Breaking History

What drives someone from an ordinary background into extremism?

In this Breaking History special, journalist Jay Solomon joins Eli Lake to discuss his investigation into American extremist Calla Walsh. 

But this isn’t an isolated story. It echoes a pattern we’ve seen before.

Following the interview, we revisit our episode on “middle-class kids breaking bad,” exploring how individuals from stable, even privileged backgrounds have repeatedly been drawn into violent or extremist movements. We explore the tale of the Red Army Faction and how Ulrike Meinhof went from reporter to terrorist.

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This week I joined The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan, who has generously agreed to let us share the conversation here. Andrew and I go way back, and few people are as willing as he is to really go toe-to-toe over our disagreements—especially on Israel and America’s role in the world.

In our discussion, we cover a broad range of history and politics: from the Iran-Contra affair to the Oslo Accords, and the Second Intifada to Iraq, Iran, Hamas, and the current war in Gaza—along with my bar mitzvah speech about nuclear proliferation and early Zionist influences. Of course we bring it to the present day, debating the political, strategic, and moral stakes shaping Washington’s arguments about the war in Iran today. 

Take a listen, and you can find Andrew’s Substack here. 
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Breaking History producer Poppy Damon sits down with Guardian security correspondent Jason Burke to unpack his new book, ⁠The Revolutionists⁠, a sweeping history of the 1970s wave of extremism that transformed global politics. From plane hijackings to hostage crises, Burke traces the radical figures and world leaders who shaped the modern age of terror. What does the 1970s tell us about 2026?

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As Iran’s regime faces mounting internal pressure, one name keeps resurfacing: Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of the last shah. But is he a viable future leader, or simply the most recognizable symbol of a free Iran? In this conversation, host Eli Lake and producer Poppy Damon unpack the strange political moment Pahlavi finds himself in—popular with many Iranians, yet viewed skeptically by parts of the opposition and treated cautiously by Washington. Can he unite the stakeholders to bring about democracy? Or is he likely to get in the way of a future without monarchs?
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In our last episode, we traced the rise of the Pahlavi dynasty and the forces building toward Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution. In Part 2, we turn to the man who brought that monarchy to an end: Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. From exile in a quiet French chateau, Khomeini launched a revolution that shattered 2,500 years of Persian monarchy. But he didn’t do it alone. Liberals and leftists, both inside Iran and across the West, played a crucial role in legitimizing his cause, a dynamic that feels familiar today.

This is the story of the first Red-Green Alliance, a tactical partnership between Islamists and the progressive left, and the cost of that alliance once power changed hands.
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