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Notes on The Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway: Episode "The Deal That Ended the Gaza War — with Dan Senor"
Episode Overview In this episode, Scott Galloway interviews Dan Senor, co-author of "The Genius of Israel" and host of the "Call Me Back" podcast. The conversation centers around the recent peace deal involving Hamas and Israel, its implications for the Middle East, and the geopolitical shifts in the region.
Key Themes and Discussions
The Cessation of Hostilities
- Significant Event: The episode highlights the crucial moment when Hamas released 20 hostages, which coincided with Israel's release of approximately 2,000 Palestinian prisoners.
- Trump's Influence: Former President Trump is noted for advocating Israel's actions despite international pressure, which, according to Senor, played a role in Hamas’s decision-making.
Process Leading to the Deal
- Israel’s Decisions: Israel's entry into Gaza City, viewed as a controversial move, surprisingly led to a realization for Hamas that they could not rely on international pressure or leverage through hostages.
- Regional Dynamics: The interview discusses how actions taken by Israel and the U.S. affected other Arab nations and their stance towards Hamas, leading to pressure for negotiations.
Negotiation Tactics
- Trump's Approach: The negotiation strategy focused on accepting Hamas's willingness to release all hostages at once, which was previously thought impossible. This shift from gradual release to an all-at-once deal caught experts off guard.
- Critical Thinking: Senor stresses that one must critically assess the situation rather than reacting impulsively based on initial announcements or media coverage.
Political Landscape Israel's Governance
- Netanyahu’s Position: The future of Netanyahu is uncertain as he faces the fallout from the war and potential threats from the hard right in his government.
- Voter Sentiment: Israelis are likely to reconsider their leadership given the recent events, with a focus on whether Netanyahu can leverage this deal to secure his political future.
Regional Players
- Role of Arab States: The discussion includes how countries like Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, and Egypt are positioned in the new geopolitical landscape and the potential for these nations to influence future governance in Gaza.
- Understanding Qatar's Strategy: Qatar’s dual role as a supporter of Hamas while simultaneously seeking stability in the region is emphasized, highlighting its unique position among Arab states.
Future of Gaza Governance Challenges
- Post-War Governance: The potential governance structure in Gaza remains uncertain, with discussions of a transitional technocratic body to manage humanitarian efforts and rebuild infrastructure.
- Hamas's Role: The interview raises questions about whether Hamas will maintain significance in governance despite military setbacks.
Disarmament Concerns
- Hamas’s Military Capacity: While Hamas has lost much of its military capability, there is worry about how disarmament will be managed and whether former prisoners will pose new threats.
Broader Implications Winners and Losers
- Winners: Israel, the U.S., the Palestinian people (due to the end of hostilities), and the Arab world (for potential stability).
- Losers: Most European nations and Hamas, particularly because of their lack of influence in the peace negotiations.
Anti-Semitism and Global Sentiment
- Rise in Anti-Semitism: The episode touches on the concerning rise of anti-Semitism, especially within Western countries, and the impact it has on global Jewish communities.
- Emergence of New Voices: There is hope that the recent events have mobilized a new generation of Jews who are more engaged and supportive of Israel.
Conclusion
- Historical Perspective: The conversation concludes with reflections on the transformation of geopolitics in the region, the potential for future conflict, and the importance of sustained engagement in Jewish identity and global Jewish issues.
- Call to Action: The need for individuals to not only fight against anti-Semitism but to also celebrate and embrace their Jewish identity is emphasized, recognizing the importance of community and cultural connections.
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This markdown file captures the essence of the podcast episode, summarizing critical discussions and insights shared by Scott Galloway and Dan Senor.
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Transcript
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.0:27Adobe Acrobat Studio, so brand new. Whether you're a founder, investor, or innovation company executive, you need a bank that truly understands your business inside and out. A bank that offers uniquely specialized solutions for your unique needs. A bank like Silicon Valley Bank. Silicon Valley Bank is still the SVB you know and trust. The only difference? SVB is now backed by the strength and stability of First Citizens Bank. Yes, SVB. Learn more at svb.com slash box. Not all journalism is the same. Take The Guardian. Our coverage has something unique. Fierce independence. Nobody owns us or tells us what we can and can't say.
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1:34Today marks arguably the most significant moment since the war in Gaza began two years ago. Hamas freed 20 remaining hostages, and Israel released some 2 ,000 Palestinian prisoners as the first step in Trump's proposed peace deal. Israel and Hamas haven't agreed on the broader terms yet, but Trump's already declared, quote, the war is over. We wanted to speak to somebody who could give us the most inside color nuance around this situation. And there was like one name that immediately came to mind, and that's Dan Sinor. Dan is a leading expert on Israel in the Middle East. He's the co-author of The Genius of Israel and Startup Nation.
2:11He's also the host of the Call Me Back podcast, which has been really just a kind of a lighthouse in a sea of misinformation and propaganda. and has become kind of the go-to source for information on this topic. Anyways, Dan, very much appreciate you taking time on what must be just an incredibly busy day for you. Thank you, Scott. It is a crazy, insane day of mixed emotions. You have been a thought partner with me on this over the last couple years, and some of my most meaningful conversations, I mean this, were not on my podcast, were on your podcast, and also having you on mine. And so I was happy to do this.
2:55So let's start with, it feels that Mark Twain saying, how do you go bankrupt? Slowly, then suddenly. It feels like this deal came about slowly, then suddenly. Can you give us any nuance into over the last 30 or 15 days, how did this culminate in a deal? Who were the parties? What were the pieces on the chessboard? And what were the critical events and or parties in bringing this deal to fruition? I've been thinking about that a lot because I think there's a tendency, Scott, you know, what you do and I do and what a lot of other folks do and trying to make sense of moments in news cycles. And there's a tendency to just have these snap reactions to events and snap analysis.
3:38And we live in this moment where the moment there's, you know, one conversation that is reported out between two leaders and then there's suddenly notifications out. Then there's whole, you know, cycles of articles written about a tense conversation or a good conversation and trying to make sense of every minute. As opposed to taking a step back and sort of letting events play out and then try to like stitch them together. And so when I think about some of the moments that occurred over the last really four weeks, four or five weeks, that there was this instant analysis and consensus on what they meant.
4:12And we now know it was all kind of wrong. So I'm just want to rattle off some of them because it gets to the question you're asking. So one was Israel's decision to go into Gaza City. So keep in mind, as you know, and as I think many of your listeners know, Gaza City was the last stronghold, the last Hamas stronghold in Gaza, sort of like Hamas's Berlin or Hamas's Moscow. And Israel had avoided going into Gaza City for most of the war. And now it made clear that it was going in. And everybody seemed to be against it. Obviously, in the international community, leaders, the UN, Europe, everyone was going crazy that Israel cannot do this.
