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PODCAST

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht

Don"t Know Much About is a show devoted to unpacking contentious topics--to clarify the complex and empower people to understand historical and political events.

history judaism

All Episodes

61:24

From Law to Culture: Where the Real Battle Is Being...

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2026/03/22

On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Dr. Naya Lekht shifts the conversation from law to culture, arguing that while legal frameworks may lag behind, culture is where meaning is made, narratives are shaped, and ultimately, where battles over truth are won or lost. She is joined by journalist and columnist David C. Kaufman, whose work has appeared in Tablet, The New York Times, Commentary, The Wall Street Journal, and Telegraph. Together, they confront the ala...

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67:04

'You Started With a Tough Case:" Jews and...

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2026/03/15

On this episode of Don't Know Much About, Dr. Naya Lekht sits down with Professor Rona Kaufman, co-founder of the Center for Jewish Legal Studies. Naya opens with a case study: a campus speaker who deploys libels against Israel. Is that legal? “Oof,” says Professor Kaufman, “you started with a tough case.” From there, the conversation moves into the basics of anti-discrimination law and free speech protections. To explain the difficulty of securing Jewish civil rights, Rona takes listeners an...

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11:32

Propaganda in the USSR, Virtue in the USA: Antizionism

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2026/03/14

On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Dr. Naya Lekht examines a troubling paradox: why is antizionism in the West more dangerous than in the Soviet Union, the regime that invented it? Beginning with a personal observation from her mother, the episode traces how Soviet antizionist propaganda, once widely recognized as cynical state messaging, was transformed in Western universities into a moral cause. While the Soviet Union imposed antizionism from above through state propaganda, in the We...

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17:34

25 Years of Campus Antizionism: An Investigative Report

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2026/03/08

On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Dr. Naya Lekht traces how antizionism took root on American campuses, beginning with student activism in the early 2000s and becoming institutionalized through recurring campaigns such as Israel Apartheid Week and the BDS movement. By the time the campus encampments of 2023–2024 emerged, the movement had matured into something far more aggressive, raising urgent questions about how this ideological framework spread so widely across universities. The e...

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46:20

Cold War Ghosts: The American Afterlife of Soviet...

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2026/02/24

Antizionism has been described as a hate movement, as a form of anti-Jewish bigotry, and, as I argue, the third era of Jew-hatred. But it can also be understood as one of the most powerful social movements of our time. Powerful not only in its reach, but in its ability to unify—cutting across political parties, generations, and national borders. So who better to explore antizionism as a social movement than my guest today, Professor Shaul Kelner of Vanderbilt University, a scholar of Jewish S...

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76:08

Byline or Party Line? Journalism after October 7 with...

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2026/02/13

Journalist Kevin Deutch and founder of the Jewish watchdog Substack AFTER OCTOBER 7, joins Naya Lekht for a conversation about what happened to journalism, and why it matters now more than ever. As antizionism exploded across American streets, college campuses, and even K–12 schools, Kevin began documenting the shift in real time. In this episode, he reflects on his career in the newsroom and identifies a critical turning point: 2020. Between the social upheaval of the BLM movement and the CO...

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61:49

To Live with Conviction: A Conversation with Natan...

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2026/02/01

What does it mean to live with conviction when the cost is prison, isolation, and the full weight of a totalitarian regime? On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, I have the profound honor of speaking with Natan Sharansky, former Soviet dissident, Prisoner of Zion, Israeli statesman, and one of the great moral voices of our time. Born in Donetsk in the former Soviet Union, Sharansky became a leading spokesman for the human rights movement and the struggle of Soviet Jews to immigrate ...

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120:57

The Islamic Republic vs. the Iranian People with Ali...

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2026/01/23

With thousands of Iranian civilians killed by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in recent weeks, the will of the Iranian people is unmistakable: a nation seeking to liberate itself from an Islamic regime that devalues human life and has set Iran back decades. On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Naya sits down with Ali Siadatan, an Iranian who fled the country after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Drawing on both his personal experience and deep regional expertise, Ali helps make...

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90:09

My Family Read That Too! The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2026/01/12

On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Naya Lekht sits down with Professor of Jewish Literature Marat Grinberg to discuss his book The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf: Jewish Culture and Identity Between the Lines. The conversation explores Grinberg’s original study of Soviet Jewish life and how books, especially those on Jewish history, became a crucial vehicle for Jewish identity and self-awareness. Central to the discussion is Grinberg’s effort to reclaim Soviet Jewish life from a rigid binary ...

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61:12

Inside the Anti-Israel Cult: Michael's Story

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2026/01/04

On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Dr. Naya Lekht sits down with Michael. His story is gripping, urgent, and, quite frankly, one that must be told. Michael was born in the United States to a Coptic Christian family, but he struggled deeply with questions of identity and belonging. Feeling isolated, he found himself drawn to the Palestinian antizionist movement, where he remained for nearly twenty years. Over time, that involvement came at an immense personal cost. Michael describes rea...

