Gidi Grinstein is the Founder of the Reut Group and the author of Flexigidity: the Secret of Jewish Adaptability and the Crisis and Opportunity Facing Israel, which offered a vision of Israel as the nation state of the Jewish People. His article ‘Time to End Diaspora Complacency’ built upon that book and on the extensive study undertaken by the Reut Institute into the condition and direction of Israel-Diaspora relations.
Ari Afilalo is a tenured Professor of Law at Rutgers Law School, where he has been teaching international law since 2000. Professor Afilalo has researched and written extensively on Statecraft, globalisation, populism, international political economy, and international institutions. He is a native of France, and the President of the West Side Sephardic Synagogue in Manhattan. He regularly publishes a blog in the Times of Israel.
Our Voice of the Fortnight is from the Times of Israel's 'Wartime Diaries' podcast. In the immediate aftermath of October 7th, Shai Davidai – an Assistant Professor at Columbia University – became an unlikely public defender of Israel. And truthfully, even he was surprised by this turn of events: As a committed left-wing Israeli, he had spent years criticizing the government, and often took to the streets to demonstrate against its policies. But the atmosphere he witnessed on college campuses (and specifically on his own campus at Columbia), compelled him to speak up and speak out.