Anti-semitism was just rooted in people being broke, bitter, ghetto, and jealous. And a lot of the insults that I would hear towards the Jewish community were just so exhausted and tired and lame. Why are there borders around Gaza? I don't know. Ask Egypt. Can there be a Tuesday solution? We don't need another terrorist state. We already have Michigan. When October 7th happened, I could not believe how quickly the media mainstream narrative had flipped on Israel, trying to paint Israel as the bad guys. I didn't grow up around pretty much any Jewish people. And when I went to my first Shabbat dinner, I was completely captivated by the elements of tradition that were there. I don't think I have ever been more disappointed in the right until I saw some of the reaction to Charlie Kirk's assassination. Look into things, but look into things in a way that's not reckless and look into things in a way that is not just blatantly disrespectful. >> What's it like earning 7K a post? It sounds great. >> If I had 7K a post, there would be signs. I tweeted this and I was so serious. If I was getting 7K a post, I would tweet every single page of the Torah post by post in every language available. Okay, everyone, this is a really, really exciting episode. We're joined by Zavier Duruso. What a name, by the way. That is a iconic name. Uh he is a political activist and commentator and he's a host at PragerU. Um which is a wonderful organization. Uh it's uh founder or president Dennis Prager by the way is uh very unwell at the moment. So please do keep him in your thoughts and prayers. Um but like uh our guest yesterday, Desh Duza, Zavier Duso has been an exceptional and extremely influential uh outspoken friend and supporter of Israel and the Jewish people and uh true, you know, American values at at its best. Um, but before we dive into this conversation, uh, instead of me telling you about Zavier, if you're not already familiar with him, let me just give you a quick flavor of his content. >> Define anti-semitism. Ghetto broken bitter. Is there an ethnic cleansing? No, the terrorists are still musty. Why are there borders around Gaza? I don't know. Ask Egypt. Can there be a two-s solution? We don't need another terrorist state. We already have Michigan. Free Palestine, free parking. Why can't people criticize Israel? They do with a full-time job with benefits. >> If I were Israel, I wouldn't even provide matching socks to Gaza. But here is all the aid that y'all claim doesn't exist. Now walk with me. I'm here in Gaza, and all I see is food, water, and opportunity. But instead of Hamas distributing the ramen noodles, they're eating it all. And that's why their leaders are on OMIC. The United Nations brings the food here to look like they're actually doing something productive. But they never finished their job, just like your ex. Now, this food is sitting here collecting flies, but y'all want to blame Israel. Then you have Egypt who built the wall of Donald Trump's dreams keeping the Palestinians here. But y'all don't say anything to them. Why don't you call on any of the nations of Islam to distribute the food to Palestinians? Mind you, there is petroleum right there. Energy. Gaza got the energy. Gaza got the terrorists wasting all the energy. So as you can see, Zavier is just reaching a youthful generation in ways that just really cut through. So Zavier, first of all, thank you so much for being here on JTV today. It's greatly appreciated. >> Of course. Thank you so much for having me. And I'm laughing because I'm like, that is such a crazy way for people to have their first introduction to me. And I love it. It's like you just rip the band-aid right off of people. >> Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Completely unfiltered. But I think this actually gets gets people to understand why you're you're so effective, why you're cutting through, why you're getting this in incredible following. But more important than that, impact in what you're doing. So I think before we dive into all the big issues of the day, I think my audience would be really interested to just know a bit about you. You know, what what is it that that brought you into this work? It's not a typical career path that people go down because from what I understand, you used to be of a more left-wing Bernie Sanders, Black Lives Matter background. So tell me, talk me through the journey. >> Yes. So, my life in a nutshell, essentially, I grew up in a very left-wing, borderline Marxist family with some of my family members. Uh, very liberal, very progressive, and a little bit of an extreme racist way sometimes. And I was born in Southside Chicago. My family moved to the middle of cornfields of Illinois. So, I spent my upbringing going back and forth between Chicago and central Illinois where I was because I was going to this rural high school, I would sound too white for the black kids and then since I was black, I'd feel too black for the white kids. So, it made me go into this like identity crisis a little bit when I was younger where I felt like I needed to assert my blackness by being over-the-top left. And that cultivated until um you know, I was doing social media content, but just on a small micro level where every Black History Month, for example, I would do a whole series about, you know, different progressive causes that had to do with the black community. And when 2020 came around, everything happened with BLM and with George Floyd. Everybody turned to me and my friend group wanted to know what I had to say about it. Well, simultaneously during 2020, I was bored and I applied as a joke to be on a reality show on Netflix. And out of 25,000 people, I ended up being cast for that show. And the whole arc of my character was I was supposed to be this super super progressive activist on the show teaching people how to be a BLM activist um but from the perspective of a catfish essentially. And in the process of getting ready for that show, I wanted to debunk the counterarguments of all these people that I didn't dis that I disagreed with. So I was going to make a series debunking Prageru videos. I was going to come after Charlie Kirk, Dennis Prager, Brandon Tatum, you name them. I wanted to go and try to debate them. But instead, I ended up debunking my own belief systems. So it got to the point where I just backed out of the show. actually a year and one week, no not a year, five years and one week