4:55Hamas obviously was was going crazy, saying Israel cannot do this. And there was even division within Israeli society. Israelis were against it. The Israeli military was against it. And it was certain that it was just going to prolong the war, result in many more IDF casualties, result in many more Palestinian casualties and and risk the hostages. And everyone just thought this was the craziest thing in the world. what we now know is that Israel's decision to defy all that pressure and that backlash and say no we're going in no matter what and when the world expected well at least the U.S. will reign in Israel and not let Israel do this President Trump said no Israel can do this and should do this and and there's no daylight and we have Israel's back and that we and at the time everyone thought that It was crazy.
5:45And what we now know, and even critics of that decision, who I just recorded a podcast with today, concede in retrospect, that more than anything flipped out Hamas because they realized that there was no one reigning in Israel. that this notion that Hamas could always use the hostages and the threat to the hostages as leverage against Israel would always reign in Israel. That the fact that that leverage or that currency was suddenly being devalued led Hamas to realize we are on our own. We may want to get back to the negotiating table. That's the first thing. The second thing is, I think history will look back at the Israeli operation in Doha, the attempted strike against Hamas, which was a failure and was deemed a failure at the time.
6:34I think that had a catalytic effect, even though it was a failure. It sent a message to the region that you in Doha or Abu Dhabi or Riyadh or wherever may think that this war, as controversial as it is in the region, will stay contained to the Israel-Gaza border. And the fire is moving around the region and the fire could come anywhere. And so I think that put a lot of pressure on some of these Arab capitals to tell Hamas enough, you know, we need to we need to get to a deal. And then the third and fourth thing, which are items which I think are connected. And this is going to be controversial, I think, for many people listening to this podcast, but I have to say it.
7:20I think that President Trump's decision to do two things. One, to send in Steve Whitcoff and Jared Kushner, who we know are not career diplomats, but everyone in the region knows these are two individuals that are extremely close to him. And in the Middle East, that matters a lot. That the sense of family, the sense of personal connection, when the leaders in the region knew that Jared and Whitcoff had been empowered by the president to go close the deal. it it it elevated the stakes for many in the region including for Hamas I mean these guys were in the room with Hamas like in the last couple of days in the last few days directly I think that sent a statement and then lastly Trump's decision to and this was and I still don't know if this was you know how analyzed this was or this was just an instinct Hamas said in this last round of negotiations, yes, but, right?
8:21We will agree, yes, but, and they would have some changes. Now, what was the yes part? The yes part was for the entirety of these two years, Hamas would never agree to a deal that would release all the hostages at once, ever. There was always a sense, it has to be in phases, Israel has to withdraw, there has to be a pause in fighting, then we'll release a few more, spread over a period of time. And this was, by the way, even I was guilty of assuming that was the only way it could work. It always has to work in phases. Hamas will never give up all at once. And at some point, Trump said, no, all of them at once.
8:57We're not doing phases. You're not trickling them out. We want them all out at once at the front end of the deal. And every expert was saying there's no way he's naive, he's foolish. And then Hamas said, yes, but. Now, in a negotiation, when someone says yes, but you can choose to focus on the yes or the but. And many of the negotiations over the last two years have fallen apart because various parties tended to focus on the but. And what Trump seemed to do is he took the yes. Wait a minute. They just said yes. They will release all the hostages at once at the front end. Yes, they're going to quibble with some of the other details.
9:34But I'm going to I'm going to bank the yes and deal with the but later. And I do think generally in negotiations, whether it's in business or geopolitics, there's a sense that opportunity can beget opportunity. And I think what the U.S. did here was say there's opportunity here. Hamas just said yes to something they've never said yes to before. We're going to grab that. We'll deal with the details later, deal with their butts. And we're going to figure out how to create momentum around the yes. And that's what happened. And once, by the way, everyone in the region, obviously not just the Israelis, but all these capitals.
10:06I spoke to government officials, diplomats in other countries in the region and Arab capitals. And they were like, wow, the moment everyone seized on the yes, we could start envisioning an end to this war. And so that created like, wait a minute, this is in reach. And here we are. So I want to respond to each of those three and get and try and inspire more color from you in reverse order. I encourage people, and something I have trouble with is to be a critical thinker, and that is go issue by issue. And I find I have a negative bias towards almost anything the Trump administration does. I just immediately, reflexively, subconsciously find fault in everything this administration does.
10:50And I think if you are not giving this administration tremendous credit for what has just happened, you are not a critical thinker. Also, I think Jared Kushner, who was my student, I got to think that some of the relationships and trust that he fomented and cemented during the Abram Accords really paid off here. I got to think he had a lot of these people on speed dial. Also, quite frankly, in typical Trump fashion, he seems more focused on the prize and the piece itself. So we tend to, again, want to have a conversation around whether or not, you know, who deserves credit. The Trump administration deserves a ton of credit for this.
11:29So kudos to them. The thing you said that really shocked me and had changed my mind because I felt differently about it was the strike on Doha. I thought they were they were kind of four for four. The pager operation, most strategic, effective, precision counterterrorist attack in history. Right. Taking out around air defenses. We are all safer. If I could pick the Nobel Prize, if I was the Nobel Prize committee, it would absolutely go to the IDF. I think they've created much more sustainable peace, a tremendous sacrifice to them strategically with incredible courage, technology, bravery, everything we would hope from from our military.
12:10They were sort of four for four. And then I thought, oh, oh, no, the Doha strike not only was probably a bridge too far, but it was a failure. That was, you know, that was just too far. But I don't think there's any ignoring the timing that it happens. And all of a sudden there appears to be new pressure on Hamas. And there's my sense is the two external parties. And tell me if you agree with this, that it can put pressure on Hamas were Qatar and to a certain extent, the Trump administration putting pressure on Israel. You know, there's there's just a small number of parties that could really put pressure on these groups.
12:47And it feels like Qatar is one of those parties. And to your point, when Qatar said, you know, Honey Badger don't give a shit. They will come in and start bombing our cities. Shit just got very real for us. And we would like to see this come to an end. And so the Gaza City thing, I had not even I had that was not even on my radar screen. But a long winded way or intro into a question of we have a tendency in the U.S. to look at the Gulf as one amorphous region with all with similar politics and a similar view of Israel. And the reality is Qatar is much different than the kingdom, which is much different than the UAE, which is not much different than Bahrain.
13:27And I'd heard you talk about the role that Turkey played here or will play moving forward. And I hadn't even brought that into the calculus. Can you give us a sense for the different players in the region who played a critical role and who plays a critical role moving forward? Yeah. So I'll tick through each of them quickly. And then if you want to focus in on any one of them, just let me know. Obviously, the Saudis play the most important role in the region, their largest economy, the only ones that have a real serious military in the region. and a modernizing leader in Mohammed bin Salman, regardless of what some may think of him, he is single-handedly transforming that country.
14:12And it's understood both in Riyadh and Jerusalem that if there is normalization between these two countries, between Israel and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the Arab-Israeli conflict is effectively over. And really the region and big parts of the world will be transformed too as a result of that. You know, the Saudi leadership was planning on normalization with Israel before October 7th. And I think, and I know they're still committed to it. Obviously, the details got a little more complicated because of October 7th, but they're still committed to it. And this has been a huge carrot for Israel.
