today on the program -- we'll get the latest live on israel-hamas war. plus the world watches as two major wars, one in the middle east and the other in europe. each one side is heavily funded by uncle sam. >> it's ukraine's fight against russia that is about to run out of american funding. what does the gop have to do with it? >> cory shockey and anne applebaum of "the atlantic." also french philosopher bernard levee on anti-semitism rearing its ugly head again and former harvard president on racism in america. >> but first, here's my take. when one thinks of america's greatest strengths, the kind of assets the world looks at with admiration and envy, america's elite universities would long have been at the top of the list, but the american public has been losing faith in these universities for good reason. three university presidents came under fire this week for their vague and indecisive answers when asked whether to call for the genocide of jews would violate their institution's codes of conduct, but to understand their performance, we have to understand the broad shift that has taken place at elite universities which have gone from being centers of excellence to institutions pushing political agendas. people sense the transformation, the share of young adults who said a college degree was very important fell from 74% in 2013 to just 41% in 2019. in 2018, 61% of those polls said higher education was headed in the wrong direction and only 38% felt it was on the right track. in 2016, 70% of america's high school graduates were headed for college. now that number is 62%. this souring on higher education makes america an outliar among all advanced nations. american universities have been neglecting a core focus on excellence in order to pursue a variety of agendas and many of them clustered around diversity and inclusion. it started with the best of intentions, colleges wanted to make sure young people of all backgrounds have access to higher education and felt comfortable on campus, but those good intentions have morphed into a dogmatic ideology and turned these universities into places where the pervasive goals of political and social engineering and not academic merit. as the evidence produced from the recent supreme court case on affirmative action showed universities have systematically downplayed merit-based criteria for emissions in favor of racial quotas. some university's response to the ruling seems to be that they would go further down this path eliminating down the path for standardized tests like the s.a.t. that move would, lou them to then take students with little reference to objective criteria. of course, those who would suffer most will be bright students from poor backgrounds who normally use tests like the s.a.t. to demonstrate their qualifications. in the humanities hiring for new academic positions now appears to center on the race and gender of the applicant as well as the subject matter which needs to be about marginalized groups. a white man studying the american presidency does not have a prayer of getting tenure at a major history department in america today. great inflation in the humanities is rampant. at yale, the median grade is now an a. new subjects crop up that are really political agendas, not academic fields. you can now major in diversity, equity and inclusion at some colleges. the ever-growing bureaucracy devoted to diversity, equity and inclusion naturally recommends that more time and energy be spent on these issues. the most obvious lack of diversity in universities, political diversity which clearly affects their ability to analyze many issues is never addressed assuring that these goals are not centrally achieving to sustaining or building excellence. out of this culture of diversity has grown the collection of ideas and practices that we have now all heard of, safe spaces, trigger warnings and microaggressions. the author's jonathan hait, many of these colleges have instituted speech codes that say things some groups might find offensive. universities have advised students not to say that would offend minority groups. the george mrfloyd protests latched on and issued statements effectively aligning their institutions with these protests. by my memory, few took such steps even after 9/11 or during the iraq war. in this context it is understandable the jewish groups would wonder why do safe spaces, microaggressions and hate speech not apply to us? if universities can take positions against free speech to make some groups feel safe, why not us? having coddled so many student groups for so long, university administrators found themselves squirming, unable to explain why certain groups, jews, asians don't seem to count in these conversations. having gone so far down the ideological path, these universities and these presidents could not make the case clearly that at the center of a university is the free expression of ideas and that while harassment and intimidation would not be tolerated, offensive speech would and should be protected. as cnn's van jones has eloquently said, the point of college is to keep you physically safe, but intellectually unsafe to force you to confront ideas that you vehemently disagree with. what we saw in the house hearing this week was the inevitable result of decades of the m politicization of universities. america's top colleges are no longer seen as past bastions. they abandon this long misadventure into politics and regain their gaze on their core strengths and rebuild their rep takes as centers of research and learning. go to cnn.com/fareed for a link to my column this week and let's get started. ♪ ♪ the war in the middle east continues to grab headlines while it seems leak the war in ukraine is being sebnt to the back pages. the u.s. must not forget its allies in europe or the middle east. he was in ukraine over the summer producing his front lines from the war. this one is called glory to the heros and it premiered in new york, d.c. and l.a. and it will follow in other major american cities. bernard, thank you for being on, first tell me, the movie is fantastic, but since then, what are you hearing from the front lines now because you know what people are saying is that it's a