to the date, I backed out of going on the reality show and I decided I wanted to start speaking out about my new values and principles. So in February 2021, I started making political content as someone that leaned more conservative, some would say classically liberal on some things, conservative on other things, right of center for the most part. and I just started speaking out on my about my new values and it gained a lot of traction. Two years into it, I ended up starting to work with PragerU. I joined the Prageru team and how I ended up speaking so much about anti-semitism was very organic. So, I went to my first Shabbat dinner ever. I didn't grow up around pretty much any Jewish people. I knew as a kid three Jewish people, two I didn't know were Jewish until after October 7th. And I didn't know anything about Jewish culture. And when I went to my first Shabbat dinner, I was completely captivated by the elements of tradition that were there. My childhood had no tradition really. So to see like, wow, you guys have Thanksgiving every single week. And to learn little details about the Jewish community that I find so fascinating and impressive where you can be any side of the world, no matter what the Jewish community has went through, how no matter how much they've been scattered around, they are still on the same page of reading. we're reading this section of the Torah everywhere in the world at the same time. That to me was so cool. So, as I'm talking to the CEO of Prageru, Marissa Strike, she goes on a family vacation there every year. And she goes, "You should come to Israel with me." And I said, "One thing about me, I will book a flight, okay? So, don't invite me somewhere unless you want me there." And this was, you know, spring of 2023. So, June of 2023, I went >> because you were already working for Prageru at this point. Yes, I had just started with Prageru um in June of 2023 or no, February 2023 I started with Prageru and then June of 2023 I went over to Israel and I absolutely fell in love with it. And what blew my mind was I didn't even post anything political about Israel. I really didn't know much about the history of Israel before going there besides knowing that this was the biblical Holy Land. That's all I really went into it knowing that. And I had a rough understanding that Israel was usually defending themselves, but I didn't know why or from who or much of what was going on. And I posted two simple pictures. I found the one camel that you can find in Jerusalem, took a picture on that, and I went and I floated in the Dead Sea. And I posted those two photos. And I got so much backlash just from being there. And everybody was calling me, you name the insult, you name the slur, that's what they were calling me simply for riding a camel. and for being in the Dead Sea. And that was when I realized, oh, anti-semitism is still very much a thing. The same thing that I just learned about at the Holocaust Museum, this is going on now, too. >> A quick update before we continue. I've got some big news for you. We finally decided to bring JTV in person. I'm planning a speaking tour across America where I'll be talking about everything from the big issues the Jewish people and Israel face today to Judaism's deepest ideas. And of course, I'll be taking your questions. If you want me to come to your location, just click the Google form link below in the video description and I'll be in touch. Let's have a conversation. So, I started speaking out and you saw the humanitarian aid video. That's a series I do called Walk with Me. And Walk with Me was brand new at that point. And one of my first videos I made was about standing with Israel and how I thought that anti-semitism was just rooted in people being broke, bitter, ghetto, and jealous. And a lot of the insults that I would hear towards the Jewish community were just so exhausted and tired and lame and just such hater energy to put it simply. And I made that video in I believe either August or September of 2023. So I had already started speaking out about anti-semitism. Then when October 7th happened, I could not believe how quickly the media mainstream narrative had flipped on Israel, trying to paint Israel as the bad guys, as if we didn't just see the humanitarian crisis of my generation all the way back until, you know, 9/11. I was a little kid, so I knew that if I didn't speak up in that moment, I was going to regret it down the road because it would, again, it would be just like what I saw at the Holocaust Museum. So I essentially quadrupled down and now I'm an outspoken Zionist. >> Wow. That is amazing. That's really amazing. And so I think you've really cut to cut very deep when you say that you see with anti-semitism there's a culture of grievance, of envy, of jealousy, of just resentment. Is that what you think is going on at the root of it? >> You know, there's many roots of it. And that's what's scary about anti-semitism. It comes from so many different directions. It comes from a lot of people just being misinformed. There's a lot of people who, and I'll give you a perfect example of that. A lot of people are misinformed to the sense where they think that they're doing something great for the world and they think the only way to put their head on a pillow at night is if they go up and stand up against Israel. And an example is during the UCLA encampments, I ended up going in disguise with my friend Cam Higgby. It was very easy. I just went to Staples, got the same wristband, put on the tackiest pink bucket hat I could find and a red bandana and I fit right in. So, I snuck into the encampment and during the UCLA encampment, I noticed that beyond the gender neutral poop buckets, there were about five college students that looked like underassmen that were pulling apart the plywood a little bit to see what was happening on the counterprotest, the on the Israel side, the Zionist side. And when I went over there, I saw that they were watching the clips that were being played on this huge jumbotron TV of October 7th. And all the kids are sitting there, these like 19, 18year-old kids. They're saying, "Are they are the Israelis? Are the Zionists? Are they bragging about what they're doing to the Gazins? Are they bragging about how they're attacking Palestinians?" They're like, "What is this video? Why is it so loud?" And I said to them, I was like, "Oh, I think it's just footage from October 7th." that