Anna Veronese was born in Venice, Italy. Since 2009, she has been living in Paris with her husband and three children. She holds a BA in Archaeology, an MA in History from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and an MA in Information Science from the CNAM Institute in Paris. She is the project coordinator at Ta Shma, an independent French Beit Midrash in Jerusalem. She is the vice-president of Kol-Elles, a Beit Midrash in Paris offering Jewish learning for women. She studies issues of gender, equality, and social justice within Orthodox Judaism. She is passionate about Italian Jewish traditions, rich and composite in both customs and liturgy, which she studies and passes on to the next generation.

Host and Creator: Manya Marcus

Managing Producer: Maya Zanger-Nadis

Editor and Producer: Ben Wallick

Logo Design: Samuel Vilemar

Outro Music: "Mar'ot" by Anat Malamud

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Earlier this year, What Came After traveled to Brussels for a sobering conversation with Rihards Kols, Latvia’s Member of the European Parliament. Recorded inside one of the European Parliament’s media studios, this interview confronts a chilling possibility: that the world may be repeating the darkest chapters of the 20th century.

Kols offers an unflinching look at how his own country has confronted Russian aggression, and how the invasion of Ukraine by a nuclear-armed autocracy has emboldened others—China, North Korea, and Iran among them. He draws a direct line from Russia’s war in Ukraine to Iran’s support of Hamas’s attack on Israel—both sovereign nations under siege.

As the world grapples with rising authoritarianism, Kols warns of the West’s dangerous complacency. He challenges the belief that dialogue alone can deter autocratic threats and criticizes the hesitation of democratic nations to provide meaningful support to those on the front lines—especially Ukraine and, more recently, Israel.

Recorded in January 2025, several months before the outbreak of the Israel-Iran war, this conversation now resonates with eerie urgency. Kols’s words offer one glimpse of hope: history will warn us, rather than repeating itself, if we are willing to listen.

Host and Creator: Manya Marcus

Managing Producer: Maya Zanger-Nadis

Editor and Producer: Ben Wallick

Logo Design: Samuel Vilemar

Outro Music: "All We See" by Nuriel

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In this episode, we travel to Rome to speak with Luca Spizzichino and David Fiorentini. Luca is the current president of the Italian Union of Jewish Students and Young Professionals (UGEI) and a freelance journalist. David, a recent medical school graduate, is UGEI’s former president and its current Policy Officer.

Luca discusses the growing challenges of combating antisemitism online and how Holocaust education has become even more central to Italian Jewish advocacy since October 7th. He also shares his efforts to defend university students whose studies were disrupted by anti-Israel protests, and reflects on his own grandparents' survival of the Holocaust without ever leaving Italy.

David talks about the difficulty of presenting Israel—a Middle Eastern country—to Western audiences. As one of just 40 Jews remaining in the Tuscan city of Siena, he reflects on the dual nature of aliyah: how moving to Israel energizes many Italian Jews, while also complicating efforts to preserve the diverse and historic Jewish culture unique to each Italian region.

Host and Creator: Manya Marcus

Managing Producer: Maya Zanger-Nadis

Editor and Producer: Ben Wallick

Logo Design: Samuel Vilemar

Outro Music: "Kama Tov" by Shlomo Lipman

Listen on ⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify ⁠⁠⁠⁠or ⁠⁠⁠⁠Apple Music⁠