stalemate, the ukrainians have stalled and the russians have the momentum. >> on the ground, i don't think so. ukrainians are still resisting, still holding the line with an incredible bravery. we are tired in america and in europe, not in ukraine. they are not tired. they continue with huge sacrifice, spilling their blood. we pay money. they pay with blood and they do it because they defend their country, but also they do it with a feeling that europe, america, the western world, freedom. they feel this is the what i felt most on the battlefield, we are the center of the free world. i heard this sentence dozens of times. >> do they worry about the losing -- that the west is losing patience, it's getting tired? >> they're worried about the maneuvers of putin since day first. they know that putin is counting on the victory of trump. they know that putin is hoping europe to be dismantled. they know that putin is playing the game of the extreme right and the extreme left in some european countries including mine so they're worried about all of that. they are worried about our naivety. you americans, us europeans in front of putin and they're afraid of this terrible trap which putin is putting under our feet. >> i want to know from you firsthand because you are witnessing it and living it. describe for me what is happening in europe as a consequence of the israel-hamas war? >> do you see a significant rise of anti-semitism? >> i see it in europe. i see it in america, fareed, let's be honest. we all thought that america was vaccinated against anti-semitism, that it was another shelter for jews. i wouldn't have tried to be a student in some of your highest schools or universities and there is a terrible wind and wave of anti-semitism going on in america and the worst among the youth which is really heartbreaking with such a for a man like me who did fight all his life against racism and anti-semitism, it's america. >> but tell me in europe, do you think the anti-semitism is all related to this? do you think it's the ghosts of the '30s rising again? it is the ghosts of the '30s with another incarnation, with another set of actors, of course, and theyor the left. it is the same speech. it is the same way of thinking which has migrated for a large part and the extreme right to the extreme left, but it is the same way of deflecting the extreme right in the 30s. >> what do you hope to do with this movie? >> yesterday night there was a premiere in the u.n., and it was a real achievement. and a lot were there in the audience in the big room of the united nations. they saw this first-hand testimony which i brought to them, and i think that some of them, i hope, at least, understood that the real imperialism of today is not america, but is russia. bernard henri levy, always. nine weeks into the war, israel continues to bombard gaza with air strikes. what is the strategy behind all this violence? i'll talk to the diplomatic correspondent amir tebran next. on friday, the united -- the united states vetoed a u.n. security council resolution calling for a ceasefire in gaza. israeli air strikes continue to pound gaza throughout the weekend and israel's national security adviser said yes today, it can no longer accept hezbollah on its northern border. does israel plan to expand its war. i want to bring in amir teban in israel and he's correspondent for for the israeli newspaper. amir, welcome. i want to ask you, for those of us looking at this from afar, it does appear that the air strikes continue at a kind of extraordinary pace. the financial times has calculated that more of gaza has been destroyed than dresden during world war ii. human rights monitor says in the first month israel has dropped 25,000 tons of fire power which is the equivalent of two nuclear bombs. that's just in the first month. the civilian death count is now 17,000 in gaza. is there a strategy behind this or is there going to continue until the last hamas militant is killed? >> fareed, this is a response to an unprecedented terror attack that israel had never experienced before and frankly, it's hard to think of an equivalent attack in our life time. you can look at september 11th as perhaps the only comparison i can think of and obviously, what's happening now in gaza is an attempt by israel to defeat hamas and make sure that something like october 7th can never happen again. now is that strategy actually successful or not, i think we need more time to see what happens with hamas and gaza. we are seeing that in the northern part of gaza where israel put most of the effort so far, hamas is losing many of its capabilities and we are seeing it to the great events with the idea over there were pictured in the last 48 hours that fighters are putting down their arms in hamas, we still have a very strong presence in hamas in the southern part of gaza and that's going to be more difficult, but abvows obviously when hamas launched this into october 7th and into civilian kibbutz, towns and cities and murdered and kidnapped civilians this was the response that they anticipated would come from israel. what he did on that day, he signed the death certificate of just a disaster for the people of gaza, and for me personally, it's very, very sad and it's a terrible tragedy, but i don't think any country in the world would have accepted what happened to israel on october 7th and not responded in such a forceful way. >> is -- is it possible that the strategy will backfire? i mean, your -- it does feel like it's difficult to see how the 2 million people of gaza who are still going to be living right next door to israel will look upon this and say we have to come to peace with our neighbors. >> honestly, fareed, i think in the long run i personally still think that we have to find a formula for us, israelis and the palestinians to live in peace and share this land, but i think right now we're looking at a very, very difficult situation on both sides -- in which we have a level of hostility that is unprecedented even in this very, very long and bloody conflict, and i think right now -- >> let me ask you, amir -- >> so let me ask you about the north before i lose you because i do want to ask you, what do you make of that