February 22, 2022

This column was written on Monday, before both Russia’s invasion and before Israel’s statement in support of Ukraine. Israel’s statement in of support of Ukraine’s territorial integrity was issued after Russia’s incursion into Ukraine’s eastern region and the day before the full invasion of Ukraine began. While Israel had little choice but to speak out against international aggression, the statement did not mention Russia. The essential premise of the column still holds: that Israel is caught in an awkward position between two longtime allies.

To untrained eyes such as mine, the distinction between the prelude to war and war itself has largely been lost in the mud of Eastern Ukraine. When this column was submitted, Russian and Ukrainian forces were exchanging gunfire, missiles, injuries and death. Yet world leaders were still speculating about the likelihood or probability of war between those two countries rather than the battles already underway.

By the time you read this, Russia may have launched the full-out invasion that President Biden and others have warned about. But regardless of how the military action in Ukraine is named, it’s clear that the post-post-Cold War era of European geopolitics has begun. Since the fall of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, the United States enjoyed almost three decades as the world’s lone superpower. But China’s rapid ascension to global prominence has remade that landscape, and now a newly assertive Vladimir Putin is forcing a reconsideration for the U.S. and its allies as to the best way to deal with a threat they assumed had long since faded.

As a result, the Biden Administration is adjusting to the challenges of a tri-polar world. Most of Europe has realized that Russia will be a military concern and an economic threat for the foreseeable future. And U.S. allies on the Pacific Rim understand that our country’s pivot to China will not be as complete a re-ordering of priorities as they had hoped.

This latest world order presents important challenges for Israel, whose uniquely deep ties with the U.S. are not quite as unique anymore.

But this latest world order also presents important challenges for the state of Israel, whose uniquely deep ties with the United States are not quite as unique anymore as the Jewish state’s growing relationship with Russia and China created a different but connected set of challenges. Both Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping understand the geopolitical benefits of closer ties with Israel, and while both countries’ ongoing support of Iran will keep Israeli leaders on their toes, it’s clear that Israel sees the advantages in these alliances too.

As the violence in Ukraine worsens, Israel now finds itself in a particularly troublesome position, having maintained good relations in recent years with both Ukraine and Russia. Even while most American allies joined Biden in condemnation of Putin’s conduct and offered varying degrees of military assistance to Ukraine, Israel has stayed steadfastly neutral. At one point, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett offered to host peace talks, an idea that Putin quickly swatted away. And the Ukraine Foreign Ministry reacted angrily last week when Israel requested Russia’s help in evacuating Israeli citizens from Ukraine during an invasion.

Even as the rest of the world is consumed by the conflict, Israel has otherwise mostly kept quiet. But if the violence escalates, that position will be much harder to maintain. Ukrainian government leaders are becoming increasingly vocal in calling for Israel’s support against Russia’s violation of international norms. And while the Biden Administration has enough else on its plate at the moment, they will certainly take note if Israel remains on the sidelines while Russian tanks roll toward Kyiv.

But the international politics of this are more complicated for Israel than it seems. Many Westerners believed that the friendship of mutual convenience between Putin and Benjamin Netanyahu was based on the personal needs of the two leaders, but it became clear to both that cooperating in Syria benefited both countries’ security priorities and laid the groundwork for other types of collaboration. And while Avigdor Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu party might not be as prominent as in past years, it is still an integral part of Bennett’s governing coalition and still commands the support of legions of Russian-speaking immigrants. Although the United States is far and away Israel’s strongest ally on the world stage, upsetting Putin would have both international and domestic political consequences.

Israel is still navigating similar intricacies in its dealings with China. Last year, when the U.S. determined that their conversations relating to shared technology could pose a potential security threat, the Biden Administration made it clear that Israel needed to pull back. We’ll see in the weeks ahead if Bennett receives a similar message regarding Russia.

Dan Schnur is a Professor at the University of California – Berkeley, USC and Pepperdine. Join Dan for his weekly webinar “Politics in the Time of Coronavirus” (www/lawac.org) on Tuesdays at 5 PM.

I’m a woman in my thirties, which, in age-obsessed Los Angeles, renders me in my seventies. 

During the spectacular Super Bowl Halftime Show that featured artists such as Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg —who made it big decades ago — I turned around to one of my houseplants and bragged, “That’s my jam.” 

And lately, I’ve been calling a lot of people, from telemarketers to waiters, “dear,” and complaining to anyone who will listen that young people today wouldn’t know good music if Eminem hit them over the head.

I’m in need of glamour and variety; of high heels, stiff drinks, and a world in which some good old-fashioned red lipstick always saves the day. 

I’m in need of glamour and variety; of high heels, stiff drinks, and a world in which some good old-fashioned red lipstick always saves the day. Suffice it to say, I badly need the return of a show like Amazon Prime’s “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” which debuted the first two episodes of its fourth season on February 18 after a two-year hiatus.

