen spoke with Sarah Schwartz, the Melbourne-based executive officer of the new progressive, independent Jewish organization the Jewish Council of Australia. They parsed the various responses, from Australia to the US to Israel; explored the folly of conflating the ideology of the Islamic State with Palestinian national or solidarity politics; and reflected on the role and responsibility of the Jewish left amid antisemitic violence. Thanks to Jesse Brenneman for producing and to Nathan Salsburg for the use of his song “VIII (All That Were Calculated Have Passed).” Articles Mentioned and Further Reading “Jews, antisemitism and power in Australia,” Max Kaiser, Meanjin “Bondi Beach Is What ‘Globalize the Intifada’ Looks Like,” Bret Stephens, The New York Times Benjamin Netanyahu’s statement on Bondi Beach Tweets from Rep. Claudia Tenney, Rep. Cory Mills, and Deborah Lipstadt “'Not a blame game': Antisemitism envoy responds to Bondi attack, following Netanyahu snipe,” Ewa Staszewska, Anna Henderson, SBS News “Labor is fast-tracking its response to the antisemitism envoy’s report after the Bondi attack. What are the recommendations?,” Sarah Basford Canales, The Guardian “I was at Bondi Beach last week. Our concerns were ignored,” Marina Rosenberg, eJewishPhilanthropy “A Canadian Antisemitism Statistic Went Viral—But It Has No Source,” Blake Lambert, Jewish Currents Israeli figures talking about antisemitism as an opportunity to trigger immigration to Israel “Sydney Gunmen Were Motivated by ISIS, Australia’s Leader Says,” The New York Times “Understanding ISIS’s Palestine Propaganda,” Samar Batrawi, Al-Shabaka “Islamic State's Response to October 7,” Ilana Winter, Washington Institute for Near East Policy “The importance of understanding the differences between Hamas, IS and al-Qaeda,” Dino Krause, Danish Institute for International Studies “The Centrality of Anti-Semitism in the Islamic State’s Ideology and Its Connection to Anti-Shiism,” Daniel Rickenbacher “Criminal complaint reveals new details in alleged ISIS-inspired plot to attack Jewish people in NYC,” Aaron Katersky, ABC News Tweet by Deputy Permanent Observer of the State of Palestine to the UN Majed Bamya “Australian state proposes ban on protests at places of worship to fight rising antisemitism,” Rod McGuirk, AP “The Tangled Knot of Anti-Zionist Violence,” Daniel May, Jewish Currents, and the accompanying letters “Chabad’s Extremist Turn,” On the Nose, Jewish Currents Rabbi Eli Schlanger’s Zionist activism Transcript forthcoming.

    55 min

  7. 11/12/2025

    Writing the Palestinian Diaspora

    This year saw the release of two memoirs concerned with the Palestinian diasporic experience. Tareq Baconi’s Fire in Every Direction is a story of queer adolescent unrequited love, braided together with a family history of displacement from Haifa to Beirut to Amman. Sarah Aziza’s The Hollow Half is a story of surviving anorexia and the ways that the body holds the intergenerational grief of the ongoing Nakba. In this episode of On the Nose, Jewish Currents editor-in-chief Arielle Angel speaks with Baconi and Aziza about what it means to claim Palestinianness as a political identity, not just a familial one, and the radical necessity of turning silence—around queerness, Gaza, the Nakba—into speech. Thanks to Jesse Brenneman for producing and to Nathan Salsburg for the use of his song “VIII (All That Were Calculated Have Passed).” Books Mentioned and Further Reading The Hollow Half by Sarah Aziza Fire in Every Direction by Tareq Baconi Hamas Contained: The Rise and Pacification of Palestinian Resistance by Tareq Baconi “Al-Atlal, Now: On Language and Silence in Gaza’s Wake,” Sarah Aziza, Literary Hub “The Work of the Witness,” Sarah Aziza, Jewish Currents “The Trap of Palestinian Participation,” Tareq Baconi, Jewish Currents Black Atlantic by Paul Gilroy “Selling the Holocaust,” Arielle Angel, Menachem Kaiser, and Maia Ipp, Jewish Currents

    45 min

  8. 04/12/2025

    Debating the “Palestine Laboratory”

    In spring 2023, journalist and filmmaker Antony Loewenstein published The Palestine Laboratory, a book tracing the way that Israeli military technology and weaponry, battle-tested on Palestinians, is exported around the world. Lowenstein argues that as Israel’s surveillance and combat technologies are sold far and wide, we can expect to see the forms of violence carried out in Gaza, for example, appear elsewhere in the world. Last month, Jewish Currents published an article by Rhys Machold called “The Myth of Israeli Innovation,” which takes a critical look at what Machold has termed “the laboratory thesis” and examines how it obscures Israel’s dependence on powerful allies, while doing PR for the overhyped Israeli tech sector. On this episode of On the Nose, Jewish Currents editor-in-chief Arielle Angel hosts Loewenstein and Machold for a comradely debate about the “laboratory thesis” and whether it serves a narrative of Zionist exceptionalism. The guests discuss how advanced Israeli weapons really are; how “Israeli” they are, given the role of Western governments and corporations in their development; and how much of Israel’s “innovation” should be considered technological as opposed to political. They also explore whether or not Israel is on the verge of collapse, and how to characterize the balance of power between Israel and the US. Thanks to Jesse Brenneman for producing and to Nathan Salsburg for the use of his song “VIII (All That Were Calculated Have Passed).” Articles and Media Mentioned and Further Reading The Palestine Laboratory by Antony Loewenstein The Palestine Laboratory, documentary series by Antony Loewenstein on Al Jazeera “The Myth of Israeli Innovation,” Rhys Machold, Jewish Currents “Reconsidering the laboratory thesis: Palestine/Israel and the geopolitics of representation,” Rhys Machold, Political Geography “How Palantir, Google & Amazon armed Israel's genocide in Gaza,” interview with Antony Loewenstein on The Big Picture, Middle East Eye “‘Lavender’: The AI machine directing Israel’s bombing spree in Gaza,” Yuval Abraham, +972 Magazine “Profiting from Terror in Cold War Latin America: Bishara Bahbah’s Israel and Latin America: The Military Connection,” Alexander Aviña, Liberated Texts “From Domination to Extermination,” Shir Hever, Phenomenal World “Global Spyware Scandal: Exposing Pegasus,” Frontline, PBS “Zionism is an anachronism,” Makdisi Street “The rot is very, very deep,” Makdisi Street Israel on the Brink by Ilan Pappé “How Israel’s War Economy Defied Economic Predictions,” Assaf Bondy and Adam Raz, Jacobin The Israeli Connection: Who Arms Israel and Why by Benjamin Beit-Hallahmi Drop Site reporting on “Epstein and Israel” by Ryan Grim and Murtaza Hussein “On Jeffrey Epstein,” On the Nose “Survey: Young, diverse generation of evangelicals shows growing ambivalence toward Israel,” Jack Jenkins, Religion News Service

    43 min
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About

On the Nose is a biweekly podcast by Jewish Currents, a magazine of the Jewish left founded in 1946. The editorial staff discusses the politics, culture, and questions that animate today’s Jewish left.

Information

  • Creator
    Jewish Currents
  • Years Active
    2021 - 2026
  • Episodes
    134
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Copyright 2026 Jewish Currents

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