Hello and welcome to Background Briefing, available 24-7 at Background Briefing.org, I'm Ian Masters,

and today we'll look into a number of stories and issues in the news.

We'll begin with a political failure amid talk of an intelligence failure

that elites in Israel, the Middle East, and in Washington

are now having to face for not considering the plight of the Palestinians

as they dreamed up a new peace and prosperity plan for the region.

Joining us is Nata Hashemi, the director of the Al-Aweed Center for Muslim Christian Understanding,

and an associate professor of Middle East and Islamic politics at the Edmund A. Welsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University.

A non-resident fellow at Democracy for the Arab World now. He's the author of

The People Reloaded, the Green Movement and the Struggle for Iran's Future, and sectarianization,

mapping the new politics of the Middle East. Then, with pushback against Harvard students

blaming the U.S. for the latest war between Israel and Hamas

and AOC condemning Sunday's rally by Democratic Socialists of America for bigotry and callousness

in not rejecting Hamas' horrifying attacks. We will speak with Mitchell Plitnik, the president

of rethinking foreign policy, and former vice president of the Foundation for Middle East Peace.

A political analyst and a frequent writer on the Middle East and U.S. foreign policy,

he served as director of the U.S. Office of Bitsilem, and co-director of Jewish Voice for Peace,

and he is the co-author with Mark Lamont Hill of, except for Palestine,

the limits of progressive politics. Then finally, we'll examine the flood of disinformation about

the war in Israel on Twitter or X, since Elon Musk allows anyone to buy blue check accounts

previously restricted to journalists, politicians politicians and business and world leaders,

which fake journalists can now use to spread outrageous lies that can be monetized, depending upon the millions they deceive.

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