The Unholy Blog

Longer reads from Unholy Conversations, the interview strand of the podcast. What our guests argued, in their own words, with links to each conversation on YouTube, Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

Unholy Conversations ·

Amir Tibon went back to Nahal Oz. Now he fears the next October 7

Three years ago this week, Amir Tibon spent ten hours in a safe room in Kibbutz Nahal Oz with his wife and two small daughters while Hamas gunmen moved from house to house. His father, a retired general, drove down from Tel Aviv with a pistol and joined the battle to take the kibbutz back. Tibon, a Haaretz journalist and the author of The Gates of Gaza, has now moved the family home.

With Amir Tibon · 3 min read

Unholy Conversations ·

The booing was a gift: Yuval Raphael on Nova, healing and Eurovision

Three years after the Nova festival massacre, Yuval Raphael is going back to Re'im to sing at the memorial, on the ground where she survived eight hours in a roadside shelter. In between, she represented Israel at the Eurovision Song Contest in Basel, where parts of the crowd booed her. She calls the booing a gift.

With Yuval Raphael · 3 min read

Unholy Conversations ·

It was never about soldiers: Yitzhak Pindrus makes the Haredi case on the draft

The draft law is the condition Israel's Haredi parties have put on joining any coalition, and the case for the exemption is rarely argued in English by someone who has to win it. Yitzhak Pindrus, a United Torah Judaism MK and former mayor of Beitar Illit, sat down with Jonathan Freedland and Yonit Levi for the kind of adversarial political interview Unholy almost never does. Jonathan said as much on air.

With Yitzhak Pindrus · 4 min read

Unholy Conversations ·

What brought her down keeps him up: Ilana Dayan on Netanyahu, Eisenkot and October 7

Ilana Dayan has anchored Uvda, Israel's flagship investigative programme, for three decades. Six weeks before the 27 October election she joined Yonit Levi and Jonathan Freedland for Unholy Conversations to talk about the choice Israelis face, the two men at the centre of it, and what 7 October did to the country's belief in its own state.

With Ilana Dayan · 2 min read

Unholy Conversations ·

Judaism believes we can change: Rabbi Angela Buchdahl on forgiveness, Zionism and Mamdani

The Jewish new year arrived with the word Zionist being used as an insult and a record that never forgets anything anyone has ever said. For the third year running, Yonit Levi and Jonathan Freedland opened the season of awe with Rabbi Angela Buchdahl, senior rabbi of Central Synagogue in New York and author of Heart of a Stranger. Three weeks before the conversation, an intruder had rushed the bimah at Central during a packed Friday night service. She wanted to talk about forgiveness.

With Rabbi Angela Buchdahl · 3 min read