Do not cut this out of the interview. That is for us.

I feel like we decided to backdoor pilot for a basketball podcast in the middle of our podcast discussion about Palestine.

From Topic Studios and WarnerMedia Podcast Network, this is politically reactive. I'm Debbie Camelbell.

And I'm Harry Kuntabolo, aka the 1993 PS 115 Spelling Bee runner-up.

That's right. Defying stereotypes and Indian American lost the spelling bee.

But to be fair, another Indian American won the spelling bee.

We're two friends in stand-up comics and dads trying to make sense of American politics.

That's very, very hard.

We're probably still easier than trying to get people to talk rationally about Israel and Palestine.

Which is the topic of today's episode.

The Palestinian people are not protected. They live in a state of inequality and injustice and oppression and occupation.

Don't start your angry tweets yet.

First, listen to our conversation with our guest, Mark LeMont-Hill.

Mark's new book is, except for Palestine, the limits of progressive politics.

We say, oh, well, Israel has a right to exist. Israel has a right to defend itself.

Those people have been fighting forever. Why don't we blame Hamas? They need to stop terrorism.

And instead of unpacking those kinds of statements and getting somewhere better and smarter so we can have a lasting peace for everybody, we just say, you know, we'll leave it.

Mark knows what it's like to face backlash for speaking out in defensive Palestinians.

In 2018, CNN dropped him as a commentator the day after he spoke to the UN on its annual day of solidarity with Palestinian people.

For these kept added, as a progressive black scholar, he feels it's his responsibility.

I think there's such an opportunity with this issue to not just being an issue about Israelis and Palestinians, but to be a referendum on a bigger conversation about what justice might look like and how it might feel.

And that from me, it is super interesting.

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