Call Me Back - with Dan Senor Unlocked FM

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Over the past 8 months, we've focused most of our attention on Israel's perspective and the American perspective since October 7th. But what we wanted to do today is gradually zoom out from Israel and Gaza, to the perspective of other regional players in the Middle East, and finally examine this war from the perspective of the global powers, especially China and Russia. Has the Israel-Hamas war advanced their interests or reversed them?

Our guest today is Walter Russell Mead. He is at the Hudson Institute, he is the Global View Columnist at The Wall Street Journal. He was previously the Henry Kissinger fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. He also has a terrific podcast at Tablet Magazine, called What Really Matters: https://www.tabletmag.com/podcasts/what-really-matters

He is also a prolific author. His most recent book is -- The Arc of a Covenant: The United States, Israel, and the Fate of the Jewish People, which you order here -- shorturl.at/bdhpz

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Tzipi Livni has served as a minister of eight different cabinet ministries under three prime ministers: Ariel Sharon, Ehud Olmert, and Benjamin Netanyahu. Her positions have included Justice Minister, Foreign Minister and Vice-Prime Minister. She has also been the official leader of the opposition.

As foreign minister, Tzipi Livni led negotiations with the Palestinian Authority, she was a key government figure during Israel’s disengagement from Gaza and during Hamas’s subsequent takeover of Gaza. She was foreign minister during Israel’s Second Lebanon War and during Israel’s operation to take out Syria’s nuclear reactor.

She began her service as a member of the Likud Party, and then the Kadima Party, and later the Hatnua Party and Zionist Union.

Earlier in her career, Tzipi served in the Mossad (including in the elite unit famous for being responsible for the assassinations following the Munich massacre).

No major Israeli political figure has had more recent experience trying to negotiate a two-state solution than Tzipi Livni.

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Tzipi Livni has served as a minister of eight different cabinet ministries under three prime ministers: Ariel Sharon, Ehud Olmert, and Benjamin Netanyahu. Her positions have included Justice Minister, Foreign Minister and Vice-Prime Minister. She has also been the official leader of the opposition.

As foreign minister, Tzipi Livni led negotiations with the Palestinian Authority, she was a key government figure during Israel’s disengagement from Gaza and during Hamas’s subsequent takeover of Gaza. She was foreign minister during Israel’s Second Lebanon War and during Israel’s operation to take out Syria’s nuclear reactor.

She began her service as a member of the Likud Party, and then the Kadima Party, and later the Hatnua Party and Zionist Union.

Earlier in her career, Tzipi served in the Mossad (including in the elite unit famous for being responsible for the assassinations following the Munich massacre).

No major Israeli political figure has had more recent experience trying to negotiate a two-state solution than Tzipi Livni.

Tzipi Livni on X: https://x.com/Tzipi_Livni

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Today during one of our regular check-ins with Haviv Rettig Gur, we had some big questions:

I) How is the war actually going? What do we know?
II) Following President Biden’s announcement last Friday, was the proposal he revealed the official proposal that Israel is offering Hamas? And if it is, why did the war cabinet approve it?
III) As for Egypt, do we now have a clearer picture of why Egypt was so hysterically opposed to an IDF operation in Rafah?
IV) And, finally, Prime Minister Netanyahu has been invited to address the U.S. Congress? What’s likely to happen when he comes to the nation’s capital?

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Since October 7, there has been a debate inside Israel about what cost Israelis should pay as a society to get their fellow citizens home, or, what the cost would be to Israeli society if their fellow citizens do not return home.

One perspective we have not heard is that of a professional who led the debriefing of every single living hostage upon return, including children, women and the elderly; those who were held in underground tunnels and those who were held in apartments above ground by Gazan families; those who were held captive alone and those who were held captive with other Israelis; those who were medically treated, and those who were tortured.

Glenn Cohen is that person. He made aliyah to Israel from the United States as a young man and joined the IDF. He had an impressive and improbable career in the military (which we chronicle in Chapter 12 of THE GENIUS OF ISRAEL - https://tinyurl.com/4hpxsx2x).

Glenn was an air force pilot, a Mossad officer, a hostage negotiator, and a special forces psychologist. He served in the Mossad for 25 years, retiring as the Chief of Psychology with the equivalent rank of Colonel. During the current Israel-Hamas war, Glenn served for over 100 days in reserve duty as the head psychologist of a team that debriefed the hostages upon their return.

To reach Glenn Cohen or learn more about his work, visit: https://www.glenn-cohen.com/

Rachel Goldberg Polin's speech that was featured in the episode, can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZX79M3k-L4

To learn more about Hersh Goldberg-Polin: https://m.facebook.com/BringHershHome

OR

IG: Bring.Hersh.Home

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Earlier this morning, the International Court of Justice ordered Israel to immediately halt its military operations in Rafah.

This comes less than a week after the ICC announced that it is considering arrest warrants against Prime Minister Netanyahu and Defense Minister Gallant, and days after three European countries announced that they will formally recognize a Palestinian State (that doesn’t yet exist!)

In this special episode, recorded just minutes after the ICJ announcement, we were joined by Nadav Eyal (journalist with Yediot in Israel) and by Matt Waxman (Columbia Law School professor and former national security legal official in the George W. Bush administration) to unpack each of these developments.