Sunday Reads: Bennett’s euphoric week, Bannon and the Jewish pundits, Turkey’s autocratic turn

US

Eli Lake writes about how Trump ” target=”_blank”>“bi-polar presidency”  in the President-elect’s transition period:

How Trump’s manner of doing business will translate to the office of the president is equally difficult to predict. He has shown a willingness to violate norms of diplomacy and dignity normally enforced by a sense of priority. He seems caught in a cycle: a few days on message, then a conspiratorial or bullying statement or tweet, then a scramble by Republicans to solicit intervention from “the family,” who give the president-elect the political equivalent of lithium and get him back on message before the next manic stage. Republicans are now finding strategic brilliance in this attempt to keep the whole world off balance. But what happens when President Trump can truly throw the whole world off balance?  

Israel

Sima Kadmon writes about the ” target=”_blank”>Bennett’s efforts at promoting more Jewish studies as education minister:

The leadership of the right-wing Likud Party has been dragged along on Bennett’s march of folly over the refusal to allow the court-ordered evacuation of the illegal West Bank settlement of Amona. They have failed to notice that the education minister is cooking up a new batch of constituents under their very nose.

Middle East

Robert Fisk explains why the rebels of Aleppo ” target=”_blank”>Turkey’s autocratic turn in the WSJ:

Mr. Erdogan’s Turkey has come to look increasingly like just another troubled corner of the Middle East. And, many Turks and Westerners fear, the country is becoming infected with the same sicknesses—intolerance, autocracy, repression—that have poisoned the region for decades.

Jewish World

Jay Michaelson believes that most Jewish pundits ” target=”_blank”>S.Y. Agnon’s Nobel prize acceptance speech 50 years ago:

At the Nobel banquet, standing before the King of Sweden and reciting the customary blessing prescribed by the Talmud upon being in the presence of royalty, Agnon declared that he felt compelled to explain who he was and from whence he—and his art—had sprung. What resulted, however, was a most remarkable description of Jewish history (and presumably his place within it) and the impact of the arc of that history on Hebrew literature and Jewish storytelling.