Fathoming the Intellectual Revolution of our Times | The Disorientations of Lethal Journalism: On Western Media and the Arab-Israeli Conflict | Fathom

Richard Landes is a historian who taught at Boston University. His work focuses on apocalyptic beliefs at the turn of the first and the second millennium. His most recent book is Can ‘The Whole World’ Be Wrong? Lethal Journalism, Antisemitism and Global Jihad (Academic Studies Press, Boston, 2022). In this long read he asks why so much western commentary on the Middle East is so detached from the realities on the ground, and so extravagantly and obsessively hostile to Israel, finding the answer in a complex combination of intellectual and psychological shifts that have overtaken much western culture in recent decades, especially on the left, including ‘Western liberal cognitive egocentrism’, ‘humanitarian racism and the human rights complex’, ‘psychological supersessionism’ (and the consequent appetite for News of Jews Behaving Badly), ‘jihadi intimidation and the fig-leaf of post-colonial ideology’, and a revolutionary ‘apocalyptic millennial mindset’ that abhors contradiction.
Fathom is running a series of essays mapping the intellectual revolution of our times and assessing its impact on the discourse of contemporary antisemitism and demonisation of the Jewish State. We began with Kathleen Hayes’ reflections on gender identity ideology. Forthcoming is an interview with Balázs Berkovits about ‘critical whiteness studies’ and contemporary antisemitism and antizionism. The editors encourage responses from readers.