14:49Like, what do they need to do to get to Saudi normalization? So Riyadh is a major player. Qatar, for all the obvious reasons, is a major player here because they have direct channel to Hamas, whereas Saudi Arabia does not. And the Hamas leaders that are not in Gaza are based in Doha. And Qatar, the government of Qatar, had been working for years with Hamas in Gaza, long before October 7th, with, by the way, the knowledge of and sort of quiet support of the Israeli and U.S. governments. And there's a sense that Qatar will play a big role in Gaza after the war. So when Qatar says, it's now or you've lost us, that matters a lot in these conversations between the Arab countries and Hamas.
15:37And I'll also add that Qatar is in this unique situation where it's got extraordinary wealth, and yet it's a tiny, tiny country and a tiny, tiny population. And I've heard officials from Qatar describe their situation to Kuwait in 1990. Small country, extraordinary wealth, extraordinary natural resources. But in one day, in August of 1990, Saddam Hussein's military rolls into Kuwait and declares Kuwait the 19th province of Iraq. And sure, Saddam's forces were kicked out of Kuwait, but that Kuwait has never recovered, that its stature and its status in the region never recovered to this day. And I've heard officials in Doha basically say, we don't want to be that.
16:16We're scared of being that. And so Doha's M.O. has been to be friends with everybody. They're close with the U.S. They host a U.S. base in Doha, not too far from where the Israelis struck, tried to strike Hamas. They have open ties with the Muslim Brotherhood. They've open ties with the Iranians. They've open ties with, you know, the bad actors in Afghanistan, the Taliban. They have a relationship with everybody, with Europe, with Russia, with Putin. That's their MO. We're friends with everybody, and hopefully that will give us some sense of security. And that model, that approach with the strike that Israel conducted in Doha, can we be friends with everybody?
16:53And it's not going to cause problems with us? Because right now, Israel striking in the heart of Doha doesn't feel very safe. So that's Doha. Egypt and Turkey, to me, are the most interesting stories here. Turkey, after the Israeli-U.S. war against Iran, meant that Iran is no longer a real player in the region. And it's lost its proxy system, Hezbollah. The Houthis are kind of on their last legs. It's the satellite state in Syria and Damascus, the Assad regime, which had been in power for 53 years, gone. You know, and Iran is naked. No air defenses. Israel and the U.S. having total air superiority over Iran.
17:37So Iran is no longer a player. So with Iran out of the region in terms of a power player, still in the region but not a geopolitical power, the two countries now that matter the most are Israel and Turkey. Turkey is is a major to me the Israel and Turkey as the as the future major players in the region are is the big story. And therefore Erdogan has a lot of has a lot of capital, political capital. And he also has. And again, this will make some people uncomfortable, but is the truth. He also has a very good relationship with Trump. And I think Trump pressed on that. There are a lot of things that Turkey want.
18:11Turkey wants out of the U.S.-Turkish relationship, certainly on the military side. and Erdogan and Trump have a very direct relationship. So pressing on Turkey to help close Hamas was important. And the last country here is Egypt, which is, you know, we all focus on and the press just focuses on that there's only one border for Gaza, which is the Israel-Gaza border. When in reality, there's two borders. There's the Israel-Gaza border and there's the Gaza-Egyptian border. And Egypt was occupying Gaza before the 1967 Six-Day War. And Egypt could have let any number of Gazan Palestinians, war refugees, into Egypt over these last two years and did not.
18:54They basically barricaded the place. And Egypt has a big stake in what happens in Gaza next. And they have direct channels with Hamas. And they are also the second largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid. To this day, Egypt is a massive, massive recipient of U.S. foreign aid. And so for all those reasons, concern about the war spreading throughout the region, close ties to Hamas and a big recipient of U.S. foreign aid, I think, gave the U.S. a lot of leverage over Cairo. What is the state of Hamas right now? There's a general viewpoint that militarily it's been totally neutered. As a political body, as a military force, where is Hamas right now?
19:37I think militarily it is virtually non-existent, meaning it basically had a free run from 2007, call it, to October 7th, 2023, to build up a very sophisticated military. It was think of it as what we tend to think of it as like a militia or it is a terror group. But it but the way it was organized, it was organized and trained and developed like a a light infantry army of a of a sovereign state. It had battalions and it had a command and control structure and it had the troops, if you will. The terrorist commandos were very well trained. They had sophisticated weapons. They built this tunnel system that was, you know, bigger than the London, you know, the tube.
20:26It was this massive, massive infrastructure. So that was a couple decades in the making. And so what does Hamas have now? Most of their fighters that have been training over the last number of years have been wiped out or captured by Israel. Its leaders have been largely wiped out. the sophisticated of its arms. They haven't gotten arm supplies over the last two years. So it's all but non-existent. However, and here's the however. One, what it has done over the last year is it's been losing a number of its fighters. It's been recruiting new and new fighters. Now they're not well-trained. They're like kids.
21:01You can see it. When I speak to IDF soldiers who are in Gaza, they say like at the beginning of the war, they're fighting very sophisticated well-trained Hamas fighters. Now they're fighting like 15-year-old, 14-year-old boys who are just recruited like cannon fodder for Hamas. So it doesn't have the level of sophistication. They haven't received new arms, but there are some arms still there. And how we handle or how the U.S. and all those involved who are meeting in Sharm el-Shek today deal with the disarmament of Hamas, what's left of their arms, is going to be a very complicated issue, not easy to discern how that's going to be implemented.
21:36Israel is very focused now on blowing up the tunnel system in Gaza. That will take a lot of time and won't be easy. So what exists of Hamas now is basically a political organization in Gaza that has a sort of ragtag militia, which is different from what it had before October 7th, which was a political organization in Gaza and a very sophisticated military. Now, that political organization will still try to stay in power and still try to terrorize. And in fact, there are other Palestinians. There are stories coming out of Gaza today about Hamas kind of coming up from the rubble, what's left of Hamas, and imposing retribution on Palestinians that defied them over the last few months, or that they argued, worked with the Israelis, or worked with the food aid distribution services, or whatever.
22:25There's these, I mean, you can see them online. There's these executions going on of any kind of clans or families or individuals that in some way they believe we're not loyal to Hamas during this war. That's playing out now. Now, the international press is going to have no interest in covering that. It's brutal, by the way, and ghoulish to see, but it is going on. The press won't have interest in it because it doesn't involve Israel. But what's playing out right now is a fight for the future of Gaza and whether or not there are Palestinians that are willing to stick their necks out and say, we want a different future than what we've had since Israel pulled out of Gaza, you know, two decades ago.
23:06And Hamas is going to try to play in that competition.
23:14We'll be right back.
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24:50What does governance likely look like moving forward in Gaza? because even deep into the war, with all of the devastation, I had read that 70 % of residents, and I don't know if they're under pressure to say it in a poll, still supported Hamas, whereas the Islamic regime in Iran, it was flipped. Only 30 % of the populace supports the reigning government there. Does Hamas still have deep, deep support among the people of Gaza, which likely means they are going to be very involved in governance? What does governance look like and what is the current view on Hamas amongst the residents of Gaza? So it's not clear what governance looks like, will look like.
