
History’s Case for Trump’s Gaza Plan - with Andrew Roberts
02/22/25 • 37 min
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Housekeeping note:
Ark Media, the humble home of this podcast, is looking for a purpose-driven Chief Operating Officer, to help facilitate its ambitious plans for the future. If you are interested in applying for the position, please follow this link: https://tinyurl.com/mp5udcxr
Watch Call me Back on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@CallMeBackPodcast
To contact us, sign up for updates, and access transcripts, visit: https://arkmedia.org/
Dan on X: https://x.com/dansenor
Dan on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dansenor
Following a gut-wrenching 48 hours for the Bibas family and for all of us, six living hostages were released from Gaza today, including two who had been held there not for a year, but a decade. Eliya Cohen, Omer Shem Tov, Omer Wenkert, and Tal Shoham were abducted on October 7, 2023. Avera Mengistu, an Ethiopian-Israeli, and Hisham al-Sayed, an Israeli Arab, had crossed into Gaza in 2014 and 2015, and were then taken hostage by Hamas.
Hamas’s decision to release more living hostages than originally planned today is believed – according to our Israeli sources – to be a response to a sustained American pressure campaign. Part of that pressure includes President Trump’s proposal for the U.S. to take control of Gaza and relocate its entire population.
Two weeks since its unveiling, Trump’s Gaza proposal has continued to drive headlines and debate around the world. Though that proposal is already impacting the policy decisions of various stakeholders in Gaza, it is still largely perceived as a shocking, unprecedented idea. For this episode of Call Me Back, we sat down with a historian who argues that Trump’s plan is in fact aligned with the outcome of many modern wars.
Andrew Roberts is a British historian, member of the House of Lords, and the author of 24 books, including the New York Times bestseller, Churchill: Walking with Destiny. In a recent article for the Washington Free Beacon, Roberts writes, “peoples who unleash unprovoked aggressive wars against their neighbors and are then defeated...lose either their government or their sovereignty, or both.”
To read more by Andrew Roberts on this topic, go to the Washington Free Beacon: https://freebeacon.com/israel/the-historical-case-for-trumps-riviera/
Housekeeping note:
Ark Media, the humble home of this podcast, is looking for a purpose-driven Chief Operating Officer, to help facilitate its ambitious plans for the future. If you are interested in applying for the position, please follow this link: https://tinyurl.com/mp5udcxr
Watch Call me Back on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@CallMeBackPodcast
To contact us, sign up for updates, and access transcripts, visit: https://arkmedia.org/
Dan on X: https://x.com/dansenor
Dan on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dansenor
Following a gut-wrenching 48 hours for the Bibas family and for all of us, six living hostages were released from Gaza today, including two who had been held there not for a year, but a decade. Eliya Cohen, Omer Shem Tov, Omer Wenkert, and Tal Shoham were abducted on October 7, 2023. Avera Mengistu, an Ethiopian-Israeli, and Hisham al-Sayed, an Israeli Arab, had crossed into Gaza in 2014 and 2015, and were then taken hostage by Hamas.
Hamas’s decision to release more living hostages than originally planned today is believed – according to our Israeli sources – to be a response to a sustained American pressure campaign. Part of that pressure includes President Trump’s proposal for the U.S. to take control of Gaza and relocate its entire population.
Two weeks since its unveiling, Trump’s Gaza proposal has continued to drive headlines and debate around the world. Though that proposal is already impacting the policy decisions of various stakeholders in Gaza, it is still largely perceived as a shocking, unprecedented idea. For this episode of Call Me Back, we sat down with a historian who argues that Trump’s plan is in fact aligned with the outcome of many modern wars.
Andrew Roberts is a British historian, member of the House of Lords, and the author of 24 books, including the New York Times bestseller, Churchill: Walking with Destiny. In a recent article for the Washington Free Beacon, Roberts writes, “peoples who unleash unprovoked aggressive wars against their neighbors and are then defeated...lose either their government or their sovereignty, or both.”
To read more by Andrew Roberts on this topic, go to the Washington Free Beacon: https://freebeacon.com/israel/the-historical-case-for-trumps-riviera/
Previous Episode

The Tragic End of the Bibas Story - with Matti Friedman
This morning in Gaza, in a ceremony that was even more twisted than those that came before it, Hamas paraded four coffins, containing the dead bodies of four hostages who were killed in captivity, before handing them over to the Red Cross. Israel then received the remains of Oded Lifshitz, an 83-year-old peace activist abducted from his home in Kibbutz Nir Oz; and the bodies of the iconic young mother Shiri Bibas, and her boys, Kfir and Ariel, who were respectively 9 months old and 4 years old at the time of their abduction, also from Nir Oz, which lost a quarter of its residents on October 7, 2023.
Shiri, Kfir and Ariel came to symbolize Hamas’s brutality and the helplessness of the victims of October 7. Oded was also a symbol of the many men and women who had dedicated their lives to seeking peace with the Palestinians, and whose lives were brutally ended by Palestinians on that darkest of days.
In a year of somber days, today is one of the more difficult ones we have experienced - here at Call Me Back, and as a nation. We are joined today to process this wrenching moment by a Call Me Back favorite: Matti Friedman, to help us understand what this day means for Israel, and how it will change us and the stories we tell ourselves about Israel and our hopes for peace.
Matt Friedman is an award-winning journalist and author of four books. He is based in Jerusalem, and writes a column for The Free Press. Read his latest, “The Family That Never Came Home,” here: https://www.thefp.com/p/matti-friedman-the-bibas-shiri-kfir-ariel-yarden
Matti’s books: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Matti-Friedman/author/B0073YU31C
Link to Seth Mandel’s article in Commentary Magazine, mentioned by Dan in this episode: https://www.commentary.org/seth-mandel/the-meaning-of-kfir-bibas/
We would like to take this opportunity to thank Rebecca Strom, who has been running Ark Media’s operations almost since the beginning of the war, and is now moving on to the next chapter in her career. Rebecca was our first hire, and in hindsight, having her run our operations allowed Ilan and Dan to develop a larger vision. More on that in the near future. In the meantime, on behalf of the Ark Media team, we want to share our gratitude for all the hard work, long hours, holidays and weekends that Rebecca poured into this venture.
Consequently, Ark Media is now looking for a hard working, mission-aligned, highly motivated Chief Operating Officer. If you want to throw your hat into the ring, please follow this link
CREDITS:
ILAN BENATAR - Producer & Editor
MARTIN HUERGO - Editor
STAV SLAMA - Director of Operations
GABE SILVERSTEIN - Research Intern
YUVAL SEMO - Music Composer
Next Episode

The likelihood of Phase Two - with Amit Segal
Watch Call me Back on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@CallMeBackPodcast
To contact us, sign up for updates, and access transcripts, visit: https://arkmedia.org/
Dan on X: https://x.com/dansenor
Dan on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dansenor
As phase 1 of the ceasefire and hostage deal enters its final week, the fate of phase 2 of the deal remains uncertain. While hostages’ families are urging for a continuation of the deal to bring all the remaining hostages home, parts of the Israeli government are pressing for a return to the war.
With Mideast Envoy Steve Witkoff traveling to the region this week to push for an extension of the deal, we turned to a Call Me Back regular and leading Israeli journalist to make sense of the mixed signals we are seeing from every direction.
Amit Segal is a columnist for Yediot Ahronot, and a senior political analyst for Israel’s Channel 12.
CREDITS:
ILAN BENATAR - Producer & Editor
MARTIN HUERGO - Additional Editing
STAV SLAMA - Director of Operations
GABE SILVERSTEIN - Research
YUVAL SEMO - Music Composer
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