The Times of Israel Daily Briefing

Welcome to The Times of Israel's Daily Briefing, your 20-minute audio update on what's happening in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world.
News editor Ben Sales joins host Jessica Steinberg for today's episode.
With the final barrage of election polls before the October 27 election, Sales notes that the canvassing can't accurately predict who will win, and explains why, including the issue of the smaller parties on both sides of the political spectrum that are hovering around the 3.25% electoral threshold.
Sales also discusses rising tensions among members of Mayor Zohran Mamdani's political base and New York City Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch, as they call for her to be fired after police officers clashed with protesters following the shooting of a man in the Bronx by ICE agents.
The shooting, and the NYPD’s response to it, had no direct connection to Israel or antisemitism in the city. But the protest against pro-Israel Tisch relates to her role as a pro-Israel presence in City Hall and the implications if she were no longer in that job.
Check out The Times of Israel's ongoing liveblog for more updates.
For further reading:
3 experts on how you’re reading election polls wrong — and why they can’t predict the result
Threats to NYPD’s pro-Israel commissioner are an inflection point for New York Jews
Subscribe to The Times of Israel Daily Briefing on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. This episode was produced by Ari Schlacht.
IMAGE: News editor Ben Sales appears on the Daily Briefing with host Jessica Steinberg (Flash 90)
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Welcome to "A Mandatory Listen," a new weekly podcast in which The Times of Israel deputy editor Amanda Borschel-Dan asks the big questions facing Israel and the Jewish people.
For this fourth episode in the new series, we speak with Prof. Nechumi Yaffe, an ultra-Orthodox woman running for Knesset for the Charedi Public Party (HaTzibur HaCharedi).
A faculty member at Tel Aviv University since 2019, Yaffe is currently a tenured senior lecturer at the School of Public Policy and co-director of the Haredi Research Group at UCLA.
Among other fields of interest, Yaffe delves into the issues of poverty and identity in Haredi society.
We hear how the October 7, 2023, Hamas onslaught on southern Israel made Yaffe rethink the ideas of civil obligations and rights. While she believes that youths who are not fit for yeshiva can -- and should -- be conscripted into the IDF, she is deeply concerned with allowing the ultra-Orthodox community to remain strictly observant.
How can a delicate balance between religious observance and national burden be forged? Only through education, says Yaffe.
Over time, she relates, her friends and neighbors in the ultra-Orthodox world stopped accusing her of airing their dirty laundry in the secular public and began understanding the dire situation their community is in.
But will this increased awareness lead to a gain in the polls? Perhaps through the Haredi world's overlooked weapon -- women.
A Mandatory Listen podcast episodes are available for download on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. This episode was produced by Yitzchak Ledee.
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Welcome to The Reel Schmooze with ToI film reviewer Jordan Hoffman and host Amanda Borschel-Dan, where we bring you all the entertainment news and film reviews a Jew can use.
This week's featured Schmooze film is "The Apartment," a 1960 iconic work of dark comedy by famed filmmaker Billy Wilder.
Starring Jack Lemmon, Shirley MacLaine and Fred MacMurray, the film takes us to the massive offices of an insurance conglomerate where Lemmon is attempting to climb the corporate ladder. A bit of a "shnook," he finds himself lending out his Upper West Side apartment to a group of four adulterous bosses for their flings.
At the same time, a quiet, amiable connection is made between Lemmon and MacLaine, an elevator girl, who, it turns out, is also one of the bosses' girls.
The movie was nominated for 10 Academy Awards and won five Oscars. Its resonance lingers and comedian Chris Rock recently gave it a nod in a lengthy The New York Times interview.
Let’s hear who gave this film an “oy,” “meh” or the prized “not bad” this week on The Reel Schmooze.
The Reel Schmooze is produced by Ari Schlacht and can be found wherever you get your podcasts.
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We recorded a live Daily Briefing podcast in Jerusalem on Wednesday, October 14, joined by an exclusive ToI Community audience.
Deputy editor Amanda Borschel-Dan hosted military correspondent Emanuel Fabian, diplomatic correspondent Lazar Berman, and political correspondent Ariela Karmel for a night of interactive polls and audience questions, followed by light refreshments.
This event was exclusively for members of The Times of Israel Community, our reader support group.
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Welcome to The Times of Israel's Lazar Focus. Each Friday, join host diplomatic correspondent Lazar Berman for a deep dive into what's behind the news that spins the globe.
Israel is doing well on the battlefield since October 7, but has lost significant ground in the information war.
Much of that discourse is rooted in legal language -- war crimes, arrest warrants, illegal settlements, charges of genocide.
International law and the conversation around international law is a central battlefield for Israel.
Natasha Hausdorff is one of Israel's most prominent advocates, especially around questions of international law.
Hausdorff is a barrister in London with law degrees from Oxford and Tel Aviv University. She is the legal director of UK Lawyers for Israel Charitable Trust, and is the founder of the Center for International Rule of Law.
She argues that there is an ecosystem of international organizations, NGOs, and foreign governments "promoting a particular agenda against Western civilization" and using the phraseology of international law to vilify Israel.
Hausdorff says Israel takes measures to protect civilians that go beyond those of any other army in the world. That includes the delivery of leaflets, phone calls to individual householders, evacuation corridors to humanitarian zones, and yes, estimates of collateral damage before strikes.
She also argues that the International Committee of the Red Cross does not have a clear mandate to access terrorist combatants in Israeli prisons.
Turning to the genocide question, she says the UN Commission of Inquiry that ruled Israel was committing genocide in Gaza was "essentially a copy and paste" of the Amnesty International report, which relied on a Human Rights Watch report.
Hausdorff calls it "a cycle of disinformation laundering... Hamas propaganda getting that stamp of UN authority."
She also laments Navi Pillay's Nobel Peace Prize, saying she is part of the effort to lower the threshold for genocide in order to find Israel guilty.
Lazar Focus is available on all podcast platforms. This episode was produced by Gabriella Jacobs and video edited by Yitzchak Ledee.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.