This week on Unorthodox: Ann Coulter’s ill-advised tweet during the Republican presidential debate about “f—ing Jews” (and A.J. Jacobs’ fact-minded response); the pope’s visit to the United States; and a Brooklyn animal-rights activist’s campaign to end the practice of kapporot, in which chickens are ritually slaughtered before Yom Kippur.
Our Jewish guest is defense lawyer and former Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz, whose latest book is Abraham: The World’s First (But Certainly Not Last) Jewish Lawyer. He talks about his former research assistant Natalie Portman, who’s thanked in the acknowledgements of his 2003 book, The Case For Israel, and whom he describes as a “star student.” He also explains why some critics of Israel are bigots, and others are not.