During the 15th and 16th centuries, Europeans produced a great amount of new and beautiful art. The same era also saw a revival of classical scholarship and an interest in humanistic textual scholarship. Did the Jews of Europe participate in this rebirth of the arts? Joanna Weinberg answers with a resounding yes and, in conversation with J.J. Kimchi, tells the stories of a number of rabbis and other Jewish scholars who taught and exchanged ideas with Christian men of letters. They also produced what, Weinberg argues, can best be described as impressive works of Jewish humanism. (Audio, 68 minutes.)

Recent reports suggest that the White House has at last acted to allow the shipments of weapons that had been withheld from Israel and to end further the delays. On this topic, Elliott Abrams comments, “I don’t know what and how much has been held up, but it shouldn’t have happened. The level of delay should be zero.”

In this interview with Ariel Kahana, Abrams also comments on the failings of U.S. policy toward Iran, and the Biden administration’s refusal to enforce existing sanctions:

According to Abrams, Iran has indeed halted the advancement of its nuclear program on rare occasions. “This happened when Bush invaded Iraq in 2003, and when [President] Trump eliminated Qassem Suleimani in 2020. The U.S. needs to be ready to use force in Iran, but credibility is critical here. Only if [Iran’s leaders] are convinced that the U.S. is willing to act will they stop.”

Abrams claims that the U.S. president tried for two-and-a-half years to revive the nuclear deal with Iran until he realized it wasn’t interested. “Iran has benefited from this situation, and everyone outside the administration sees it as a failure.”