statement by the national security adviser? does that mean israel has to now go into the north, as well? >> fareed, let's separate a statement from the netanyahu appointee who said two years ago that hamas will not attack for 15 years and this is what this guy, our national security adviser said two years ago that hamas will be deterred by netanyahu and will not attack by 15 years, i do not put any weight into his statements and there are now tens of thousands of israelis who have left their homes in northern israel on the border with lebanon and they will not go back home as long as hezbollah is on the border. that's just a fact of life and if hezbollah does not withdraw from the border area either by the course of some diplomatic action or military action then these people will not go, no country can accept the reality in which tens of thousands of people are uproaded by their homes and can't go back. i think there will be a diplomatic solution and there is hope here for the biden administration and for other countries that have relationships with lebanon and france, i know, is trying to help to solve this diplomatically, but if it's not solved via diplomat being means i'm afraid israel will not have a choice because accepting this reality that these people cannot go back to sleep in their homes knowing hezbollah is on the other side that that is unacceptable. >> amir, thank you. always, always insightful to hear from you. thank you. >> thank you for having me. next, will congress continue to back ukraine? will europe? when we come back. dear moms and dads, what you have achieved here today is going to help us and our futures. it is why we're coming up on stage to collect your diplomas. mom, love you always. vo: when you graduate, they graduate. visit finishyourdiploma.org to find free and supportive adult education centers near you. on monday, the white house issued a dire warning on ukraine in a letter to congress, the omb director said money is swiftly running out and so is time. on wednesday, senate republicans blocked a bill that included more aid for ukraine as they and their counterparts and the house demand significant changes on immigration policy in return. what will this mean for ukraine's fight against russia and what does it say about the republican party? joining me is acura shockey who served in george w. bush's administration and is now a senior fellow at the american prize institute and anne applebaum say staff righter at "the atlantic" and has an article that predicts trump will abandon nato if re-elected. welcome to you both. anne, first, i want to ask you on the ground what do things look like for ukraine? i was about to say how bad is it? >> so, it's often described as a stalemate, but that's actually an incorrect description because a stalemate makes it sound like nothing is happening. ukrainians did not have the equipment or the force to break through all of the russian lines over the summer. they are now defending their territory, they're still trying to make breakthroughs in a few other places, but the situation is incredibly dynamic. so there's a lot of fighting every day. there's a huge amount of ammunition used. the russians are still trying to break through in the north. the ukrainians are trying to break through in the south. so there's a -- they have reached a point where at the moment neither side can advance quickly or rapidly, but the -- it could still tip very easily either way. >> but anne, what i've heard is that the ukrainian counteroffensive failed for a number of reasons. some of it was equipment. some of it there are feelings that the strategy may have been wrong. they were trying to do too many things in too many places and that the russians are actually doing quite well partly because they have really concentrated mass. they're producing lots of drones and artillery. the russian are russian troops have been reinforced and they're defending very secure lines and lots of minefields and lots of concrete bunkers. so it is a stalemate, but not in the dynamic sense, you mean? >> if anyone has the advantage right now it's the russians. is that consistent with your reporting? >> so the russians have an advantage in this sense. the russians have devoted 40% of their budget to the military. they have switched their economy to a war fighting, war strategy economy. the ukrainians are dependent for their military supplies on a large and powerful range of countries around the world who coordinated and are not helping them in always in a strategic and consistent way. so in that sense, you do have right now something that looks uneven. the russians feel confident. that's partly psychological. you know, they're fine. they're defending their lines and they're trying to move forward, and the ukrainians have a behind them a coalition whether it's in the u.s. or whether it's in europe that appears to be faltering. so this war is as much about psychologically who's going to last. who's going to stick it out and you know, put in the resources to win on the ground or in some other way and who will not. right now the russians feel more confident, yes. >> cory, what would it mean if russia were able to not just hold the territory, but even chip away at more ukrainian territory, what does it mean if russia would be seen as in some sense far from being punished or losing because of this aggression? >> the world is getting more unstable and more dangerous and if russia is permitted to succeed in ukraine, first and foremost it means more war crimes against ukrainians and more terrorizing of ukraine and it would make america's allies in europe very worried that the united states, despite the president saying we will do everything we can for as long as it takes, that's not what we're doing and that is visible to america's allies and america's adversaries. it will encourage challengers to the existing order in europe and in asia and that will make it c costlier to the united states to keep our friends secure and prosperous. >> and you have argued, cory, that the biden administration's mistake and strategic flaw here is not as some republicans say aiding ukraine, but not giving it more aid or more lethal weaponry and doing it all more