a single one of those five college students knew what October 7th was. >> Wow. >> They were so confused that they thought that that was the IDF attacking Palestinians. That is how misinformed a lot of these college kids are. And they're ultimately seeking comm community. Some of them, not all of them. Some of them are just evil and just beyond evil. >> They're a lot of them are seeking community. They're seeking social justice because social justice has taken the place for religion for a lot of people and they're trying to give their lives a sense of purpose. So, they're just misinformed. Then you have some people who try to say, "Oh, well, why are CEO why are so many CEOs Jewish? Why are so many successful people Jewish?" And just like I said in that video you played in the beginning, choices. It's a matter of choice. It's a matter of culture. But people would rather point at someone that is doing something that they feel like they're they've convinced themselves that they're incapable of doing. And instead of being like, "Okay, well, let me go and get a law degree. Let me go and get educated and make sure that my family and my kids are prioritizing, you know, education and virtue and being a good person." They go and they decide to be mad at the people that are successful and blame them as if there's some type of scarcity. So, it's rooted in many things, many, many things. But ultimately it's a disease. >> Yeah. And I think you're absolutely right to say that much of it as you observe firsthand is just ignorance. And I actually think that that's good news because ignorance can be replaced with education which by the way makes the work you're doing so utterly vital and it informs you know everything that I do as well. Um, but what's interesting is that, and this is something I touched on with Desh, and I'm sure this is something that you're very familiar with now, is that it, you know, as I grew up, and I'm sure as you grew up as well, it used to very much go hand in hand that with, you know, being a cons on the conservative side of things, typically you're going to be pro- Israel. Now, we're starting to see this growing divide on the right over Israel. What do you make of what's happening? Isn't that the question of the day? You know, it's really >> I forget you guys eight hours behind, so it's just morning for you, but sorry to throw this at you at the start of the day, but what can I do? >> You know, it's really the definition of horseshoe theory, if you're familiar, where the further you go left and the further you go right, they they tend on the extreme sides to be similar, more similar than they're different. Because what I've noticed, especially with my I've developed a large Jewish audience now, and what I've noticed is that a lot of them are actually, you know, left of center. And I've realized that people who are either left of center all the way through right of center, you know, the people who are not radical on either side, they tend to be pro- Israel. But the people that are on the radical sides of both, they're both against Israel, but for different reasons. The left, the far left, they're in this radical free Palestine movement because they've rebranded BLM. but made it more extreme and they think it's the racial issue of our time. They've tried to equate the Israel Palestinian crisis as black versus white, which is insane when you go to Israel and realize that it's 50 Shades of Brown, but they've turned it into a social justice cause. Then you have the far far alt-right. They have turned this into just a cluster of conspiracy theories where it's just the easy default thing for them to do is to blame Israel and to blame the Jewish community. And both sides of it are just wildly ignorant, but from two different sectors of it. But I also think that a lot of the anti-Israel sentiment is overexposed, which is dangerous though because, and when I say overexposed, I mean it in the sense that a lot of it is bots. I hope by now everybody knows that there are millions if not billions of bots out there that are creating a lot of the the the divide that's happening on a global scale when it comes to political and social issues. And because of those bots amplifying bad ideas or hateful ideas or amplifying lies, when enough people see the lies over and over again, they start to think that that's the truth. And that's when it gets dangerous because then it plays out in day-to-day life. But when I go to a Republican convention or a conservative organization or convention, majority of the people that you meet there are pro- Israel. I can say that very firmly. But when it's the more alt crowd that tends to be very very loud, especially on social media platforms like X, that's why there's so much hate that's coming from the right. And it's sad to see that it's become such a divisive issue when to me the history is complex, but what's happening today is very simple. >> Yeah, for sure. And I'm sure that the bot does do play a role in it. At the same time, there are some people who are sort of ringing leaders of this anti-Israel move on on the right that as far as I know are not robots but are real human beings. You know, people like Tucker and Candice and others. My question is around the debate that's happening on conservative circles online where there's basically people like Matt Walsh and others who are saying we just need to be unified. We need unity. people like Megan Kelly as well. They're like, I'm not going to call out, you know, uh, people who have differing opinions or, let's say, someone that's anti-Israel on the right because we need to see the bigger picture. And then there are people like Ben Shapiro and others who are saying, what do you mean bigger picture? If we if we don't have a certain set of values that we can all agree upon, uh, then what exactly are we as a movement? What are we doing? What's the point of us? What's your view on this whole debate that's growing on the right? You know, that's a great question and it's something that I do actually think about a lot because there is a fine line between holding your peers accountable versus, you know, demonizing people that are categorized together. And unfortunately, you know, with us being a two-party system, we end up under this huge umbrella of like are you left or are you right when there's clearly so much division that's happening in between. But I think it's I think it's unrealistic that