Eric Alterman

1 week ago | portside.org | Eric Alterman

Why American Presidents Dance to Bibi’s Tune Published June 20, 2025 Despite the extremely stiff competition, it’s fair to say that Donald Trump may be about to win the historical contest to become the all-time “Bibi’s Lapdog” among American presidents.

1 week ago | newrepublic.com | Eric Alterman

Despite the extremely stiffcompetition, it’s fair to say that Donald Trump may be about to win thehistorical contest to become the all-time “Bibi’s Lapdog” among Americanpresidents. After repeatedly rejecting the ideaof joining with Israel to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities and distancinghimself when it finally happened, then reversing himself again to take partialcredit for it, Trump appears to be ready to go one massive step further andturn the Israeli attack into a full-fledged American war.

2 weeks ago | altercation.substack.com | Eric Alterman

1) A Times op-ed responding to Donald Trump’s criticisms of Bruce Springsteen, here2) A piece I wrote for Lenny Bernardo’s Ideas Letter published this morning about the reaction to Peter Beinart’s book, Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza, and Gaza and what conclusions might be drawn from that hereThanks for reading Eric’s Substack! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.

2 weeks ago | forward.com | Eric Alterman

Did President Donald Trump's administration just reverse decades of precedent when it comes to Israel? In what The New York Times characterized as a "sharp shift away from decades of American foreign policy on the Israel-Palestinian conflict," Mike Huckabee, Trump's ambassador to Israel, this week suggested in two interviews that under Trump, the U.S. no longer aims for the creation of Palestinian state bordering Israel in the West Bank and Gaza.

2 weeks ago | theideasletter.org | Eric Alterman

One balmy evening in mid-March, I went to the SoHo Playhouse in downtown New York to watch a debate about Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians between the journalist and political commentator Peter Beinart and Michael Rubin, a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. Perhaps because the two had been college friends, Rubin refrained from calling Beinart a “kapo,” a “self-hating Jew,” or any of the other names that right-wing Jews frequently sling at Beinart.