Unholy: Two Jews on the News

Episode: Two Jews Take on Christmas (December 25, 2025)

Hosts:

• Jonathan Freedland (The Guardian, London)
• Yonit Levi (Channel 12 News, Tel Aviv)

Episode Overview

In this special Christmas edition, Jonathan and Yonit—two prominent Jewish journalists—dive into the multifaceted relationship between Jews and Christmas. With their usual blend of humor, insight, and candor, they reflect on personal experiences, cultural traditions, historical peculiarities, and contemporary challenges of navigating Christmas as Jews both in the diaspora and in Israel. The conversation touches on assimilation, identity, Jewish contributions to Christmas culture, and how political dynamics color the holiday’s celebration.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Jews as Outsiders at Christmas

• Jonathan reflects on how Jews have traditionally felt like outsiders on Christmas, not so much actively excluded but making a deliberate choice to "opt out" of the holiday.
  • "It's not like we were excluded actively from Christmas or we were sort of shut out... I think we sort of opted out of it." — Jonathan [04:08]
• Yonit recalls explaining her identity as a child in America:
  • "The Jews are the people who don't have Christmas. So this is... a good working definition? Yes, I think so." — Yonit [05:27]
• Discussion of how Jewish families in the diaspora developed their own unique Christmas routines, such as going to the movies and eating Chinese food—“plausibly deniable trafe.”
  • "Apparently this was the concept of plausibly deniable trafe. Safe trafe...Chinese food where the pork was hidden." — Jonathan [02:53]

2. Participation, Assimilation, and the Christmas Tree Debate

• Pew Research: ~32% of American Jews have a Christmas tree at home, frequently due to interfaith households.
  • "I was quite surprised by that figure... One in three American Jews having a Christmas tree. I was surprised because I thought it would be higher." — Jonathan [06:57]
  • "If you're very religious, you're not gonna come close to near a Christmas tree." — Yonit [05:58]
• The Christmas tree as a contested symbol of assimilation:
  • "It's so associated in my mind with that step towards assimilation that no, we don't have a Christmas tree." — Jonathan [07:34]
• Reference to Tom Stoppard's play Leopoldstadt:
  • "The family that tries to assimilate...starts with this huge Christmas tree and the sign of assimilation...foreshadowing of this and what will happen to them." — Yonit [07:54]
  • "At the top they put a magentavid, a Star of David...as if to say we can and do combine both." — Jonathan [08:24]
• American Jewish attempts at “rebranding” the tree: the “Hanukkah bush.”
  • "We've got a Hanukkah bush, not a Christmas tree." — Jonathan [09:02]

3. Jews and Christmas Culture: Music, Movies, and Influence

• Jewish songwriters’ outsized contributions to Christmas music:
  • "Most of the very popular Christmas songs, 'Let it Snow', 'White Christmas' and 'Rudolph the Red Nose'...all written by Jews." — Yonit [10:37]
  • "White Christmas written by one Israel Berlin or Irving Berlin, as he became." — Jonathan [11:18]
• Saturday Night Live’s “Christmas Time for the Jews” [12:45–13:21]:
  • "It's fantastic that...it's playing with anti-Semitic tropes about Jewish control and everything, like checklists." — Jonathan [13:23]
  • "They can crank Barbra Streisand in the streets they cruise." — Yonit quoting SNL [13:33]
• Jewish immigrants and Hollywood:
  • "They were thinking, we are not let into the inner circle of American life. So we'll invent...the whole Hollywood depiction of the Midwestern home...All part of the American attempt to assimilate and to somehow define what American life was as they at least imagined it." — Jonathan [11:03]

4. Christmas in Israel

• Demographics: Christians <2% of Israel’s population, so Christmas has a minor presence except in mixed cities and through Russian immigrants’ Novigod celebration.
  • "In Tel Aviv it is 25°C...so discussing Christmas at all is a very weird experience." — Yonit [15:41]
  • "We have heard of a few completely secular Israeli Jews who have a little tree in their house just to sort of maybe be part of the cosmopolitan, the part of the rest of the world." — Yonit [16:08]
  • "Novigod...the Russian New Year adds to that sort of feeling and celebration." — Yonit [16:25]
• Changing perceptions:
  • "I think the more Israelis sort of perceive the real danger coming from Islamic countries...they feel...less dwelling on, you know, 2,000 years of anti Semitic Christianity." — Yonit [16:32]
• Tourist pilgrimages to Christian towns and festivities in Jerusalem, Jaffa, Haifa, Nazareth.