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12:52

Beware Those Who Condemn Antisemitism: The...

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2025/12/27

On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Dr. Naya Lekht leads a critical conversation on how public condemnation of antisemitism often functions as cover for antizionism, the latest mutation of Jew-hatred. Drawing on her framework of the three eras of anti-Jewish movements, anti-Judaism, antisemitism, and antizionism, Naya argues that antizionism must be understood not as a break from the past, but as its continuation. Each era, she explains, developed its own language, tropes, and libels to...

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59:26

When the State Took the Classroom: The Story Behind...

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2025/12/24

At the crossroads of expanding teachers’ unions, the infiltration of anti-American curricula, and the silencing of dissenting scientists and doctors lies a story that now feels distant but urgent: the closure of schools during COVID. On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Naya Lekht is joined by filmmaker Natalya Murakhver, whose recent film, 15 DAYS: The Real Story of the Pandemic School Closures, was viewed more than one million times during an exclusive month-long run on X and is now sc...

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83:23

Illegal on Paper, Ignored in Practice: Jews and the...

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2025/12/23

As anti-Jewish violence continues to rise, Jews are increasingly forced to confront a troubling question: how effective are existing laws at protecting them when the community seeks protection and finds few willing to provide it? Against this backdrop, Dr. Naya Lekht is joined by Sarah Ettedgui, a senior corporate mergers and acquisitions lawyer based in Montréal, Québec. Their conversation took place just one day after the terrorist attack targeting Jews at a Chanukah celebration in Sydney, ...

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44:45

Heroes, Villains, and Speaking for a Nation with...

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2025/12/18

In this episode, I sit down with Eylon Levy, former spokesman for the State of Israel, to ask, what is the role of a government spokesman, and does every country have one? We begin by examining the function of state advocacy, public diplomacy, and crisis communication, separating myth from reality in how nations speak for themselves on the world stage. From there, the conversation widens to the deeper challenge facing Israel today. We argue that advocacy cannot remain reactive or limited to f...

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89:42

Born in the West: The Hidden Origins of Today’s...

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2025/12/01

On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Dr. Naya Lekht is joined by Samuel J. Hyde, a fellow at the Jewish People Policy Institute (JPPI) and a columnist for The Jerusalem Post. Born in South Africa, Sam recounts his firsthand encounters with what he calls institutional antizionism. It may sound unbelievable, but in South Africa, Hamas maintains official representation: an actual brick-and-mortar office in Cape Town. Sam explains how Hamas, along with other Third World “liberation” terroris...

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76:28

Antisemitism Was Illegal and Poland Purged Its Jews:...

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2025/11/26

Top-down history often fails to capture the lived experience of individuals, and Naya has long been committed to telling history through personal stories. On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Dr. Naya Lekht sits down with Leyb Ejdelman, who shares his powerful story of growing up in post-Holocaust Poland. Leyb’s life offers a rare window into how two eras of Jew-hatred—antisemitism and antizionism—intersect within a single individual’s experience. Jews who remained in Poland after the Ho...

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68:29

Arrivederci Italy: Monica Osborne on Italy's Jews

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2025/11/12

On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, award-winning journalist and storyteller Monica Osborne joins Naya to discuss the difficult decision she’s had to make: leaving Italy amid the alarming rise of antizionism. This conversation was inspired by Monica’s recent piece in the Times of Israel, "Italy's Jews are in Danger," in which she chronicles how quickly Italy has changed and how the normalization of antizionism has placed its Jewish community at risk. On this episode, Monica recounts wha...

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68:29

This Far, No Further: On the Need for Jewish Rebels

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2025/10/29

On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Naya speaks with Israeli-American writer and award-winning journalist Benjamin Kerstein about his new book, Self Defense: A Jewish Manifesto. The thesis of the book can be summed up in a single declaration: “This far, no further.” It is a call for Jews to stop accepting abuse, to draw firm boundaries, and to look evil directly in the eye, without shame in naming it. This message is especially urgent because, for decades, Jews have been forced into the...

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68:29

The Courage to Name It: Andrew Pessin's Journey...

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2025/10/22

On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Dr. Naya Lekht sits down with philosopher, professor, and author Andrew Pessin, one of the earliest Jewish academics to warn about the rise of antizionism within higher education. Pessin reflects on his own “Herzl moment,” the point at which he recognized that antizionism is not a political critique but a modern guise of Jew-hatred. Drawing from personal experience, including being targeted by students and colleagues for his Zionist identity, h...

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18:53

Reevaluating Jewish Advocacy Against Antizionism

Don"t Know Much About with Naya Lekht ·

2025/10/15

On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Dr. Naya Lekht asks, Why have so many Jewish and pro-Israel advocacy groups failed to counter the antizionist narrative? While antizionism evolved into a sophisticated campaign of disinformation, Jewish advocacy often treated it as mere misinformation, a problem of mistaken facts rather than deliberate deception. Naya breaks down how this misunderstanding gave rise to “inward advocacy,” three self-defeating modes of response: “looking at the sel...

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45 results

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