The Comedy Cellar: Live from the Table

Noam Dworman and Periel Aschenbrand are joined by return-guest, Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, for a wide-ranging debate about truth, propaganda, evidence, starvation and the Israel-Gaza war. The conversation focuses on John Mearsheimer’s claims about October 7, whether public intellectuals should lose credibility when they make unsupported accusations, disputed casualty reporting in Gaza and the role political bias plays in shaping what people choose to believe.

Dr. Feroze Sidhwa is a general, trauma, and critical care surgeon in California. He is also a humanitarian surgeon, having worked most extensively in Palestine, but also in Ukraine, Haiti, Zimbabwe, and Burkina Faso. He has written and spoken extensively about surgical humanitarian work, the United States’ role in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the political consequences of medical relief work.

Twitter/X @FerozeSidhwa

Chapters:
00:00 Intro and Twitter fights
08:14 Mearsheimer, October 7, and “good faith” arguments
15:25 Trump, Epstein, and blackmail claims
22:01 The Israel Lobby and the Iraq War debate
34:05 Germany comparisons and collective punishment
37:09 Netanyahu, “Amalek,” and genocide accusations
46:15 Dead children, crossfire, and moral responsibility
47:43 Gaza aid shootings and casualty reporting
50:02 The Al-Ahli Arab Hospital explosion controversy
55:11 Rashid Khalidi, sources, and historical credibility

Noam Dworman is joined by Professor Gerald Steinberg. Steinberg breaks down the hidden world of NGOs—what they are, how they gained massive global influence and why he believes many have drifted far from their original mission. From organizations like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch to their role at the United Nations, Steinberg argues that these groups now act as powerful political players shaping narratives around conflicts like Israel–Palestine. 

Gerald Steinberg is founder and president of NGO Monitor and Professor at Bar Ilan University. His research focuses on Middle East diplomacy and Israeli security, and the politics of human rights and non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Prestigious grants and prizes include Israel Science Foundation, Bonei Zion Prize (2017) and the Bernard Lewis Prize in 2025.

https://x.com/GeraldNGOM

Andrew Fox joins Live From The Table to talk about personal courage, Gaza, Hamas casualty numbers, Israel’s military strategy, Iran, the Strait of Hormuz and what modern war actually looks like.

Andrew Fox is a former British Army officer (three tours in Afghanistan), now a senior fellow at the Henry Jackson Society, a London-based think tank. Fox has been to the frontlines in Gaza, Lebanon and Ukraine. He wrote the first papers worldwide exposing the Hamas fatality figures manipulation in Gaza and showing how Israel actually fought on the ground in Gaza from a tactical perspective.

mrandrewfox.substack.com

https://x.com/mr_andrew_fox

0:00 Intro

1:00 Serving in Afghanistan

4:00 Looking back on the war

7:30 Hamas casualty numbers in Gaza

10:00 Why Andrew looked into the numbers

12:00 Hamas figures, IDF figures, and media coverage

15:30 Civilian casualties and Hamas’s strategy

18:15 Child fighters and Hamas

19:25 Why Andrew speaks up for Israel and Jews

22:00 Problems inside the IDF

28:40 Iran and the wider war

31:50 Why stopping Iran’s nuclear program matters

37:30 Strait of Hormuz

42:00 What kind of Iran deal would make sense?

47:20 Why this is different from the JCPOA

54:00 Gaza casualty ratios and urban war

57:00 Was the Gaza war worth it?

1:02:00 Why Israel went into Gaza first

1:04:30 Final thoughts

Separating Politics from Reality. Is the war going better than we realize?Eliot A. Cohen is a contributing writer at The Atlantic. He is a professor emeritus at Johns Hopkins University, the author of the forthcoming book The Strategist: How to Think About War and Politics, and a co-host of the Shield of the Republic podcast.

Jamie Kirchick joins the crew for a sharp discussion on ideology, hypocrisy and why smart people can still fall for bad ideas.
A wide-ranging, no-filter conversation about Iran, nuclear tensions, global risk—and the dangers of antisemitism. They discuss everyone from Tucker Carlson and Daryl Cooper to Bryon Noem. This episode addresses serious geopolitical stakes and is part political analysis, part philosophical sparring and part classic around the table repartee.

Jamie Kirchick is a journalist and the New York Times-bestselling author of Secret City: The Hidden History of Gay Washington and The End of Europe: Dictators, Demagogues, and the Coming Dark Age. He is a contributing opinion writer to the New York Times and a writer at large for Air Mail.

https://x.com/jkirchick