Laura Tingle

With that as a little backdrop, let's dive in.

And joining us from Jerusalem to break down the results is the ABC's Global Affairs Editor and, of course, part of our global roaming team, Laura Tingle.

Hi there, Laura.

Hello, Geraldine.

So I just don't see how it presently would work.

You're on Global Roaming on our Radio National special with me, Geraldine Dugan, Latika Bourke.

But we're speaking to the ABC's Laura Tingle and Eric Torchik about these results in the Israeli election and what it might mean for the country's future.

Now, Laura, you've been trying to contribute.

Sean Tarek Goodwin there.

Global Affairs Editor Laura Tingle is in Jerusalem and she joins me.

Laura, what does this mean for Benjamin Netanyahu and his party?

Well, Andy, he's claiming that, of course, that his party has got the biggest block of votes in the Knesset, but the bottom line is that neither his party nor the group of coalition partners that he has collectively have enough seats to form a government in their own right.

One of them would be to basically provoke a new war with Iran and then seek to form a claim that should form a unity government because the country finds itself in conditions of war.

Now, this has happened previously and, you know, there is a possibility we would try to achieve that, but whether other parties would be prepared to come on board with that I think is now a very moot point.

Laura Tingle.

Thanks for listening to The World Today.

What does it in fact prove to you?

Well, there's a lot to unpack from your editorial, of course, Andrew, and I would agree with each of the contributory causes that explain much of the background, although it doesn't explain fully, at least, the individual allegedly causing the horrendous issues, mental health, drugs, and the two are so related, the bile and hatred of much of social media, social isolation.

You could add weak courts and woke police forces.

But for politicians, the debate, John Howard's perfectly correct, the debate between politicians is not obviously more dangerous in its tone or its intent than it was in past years.

I don't know.

But the point is I think a lot of people, Michael, are seeing in this... whether correctly or not, a symbol of their real concerns about where Australia is going now, whether it's caused by this or not, whether it's caused this or not, the incivility, the hatred, the enjoyment of rage, all that is really frightening people now.

Well, that's true, Andrew, but I totally agree with your editorial.

I think it's up to the courts to decide what the causes here were, not people to speculate with their own agendas, and that's what's happening.

It's a great book and it serves as the closest thing we have to a memoir of that former Prime Minister who once famously quipped, anyone who's any good never writes about themselves.

Laura Tingle, on the end there, ABC's global affairs editor and long-time high-impact political journalist.

I always used to call Laura the smartest journo in the gallery.

And Lorena Allam, in the middle, senior ABC and Guardian journalist, descendant of the Gamilaraay and Yawalaroi nations.

And then there's that other victory book, which was Marianne Wilkinson and David Marr, Dark Victory, which is about those times, which is an extraordinarily detailed and research book itself.

You're listening to a special edition of the Radio National Hour.

It's a panel discussion that I recorded in front of a live audience last weekend at the New South Wales State Library in Sydney, with journalists Kerry O'Brien, Laura Tingle and Lorena Allam talking about great Australian political writing.

From the Irakala bark petitions to Goff's memoir and the leadership spills, so many of them in recent years, these are the political books that have shaped the way we think about politics and the people who govern us.

Today, the immense squeeze on Jordan.

I'm Laura Tingle.

And I'm Latika Bourke.

Let's go roaming.

So the frustration, firstly, is from being dragged into a war they didn't choose to wage, but they are forced to bear the cost of.

That's where the frustration comes from.

[upbeat music] You're listening to Global Roaming on Radio National with Laura Tingle and Latika Bourke, and we're speaking to Sean Yom, professor of political science at Temple University, about the situation in Jordan.

So despite the fact that they're now sort of a, a, a bigger target for Iran because of this relationship with U- US, and despite the fact they didn't want this war, you wrote in Foreign Policy a couple of months ago that Jordanian officials are actually much more concerned about Israel's future plans than it is about Iran, specifically, uh, an- any Israeli push to annex the West Bank.

And now with a Bolsonaro leading the first round of elections, Brazil could be about to join the club

But when Brazil's largest trading partner is China, could a closer relationship with the US cause an international upset? I'm Laura Tingle

And I'm Latika Bourke.

Let's go roaming.

This is why they never had a debate.

They never had a situation to expose their ideas besides talking negative things about each other.

[dramatic music] You're listening to Global Roaming on Radio National with me, Latika Bourke and Laura Tingle.

Today, we're joined by Thiago D'Aragao.