Connections Episode 118

RFK, Sirhan Sirhan, and Palestine

Mouin Rabbani Interviews Michael R. Fishbach

Wednesday, 21 October 2026
2:00 PM ET | 20:00 CET

Join us on Wednesday, 21 October for a conversation with Michael Fischbach about his new book, I Did It For My Country: Sirhan Sirhan, Palestine, and the Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy. This episode of the Connections podcast examines how Palestine played a central role in US presidential politics in the late 1960s.

Connections offers timely and informative interviews on current events and broader policy questions, as well as themes relevant to knowledge production. It combines journalism, analysis, and scholarship. 

Guest 

Micahel R. Fishbach is Professor of History at Randolph-Macon College in Ashland, Virginia, where he has taught since receiving his Ph.D. in history from Georgetown University in 1992. Fischbach has studied land and other property ownership in Palestine and Jordan, notably in relation to the Arab-Israeli conflict, and has written several monographs on this topic, including: State, Society, and Land in Jordan (Brill); Records of Dispossession: Palestinian Refugee Property and the Arab-Israeli Conflict (Columbia University Press); and Jewish Property Claims Against Arab Countries (Columbia University Press). 

In recent years Fischbach has researched how the Arab-Israeli conflict affected American politics and political movements during the 1960s and 1970s. This led to three monographs: Black Power and Palestine: Transnational Countries of Color (Stanford University Press); The Movement and the Middle East: How the Arab-Israeli Conflict Divided the American Left (Stanford University Press); and I Did it For My Country: Sirhan Sirhan, Palestine, and the Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy (Columbia University Press).

A frequent public speaker and consultant, Fischbach has participated in academic, diplomatic, and United Nations meetings in seventeen countries on four continents.

Host

Mouin Rabbani is a researcher, analyst, and commentator specialising in Palestinian affairs, the Arab-Israeli conflict, and the contemporary Middle East. He has among other positions previously served as Principal Political Affairs Officer with the Office of the UN Special Envoy for Syria, Head of Middle East with the Martti Ahtisaari Peace Foundation, and Senior Middle East Analyst and Special Advisor on Israel-Palestine with the International Crisis Group. Rabbani is Managing Editor of Jadaliyya, and a Contributing Editor of Middle East Report.