After a lovely Friday night dinner recently, I asked my friend - an October 7 survivor from one of the border communities: “What were you thinking about during those hours in the ’safe room’?” His response took me aback. “I was thinking of the Hebron Massacre in 1929.”
As the Arabs in Hebron slaughtered their Jewish neighbors on August 23-24, 1929, they shouted: “Allahu Akhbar. Kill the Jews.”
Huddled with his daughter on October 7, 2023, my friend heard the same blood curdling screams on his kibbutz, almost one hundred years later. “Allahu Akhbar. Kill the Jews.”
Two years ago, an extraordinarily powerful, incisive, and important book shed light on the Original Lie that has fueled feral anti-Zionism and antisemitism that have intensified over the last century. And this Lie is now the dominant narrative in the west, featuring the Jews as colonialist occupiers oppressing the indigenous population; alleging that the “Jews” have a sinister plan to “occupy” the Al Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem.
The origin of The Lie is exposed and discussed in Yardena Schwartz’s book: Ghosts of a Holy War: The 1929 Massacre in Palestine that Ignited the Arab-Israeli Conflict. In this episode, we feature an extensive interview with Yardena Schwartz, who brings to life the horror of the Hebron Massacre of Jews in 1929, through the letters and story of a young American man who was among those slaughtered. Her historical research is masterful. And the parallels to October 7 are eerie; in terms of the religious propaganda and incitement, betrayal of the Hebron Jews by their Arab “friends” and neighbors, and the willful blindness on the part of the Jews to the existential danger lurking, everywhere. We weave the past with the present - and take you to present day Hebron to see where it happened. We hear from a local Jewish woman who has lived there for more than 40 years.
It is a longer podcast than usual, so take your time to soak it up. There is a lot in here. I have worked on this for more than one year. This episode has a lot of visual content that is quite fascinating but it can be enjoyed in audio form if you prefer.
It is a journey that will shake you to your core. In a good way. Because what Yardena Schwartz learned and writes is brilliant, fresh and has never been treated so carefully.
00:00 Introduction: A “safe room” on October 7th, and the memory of 192902:18 Introducing Yardena Schwartz and “Ghosts of a Holy War”03:12 Why the Hebron massacre is also the story of October 7th04:23 Walking the streets of Hebron with Shelli Karzen06:48 A word to our listeners and supporters08:23 Interview: Yardena Schwartz 09:31 A box of letters in a Memphis attic13:09 Who was David Shainberg?16:15 From Wharton to a Hebron yeshiva19:37 Jewish life in Hebron, 1928: coexistence22:32 Second-class citizens: the limits of tolerance24:32 The match is lit: the Grand Mufti’s campaign26:17 Documentary excerpt: Haj Amin al-Husseini28:42 The Al-Aqsa lie and the Western Wall, Yom Kippur 192832:30 From 1929 to the “Al-Aqsa Flood”: Hamas’s Ghazi Hamad34:59 Tisha B’Av 1929. The riots begin41:43 A myth that has lasted a century: The Jews are taking over Al Aqsa42:37 August 24, 1929: the massacre in Hebron45:22 Where it happened: Shelli Karzen outside of Hadassah Hospital, Hebron47:53 Aftermath: A city without Jews51:06 1947, the Mufti, and the Nazis52:08 How 1929 ignited the Arab-Israeli conflict1:01:52 Closing thoughts with Yardena Schwartz1:03:16 Introducing Shelli Karzen1:06:55 Shelli Karzen on life in Hebron
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Podcast Notes:
* Yardena Schwartz’s website with information about the book and more: www.yardenaschwartz.com
* Link to full documentary about the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, the creative mind behind The Original Lie
Yardena Schwartz is an award-winning journalist and Emmy-nominated producer who was based in Israel for a decade until 2023. Her reporting from four continents has appeared in dozens of publications, including The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, New York Review of Books, The Economist, TIME, National Geographic, and Foreign Policy. Yardena previously worked at NBC News and MSNBC. She graduated with honors from Columbia Journalism School in 2011, received an Emmy nomination for her work at MSNBC in 2013, and the RNA award for excellence in magazine reporting in 2016. Yardena now lives in New York’s Hudson Valley with her husband and children. Ghosts of a Holy War is her first book.
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