speedily, right? >> absolutely. the slow pace give the russians six months to dig in and make these defenses that ukraine is slowly, methodically working its way through, fighting its way through and it's disgraceful for us to be behind our hands complaining about ukrainian strategy where for 4% and zero american deaths, we need to pour more support in as the president has promised because not only would it be terrible for ukraine and corrosive to the international order. it's going to be really bad for president biden to have made so big a commitment and then not see it through. >> stay with us, both of you. when we come back i want to talk about something that is at the center of both of the articles you have written which is what happens if donald trump wins? what happens to ukraine? what happens to this whole pivotal conflict when we come back? and we are back with kori schake and anne applebaum. you have an article on why trump will almost certainly abandon ukraine and if you were elected, there are lots of people who feel otherwise saying he said things like this when he was campaigning the first time around. he -- you, it doesn't mean anything. what gives you the sense that trump really does feel strongly enough here that he would pull the plug on ukraine and cut a deal with russia? >> so trump has told us that when asked specifically about ukraine. he said i'll end the war in one day. that can only mean one thing. he would end the war by seeking to concede, not that that -- not that that would prevent the ukrainians from fighting. he's made a number of comments over the years and decades about his lack of interest in european allies about his scorn and disgust for nato. he once said i don't give a shit about nato to john bolton, his national security adviser. and during his first term there were enough people around including bolton, including mike pence, including others who persuaded him nevertheless to stay in. in his second term those people will not be there, and what i think most americans don't know, in fact, what most people don't know about nato is that although it's a treaty in which the united states and its allies agree to help one another in case one or the other is attacked, it doesn't have any clear obligations and it's also much more the psychology of theed in a otreaty is more important than the law. if trump says i'm not going to help anybody, i'm not going to defend ukraine and then immediately the whole idea of collective defense disappears and it would clearly be one of the first thing hs he does if h becomes president. >> there is some softening of support in europe either a kind of war weariness or what's going on on that end of the atlantic? >> what's happening in europe is very similar to what's happening in the united states in that there are small groups of people or particular countries who are blocking aid for ukraine. it's hungary in the european union and it's truckers in poland, slovakia and hungary who are complaining about the situation on the border. there are small groups who are creating difficulties much in the way that there's a small group of republicans essentially pro-russian or isolationist republicans who are also blocking aid, and they are capable of stopping what is still majority support for ukraine, the majority in europe and there's a majority in the united states. most people still want ukraine to win, but we haven't yet -- we haven't yet identified this as an important enough national cause or international cause. we haven't gone on -- we haven't ourselves gone on to a war footing and we aren't pushing through the bills and the money that we need. >> kori, your art beicle makes conservative case for aiding ukraine and mostly abandoning a kind of policy of isolationism that many republicans seem to be flirting with. do you think that it is a small minority? what i worry about is it may be small now, but it does feel like it has a lot of energy and it is growing. >> yes. i think that's right. americans are reluctant internationalists, but we are internationalists and there are a small cadre of republicans who are opposed to aid to ukraine in the congress. the vast majority of republicans in congress support aid to ukraine. when we're seeing right now is a congressional tousle over knowing what the president needs to pass aid for ukraine. the republicans wanting to get some other things that they will likewise get concerned about. border security and reduction in the national debt, expressing concern about where ukraine fits in the president's priorities. concern that russia has a winning strategy, stalling for time and president biden does not, and so they want to see those things addressed and when they are you will easily have the votes to aid to ukraine. >> do you worry about the things anne was talking about. there is a kind of anti-nato, anti-ally tenor to some of the conversation. if you look at the primaries for someone like vivek ramaswamy. these are new arguments being made particularly on the republican side to have the party of ronald reagan be talking about abandoning its democratic allies. it's very odd. >> yes, it is very odd and it risks squandering republicans' reputation for being serious about national security policy, but it's not surprising that donald trump while president and since has been arguing against america's allies as the strongest and most cost effective way of securing our country and their country. these are winnable arguments and these are winnable voters. the reagan institute poll of attitudes even the majority of trump voters describe themselves as internationalists, not isolationists. these are winnable arguments. we just have to engage in a positive way about things americans are actually concerned about. >> kori schake, anne applebaum. a very important discussion. thank you. >> next on gps, i'll talk to a former president of harvard about anti-semitism, race in america and her new book. my next guest has a very impressive resume, indeed. she was the first female president of harvard and is one of the country's leading historians of the civil war. now drew gippin faust is looking back at her early life and the forces that shaped her in her new book "necessary trouble. growing