there's going to be this huge camaraderie of unity now in the right because if it was going to happen it would have been after Charlie Kirk's assassination if we're going to be realistic. What I'm hoping is that the main reason that the right needs to essentially stick together in a left versus right capacity is who you're voting for. So, it's like when it comes to election season, hopefully there's enough unity that we're able to choose a candidate that's going to not be extreme or choose a candidate that is going to encompass most of our at root values. And I do think it's important for us to have discourse even within the right otherwise it just goes down this rabbit hole of more and more people become extreme. You have to call out people like because here's the thing is I grew up or not grew up but in my new conservative life I have essentially grown up watching Tucker Carlson is what it feels like. He was one of the original people that I was watching on Fox News when I started becoming more open to you know right-wing media. So, it's painful for me personally to see him go and try to downplay Hamas being a terrorist organization and for him platforming so many people that are aggressively anti-Semitic and aggressively hateful. I think things like that are 100% worth calling out. When you are at the point that you are uplifting and trying to humanize literal terrorists, genocidal terrorists, I think at that point you have to call each other out. I'm not saying demonize their character. I'm not saying that we have to shred every single element of their credibility about every single thing that they say unless it gets to that point, but there is a point where you have to be willing to call it out. Otherwise, we just look like this ginormous cult, which is something I'm not signing up to be in. I am more than willing and have extensively called out people who are on the right side. And I think that is important to do, but I also think it is an unfair expectation for certain people to attack their friends. Um, I know Brett Cooper just made a video recently that she's getting a lot of flack for where basically she said she supports Candace Owens and Ben Shapiro and she has a personal relationship with both of them. So on a human on a human level, you have to understand that it's it's a bit unfair to her to try to make her pick a side. However, you also have to realize, you know, speaking to Brett on this, it's like you can't be upset at your audience for expecting you to do that when our entire careers are built on being transparent about how we feel about various issues and various people. So, it's a double-edged sword for sure, but I hope that gives a good context on the issue. >> Yeah, definitely. Absolutely. And and I think people should be able to make distinctions between like not denouncing someone's a person or their character and saying I disagree with this point of view. And I don't see why there should be anything wrong with that. I don't understand why let's say you have two big influencers let's say on the right or big activists on the right and they have two very strongly opposing views and people will you know uh want to know do you agree with this person? I don't see why there's anything wrong with someone saying, "Look, we're great friends and we have a disagreement on this and why people seem to conflate being able to express that, which I think people influencers have a responsibility to their audience given their impact to give moral clarity on issues whilst also they can state at the same time. I'm not denouncing someone's uh personality or or cancelling them or boycotting them or anything like that. So, I just think we should just be sensible about all of this." And you mentioned Charlie Kirk. I I know you you knew him. I also knew him although it was from quite a few years ago. Um I was so appalled to see you know there are some people hijacking his death and I know you were quite outspoken about this but specifically around trying to suggest that Israel was involved in his murder. I mean I laugh because otherwise what are you going to do? Just cry it's just so absurd. Um what are your thoughts on the whole reaction to to his uh assassination and these you know conspiracy theories that we saw emerging? >> Aggressive disappointment. I don't think I have ever been more disappointed in the right until I saw some of the reaction to Charlie Kirk's assassination. I understand, ask questions, turn over every stone, you know, look into things, but look into things in a way that's not reckless and look into things in a way that is not just blatantly disrespectful. The fact that there are people that are trying to push conspiracies about Erica Kirk or about Turning Point and trying to point the finger at them, I I couldn't even believe I was living in reality. I understand everybody's grieving in a different way. Everybody's furious. Everybody learns to has learned by this point, don't trust the three-letter organizations. I get that. But if you're going to try to cosplay being an investigative journalist, at least have some integrity. Okay? There's certain things we shouldn't be figuring out, you know, alongside with you every single little piece that you're looking at that you have not verified. So, the fact that there's people trying to blame Israel, that is insane. and this rewriting of history where people are trying to say that Charlie Kirk was turning on Israel. That is not the case. There is not a single person that was close within his life at the end of his life that feels that he was turning on Israel. He had maybe some criticisms of Israel, but he also had criticism criticism of America. Are you going to tell me that Charlie Kirk wasn't patriotic because he had criticisms of America? So, no, there was never this thing where it was this Charlie Kirk is turning on Israel. So, I don't even know where people even came up with that narrative. And then, you know, the whole I don't know if you saw the whole Hampton scandal that they tried to bring out of >> Do you want to explain that to people because I know you were quite outspoken on this. If for people who aren't familiar, just give us a quick background. >> Yeah. So, essentially in August, first weekend of August, Charlie Kirk and Bill Aman, who's a big hedge fund guy, they flew out some of the top, you know, rising political voices that are newer on the scene. And what it really was