25:33Right now, we don't know what exactly to look like because there's going to be this international stabilization force. It's set up. There's these Arab countries that are going to step in, the Emiratis, the Egyptians, maybe others. They're going to come in and try to help run the place. There's this body, this board that's being created. Tony Blair is going to have a big role in trying to create some transitional technocratic governing body to kind of just run the place. So basically get a bunch of technocrats, not ideologues, who can come in and just, you know, get the trains running on time. Start thinking about the rebuilding, start thinking about getting humanitarian assistance to Palestinians, start dealing with just delivering essential services to Gazan Palestinians before they really think through who's going to govern this place, who the future of the the Gazan state or whatever you want to call it will be.
26:24So I think we don't know. Your point about 70 percent of Gazan Palestinians supporting Hamas, when you drill down into that data, what you find is it's not so much that they support Hamas. And this is both, this is going to sound odd to say, but it's both an encouraging sign in a counterintuitive sense, but also a depressing sign. They don't necessarily support Hamas. They support October 7th. That's what the polling says. So they say they're frustrated with Hamas, and they're frustrated with Hamas running Gaza, but they support the war against Israel. And that, to me, is we're now going to see whether or not that's what they felt the pressure to say, whether or not they can, you know, whether or not when Palestinians in Gaza can start speaking freely, do they say, look, invading Israel and war after war after war against the Israelis was a mistake.
Read the full transcript
27:14We set back our own cause, and we need to start a new day of coexistence. whether or not there is that sentiment out there and there just needs to be oxygen in the space where Palestinians can feel safe articulating it, we don't know. The flip side is it could be that Hamas, at least in its hatred and its ideological hostility to Israel, is so entrenched in Gaza and among Palestinians that no matter who emerges in Gaza, that sentiment, that hold on people's minds cannot be broken. We don't know. I mean, what I'm looking forward to is testing it. I mean, we have to test this now. Is there a world in which there can be some leadership in Gaza that can be willing to coexist with Israel?
28:06And I will say it's not easy because to do so, if anyone is willing to stick out their neck and present that kind of vision, they are risking their lives. They are risking their lives. To what degree are you concerned that the prisoner swap, so 20 hostages and whatever remains they can locate, turn back over to Israeli families in exchange, Israel has released some 2 ,000 Palestinian prisoners. To what extent are you concerned, and is there any way to safeguard that we're, when I say we, that the Israelis are this deal isn't just repopulating the leadership ranks of Hamas? Because if I remember correctly, Sinwar was once a prisoner of Israel and was handed back.
28:47To what extent are the Israelis, you know, against their will, they would not rather have this way, are they going to just replenish the leadership of Hamas? It is one of the things I'm most worried about with regard to this deal and the previous deals. You're absolutely right. In 2011, Israel did a released they did an exchange they released 1027 Palestinian prisoners from Israeli prisons to get back one hostage Gilad Shalit and one of those prisoners that was released as you said was Yehia Sinwar and the question is is Israel releasing today a lot of Yehia Sinwar I think there are two problems with this approach of the prisoner releases and I don't think Israel had a choice But there are two problems with it.
29:37One is not only are you replenishing Gaza and the West Bank, because some of them are going to return to the West Bank, with these monsters who know how to be monsters and are quite skilled at being monsters, even if they've been in prison for 10 or 20 plus years. So you're replenishing, as you said. And two, you're sending a message that this works. When you take Israelis hostage, you get your heroes, if you will, the biggest monsters from Hamas, out of prison and back home. So it has two effects. A, it creates a risk that the people who know how to conduct this kind of violence and wage this kind of mass violence are now free.
30:16And two, you create an incentive structure because you're saying, this is how we get our people out of prison is we take Israeli, we kidnap, and we steal Israelis. So I'm deeply, this is what I'm, among the things I'm most worried about, this is right up there. And yet, I don't think, Israel had a choice. The way Israel deals with hostages is perplexing to so many people around the world because if you look at the standard practice when someone is taken hostage, the standard practice, the practices that are encouraged by experts in hostage negotiations is to downplay the significance of the hostages, to not make them household names, to not turn them into these symbols of a priority for society.
31:10Even if it is a priority for society to get them back, you shouldn't turn them into these rallying cries because that only increases their value. Their stock only goes up in the eyes of Hamas. Wow, look how badly Israel wants these people back. All the more reason to hang on to them, all the more reason to kidnap more of them. so and yet Israel time and time and time and time again does this they they whenever Israelis are taken hostage you get a version this was an extreme version but you get a version of what we've just seen over the last two years where there's a sense from Israel's enemies that Israel wants nothing more than getting these hostages back on the one hand however if you listen to Hamas's rhetoric one of the things they have said including Sinwar himself was that Israel's greatest weakness is they love life.
32:02Israel's greatest weakness is Israelis love life, whereas we love death. These are not my words. This is Hamas's words, Sinwar's words. And they thought that the kidnapping, the taking of hostages is what would break Israel because they're so weak that they so desperately want these people back. And I could argue this so many ways, Scott, and I think about this a lot. On the one hand, of course it's a weakness for all the reasons you and I were just saying. On the other hand, when you watch the images from today and you just see this, the vibrancy of Israel and the health of Israeli society, and regardless of what you think of its politicians, regardless of what anyone thinks about certain decisions they made here or there, you just watch that Israel was willing to risk everything to get back what these musicians and these kids who entered went to the nova fest music festival and and parents and innocent you know people who lived on the wrong kibbutzim and you know at the and were there at the wrong time and just these regular people they're willing to risk everything and what is hamas trying to get back hamas is trying to get back monsters i mean literally agents of barbarism not just agents of chaos agents of barbarism that's who they value and Israel values the people we're seeing return today.
33:28And so I, on the one hand, think it's a weakness for Israel and I live in fear that Israel's gonna get into this aversion of this jam again. On the other hand, I think one of the reasons Israel endures and Israeli society endures and is a standout and a shining light in an otherwise often very dark region is in part because they have this love for life. Yeah, I think you're right. tactically it's a weakness, but strategically, if I use the term loosely, the brand of Israel, there is something about life and an appreciation and kind of no man or woman left behind. It reminds me of the film Superman where General Zod is watching the devastation they're wreaking, and he all of a sudden pauses and says, I found Superman's weakness.
34:12He cares. If you're looking for moral clarity in geopolitics, you're just not going to find it. Of this 20-point plan, what do you what are you most worried about? It feels I love what you said earlier, and I think it's a great actually great business lesson that if you can, you know, if you're trying to take over a company or a merger, the company, if you can get the price agreed to, you can probably work out the rest. Right. And what you're saying is the release, the hostage and prisoner exchange was kind of the was the price and that we should be able to figure out both sides should be able to get to some sort of resolution.