5. Jewish-Christian Political Dynamics and Anti-Semitic Tropes

• Shifts in antagonism: tension with Islam is more current, compared to the historic Jewish-Christian rift.
  • "The idea of there being tension between Judaism and Christianity feels somehow more retro." — Jonathan [17:32]
• Christmas imagery used in political discourse, especially relating to the Israel-Palestinian conflict.
  • "There is this motif...in which the Palestinians are as it were sort of crucified...equated to Jesus as if to say...the Jews are doing it again." — Jonathan [18:39]
• Controversy over representations of Mary in film, notably the casting of an Israeli actress in "Mary" on Netflix.
  • "Well, Mary was Jewish. This is part of history we can't change...it's okay to let an Israeli actress portray her." — Yonit [19:54]

6. Christmas Films and Secular Traditions

• Family routines and film recs:
  • "I will be putting on the Sinatra Christmas CD...and we do, at least to that extent, market." — Jonathan [20:40]
  • Favorite film: It's a Wonderful Life (Jonathan)
    • "It's just a wonderful film...It slightly reminds me of Yom Kippur or Rosh Hashanah, where you sort of take stock and you think about the year you've had, but also the life you've had." — Jonathan [21:37]
  • Debate about Die Hard as a Christmas movie:
    • "I know that you think it's a little too...well, what did you call it when I forced you to see it? ...you were surprised by, you know, its violence." — Yonit [22:14]
    • "I was surprised by your enthusiasm for it." — Jonathan [22:42]
  • Elf and Home Alone as family favorites:
    • "If you haven't shown Elf to your kids yet, by the way, Elf they'll love. Okay, that's a recommendation." — Jonathan [22:54]
    • "Home Alone is a very good film, very good film for children." — Yonit [23:13]
  • Jonathan's "guilty pleasure": Jesus movies at Easter, and the possibility of a future Easter-themed episode.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

"The Jews are the people who don't have Christmas." — Yonit [05:27]

"Apparently this was the concept of plausibly deniable trafe. Safe trafe...Chinese food where the pork was hidden." — Jonathan [02:53]

"It's so associated in my mind with that step towards assimilation that no, we don't have a Christmas tree." — Jonathan [07:34]

"At the top they put a magentavid, a Star of David...as if to say we can and do combine both." — Jonathan [08:24]

"Most of the very popular Christmas songs...all written by Jews." — Yonit [10:37]

"They can crank Barbra Streisand in the streets they cruise." (quoting the SNL song) — Yonit [13:33]

"There is this motif...in which the Palestinians are as it were sort of crucified...equated to Jesus as if to say...the Jews are doing it again." — Jonathan [18:39]

"I will be putting on the Sinatra Christmas CD...and we do, at least to that extent, market." — Jonathan [20:40]

"It's just a wonderful film...It slightly reminds me of Yom Kippur or Rosh Hashanah, where you sort of take stock..." — Jonathan [21:37]

Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:18–02:00 – Opening/Setting the Scene: 'Two Jews take on Christmas'
• 02:00–05:08 – American Jewish Christmas customs: movies, Chinese food, and "hidden trafe"
• 05:08–09:22 – Personal/family perspectives and the Christmas tree/assimilation debate
• 09:22–11:58 – Historical shifts: Hanukkah bush, American Jewish identity, and Christian-Jewish backstories
• 11:58–13:43 – Jewish contributions to Christmas music, SNL’s “Christmas Time for the Jews”
• 15:41–17:32 – Christmas in Israel, Russian Novigod, assimilation, and changing anxieties
• 17:32–18:39 – Political symbolism, anti-Semitic tropes, and modern conflict overlays
• 19:54–23:26 – Christmas films: favorites, family traditions, and genre analysis
• 24:53–25:29 – Jonathan’s appreciation for Easter “Jesus movies”

Tone and Style

Playful, witty, but deeply insightful—characteristic of Jonathan and Yonit's chemistry. The conversation blends personal nostalgia, pointed cultural critique, sharp observations on assimilation and identity, and an ongoing affection for both Jewish and Western traditions.

Conclusion

This lively and reflective episode maps the complex, at times humorous, at times poignant territory occupied by Jews during Christmas—negotiating cultural boundaries, adapting and contributing to “American” Christmas culture, and grappling with the politics of representation. Whether negotiating the "plausibly deniable trafe" of Christmas eve Chinese food or deconstructing the politics of nativity scenes, the hosts make clear there's no one Jewish way to "do" or not do Christmas, but a rich history of adaptation, debate, and engagement.