was like a debating workshop. What it was was Charlie Kirk. He would we were hanging out, chitchatting, getting to know each other. And for him, it was a litmus test of two things. One, he wanted to see what are, you know, some of the people in Gen Z saying about various issues. How do we feel about you name the issue, we talked about it. Yes, we talked about Israel, but we also talked about Islam. We talked about dating. We talked about marriage. We talked about abortion. We talked about immigration. We talked about economy. We talked about every subject that you can think that a political media personality would talk about. And how he would start each conversation was he would say a provocative statement, not necessarily something he believed in, but he would say a provocative statement and be like, "What do you guys think of this?" And we amongst ourselves would debate each other respectfully. And Charlie would jump in and be like, "See this debating tactic like this is too emotional or this is not something that you can go and say because this is easily debunked." like he was essentially helping us fine-tune our debating skills while also seeing which one of us did he want to take under his wing. I had a meeting a week before Charlie's assassination where I was talking about the potential of joining some of these campus stops just to, you know, help promote it, but also doing like my own little events at some of these college tours because Charlie wanted to mobilize more young voices. He didn't want to be the only one having these, you know, these conversations. He was all about pushing for democracy and having us be able to go and communicate our ideas in a way that was respectful and concise. Somehow someway because myself and one other influencer of the 30 influencers who were there, myself and one other influencer who had we had a trip to Israel a week later and earlier in the year I've had that trip planned I want to say since February. The whole Hampton's meeting was planned weeks before is when I agreed to go. But there were certain people uh I would just say an outlet that had absolutely no integrity. I don't even want to say their name or give them promotion because it's it was just slanderous what they said. They tried to conflate the two of us going to Israel after. They lied and said that we were rewarded with the trip to Israel. They lied and said that the is that going to Israel was actually an intervention for Charlie and that all the influencers were flown there by Charlie to yell at Charlie to be more pro-Israel which was absolutely insane. And it was like every day there was a new narrative that was added into the lie. But somehow someway because two of us went to Israel a week after the Hampton's trip that means that Israel somehow had a hand in the assassination. So, when I say that it's the most easily debunked, nonverifiable lies that people try to spread in order to blame Israel, it's honestly the most desperate thing I've ever seen. And every single person that tried to pedal that lie should be absolutely ashamed of themselves. >> Absolutely. It was just so it was so appalling and painful to see. Um, and uh there was also this uh nonsense. I don't know if you've involved in this about saying that when Netanyahu came to America, he told all these influencers that they're it's they're going to get paid $7,000 a post. My that was going to be my next question. What's it like earning 7K a post? It sounds great. If I had 7K a post, there would be signs. I tweeted this and I was so serious. If I was getting 7K a post, I would tweet every single page of the Torah, post by post in every language available. I would milk that money as much as I possibly could and I would retire and y'all would never see me again unless I was in Tel Aviv. Like that is the most insane thing I've ever seen. And I really don't even know where the origin of that came from besides I would see it on like meme Twitter pages and then it turned into this thing where people were saying that there's documents but the documents that they're providing saying that it proved that you know myself and some of my friends and some people who don't even speak about Israel that was the funniest part some of the people on that list don't even talk about global politics but they were from pages that had their watermarks on the on the PDFs because they were posting it for clout and for attention and the whole meeting with BB Netanyahu in New York. The funniest thing about that to me is a couple of my friends that actually attended that event called me when the the whole Twitter spill out happened laughing at me because I was getting the most hate for it online and I wasn't even there. >> I wasn't even in New York. I was getting cancelled of people saying that I was meeting with BB Netany and Yahoo and I was on the whole other side of the country and so somehow I got tied into that scandal. But it just goes to show when you are a voice for truth and a voice for reason, people will try to find every single reason to dim your light and to throw darkness and dirt on you. But I refuse because I just view these people as radically unserious. Yeah, some of them are bots, but some of them, like you said, they're real people, too. And I don't care that they boo me because I know what it is that they cheer for and everything about it is evil and unserious to me. >> Oh, that's amazing. That's so great that you have that clarity. I mean, I I was so shocked. I did a collab with Desh Duz yesterday from one of our clips and uh I I saw the comments literally every third or fourth comment was like that 7K must be nice Desh and all this. I'm just like oh my gosh, this is insane. But it's so wonderful and I'm sure encouraging for our audience to to hear your moral clarity and to you kind of what you just said is uh an embodiment of that line from Churchill where he said uh you have enemies. Good. That means you're standing up for something. Um and that's exactly right. And uh I I think one thing that would be really interesting for our audience to know about from your perspective as someone that's having such a big impact and is cutting through, what do you think that Israel can be doing better to win the the online or the PR war? Before we continue with the video, I want to share something with you. The entire anti-Israel movement is built on one central accusation that in 1948 Israel stole the land and