Episode 11: Iran is imploding - A conversation with Dr. Sharona Mazalian Levi

Ask Haviv Anything

Haviv Rettig Gur

History

4.9 • 640 Ratings

🗓️ 28 April 2025

⏱️ 51 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

As the Trump administration tries to strike a deal curtailing Iran's nuclear program, I turned to Dr. Sharona Mazalian Levi, an Iran expert and proud Persian Jew, to try to take us past the headlines and political elites to the conditions and hopes of ordinary Iranians.

Dr. Mazalian paints a dire picture. Desperate shortages of clean water, electricity and gas, a collapsed currency, a third of the population under the poverty line, an oppressive religious police, the highest rate of executions in the world, severe air pollution and environmental degradation -- and a regime more interested in exporting its "revolution" than tackling any of these problems.

Iran, one of the most energy-rich places on Earth, is "a poor nation in a rich country."

Today’s episode is sponsored by the Sapir, the quarterly journal edited by Pulitzer-prize-winning commentator Bret Stephens. If you’re in the US, you can get this excellent journal sent to you absolutely free by going to http://sapirjournal.org/AskHaviv. Please use the link. It helps the podcast if they know we sent you.

Sapir are initiating the Sapir Debates, a series of live debates on issues facing the Jewish people. The first debate will take place at 92NY on May 15 at 7 pm.

Former Obama chief of staff and Chicago mayor Rahm Emmanuel and former Trump special envoy to the Middle East Jason Greenblatt will debate the topic: “Is Donald Trump good for the Jews?”

To purchase tickets to the inaugural SAPIR debate, go to http://sapirjournal.org/sapirdebate.

Please join me on Patreon to support this project: ⁠ www.patreon.com/AskHavivAnything⁠

If you would like to sponsor an episode, please email us at ⁠[email protected]⁠.

A podcast by Haviv Rettig Gur

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello, everybody. Welcome to Ask Kaviv Anything.
0:09.2	This is going to be a very special episode. We're talking to an expert, a friend of ours,
0:13.4	Dr. Sharona Mazaliyan Levi, from the Alian Center for Iranian Studies at Tel Aviv University.
0:19.6	An Iran expert, someone who more and more Israelis
0:23.8	are turning to to understand that country, to understand the enemy, but not just the enemy regime,
0:30.2	the society, the trends, the struggles that that people is going through to no small extent
0:36.9	because of that regime.
0:38.8	Before we get into it, I just want to tell you our sponsor for this episode and to thank them.
0:45.0	Many of you were able to catch our mini episode just before Pesach,
0:48.7	which was sponsored by Sapir, the quarterly journal edited by the Pulitzer Prize winning Brett Stevens.
0:56.0	I mentioned that if you're in the U.S., you can get this excellent journal sent to you
0:59.4	absolutely free by going to Sapil Journal forward slash Ask Chaviv, which you should still do.
1:07.7	It helps us a lot.
1:09.2	It tells them we sent you.
1:10.3	But they're also initiating the
1:12.2	subpoe debates, which are a series of live debates on issues that face the Jewish people. The first
1:17.6	debate is going to take place at the 92nd Street, Why, in New York on May 15th at 7 p.m.
1:25.5	And it'll be on the very slightly sensitive topic of,
1:29.2	is Donald Trump good for the Jews?
1:31.1	They're going right for the throat this time,
1:33.6	moderated by Brett Stevens,
1:35.2	featuring former Chief of Staff for President Obama,
	...

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