34:49Of the remaining points to be ironed out, what do you see as the most fraught with risk of an enduring peace here? One, the issue of disarmament, which I referenced earlier. So among the 20-point plan, Israel, I mean, Hamas must be disarmed. How's that going to happen? Who's going door to door and tearing Kalashnikovs and, you know, RPG launchers from the hands of Hamas. Who's doing that? Really, who's doing that? Are Egyptian and Emirati forces doing that? Maybe. Are American forces doing that? No. Are Israeli forces doing that? Israel has basically conceded that it won't be by agreeing to this deal.
35:32So there's talk about Hamas disarmament, but I don't see Hamas saying they're going to disarm. And I don't know who's at, because to go door to door and get those Kalashnikovs means every time you quote unquote knock on a door, you're risking your life. Which country is signing up to have their lives of their soldiers being risked in order to get Kalashnikovs out of the hands of Hamas 15 year old boys. So the disarmament piece worries me.
36:01the role of Hamas in the governing structures you and I were talking about, not clear. I think that if Hamas emerges as a player in a future governing authority in Gaza, it will be a huge win for Hamas that will be able to say that Israel took out Iran, Israel took out Hezbollah, Israel took out, you know, had a role in taking out the Assad regime. But we, Hamas, we launched the biggest massacre on the Israeli people, on the Jewish people in a single day since the Holocaust, and we're still standing. And not only are we still standing, but we actually have a role in the governing authority in Gaza.
36:37So the message that sends to the region worries me. I can go on and on with some of my other concerns, but I think the biggest caveat to everything I'm saying, which is what is so extraordinary to me about this deal, not only getting all the hostages back at once at the beginning, was that the IDF is still in Gaza. The IDF is still in 53 % of Gaza, according to this deal. Now, it's not in Gaza fighting, and it's not in war fighting mode, but it is there. It is present. It can obviously turn on war fighting mode when it wants to. So Israel has real leverage now, as the details are being sorted out, to basically say, we're still here.
37:18And if we're uncomfortable with the way things are going, we have a lot of tools as well. So I have a lot of concerns. Those are mollified from my perspective, from Israel's perspective, by the IDF being allowed to stay in Gaza until some of these details are sorted out. I want to turn to the politics and our governance in Israel right now. Something that I found incredibly distressing but not surprising was the deafening silence from that kind of pro-Palestinian advocates here in the U.S. Because my understanding is that this deal is absolutely not what certain factions of the far right in the Knesset wanted.
37:59They wanted occupations, they wanted settlements, they wanted continued military presence. They wanted permanent displacement of the Gazan-Palestinians out of Gaza. They want, yeah, you're exactly right. Everything the hard right wanted, really, I mean this, and obviously I'm an advocate and I defend Israel, but I'm a critic of the hard right in Israel. I know what they wanted. Okay. I know what they wanted and they didn't get it. Yeah. And yet this feels like a deal. This feels like to me, the best or arguably a pretty good deal for Hamas. And yet it felt like factions in the U.S. were, to me, it outed them as being more concerned with having a vessel for anti-Israel or anti-Semitic hate, as opposed to real concern for a deal that brings a lasting peace.
38:49I saw none of these flags flying or none of these celebrities urging Hamas and Israel to get this deal done. The analogy I would use is what you talked about with Egypt or some of the other nations, that they saw the conflict in Gaza, quite frankly, is politically advantageous for them from a brand and a PR standpoint, but weren't that interested in actually helping the people of Palestine. And so I'm using that one that's a comment leading up to a question, which I think you agree with. But what give us the state of play of the governance, how Israel, my sense is Israel, the far right faction, which a lot of people would argue had way too much influence over Netanyahu, destabilizing the region.
39:34There was a fear that there was a kind of wag the dog situation here where Netanyahu wanted to be on a war footing, regardless of what the right thing or the humane thing was to do, and that the far right in Israel did not get what it wanted. Far from it here. Talk about the governance in Israel, how this deal came about, what kind of pressure was applied, and what do you think this means for governance and specifically Netanyahu moving forward in Israel. So a few things. First, I completely agree with you. We have been lectured and hectored at for the last number of months that there was a genocide taking place in Gaza.
40:13And this was everything from these rallies and protests in places like London and Paris and New York City to, as you said, the Hollywood elite. Anyways, I don't want to start singling out names. You know who these people are. They were all talking about a genocide. Stop the genocide. Obviously, I strongly dispute that it was a genocide. It wasn't a genocide. And we can talk about, I mean, Israel has lost over 900 soldiers in this war, the majority of which, the overwhelming majority of which was after October 7th, meaning it chose to send its youngest, its best into Gaza to fight. Why? If it was a genocide or an attempted genocide, Israel would have just obliterated the place from the air.
40:54And it didn't. It sent soldiers in to fight. I mean, it's just so absurd on so many levels, this idea that this was a genocide. That said, if you really believed it was a genocide, then when the genocide was, quote unquote, stopped, when there was actually a peace agreement that stops the genocide, IDF soldiers are not fighting in Gaza today. Shouldn't your first moral obligation be to embrace the peace agreement that made that happen? And when all these players did not do that, they revealed themselves as not interested, actually, in the Palestinian people. They were interested in a political weapon against Israel.
41:38That's what this was about. And the cause of, quote-unquote, stopping the genocide became that weapon once the genocide, quote-unquote, stopped. They weren't interested, first off. Second off, on a very practical level, you know, ask yourself, how many Palestinians were actually dying every day? Like a lot. We should, we need to say that a lot of Palestinians were dying every single day. Now we can debate the numbers and there's a, you know, I have serious issues with the authorities in Gaza who provide these numbers, but it's indisputable that you pick your 50, 70, 90, 10, 15, whatever your number, Palestinians were dying in this war every single day.
42:17If you care about the Palestinians, today there are no Palestinians, at least from Israeli forces, dying, being killed in Gaza. Shouldn't you celebrate that day and the next day and the next day? Every day those are lives saved. And the fact that that's not the focus, I think, tells you everything you need to know. As it relates to the Israeli government, I think two things are going on. I don't think Netanyahu is as beholden to the hard right in his government as the press often characterized. I think, obviously, coalition politics always has its own dynamics, but I don't think they had the gun to his head that everybody thought, certainly, as we can tell, see over events of the last couple of weeks.
42:58His government could fall over this deal, and yet he still pushed it through. Israel now is going to have to go to elections at some point between now and October of 26. According to Israeli election law, the next election has to happen by October of 26. And so now the big question is, does Netanyahu go to elections soon? Does he go to elections very soon? Does he, quote unquote, take the win and say, I'm now, you know, only I could have gotten this deal done. Only I could have gotten the hostages back. And only I now can take this energy and this talent that you saw as I maneuvered the geopolitics of Israel and the region and the world and got the Iran threat eliminated.
43:40I got the Hezbollah threat eliminated. And now I'm the guy to make Saudi normalization happen. And that's why I need to continue serving in government. And I'm staking my election on Israel's full normalization into the region. That's what this is about. That's one way he could run. The other way he could run is actually just delay the election and push off calling elections well into next year and try to start making the normalization happen and then run on that. I think the latter is a riskier course for him because I think on the one hand, there's a lot of promise in terms of normalization.