ever since Palestinians have simply been resisting. But what if everything we've been told about this story is untrue? What if the real history of 1948 shows not Arabs being forced out, but Jews while seeking peace, having to fight for their survival against a genocidal enemy that willed its destruction long before Israel's reestablishment. Have a watch of the trailer for our new groundbreaking and essential documentary entitled What Really Happened in 1948. And if you want to see the full film, just click the link in the video description. In 1948, the world witnessed the rebirth of the Jewish state, the state of Israel. A moment celebrated as a miracle of survival and self-determination after centuries of persecution and the horrors of the Holocaust. Yet, for decades, this event has been twisted into a narrative of theft and catastrophe with the so-called Nakba portrayed as Israel's original sin, where Jews allegedly stole Arab land and displaced innocents in a premeditated act of ethnic cleansing. But what if this story is fundamentally inverted? What if the cause and effect are the other way around? Not Israel aggressively seizing territory and Arabs responding in self-defense, but Arabs driven by deep-seated hatred, rejecting the Jews legal and historical rights to live in their ancestral homelands and waging a genocidal war long before Israel's reestablishment. In this JTV Plus documentary, we're going to uncover the unvarnished truth about 1948, the centuries of pograms and anti-semitic violence that set the stage. the Arab leaders explicit calls for extermination and the defensive war Israel fought to secure its existence. Will challenged the pervasive lies head on, showing how Arab rejection of peace wasn't about creating a Palestinian state, but about denying Jews the right to live at all. From the Nazi allied leader of the Arabs in Palestine, the MUI al-Husini, to the forgotten occupations by Jordan and Egypt, where no Palestinian state was even considered, this is the story of a conflict rooted not in displacement, but in whether the Jews deserve to live in their homelands. Join us as we debunk the myths with facts, confront the historical record fairly but firmly, and reveal why 1948 was not an act of aggression, but a righteous response to annihilation. This is what really happened in 1948. To watch this JTV Plus documentary and access much more premium content, click on the link in the video description. War. Because you know, one of those lines I've been hearing recently in the aftermath of the ceasefire is uh people saying, "Look, Israel may be winning the military war, but the PR war not going so well." >> You know, that is true. That is very true. Because the thing is is when you look into the details of like what the IDF is doing, BB strategy, when you look into so many of these things, it's absolutely filled with integrity and that's a be that's a beautiful thing. But there's so many lies out there that I feel like from the eastern perspective of the world, they don't really realize how serious the PR world is on social media. When I have visited Israel and I've talked to, you know, certain leaders that were there and I bring up the social media fight, some of them to this day don't understand how much the perception of the internet actually affects what global leaders are saying and doing because they at the end of the day work for if they're in some type of democracy, they are working for the people. So if the people are mad at you and social media is mad at you, then these other peop these like countries and leaders are going to be mad at you too. and public percept public perception actually does matter. So, I think they need to be more serious about their PR and spend more time showcasing to the world the truth and showcasing to the world what it is they're fighting, why they do what they do. Not in a way of defending themselves. Because I feel like Israel spends so much time defending themselves about who they're not that they don't explain to the world who they are and why they do what they do. I don't think that they show enough of their own um their own moral clarity and enough of their own precision in why they do what it is that they do. Like we have the amazing Caroline Levit here in America. Um the press secretary at the White House who you listen to her speak for 20 minutes and you understand every single thing that Donald Trump is doing whether you like it or not. She is clear, she's concise, she's sharp, she's direct. She explains it very thoroughly. We need something like that over in Israel so that people understand the moves that Israel is making. Again, not in a way of being like, oh, we're on defense because if you're explaining in a defense way, you're already losing because you end up putting extra attention on the lies. We don't need to have all the focus be on the lies. There's enough focus on the lies. What needs to be focused on? There needs to be hyperfixation on the truth. There needs to be hyperfixation on what it is that Hamas was doing, where their leaders were or where their leaders are, who's helping the leaders. We should be seeing more of that. And it needs to be timely. It needs to be on social media. It needs to be on TV. It needs to be in writing. It needs to be everywhere. PR is very, very important because if you're not doing positive PR, all you're doing is allowing yourself to be buried by propaganda. And like I said before, we've seen the Holocaust. And that is what happens when holoc or that is what happens when propaganda goes unchecked. >> That so well put so so well put and I think you're completely right that Israel and Jews psyche for too long has been on the defensive perhaps understandably because we felt like you know so often that we are under attack. Um but it doesn't it doesn't come across well and uh it people think why are you being defensive? I've actually been calling for like the IDF to change their name from the Israel Defense Force. Just should just be the Israeli Army. You have the American Army. Uh you have the Israeli Army. In fact, I think they did that in America with the it's now the um Department for War, right? No longer the Department for for Defense. And uh you know I think even in in our argumentation I've been for for a long time was talking about how if you study the history Palestinianism is so clearly centered only not around self-determination but around trying