Podcast Review: Fear and Loathing in the New Jerusalem
When the Hamas attacks on Israelis living and partying along the Gaza envelope were streamed all over the world on and after 7 October 2023, a conflict that had always hovered in the periphery of my consciousness crashed into my field of focus.
First, the sheer horror of watching and reading and hearing about the unimaginable violence unleashed on that day. I shook and cried, as I think is the normal response to witnessing depravity like that. Then, Israel rolled into Gaza in response, and a new wave of horror rolled over me as video circulated of the immense suffering on the other side of the cursed border.
But of course, even though I was turning my full attention to these horrors from afar for the first time, they are not new. Not at all.
Since October, I have been trying to understand.
I have spent hours and hours reading, listening, and talking with people who have a stake in this situation. I have had so many questions.
How did we get here?
Can it ever be resolved?
What is a Zionist?
What is Hamas?
What is a proportional response?
Where is the line between counter terrorism and genocide - is there one?
Why is antisemitism so universally rife?
Of all the resources I’ve availed myself of during this time, there is one that, to this novice, gave the most balanced, in-depth and compassionate background to today’s situation, and so I want to share it with you.
Fear and Loathing in the New Jerusalem is a podcast series under the handle Martyrmade, by Darryl Cooper. I first heard about it when comedian and political commentator Dave Smith mentioned it on Joe Rogan’s podcast.
The series is well over 20 hours of content divided into six parts, giving an overview from the birth of Zionism, in the late 1800s, up until 1948, when the state of Israel was officially established. It’s heavy going at two-to-five hours per episode, but the upside is that there is time to meander into historical detail that you cannot get from reading current news articles.
The boiler plate for the series reads:
“The conflict between Israel and Palestine can often seem like a permanent feature of the global order. The wars, intifadas, refugees camps, suicide vests, UN resolutions, and peace talks have been painfully burned into our collective consciousness. But how could this have happened? Was it always this way? That’s what we’ll seek to find out in this three-part series [which obviously ballooned to six parts] on the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”
The series has its flaws (some repetition and overly lengthy explanations being the main ones) but Cooper is rigorous in referencing primary sources, and fastidious with detail.
What I appreciated the most was Cooper’s constant refrain:
“What would you do?”
Cooper describes historical vignettes from both sides - pogroms against Jewish populations, the pillaging, rape and murder of Palestinians by Napoleon’s army, Britain’s betrayal of Palestine (and Syria, and Lebanon) in the aftermath of WWI, violent riots led by both Jews and Arabs in Palestine, the Holocaust, and terrorism campaigns conducted by the Revisionist Zionists. And he asks - what would you do? On each side, if you lived through that experience, how would you feel? What would you have done in response?
I don’t pretend to be an expert on this conflict, and I don’t have the answer. What I have always tried to do, especially before jumping to take a position on the current thing, is to understand.
And so I’m going to leave this with you for now, while I keep watching and reading and listening. If you have the opportunity to listen to the series, I would love to hear your thoughts. I also welcome reader recommendations.
You can find the Fear and Loathing in the New Jerusalem series on The Matyrmade Podcast on most platforms, available here.
Cooper has since release a bonus episode (published 11 November 2023), which you can listen to below. The bonus episode picks up where the original series (made and released over 2015-2016) left off, in 1948. Warning: it’s a bloody, bloody tale.
Post Note: Another refrain that has been cycling through my mind lately is Kurt Vonnegut’s ‘So it goes,’ which was peppered through his seminal novel Slaughterhouse Five, like the Psalmist’s ‘Selah.’ Vonnegut, who as an American infantryman in WWII was a POW in Dresden and saw the ravages of war up close, was vociferously anti-war and anti-US empire expansion.
I take ‘so it goes’ as an expression of recognition that these things keep happening because - this is how we are, and so this is how life is. Which is not to say that we shouldn’t educate ourselves or write about it or advocate for peace. But just to know that if you oppose war, what you are up against is human nature itself.
Like the Ukraine/Russia conflict, the Palestine/Israel conflict has been foregrounded in the mainstream media’s agenda, and therefore in the public’s field of attention. But these kinds of conflicts are playing out everywhere, all the time. It is estimated that the war in the Congo straddling last century and this one is the deadliest conflict since WWII. Wars in Syria, Darfur, Yemen, Afghanistan and Iraq have been allocated column inches and TV time here and there, but there are massacres you’ve never heard of happening at the same time in countries that are of less interest from the perspective of a Western lens.
So it goes.
To support my work, make a one-off contribution to DDU via my Kofi account and/or subscribe. Thanks!
Thanks Rebekah.
Here is another one that doesn't get much media attention - https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2023/10/the-persecution-of-armenian-christians-is-not-just-a-religious-freedom-issue
IMO the plight of the world is due to a spiritual battle, and we can only try to keep awakening the world to what mainstream media won't cover.
So keep up your great efforts, you certainly have your work cut out for you, as the battlefield is expansive.
Mark.
Thanks Rebekah
Looks like a great series, however I have been following Israel for many years, and I really can't believe any so called news about what is happening. There is enough sorrow without going into this quagmire for hours on end.
In all the wars however I don't really see Israel turning to God. They are a secular nation with a terrible persecuted past, but they won't be at peace until they are at peace with God, which doesn't seem to be now or in the near future.