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These two anti-Zionist Jews think the Israeli government is so bad, it’s funny

Summarizing Noah Hirsch-Rechter in Forward · Published Tuesday, February 10, 2026
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JL;DR SUMMARY Matt Lieb and Daniel Mat co-host the comedy podcast "Bad Hasbara," which critiques Israeli and American government propaganda. A way out west there was a fella, fella I want to tell you about, fella by the name of Jeff Lebowski. At least, that was the handle his lovin' parents gave him, but he never had much use for it himself. This Lebowski, he called himself the Dude. Now, Dude, that's a name no one would self-apply where I come from. But then, there was a lot about the Dude that didn't make a whole lot of sense to me. And a lot about where he lived, likewise. But then again, maybe that's why I found the place s'durned innarestin'.

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Tags

Jewish Identity  Zionism  Propaganda  Middle East Conflict  Anti Zionism  Comedy Podcast  Bad Hasbara  Matt Lieb  Daniel Mat 

Places mentioned

Israel
"one of Bad Hasbaras first episodes. Lieb enjoyed the experience so much that he invited Mat to co-host permanently."
Los Angeles, California, United States
"Lieb grew up in a secular, Jewish home in Los Angeles that saw Israel as an absolute moral good, but he began to have doubts about Zionism in the mid-2000s, when he was an undergraduate at UC Santa Cruz."
New York City, New York, United States
"and then refer to Birthright as an 11-day handjob. I think the combination of moral earnestness and complete lack of decorum is compelling, said Mat. And despite its mostly easygoing vibe, theyve thought carefully about the podcasts message. Weve worked really hard to diversify our guests, said Mat. Not for the sake of diversity, but for the sake of completion and for the sake of insight."
West Bank, British Columbia, Canada
"trip to the West Bank, and hearing him say that hed been crying every day since he had arrived because of what hed seen in the hospitals."
Brooklyn, New York, United States
"On the evening of Oct. 8, 2023, Mat who had not yet joined the podcast went for a walk around his Brooklyn neighborhood. For about an hour, he went live on Instagram with a kind of stream-of-consciousness of despair and frustration, in which he urged his then-20,000 or so followers to properly contextualize the Hamas-led attacks of the previous day; to sympathize no less with Palestinian suffering than Israeli. Id never done an Instagram Live before, Mat said. But I had a sense that I needed to un-crazy myself."
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
"to Zionism, by contrast, was more of an inherited condition. His father, the well-known Canadian psychotherapist Dr. Gabor Mat, is a vocal critic of Israel, and in the mid-1980s, when the younger Mat was coming of age, had become a pariah in the Canadian Jewish community, Mat said."
London, United Kingdom
"Hirsch-Rechter is a Forward intern. He recently completed a masters in journalism at City St Georges, University of London and previously worked as an Education Associate at Harvard Hillel, where he organized educational trips, taught seminars to undergraduates on a range of Jewish subjects, oversaw Hillels social media, and ran its social justice and equity programming."

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Retrieved 2026-02-11 05:31:00 UTC
Curated 2026-02-11 08:32:29 UTC