4.8 • 784 Ratings
🗓️ 9 January 2024
⏱️ 65 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
**Paid subscribers get full access to my interview with Ezzedine Fishere and Bernard Avishai, Dartmouth professors who teach a joint course on Israeli/Palestinian politics.**
**The first hour and five minutes of this episode is available to all listeners. Want to hear the whole conversation? Upgrade your subscription here.**
As university campuses have become sharply divided in the wake of the October Hamas attack and the ensuing war between Israel and Gaza, Dartmouth has emerged as a model for productive dialogue among students and faculty alike. This is due largely to the efforts of Bernard and Ezzedine, who lead by example in and out of the classroom and have recently been featured on Sixty Minutes, PBS, and elsewhere.
In this conversation, they talk about their approaches to teaching, the professional paths that led them to the classroom, and how to honor personal feelings while encouraging intellectual humility over reflexive emotional reaction. Ezzedine also discusses the limits of viewing political history through a colonial/anti-colonial framework and Bernard reflects on the complexities of Zionism and why he was so excited about the Zionist project back in 1968.
GUEST BIOS:
Bernard Avishai, a Visiting Professor of Government at Dartmouth College, has taught at Hebrew University, MIT, and Duke. He's a Guggenheim fellow and author of four books. A regular contributor to The New Yorker on political economy and Israeli affairs, he has also written for Harper's, The New York Review, The Nation, and New York Times Magazine. Formerly an editor of Harvard Business Review and KPMG's International Director of Intellectual Capital, his upcoming Harper’s cover story on Israel’s culture wars will be released on January 15.
Ezzedine C. Fishere, a renowned Egyptian writer and academic, is currently a visiting professor at Dartmouth College, teaching Middle East politics and cultures. His vast diplomatic experience includes roles in the Egyptian Foreign Service; UN missions in the Middle East and East Africa; policy advising for the Egyptian foreign minister; and senior political advising in Sudan under Kofi Annan; a senior political advisor to the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process (UNSCO) in Jerusalem; and heading the political section at the Egyptian Embassy in Tel Aviv.
ALSO:
What Is Real? Eli Lake on Disinformation, Despair and Dead Ends in the Israel-Hamas War
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0:00.0 | The students we had in the class, we had about 20, when Gaza happened, and we had a discussion about what's happening in Gaza, in the class between them, they were amazing. |
0:15.0 | We, both of us, were very moved by the degree of maturity with which they handled this terrible development. |
0:25.4 | And I think that, that is the refreshing part. |
0:29.9 | That is what makes me keep faith in, you know, the utility of teaching. |
0:35.7 | Yeah. |
0:36.2 | You know, I just, I've said this so often in Isidine's earshot, |
0:41.1 | he must be sick of hearing me say it. |
0:44.0 | But he and I did not ourselves agree on all kinds of issues, |
0:50.4 | the relevance of this fact, the relevance of that, you know, that leader, etc. |
0:56.7 | But what we did share was a profound sense of tragedy |
1:01.3 | and conveyed to the students that this is a tragic conflict. |
1:10.5 | And we both spoke before about our liberal commitments. |
1:15.6 | I think it's important that the students understood |
1:19.6 | that a sense of tragedy presumes the limitations of human beings. |
1:31.3 | Welcome to the unspeakable podcast. I'm your host, Megan Dome. Happy New Year. This is the |
1:37.2 | official start of the 2024 unspeakable season. And before I introduce my guests, Bernard |
1:43.8 | Abyshi and Izidine Fischer, |
1:46.2 | whose voices you've just heard, I have some quick announcements. First, I have announced more |
1:51.2 | retreats for the unspeak-easy this year. That is my heterodox women's community, if you don't know |
1:57.0 | already. We will be in Austin, Louisville, Kentucky, Los Angeles, Seattle, Toronto, |
2:04.3 | and Woodstock, New York this year. Additionally, if you are a member of the online community, |
2:09.7 | we'll be doing community retreats that are just for you guys. And speaking of guys, I am working |
... |
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