44:14I think we're going to see movement from Saudi Arabia with Israel. I think we're going to see movement from Syria. I think we're going to see movement from Indonesia. So there could be a lot that happens on the normalization front. But as we know, diplomacy and international politics can take weird twists and turns. And I think Netanyahu would probably want to run as the guy who can deliver it rather than the guy who's in the muck of trying to deliver it. But either way, he's going to have to go to elections. And of course, I'm not talking about the elephant in the room. He was the prime minister under whose watch the biggest catastrophe for the Jewish people, as I said earlier, in a single day since the Holocaust occurred.
44:51and that notion, that reality has never been tested in Israeli politics. People say, well, Golda Meir in 1973 after the Yom Kippur War, she got reelected right away. It's true. But the Yom Kippur War was catastrophic for Israel. It was 19 days. It was in retrospect compared to what Israel's just gone through in terms of the shattering of Israel, the trauma for Israel. Nothing else comes close to it and Netanyahu was prime minister when it happened And I don't know if that's surmountable. We have these periods, Scott, where you say, what's the first election going to be like in the US? What's the first presidential election going to be like after COVID?
45:32Or what's the first presidential election going to be like after the 2008 global financial crisis? Or what's the first election going to be like after 9-11? We go through these periods and the truth is it's very hard to know ever what's going to happen these elections because on the one hand, after 9-11, Bush got reelected. And not only did he get reelected, he won the midterms in 2002 right after 9-11. Of course, there was no way the Republicans would have won the White House in 2008 after the global financial crisis. So you could, these things can go in all these different directions. It's very hard.
46:04When you have these seismic events in the life of a nation, trying to predict what the politics would be, I think it's totally unprecedented. You don't have no historical precedent in Israel's case to point to in terms of how the electorate will react. I do think you will see one phenomenon this time in Israeli politics is the emergence of what they call the miluimniks. The miluim is a Hebrew word for the reservists. There were all these very, so Israel's standing army is pretty small. It depends on this incredible reserve force, which are people in their 20s and 30s, basically, who have day jobs and kids and, you know, cool jobs in tech and whatever.
46:44And, you know, over three to 400 ,000 of them fought, the reservists and the standing armory in the last two years. That's a higher percentage of Israeli society than the percentage of American, the American population that fought in World War II. So this war touched everybody, every family. And all these, it's a small country, as a friend of mine just said, but it's a big family. Israel and these reservists who are very talented, impressive people, you know many of them. For the first time I'm hearing from them, you know what? Maybe I should run for office. You know, I never thought about a career in politics.
47:24I was working in tech in Tel Aviv. I did. I worked in an elite unit. I served in an elite unit in the IDF, but I was basically disconnected from politics. For the first time, I'm hearing those people say we this this must be a new day for Israel. This must be a rebirth. And it's our generation now that has to play a role. So I do think in Israeli politics, everyone's focused on Bibi or not Bibi. It's like the way in American politics, everything's Trump or, you know, Trump and everything, the arc of history bends one way or the other towards how you think about Trump. It's the same with Netanyahu, such an outsized force in Israeli politics.
47:58I think we focused on Netanyahu as we should in our analysis at the expense of, I think, a new generation that will be rising in Israeli politics. And the role they play could be certainly unprecedented and very interesting. We'll be right back after a quick break.
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50:40We're back with more from Dan Cienor. It's so interesting. You know, I immediately go to, and I don't mean to diminish the gravity of these situations, but I immediately go to branding because marketing is my background. And brands, you know, Heineken's a fairly pedestrian beer in Holland, and it's a luxury beer in the U.S., and Budweiser's a luxury beer in the U.S. And I find that some of these historical figures, whether it's Tony Blair or Golda Meir, are much more popular outside of their own nation. And I was struck by how many people were applauding at every mention of Trump in these celebrations in Israel yesterday and today and booing when they heard the term Netanyahu.
51:21And then I've also heard other people say that Netanyahu was literally running to stay out of jail. Yeah, I don't buy that. I mean, I'm open to a whole range of criticisms against Netanyahu. But I think this idea that, you know, there's a tendency, I think, for those of us who follow these events so closely to always find like the secret motive behind a politician's actions. so then this narrative emerged that Netanyahu has these corruption cases and that he just wants to extend the war in order to extend his government, stay in power, and the odds of him going to jail go down if he stays in government.
51:58And therefore, unfortunately for Israelis and Palestinians, the war has to go on and on in service of Netanyahu's political career. I don't buy it for two reasons. One, these corruption cases are pretty weak if you look closely at. even Netanyahu critics who are deep into the legal aspects here, I think they're pretty weak. A, B, even if he goes, even if he's found guilty, these legal cases have been going on forever. They will go on for a while. Even if he's found guilty, he will likely appeal them. The idea that anyone sending Netanyahu at that point, well into his 80s, to prison, it's just not believable.
52:32I think what's so complicated, and you talked about this at the beginning, about trying to compartmentalize how you think about Trump and being able to hold many views, one of disgust, which you articulated at the same time of that you're impressed by what was accomplished here. I think it's important to understand or just keep in mind that politicians usually have many competing motives. I've worked with a lot of politicians. I always find this. There's a sense of commitment to public service. so so genuine good-spirited like i want to try and do things as you know publicly spirited people who at the same time have their own issues about their reputations and their how they'll be thought of in history and their and and some degree of narcissism it's all wrapped up in that in the decision to make it's all wrapped up in it and netanyahu his political rise if you go back to his political rise now decades ago, basically was on the back of the heroism and tragedy of his brother, Yoni Netanyahu, the Battle of Entebbe, the Operation Entebbe.
53:41He led the operation to Entebbe, got these Israeli hostages out, and he was the only one who was killed in the operation. And that is when the Netanyahu name became this mythical, larger-than-life name in Israeli society. And then soon after, Benjamin Netanyahu ran for office, or got involved in politics, ultimately ran for office. the idea that the bookends of his career could be the Yoni Netanyahu story at the beginning of his career, rescuing Israeli hostages, to the other bookend being the largest number of Israeli hostages taken on his watch at the end of his career. And I'm convinced, I'm not in the man's head, I speak to him from time to time, but I'm not in his head, I'm convinced that that other bookend, he was not willing to allow that other bookend be the bookend, that he was going to get these hostages back.
54:32Now, when someone says, I'm going to get these hostages back, is it because he's publicly spirited? I believe he is. I know that's going to be hard for people to, I believe he genuinely wanted these hostages back. Is he also consider himself a custodian of his own reputation and his own career? Of course. Point to me, a politician that doesn't. And so it's like, we should be able to say that politicians are complicated enough just because of those two competing factors that they're constantly like twisting and twirling inside their heads. We don't have to come up with, and then there's this, and then there's this, and then sneakily trying to do that.
55:06I think we're all usually wrong about those layers and layers and layers. And these two big factors are usually the factors. And tragically, they sometimes compete with one another. But when they're synchronized, they're all both moving the same direction. That's when I think the real magic can happen. And I think that's what has happened, actually both for Netanyahu and for Trump in the closing of this deal. Let's assume that there's something resembling an enduring peace and that this conflict has come to an end. And let's take off the table that let's assume that the residents or the citizens of Gaza and Israel are winners here.