up in mid-century." we'll get to her book in a moment, but i have to start with the testimony this week of university presidents including harvard at that house hearing. >> so, drew, when you watched those hearings with your successor as president of harvard and it was one between -- what were your thoughts, what did you think watching that and i should make clear you are just a professor now and you're not speaking for harvard and i know you don't want to talk about this and you want to talk about your book, but given that it happened this week, i have to ask you what was your reaction? >> so i didn't watch i read and have seen snippets, but i haven't seen every bit of it, but i -- i have to think about i am six years away almost from having any policy decision making or implementation and during that time i've been in the classroom with undergraduates teaching seminars in which they argue, disagree and get new summer journalists, and just the magic of universities, and the importance of universities is such a central value for me. we don't want to destroy these institutions. and they're not perfect. but i think they try hard. and there is a lot that's going on at universities right at this minute that is wondrous. and i got to see it every day in the classroom. >> it also feels to me like everyone wants the university to in a sense take their side. which is something that used to not happen. when do you think that shifted? >> well, the idea that the university taking our side, when we were students in 1960 and activists, we didn't care whether the university took our side or not. it was the adults didn't matter. we were going to transcend whatever shortcomings they had. so it is a very different world. and when i was president, there arose midway through my presidency, 2007 to 2018, around the 2011s, 2012s there appeared a set of constant demands for speaking out, universities speaking out. and it comes in part, i think, from the very strong moral sense that a lot of students have today, and we want to encourage that, we don't want to entirely deny that a university, especially for the 18 to 21-year-olds, is a place for moral and character development. so we have put ourselves in this business of urging students to think deeply about what matters in the world, and they are. and then they're asking us to ratify what they believe, which, as you say, presents a whole set of problems that i think we haven't yet worked out the implications of. >> so, this is a really terrific book. and i cannot urge people more to read it, because it is so personal and so beautifully written like everything you write. you describe growing up, again, i was surprised by this, knowing you through your extraordinary civil war scholarship, you grew up a kind of privileged southern bell. >> i never got the bell part right. but that -- in a privileged family in virginia, rural virginia, with expectations that i would be a bell. my grandmother was certainly a bell, but i was not good. i had to find a different line of work from that. >> you were surprised by the degree to which there was a kind of quiet institutional racism that pervaded the entire landscape. part of the book is the story of your realization of that. >> and i realized that as a pretty small child. but there was a phrase that was coined by a journalist in richmond, who was also a civil war scholar, doug southal friedman who wrote a biography of lee and the phrase talked about the virginia way and this was in the 1950s. and the virginia way was really to have a racially segregated society without the confrontational violence that characterized the deep south, without the visible signs saying black and white, and the notion he had of it was that black people in virginia would consent to this more peaceful hierarchy. and, of course, african americans were not readily consenting, but there did emerge a kind of veneer of gentility, of calm in virginia, that began to be shattered by the brown v. board decision in 1954. and it was that that led me as a small child to kind of turmoil that followed that and the voicing of things that had been left unspoken that led me to realize that i was living in an unjust social system and to kind of, as age 9, begin to perceive these injustices. so, it is not fair it became a refrain for me throughout my childhood and it took on an element of perceiving racial injustice and then i think did fuel my sense that fairness was an important goal throughout my life. >> and that fairness and your historical work, where you try to understand -- you empathize with, for example, it death on both sides of the civil war. was that conscious? >> well, my first book, my first published work that came out of my dissertation was about people who defended slavery in the south before the civil war. and i wanted to understand how people get up in the morning and live their lives amongst circumstances that we now see as just unimaginable and terrible. and how do human beings tell themselves that what they're doing is just fine. and that is always fascinated me and i think it pervades so much of my scholarship and how people deal with -- >> what would they -- >> they used religion, they talked about racial hierarchies, there was a whole array of intellectual tools that reinforced -- it gives you pause. that's part of why i wanted to write about it. what are we doing right now that our grandchildren are going to say, how could you possibly have lived with that? how could you possibly have tolerated that? >> drew faust, always a pleasure to hear you and always a pleasure to read you. >> thank you so much. >> thanks to all of you for being part of my program this week. i'll see you next week. first time i connected with kim, she told me that her husband had passed. and that he took care of all of the internet connected devices in the home. i told her, “i'm here to take care of you.” connecting with kim... made me reconnect with my mom. it's very important to keep loved ones close. we know that creating memories with loved ones brings so much joy to your life. a family trip to the team usa training facility. i don't know how to thank you. i'm here to thank you. hello, everyone. thank you so much for joinin