With its glorification of the late Fifties and early Sixties, the show, which tells the story of a beautiful and brilliant Jewish housewife turned aspiring stand-up comedian named Miriam “Midge” Maisel, allows me an escape from my world of sweatpants, masks, meals my kids don’t eat and more sweatpants. There’s nothing wrong with sweatpants, and it’s not my business to tell others how to dress. But I know myself, and I’ve hit a metaphorical [sweatpants] wall.

I can’t deny the delicious escapism the series offers. I previously thought I wanted to see television shows that reflected the indescribable challenges, however beautiful, of raising young children, but as it turns out, all I really want is to watch the fabulous exploits of a mother who owns more pillbox hats than diapers. 

Presently, I’m committed to channeling the fabulous “femme joy” of Mrs. Maisel while still retaining my own lifestyle, which mostly consists of writing, denting my minivan, and ignoring a mound of laundry I’ve promised to fold after retirement. Channeling Midge over the past few weeks started with the physical, as I gradually began swapping out old sweatpants for midiskirts and, on one occasion, a full-blown dress, which was promptly stained with tiny hands covered in peanut butter. It all began with the tangible and physical, but soon, I noticed a change in my attitude and lifestyle that has helped me put my problems in a healthy perspective. 

For example, each time I’m filled with anxious worry over whether my children will ever learn to regulate their emotions or, at the very least, put their toys away, I remember that if they were real, Midge’s children now would be in their mid-60s and wholly accountable for their own coping skills — and toys. Things almost always have a way of working themselves out.

Some of my Midge-inspired physical endeavors, such as working or running errands while wearing high heels, are downright misguided, at least for someone as uncoordinated as me, but inarguably fun. And in L.A., a beachside city of relaxed fashion standards, it’s been exciting and energizing to wear anything other than flip-flops.

Naturally, I wonder whether I’m setting the women’s movement back at least four decades: I recently began waiting until my husband falls asleep to remove the day’s makeup, à la Midge (and her mother). 

Naturally, I wonder whether I’m setting the women’s movement back at least four decades: I recently began waiting until my husband falls asleep to remove the day’s makeup, à la Midge (and her mother). I know, I’m awful, but it felt good to look good before bedtime, given that my usual nightly routine for the past few years has involved accidentally applying diaper rash cream to my face before collapsing in a daze.

In my defense, I believe that reclaiming fabulousness and empowerment as a woman and mother on my own terms, with inspiration from “Mrs. Maisel” and a healthy dose of modern-day perspective, is a totally feminist endeavor. 

I’m discovering the power of connecting to “femme joy” and the radical act of reclaiming my own life and talent, even as I love and care for my children. It’s not an either/or; I’m not frazzled and frumpy or perfectly-coiffed and fabulous. Instead, it’s the power of “yes.” And that power, ironically, is the motor that pushes the best comedy forward.

For me, the antidote to the survival mode that stems from mothering young children isn’t always more sleep or increased help around the house. Sometimes, it’s a fleeting moment, one in which you look in the mirror and see a glimmer of someone fabulous looking back at you, whatever your definition of fabulous might be.

But there’s so much more to emulating “Mrs. Maisel” than wanting to slip my tired feet into some glamorous house slippers, rather than stepping on yesterday’s banana. The show is also plowing the metaphoric snow of self-doubt which has plagued me ever since I became a mother and began excoriating myself for not always feeling fulfilled by that role. 

“What if some of us are just supposed to talk to adults our entire lives?” Midge asks the audience during a live set in Season Two. It’s a legitimate question, one which I ponder a lot these days as I peel stubborn, dried-out jam off the dining room floor while contemplating my master’s degree in public diplomacy.

As a mother with young children, I am trying to claim some joy and space of my own, though there are days when I could especially use more space. If I had obsessively watched “Mrs. Maisel” during the height of the pandemic, when both of my kids were home from school and my husband and I were also forced to work from our dining room table, I probably would have blinded myself with those kitten heels. But today, with school back in session, I possess both the openness and the bandwidth to take a few cues from Midge herself.  

Yes, I need the return of  “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” in my life. That’s why I recently spent $38 to buy YSL 201 red lipstick (the same brand that, in 2018, head makeup artist Patricia Regan confirmed Midge wore during most performance scenes in earlier seasons). With price tags like this, our children will simply have to eat generic Cheerios and knock-off Mott’s applesauce until 2024.

I purchased the lipstick online, with the hope that it would be my new secret weapon. I even wondered if those red lips would make me feel indestructible, at least until I trip on whatever toys the kids have left on the floor and land miserably on my tailbone. By that point, I’ll probably sound less like Doris Day at brunch and more like Lenny Bruce in jail. 

As soon as the lipstick arrived in the mail, I meticulously applied it with a lipstick brush, dabbed my lips, checked my teeth and stepped outside. I was radiant; I was unstoppable; and then, I remembered that most spaces I frequent in L.A. County still require a mask, despite California’s recent lifting of the indoor mask mandate.

Still, I’m not deterred. With enough openness and inspiration, “Mrs. Maisel” is transforming me into something I’ve never been, but always yearned to be: marvelous.

Tabby Refael is a Los Angeles-based writer, speaker and civic action advocate. Follow her on Twitter @RefaelTabby