Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza: A Reckoning
by Peter Beinart
in Conversation with Dr. Barnett Rubin
Wednesday, April 30, 8 pm
Via Zoom
by registration only
Peter Beinart, Being Jewish after the Destruction of Gaza: A Reckoning, Knopf, 2025. 192 pages.
ABOUT THE BOOK
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A bold, urgent appeal from the acclaimed columnist and political commentator, addressing one of the most important issues of our time
“At this painful moment, Peter Beinart’s voice is more vital than ever. His reach is broad—from the tragedy of today’s Middle East to the South Africa he knows well to events centuries ago—his scholarship is deep, and his heart is big. This book is not just about being Jewish in the shadow of today’s war, but about being a person who cares for justice.” —Adam Hochschild, author of American Midnight and King Leopold’s Ghost
In Peter Beinart’s view, one story dominates Jewish communal life: that of persecution and victimhood. It is a story that erases much of the nuance of Jewish religious tradition and warps our understanding of Israel and Palestine. After Gaza, where Jewish texts, history, and language have been deployed to justify mass slaughter and starvation, Beinart argues, Jews must tell a new story. After this war, whose horror will echo for generations, they must do nothing less than offer a new answer to the question: What does it mean to be a Jew?
Beinart imagines an alternate narrative, which would draw on other nations’ efforts at moral reconstruction and a different reading of Jewish tradition. A story in which Israeli Jews have the right to equality, not supremacy, and in which Jewish and Palestinian safety are not mutually exclusive but intertwined. One that recognizes the danger of venerating states at the expense of human life.
Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza is a provocative argument that will expand and inform one of the defining conversations of our time. It is a book that only Peter Beinart could write: a passionate yet measured work that brings together his personal experience, his commanding grasp of history, his keen understanding of political and moral dilemmas, and a clear vision for the future.
“Guided by a deep familiarity with Jewish history and sources, and a piercing awareness of Palestinian realities, Peter Beinart unflinchingly peels away the layers of propagandist misdirection deployed to defend Israel’s actions. This essential book leads us to a universal and Jewish reawakening that is both humane and hopeful.” —Daniel Levy, President of the US-Middle East Project and former Israeli peace negotiator “An urgent, carefully argued and compelling read.” —Rachel Shabi, author of Off-White: The Truth About Antisemitism
“[Beinart] has built a reputation for being an incisive writer and public intellectual, with a knack for admitting when he’s wrong. . . . In Beinart’s latest book,he appeals to his fellow Jews to grapple with the morality of their defense of Israel. . . . He argues for a Jewish tradition that has no use for Jewish supremacy and treats human equality as a core value.” —The Guardian
“Uses the history of the Israel-Palestine conflict as well as Beinart’s deep Jewish faith to chart a path forward for peace and safety for both Israelis and Palestinians.” —MSNBC
PETER BEINART is Professor of Journalism and Political Science at the Newmark School of Journalism at the City University of New York. He is also Editor-at-Large of Jewish Currents, an MSNBC political commentator, a frequent contributor to The New York Times and The Guardian, and a Non-Resident Fellow at the Foundation for Middle East Peace. He writes the Beinart Notebook newsletter on Substack.
He has written for a range of publications including the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, the Boston Globe, the Atlantic, Newsweek, Slate, Die Zeit, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, and Polity: the Journal of the Northeastern Political Science Studies Association.The Week magazine named him columnist of the year for 2004. In 2005, he gave the Theodore H. White lecture at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government.
He has appeared on “This Week with George Stephanopoulos,” “Charlie Rose,” “Meet the Press,” “The Colbert Report” and many other television programs.
Beinart graduated from Yale University, winning a Rhodes scholarship for graduate study at Oxford University. After graduating from University College, Oxford, Beinart became The New Republic’s managing editor in 1995. He became senior editor in 1997, and from 1999 to 2006 served as the magazine’s Editor.
BARNETT RUBIN is a Distinguished Fellow at Center on International Cooperation. During 1994-2000 he was Director of the Center for Preventive Action, and Director, Peace and Conflict Studies, at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.
Rubin was Associate Professor of Political Science and Director of the Center for the Study of Central Asia at Columbia University from 1990 to 1996. Previously, he was a Jennings Randolph Peace Fellow at the United States Institute of Peace and Assistant Professor of Political Science at Yale University.
Rubin also served as the Senior Adviser to the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan in the U.S. Department of State during the Obama administration and, prior to that, as special advisor to the UN Special Representative of the Secretary General for Afghanistan.
Dr. Rubin received a Ph.D. (1982) and M.A. (1976) from the University of Chicago and a B.A. (1972) from Yale University. He also studied at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris in 1977-1978. He is founder and chair of the Conflict Prevention and Peace Forum (a program of the Social Science Research Council) and a founding member of the Executive Board of Asia Watch, now Human Rights Watch/Asia.
Dr. Rubin is the author of Afghanistan from the Cold War through the War on Terror (2013), Blood on the Doorstep: the Politics of Preventing Violent Conflict (2002). He is also the author of Post-Soviet Political Order: Conflict and State Building (1998); Toward Comprehensive Peace in Southeast Europe: Conflict Prevention in the South Balkans (1996), and The Search for Peace in Afghanistan: From Buffer State to Failed State (1995).
Dr. Rubin articles have appeared in Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, The New Yorker, Survival, International Affairs, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The New York Review of Books, as well as academic journals. His current articles and posts on topical issues can be read on Appointed Times on Substack.
