The Keeper: A Human Rights Podcast

Latest Episodes:

Episode 15: Rule of Law Season – A Government of Laws Not Men Feb 03, 2021

Show notes

This episode kicks off our new season, where we will be exploring the significance of three simple words: Rule of Law. But what does that phrase actually mean? Is it an abstraction? An impossible ideal? Or something real and practical that holds democratic societies together? To help answer these questions and more, we spoke to one of America’s preeminent legal scholars on the rule of law, Professor Harold Koh.

Professor Koh is the Sterling Professor of International Law at Yale Law School and one of the Lantos Foundation’s Rule of Law lecturers. In addition to his legal scholarship, he has served as U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, and as the legal adviser of the State Department. In this episode, we cover everything from what the rule of law means, to where we see it being violated in the world, to how we can best preserve and uphold it at home in America.

Harold Koh Biography

Peter Gruber Rule of Law Clinic

2018 Lantos Rule of Law Lecture

United Nations and the Rule of Law

World Justice Project – What is the Rule of Law

American Bar Association – Rule of Law

Rule of Law Season Trailer Jan 28, 2021

Show notes

The new season of The Keeper will focus on three simple, but powerful, words: Rule of Law. When we decided to make this the focus of our season, we never imagined that the start of 2021 would bring this concept to the very forefront of public discourse. From the arrest of Alexey Navalny and mass protests in Russia, to China's brutal crackdown on democracy activists in Hong Kong, to the violent attack on the U.S. Capitol, there has never been a more important time to understand and commit to the rule of law.
But what does that phrase even mean? In the coming episodes, Katrina Lantos Swett, host of The Keeper, will speak with some of the world's most brilliant legal scholars and human rights leaders, people like Irwin Cotler and Professor Harold Koh, to understand why the rule of law matters so much to building free and just societies. She will also speak with activists and dissidents from around the world, like Nathan Law and Vladimir Kara-Murza, who are bravely fighting for their countries to uphold the rule of law.
Join us for our Rule of Law Season as we grapple with what the rule of law means, what happens – especially to human rights – when it is cast aside, and how we can work to preserve it, at home in America and around the globe.
The season launches in February, so stay tuned!

Episode 14: Solidarity Sabbath Season – A Humanitarian with a Bucket and Scraper Aug 19, 2020

Show notes

The final episode of this special Solidarity Sabbath season on anti-Semitism is being released on World Humanitarian Day. The United Nations calls this day a global celebration of people helping people. There are numerous examples of humanitarians throughout history who have given so much of themselves to fight anti-Semitism or to protect the Jewish people. But not every humanitarian’s contribution to the world is grand or dramatic. Sometimes, humanitarians accomplish great and lasting service to humanity through small and simple acts. This episode offers the story of one such humanitarian – a German woman, Irmela Mensah-Schramm, who has quietly taken it upon herself to remove, erase or cover up every pro-Nazi, anti-Semitic sticker, poster or graffiti that she comes across. There is no organization backing her, no funding from any government agency – just a decent, good humored, brave woman with a bucket, a scraper and an inner moral compass that we should all seek to emulate. Irmela, who is a grantee of the Lantos Foundation’s Front Line Fund, exemplifies the words of Stephen Grellet, a Quaker missionary from the late 1700s, who wrote, “I expect to pass through this world but once. Any good therefore that I can do, let me do it now. Let me not defer or neglect it for I shall not pass this way again.”

Front Line Fund

Meet the 71-year-old “Graffiti Grandma” Scrubbing Away Hate (Great Big Story)

Anti-Nazi ‘Graffiti Grandma’ Fined After Painting Over Nazi Tag (DW)

World Humanitarian Day (United Nations)

Episode 13: Solidarity Sabbath Season – Highways of Hate Aug 15, 2020

Show notes

This episode, the fourth in the special Solidarity Sabbath season, takes a deeper look at an area where anti-Semitism, and hate of all forms, is spreading in alarming ways – the internet. Katrina Lantos Swett speaks with Yigal Carmon, President and co-founder of the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI). For more than two decades, MEMRI has done ground-breaking work, researching the most disturbing examples of extreme anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial in the Arabic-, Farsi- and Urdu-speaking world. While much of MEMRI’s work in the past focused on analysis of media outlets, textbooks, religious sermons and similar kinds of communication, MEMRI is increasingly seeing the internet as the major vector of hate speech against Jews and many other minority groups. This raises vexing questions about who should be held responsible for allowing such hate to spread online unchecked.

Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI)

The Hater Next Door: Online Incitement Against Minorities in America

Department of Justice’s Review of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act

Hard Questions: Who Should Decide What is Hate Speech in an Online Global Community? (Facebook)

Trump and Biden both want to revoke Section 230, but for different reasons (Business Insider)

Episode 12: Solidarity Sabbath Season - Survivors Jul 31, 2020

Show notes

The Holocaust, or Shoah in Hebrew, refers to the World War II genocide of 6 million European Jews. This was unequivocally the most extreme and horrific example of anti-Semitism the world has ever seen. Yet, somehow Jewish survivors of this atrocity, including the Lantos Foundation’s namesake Tom Lantos, were able to emerge from this dark time with their spirits unbroken and with a deep sense of their responsibility to ensure that such horrors never happen again. In this episode, podcast host and Lantos Foundation President Dr. Katrina Lantos Swett speaks with two Holocaust survivors about their experiences during WWII and how they shaped the rest of their lives.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Yad Vashem – The World Holocaust Remembrance Center

USC Shoah Foundation

New Hampshire Governor Sununu signs genocide education bill

Maloney’s Never Again Education Act Signed into Law

Episode 11: Solidarity Sabbath Season - Special Envoy Elan Carr Jul 17, 2020

Show notes

Episode 11 of The Keeper, and the second episode of our Solidarity Sabbath season, will bring you into the 21st century of anti-Semitism with a conversation with the United States’ top diplomat tasked with combating anti-Semitism. Elan Carr, the U.S. Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism, joins Dr. Katrina Lantos Swett to speak about his work in the fight against anti-Semitism – what keeps him up at night, and what encourages him and gives him hope for the future.

Links:

Office of the Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism

Defining Anti-Semitism

Executive Order on Combating Anti-Semitism

The Hater Next Door report

“Commit to Fighting the Hater Next Door”, The Hill Op-ed by Yigal Carmon and Dr. Katrina Lantos Swett

German Parliament Deems B.D.S. Movement Anti-Semitic

Episode 10: Solidarity Sabbath Season - An Ancient Hatred Jul 02, 2020

Show notes

In the first episode of the Lantos Foundation’s special Solidarity Sabbath podcast season, we take a deeper look at the origins and history of Anti-Semitism. It is often called “an ancient hatred” or “the oldest hatred”. We ask David Nirenberg, Dean of the University of Chicago Divinity School, just how far back does it really go? Why has it been so enduring across time, geography, religion, culture, politics – even in places where no actual Jews live? This episode provides context for what will be a special season devoted exclusively to the subject of anti-Semitism and how we can combat it.
Links:
Plot Against America trailer
Defining Anti-Semitism
A Brief History of Anti-Semitism (Anti-Defamation League)
Viral trailer
David Nirenberg
How Anti-Semitism rise on the left and right (New Yorker)
Seventy-five years after Auschwitz, anti-Semitism is on the rise (The Atlantic)

Solidarity Sabbath Podcast Season Trailer Jun 19, 2020

Show notes

The Keeper podcast is back – this time with something new and a little different! Like so many other things, plans for the Lantos Foundation’s annual religious freedom initiative – the Solidarity Sabbath – fell victim to the COVID-19 outbreak this year. The Solidarity Sabbath usually offers a chance to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with a persecuted or oppressed religious community. In a time of social distancing, we’re standing virtually with the Jewish community all over the world as we bring you an entire season of The Keeper focused exclusively on anti-Semitism. The season will do a deep dive on this ancient hatred and will feature guests like Elan Carr, U.S. Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism, Yigal Carmon, President of the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), David Nirenberg, Dean of The University of Chicago Divinity School, and others. Episodes will be released beginning in late June – make sure to subscribe through iTunes or wherever you listen to your podcasts so you don’t miss them.

Episode 9 : Ensaf Haidar May 30, 2019

Show notes

We were thrilled to be joined by Ensaf Haidar, the wife of imprisoned Saudi blogger Raif Badawi. Raif’s unjust imprisonment and lashing has become an international human rights cause, thanks in no small measure to the tireless efforts of Ensaf. She has become the face of the movement to free Raif. Despite all of Ensaf’s apparent physical daintiness, there can be no mistaking her strength and determination when it comes to leading the fight to free her husband.

Episode 8 : Katrina Lantos Swett Remarks at Evian Conference Aug 27, 2018

Show notes

In July of 1938, representatives of 32 nations were summoned to Evian France at the call of President Franklin Roosevelt to try to find a solution to the Jewish refugee problem - a crisis precipitated by the increasingly draconian and violent persecution of Jews in Germany and Austria. The conference, which began with high hopes and high-minded rhetoric, was to end in abject failure. The assembled nations refused to open their hearts and their shores to the persecuted Jews of Europe and their abdication of moral responsibility was taken by Hitler as a green light to move forward with his genocidal "final solution". In July of this year, a symposium was convened in the same Hotel Royale where the 1938 gathering was held. The purpose of this event was to consider the lessons and warnings of The Evian Conference on its 80th anniversary. Dr. Katrina Lantos Swett, President of the Lantos Foundation and host of our podcast, was invited to give the keynote address for the symposium. Her insights and analysis are informed not only by her years of leadership and activism within the human rights community, but also by the lessons she learned as the daughter of Hungarian Holocaust survivors. We are happy to share Dr. Lantos Swett's remarks with you.
The Evian Conference, 1938

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