The Upfront Podcast

Eitan Chitayat is a creative director, copywriter and brand-builder, and founder of the Natie Branding Agency in Tel Aviv. Eitan has been delivering branding campaigns for B2C and B2B clients for over 25 years. He has lived in Hong Kong, London, Tel Aviv, New York, and Boston, working with clients such as Google, Volkswagen, American Express, and Toyota, as well as Israeli companies like Amdocs, NICE, The Jewish Agency for Israel, and Taglit. In 2015, he created the viral video “I’m That Jew” which has been viewed over 15 million times on various platforms. He also gave a TED talk about why he created the piece. He’s consistently been an advocate for Israel and the Jewish People, gaining a following on social media, but since October 7th he has dedicated all of his time to fighting Jew hatred and anti-semitism, focusing on building Jewish pride.

We are speaking about his advocacy work, how we as a minority need to get better at advocating for ourselves to change the current narrative, and how we should be talking to our Jewish kids about how to deal with what’s going on and how to explain this spreading hatred. Eitan and I are also talking about the value and importance of integrity, as we attempt to find a reason behind so much misinformation being spread about Israel, the war, and the Jewish people, with age-old blood libels resurfacing, holocaust inversion and relativization and other forms of antisemitism, as well as who is leading, driving and funding the pro-Hamas/anti-Jewish, supposedly pro-Palestinian demonstrations.

👉 Listen to the full conversation on all podcast platforms or at the link in the bio 🎧

Join the conversation and leave us your comments, remarks, and opinions below.

The first episode of season 2 is out!

My guest is Rabbi Akiva Weingarten , born and raised in the Jewish ultraorthodox “Satmar” community in New York. He decided to leave the community, lived abroad for many years, then studied “Jewish Studies” in Germany and eventually became the Rabbi for two liberal Jewish communities in Switzerland and Germany. His own book by the title “Ultraorthodox” has recently been published.

We are talking about Judaism specifically, other religions, spirituality, and also what it was like for him to leave his old life behind. How he dealt with the struggles of entering a whole new world, redefining himself, and how his stance on identity, religion, and spirituality has changed. He will also tell us what he thinks of pop culture depictions of ultraorthodox Jews, such as the Unorthodox series on Netflix.

👉 Listen to the full episode at the link in the bio or wherever you listen to podcasts.