to destroy Israel. It's not about a genuine desire for nationalism. But I realize that as much as it important to say that that's still a bit defensive. That's why it's showing why you at the other side are have an illegitimate claim. But we need to give the positive claim. say this the land from the river to the sea is the Jewish people's biblical god-given historic homeland. It's our land. And so I think we need to start speaking in the positive sense and not just explaining their lives. I think what you said is so so true. I want to know also what you made about of of the ceasefire deal because on the one hand it's terrific that you know just was so emotional seeing all all those hostages returned. On the other hand, Israel's withdrawing from parts of Gaza, releasing thousands of terrorists, actual terrorists back into Gaza. You're going to have other Arab countries involved in this now again Arab autonomous zone. What's that going to mean? I'm I'm very concerned that we might be going backwards and potentially repeating the same mistakes. What were your thoughts on it? >> You know, I feel the same way. I thought the entire deal was extremely bittersweet. Of course, I'm so grateful to see the living hostages be brought home, be back with their families so that they can attempt their best to heal. Um, but I think another this is another example of Israel's PR should be really pointing out the fact that Israel wanted to reunite families. Israel wanted to bring innocent people back home. The Palestinians wanted to release terrorists. They wanted people that were serving life sentences for terrorism who have sworn their entire lives to jihad. That's who they wanted back. And it was like every time I looked at the number I felt like it got bigger. And it's like now thousands thousands of prisoners are going back. It's like all you're doing is in that sense you're setting yourself back up for failure. I hate to say it like that, but somebody has to. There's not a clear to my understanding there's not a clear demilitarized zone. So really, you know, Israeli troops pulling out of that area, that just lets them get closer to Israel to put together more of their makeshift missiles to get ready to have their leaders back, to have more prisoners back, who of course are going to be so angry that they were just in prison, that they're going to stop at no means than wreaking havoc on Israel again. It's like I don't like the principle or the premise of negotiating with terrorists, I think. And then the fact that they're the deceased hostages, their bodies are still there just to extend the emotional trauma of it all. There's no logical reason as to why Hamas wants to keep deceased bodies unless they are just trying to keep the knife that much deeper and twist the knife into the backs of Israelis. So again, I'm very happy that the hostages are home. That has been one of the two biggest I would say the number one biggest priority of Israel. But you know the second thing was we need to abolish Hamas. And just because they say, "Oh yeah, we totally promise. We pinky swear that Hamas is not going to be leading this area anymore." It's like, is anybody taking that seriously? They're just going to rebrand. ISIS rebranded. Why wouldn't Hamas have rebrand? It's going to be the same leaders, the same figureheads. They're going to be doing the same thing. We already saw them executing innocent, well, I don't know if they were innocent or not, but we already saw them executing, you know, Palestinian civilians a day after the ceasefire agreement. It's like until that threat is completely eradicated, I don't think we're ever going to be able to wipe our hands clean of this issue. So, it's a double-edged sword for sure, but again, thank God that we have the hostages home. >> Yeah. No, I completely agree with that assessment. And in my view, Israel shouldn't leave an inch of Gaza. And I don't I do not trust other Arab countries or just, you know, anyone else to be policing that territory. And I don't see why Israel should. And what about the internal battles within the right? You know, you spoke about there's alt-right versus mainstream right, the kind of the conspiratorial anti-Israel, isolationist right versus the kind of more mainstream right that we've been used to. Who who do you think will will dominate in the future there? I think light will prevail on that. You know, I think the people because even after the ceasefire, so many of the people that were just aggressively anti-Israel, they became so quiet. And the people who were becoming anti-Trump because they were saying that, you know, there's this war going on. Why hasn't it stopped? Now they're being super quiet. I really genuinely, and maybe I'm delusional, but I genuinely don't think they have much power or influence outside of Twitter. As much as I love that Twitter is the free speech platform, I don't think that their impact is as big as they think that it is, as they amplify it to be, cuz you just have these chronically online, hateful people that have become basement dwellers and attic keyboard warriors who are just ferociously online condemning and hating on so many people. But again, when I go to Republican conventions, when I go to rallies, fundraisers, um any kind of celebration that is predominantly right-wing, the sentiment there is that more people there are pro-Israel and not pro Hamas. >> For sure. For sure. Um what do you see as the biggest battle ahead uh that you're you want to want to fight? the biggest battle ahead to fight. There's there's so many answers I could take to that question. I think that question is spiritual. First of all, I really think you you can't downplay what's happening in the Middle East without realizing how much of a spiritual element there is to all of that. And I think more people need to find God. I think one of the the biggest blessing that came out of Charlie Kirk's assassination is how many people went back to church. And I think until people become more aware of just the spiritual battle that's happening here and how evil and how possessed some of these leaders and figureheads are, until we start addressing that, I think everything else falls second and fiddle. And that goes for over on the left too. You know, on the left you have people like I said, social justice has become the place of religion for a lot of people. A lot of people have completely replaced spirituality or a sense