55:46Who are the other winners and probably more interestingly, the losers with this piece? Obviously, I think Israel is a winner. I actually think the Palestinians are winners here, the Palestinian people, for the reasons I was saying earlier, which is the war ends. And at the same time that the Arab world has made clear that they're committed to rebuilding Gaza. So the war ends and it's not like everyone's abandoning ship and bailing on the Palestinian people. So the Palestinians are winners here. I think the U.S. is a winner here because it has demonstrated that, you know, there was this image, someone was describing to me today on television, a split screen of Israeli soldiers taking the hostages out of Gaza and returning them.
56:31So you see the image of these Israeli soldiers taking hostages out of Gaza at the split screen on the news at the same time that Air Force One was landing at Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv. And it was that split screen, which is the power of, of course, the guy in the uniform, the soldier from whatever country is fighting. There's power that comes from that. But where you get the real kind of exponential turbocharged power is when it's paired with that Air Force One, when it's paired with the power of the U.S. and the president of the United States, regardless of who the president is. And so I think it's important for us as Americans to keep in mind, when we go shoulder to shoulder with allies and help them achieve their security aims, we are sending a message about American power that I think has the value that goes on in the world well beyond the moment we're focused on.
57:24The U.S. I think is a winner here. And I think the Arab world are largely winners here because they get calm. They get some stability. They get, you know, the Gulf states like the Emiratis and the Bahrainis have been huge beneficiaries of the Abraham Accords. There's now a potential now for further normalization, which I think will do wonders for the growth, the modernization, the economic growth in the region. So they're winners. I think the losers, if I were to pick one other bucket of losers, are most of Europe. Not all of Europe, but most of Europe. I think the European leaders like Starmer in the UK, like Macron in France, and then outside of Europe, like Carney in Canada, I think made a huge mistake just when pressure was mounting on Hamas.
58:07They came in with that recognition of a Palestinian state at the UN, which basically declared that they believed that with no conditions that Hamas release hostages, with no conditions that Hamas leave Gaza, with no conditions that Hamas rearm. They sent a message that as far as Europe was concerned in Canada, that that October 7th was Palestinian Independence Day. And that was a terrible move by them. And then even worse for them was then Trump completely ignores them and moves his own diplomacy to make something happen. And he does it. The U.S. does it. The Gulf states do it. And Europe's completely cut out of it.
58:50They're like not even involved. So they also look impotent. Not only did they make the wrong bet, but then they looked impotent. So I would say Hamas in Europe, in Canada, to some degree are the losers. I think the Palestinian people, Israel, most of the Arab world, Turkey, and the U.S. are the winners. There are a few people I know in this nation that understand the chessboard better in the Middle East than you. You've served in government. You've obviously been studying these issues and almost become sort of a go-to media figure. If someone had told you, if someone had laid out on October the 8th what just transpired, transpired.
59:28And then you had to guess what was going to happen over the next two odd years. What has surprised you most about what has happened militarily, politically, and also domestically in the U.S.? Look, I continue to be floored by... I mean, I had Sam Harris on my podcast on the two-year anniversary of October 7th. I asked him on the first-year anniversary on the podcast, I asked him what surprised him the most. And he said just the just explosion of anti-Semitism. And then he said on year two, he's still surprised by it. For me, I was, you know, I was surprised by it in year one, by year two, I guess I was still surprised, but I kind of had become numb to it a little bit.
1:00:13I do worry, Scott, that many friends of mine, Jewish friends of mine are like, okay, this period is over. Hostages, the light living hostages are back, the war is over, we're done. And I don't think we're done because I think now we have to start really thinking about, there was almost no time to kind of deal with how prevalent and ugly and pervasive this antisemitism was. And now we're going to have to start dealing with, I think you see a lot of people in the UK and France, Canada, elsewhere, leaving those countries, Jews, and big numbers. I think that's going to, I mean, I think we're all going to start looking around saying, what does this mean for Jewish life in the U.S.?
1:00:52Why couldn't something like the Manchester synagogue attack happen at any number of Jewish institutions in the U.S.? Who's going to stand up for us? Who has our back? And so that's going to be our new day, sadly. And then the other big surprise for me is taking out Iran. I couldn't be more emphatic about what, if you would have told me, forget about, am I surprised? If you'd have told Sinwar on October 6th, right, that, or give him your scenario on October 8th, hey, you just launched this attack, and in the next two years, let me tell you what it's going to look like. Hezbollah, your sister terror organization in Israel's northern border, gone.
1:01:34Their whole rocket arsenal, gone. The Assad regime, in power for over five decades, gone. Iran's nuclear capability, which was emerging to pose an existential threat to Israel, gone. I mean, if you just go one after the other, you would have never believed it, right? I think Iran was the linchpin. Israel, if you think about Israel's decision to go after Hezbollah, which removed the biggest check on Israel going after Iran. Israel was always, Israeli planners were always concerned about going after Iran because of the risk of Iran lighting up Hezbollah on its northern border. with Hezbollah gone, it created a path for Israel to go against Iran.
1:02:14And then Israel going against Iran and doing it, executing it masterfully, then created space for the U.S. to come in. And then this policy issue that many of us have been perplexed by for decades, two decades, really, the possibility of Iran going nuclear. There are four major countries that are a major threat to the United States, Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran. Three of the four have nuclear weapons. Iran was the only one that didn't. And you could not imagine, any of us could not, I could not imagine a path in which Iran was going to be stopped, short of military action. You just couldn't.
1:02:52All this diplomacy was not going to work. Iran suddenly being enlightened was not going to happen. Iran was marching towards a nuclear weapons capability. And if I would have, I couldn't imagine that after this terror attack by Hamas, the net out would be that within two years, Iran would be the first country whose nuclear ambitions would have been reversed of the major powers arrayed against the U.S. and the West and Israel as a result of all of this. By military force, by the U.S. and Israel, I'm still kind of shocked by it. It has transformed the region. I want to pivot to a more optimistic tone or talk about what I see as some points of light here.
1:03:39And I think you'll agree. You wrote a book called Startup Nation about essentially zero to one. If you were loosely to say countries that have really excelled fast in terms of GDP growth, it's usually been a function of technology or finance or both. And Israel is out in spades. and also war, nothing creates innovation like the existential threat of your society going out of existence, whether it's World War I and tanks and aircraft or World War II, you know, jet transportation, radar, splitting the atom. Cold War gave rise to the internet, DARPA and GPS. We see in Ukraine, there's real hope that that economy someday might be rebuilt with the prosperity of the drone technology.
1:04:25Ukraine, assuming we have a sovereign Ukraine, will likely be an incredible hub for asymmetric warfare and all sorts of consumer applications around drone technology. You study Israel, you know the economy well there. Pivoting to what type of innovation is going to come out of this war. I hate to call it an innovation, but I never thought of tunnels as being a huge innovation in warfare, and it played a key role here. What innovation do you see or what technologies do you think played a key role here in terms of the IDF in Israel that might give us a glimpse into future technologies? Yeah, I think there are two laboratories, as you're alluding to, there are two laboratories today that are the future, you know, where we can study the future of warfare.
