AIPAC Versus the Squad
On this episode of The Time of Monsters, Alexander Sammon on how the pro-Israel group wants to destroy progressive politics.

Here's where to find podcasts from The Nation. Political talk without the boring parts, featuring the writers, activists and artists who shape the news, from a progressive perspective.
On Wednesday, Alex Sammon reported in Slate that “one of the biggest, bitterest, and most expensive political battles of the 2024 election cycle has emerged: The American Israel Public Affairs Committee [AIPAC], one of the most powerful, best-funded influence operations in Washington, is planning to go all out to knock the famed “Squad”—the small group of highly visible and popular progressive legislators of color, most of them women—out of office.”
AIPAC is planning on spending more than $100 million to push the Democratic party to the right. Given AIPAC’s successful track record, this is a genuine threat.
For this episode of the podcast, Alex and I sat down to talk about this development, the way the current Israel-Palestine conflict is sending political shockwaves in America, and the Democratic party’s selective defense of incumbents. We also discuss the fact that Israel’s war is increasingly unpopular and facing mass opposition— a fact that could undermine AIPAC’s agenda.
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Then–Vice President Joe Biden addressing the American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee’s 2013 Policy Conference in Washington.
(Susan Walsh / AP Photo)On Wednesday, Alex Sammon reported in Slate that “one of the biggest, bitterest, and most expensive political battles of the 2024 election cycle has emerged: The American Israel Public Affairs Committee [AIPAC], one of the most powerful, best-funded influence operations in Washington, is planning to go all out to knock the famed ‘Squad’—the small group of highly visible and popular progressive legislators of color, most of them women—out of office.”
AIPAC is planning on spending more than $100 million to push the Democratic Party to the right. Given AIPAC’s successful track record, this is a genuine threat.
For this episode of the podcast, Alex and I sat down to talk about this development, the way the current Israel-Palestine conflict is sending political shock waves in America, and the Democratic Party’s selective defense of incumbents. We also discuss the fact that Israel’s war is increasingly unpopular and facing mass opposition—a fact that could undermine AIPAC’s agenda.

Here's where to find podcasts from The Nation. Political talk without the boring parts, featuring the writers, activists and artists who shape the news, from a progressive perspective.
Norman Podhoretz, one of the founding fathers of neoconservatism, died on December 16 at
age 95. His legacy is a complex one, since in recent decades neoconservatism has been
supplanted in many ways by American First conservatism. But many aspects of Podhoretz’s
influence still play a shaping role on right. I take up Podhoretz’s career with David Klion (who
wrote an obituary for the pundit for The Nation) and the historian Ronnie Grinberg, who had
discussed Podhoretz in her book Write Like a Man.
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