The Oh, Hello and

I'm going to Behind the News. My name is Doug Henwood. The By the Book Two Guests today

An El Sheline will talk about why she resigned from a State Department position to protest the war on Gaza,

and Daniel Bessner will talk about the changing relations of production in Hollywood.

My first guest is to Nell Sheline, making her fourth appearance of Behind the News.

I interviewed her twice in 2022 and once in March

2023 when she was a fellow at the Quincy Institute, mainly to talk about

Saudi Arabia and its war in Yemen. Aside from her expertise on Saudi Arabia, she's

also done field research in

Oman, Qatar, UAE, Jordan, Morocco, and Egypt. The reason she hasn't been on in just over a year

is that she took a job with the State Department's Human Rights

operation and couldn't give interviews anymore.

I was disappointed a loser as a guest, at least for what was supposed to have been a two-year appointment,

but she lasted only a year. The reason for her premature departure was that she

resigned in protest against US support for Israel's war on Gaza. She's not alone in

this. There have been several others who resigned their government positions

for similar reasons but not that many.

The most recent is Lily Greenberg Call, the first Jewish political appointee to do so.

As she said in a tough and eloquent resignation letter,

her family escaped anti-Semitic persecution in Europe and found refuge in America,

and she no longer could bear to work for an administration that was supporting the brutal treatment

of Palestinians.

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