1:05:12And that's Ukraine and Israel. While Ukraine has some of this, Israel has it at a whole other, almost like industrial scale. It has this incredible tech ecosystem that has been called to fight. So I know plenty of Israeli tech entrepreneurs and people who work at big Israeli tech companies or big multinational tech companies with operations in Israel that have been called up to fight. And they come back from fighting in Gaza and they say, I want to work on the defense of my country right now. And so the number of defense tech, the sector, the defense tech sector. So before October 7th, There were about 160 defense tech startups in Israel.
1:05:49Now that number is close to 400 in a matter of two years. It's a booming, no pun intended, sector. And it all deals, as you said, with drone warfare, with counter drone warfare, with AI, you know, is obviously embedded in all of this. and I think we are experiencing and observing a surge in defense spending globally, especially in the U.S. and Europe and all these countries that talked about cutting off arms to Israel, arms sales to Israel, doing business with Israel, buying arms from Israel. I think all that's going to fall by the wayside. I think these governments have a lot of money to spend on defense.
1:06:29They're studying what Israel has learned in its two-year war and they are going to be dazzled, as I know you have, I have, others have, by these Israeli innovators. And the combination of this incredible technical expertise, combined with having gone through crucible leadership experiences, serving in war, leading men into battle, the crucible leadership experience that these people have, which gives them a huge advantage in building companies, and now this understanding of where warfare is going. There are many areas I can talk about in the Israeli tech sector that are, you know, caused for optimism or bullishness.
1:07:10I think the defense sector is going to make the cyber sector, which was, Israel was outside of the U.S. Israel was the biggest cyber sector, cyber sector, cybersecurity startups in the world. I think it's going, what we're about to see in defense tech is going to eclipse cybersecurity. The future of warfighting with technology is, Israel is going to be the hub. You know the podcast Two Jews in the News? I think it's called. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Unholy. Yeah. Oh, I'm sorry. Unholy. Yeah. Two Jews in the News. They invited me, I'm not sure why, on the podcast before October the 7th and asked me a bunch of questions about life in America and anti-Semitism.
1:07:46And I said, well, anti-Semitism is a light sleeper. I don't really feel it in the U.S. I don't feel it in corporate America. If you ask me if it's there, I would say no, I don't notice it. I listen to that podcast now and I cringe at just how fucking stupid I was around how naive and ignorant I was. I mean, you know that adage that two-thirds of an iceberg's mass is below the surface? This felt like 99.9 % of anti-Semitism in the U.S. was underneath the surface. At least I didn't see it. I have been absolutely flummoxed, and this is my pivot to something optimistic. You and I know each other fairly well now.
1:08:28I know what a huge role faith plays in your life. It plays almost no role in my life, my Judaism. I don't feel any real connection to the religion. Since the seventh, I have become a proud Zionist. It is totally illuminated for selfish reasons. I tell my sons, who I have not brought up in any sort of religious indoctrination, that, look, it's a dangerous world. At some point, you want to make sure you can go to a prosperous, safe place for Jews, and that's Israel. So you have a vested interest in the survival of Israel and Zionism. And then people come online and comments, as they will in this podcast, and they accuse me of being a Zionist as if it's a bad thing.
1:09:08I'm like, 100%, spot on, guilty as charged. And my moment of hope here is that I think there are a lot of people like me who are ignorant to the threats against the Jewish people in Israel and now feel activated. And just like my friend or someone I admire a great deal, Dan Harris at the 10 % Happier podcast, I feel like I'm 110 % more, I'll say a Jewish, 150 % more Zionist. And I'd like to think that a lot of people feel that way now, that we don't take our background, we don't take the importance of speaking out, we don't take the demands that we devote resources, attention, and speak out, that it has really activated a lot of people, including myself, who, quite frankly, were indifferent and on the sidelines.
1:10:00Do you see hope in that? Have you seen evidence of that? Totally. I've seen huge, huge, it's what we call October 8th Jews, you know, Jews who after October 7th weren't engaged in their Judaism. And then October 8th, they're like lit up. What I don't want it to be is all channeled towards fighting with Israel's and the Jewish people's enemies. Obviously, fighting with Israel's enemies and the Jewish people's enemies is important, but it can't be the way we—the enrichment in my life that I've gotten from leading a Jewish life is not from fighting anti-Semitism. Obviously, fighting anti-Semitism is a condition of the Jewish people going back thousands of years, but every century, really.
1:10:39But it can't be our sole existence because the truth is it's unpleasant. like you see you don't want to like my kids if i just if they just if i just sit around every night telling them about the anti-semite they've got a fight with they're going to be like geez dad this is i mean i guess i should do it but it's pretty it's pretty unattractive way to live my life what they have benefited from what i've benefited from is the joy of jewish holidays the joys and enrichment and stimulation from jewish learning and debates and and jewish literacy and understanding Jewish history and the sense of community one feels when they're part of a Jewish community.
1:11:16The rituals, you know, there's so many rituals we live with. You know, my family, every Friday night we do a Shabbat dinner. My children love it. My wife and I love it. We have people from the community come for Shabbat dinners or we go to other people's homes. It's like a resetting every week on the Sabbath of family interconnectedness, not with devices, not with, you know, parties and social events, but with togetherness, human interaction, reflecting on the week, reflecting on time. I think those, I mean, I could go on and on about this. Those are the things that I hope those who are October 8th Jews don't suddenly become, you know, what date is it, October 13th, don't send suddenly that October 8th Judaism doesn't end on October 13th, 2025.
1:12:01I hope that it's a launching pad for living Jewishly in ways that aren't just about fighting with our enemies. Because fighting with your enemies is no way to live a life. Dan Cienor is a leading expert on Israel in the Middle East. He's the co-author of The Genius of Israel and Startup Nation. He's also the host of the Call Me Back podcast. Dan, a lot of young men listen to this podcast. I think you're a fantastic role model for young men because you have taken and tackled and really jumped into the deep end of the most polarizing, emotional and partisan issue. And you handle it with grace. I listen to all your podcasts.
1:12:37You don't interrupt people. You don't insult them. You're a fantastic role model, not only for young men, but for the media in general to just demonstrate the kind of grace and rigor that you demonstrate. You've really been a point of calm and a lighthouse in this storm. Very much appreciate you and your good work here. Thanks very much, Dan. Let's just say I learned from the best. Thank you.
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From the publisher
Scott speaks with Dan Senor, co-author of The Genius of Israel and host of the Call Me Back podcast, about what may be the most consequential Middle East deal in decades.
They discuss how Trump’s negotiators pushed Hamas to release hostages, Israel’s defiance of international pressure, and the regional realignment now underway across Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey. They also explore what’s next for Gaza’s governance, Netanyahu’s political future, and whether this moment marks the true end of the war.
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