of moral code or integrity. They've replaced it with just social justice. And the thing is is when you worship social justice, you worship whatever the next thing is. You worship whatever is put in front of you. Whatever the new Facebook profile page banner or the next flag to put on your bio is, the next hashtag to put on your page, people don't even research. People don't even research these days. So, it's like they worship just the the feel-good elements of constantly progressing towards the next thing. So, that's a spiritual element of it. I think also we need to get really locked in on two things and they're simultaneous at this point. AI and misinformation because AI is going to become a very dangerous weapon. Right now it's a valuable tool but it's going to become a dangerous weapon. In fact, it already is. A lot of the I saw one of the most viral posts a couple weeks ago was like these deceased children and these kids that they were saying were dead. And if you look closely, you would you could see the logo of the AI generator that created the image. I'm like, is nobody seeing this but me? But AI is a very dangerous weapon that people are using it as where they're trying to present certain things as as factual and as truth when it's completely a lie. And people get very very fired up about these lies without even realizing that it's, you know, fraudulent. So, I think we need to get more locked in on how are we going to regulate this. You know, as much as I am pro small government, there are certain things that I think need to be regulated and AI is something that needs to be regulated because these deep fakes are getting terrifying and the misinformation war. I don't think I don't like censorship. I think that we should be able to speak freely, but I think the truth has to become more accessible. And the only way that the truth is going to become more accessible is if we stop having so many gatekeepers trying to determine what's fact and what's not for us. We need to figure out a way that we can find the sweet spot of making it to where like I like that we have the community notes on X. At first I hated it, but now I'm starting to appreciate it where you're seeing that people will post a complete lie and you're able to see okay that's actually not the reality. >> Absolutely. Absolutely. And I really really interesting what you're saying around AI. It is quite uh shocking to see how realistic some things can be. Although I have to say I'm getting a lot of enjoyment from seeing some of these AI videos of the queen rapping. It's epic. Um but just my my last question to you is uh just more personally with the work you're doing, the fantastic work you're doing. What are you focused on >> just in my personal life? >> Uh just with with your work. Are there any any anything in particular? Any projects? anything that you're kind of is like the uh something you're excited about that you're going to be working on in the next few months or year? >> Yeah, I would say the biggest projects that I'm working on right now are, you know, both publicly and behind the scenes. I'm trying to get more public figures to be spoken out or to be speaking out. I don't think that every single public figure needs to put their political views out there. I think there's certain people that it just doesn't make sense. But there's a lot of people that are secretly Zionist or they're secretly proTrump or they just have a different world view than what many of their audience thinks and they're very passionate about it behind the scenes. I'm trying to create more comfortability for some of these people to become more outspoken. Um, one of my best friends here in Los Angeles is Amber Rose, for example. when she started speaking out and she spoke at the RNC, that was one of the most impactful moments of the entire election cycle. And living here in Los Angeles, I saw the effect it had in Hollywood. So many more celebrities, influencers, actors, you name it. They, especially rappers, became a lot more outspoken about their beliefs and that they didn't believe the propaganda that a lot of the times their management wants them to spread because they think that's the only way to be able to get brand deals. because there's a lot of people who are Zionists, but they're afraid that if they're a Zionist, then they're going to be cancelled or lose their brand deals. The only way to get through that is we have to power through it. So, I'm actually working on a docu reality show right now um where I'm going to be showcasing the behind the scenes of some political media personalities and some of the people that we interact with on the day-to-day. So, I'm hoping that that's able to air in I would say late winter, early spring. That's going to be called Party Lines. So, this is one of the first times I've talked about that publicly, but working actively on that and will be showing getting more people to be outspoken behind the scenes. What was that? >> Where will that be showing? >> To be determined. There's a few distribution offers on the table. So, we're going through those right now. >> That sounds fantastic. Well, please do uh let us know when it's out uh because we'd love to promote it and talk about it because that's absolutely fascinating. But Zavier, thank you so so much for your time and for your insights and wisdom and for your staunch uh uh support and and uh moral courage. It's really uh inspiring and uh I'm just super grateful for your time and please keep keep up the great work. >> Of course. Thank you so much for having me. >> I'm so excited to share with you something that I've been working on for a while. We've just taken JTV content to the next level. Introducing JTV Plus, a new platform streaming exclusive content created and handpicked by me. Get ready for jaw-dropping documentaries, exclusive interviews, insider access, and so much more. JTV Plus brings you captivating stories that will shock and inspire you. Stories that honestly I'm discovering for the first time, too. From Israel to Jewish history to Judaism, it's all there. In exclusive interviews, you'll hear guests open up about things they've never shared publicly before. Plus, I'll take you behind the scenes where I get a lot more personal with you. By joining JTV Plus, you're not just joining an exclusive community, you're partnering with me to help JTV reach new heights. 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