Chayefsky was increasingly interested in Israel at that time. In an interview with "Women's Wear Daily" in 1971, he said that he believed that Jews around the world were in imminent danger of genocide. Journalist Dave Itzkoff writes that in the 1970s his views on Israel possessed a "more aggressive and admittedly paranoid streak." He believed that anti-Semitism was rife in the U.S., especially in the New Left, and once physically confronted a heckler who used an anti-Semitic slur during a David Steinberg performance. While filming "The Hospital", Chayefsky commenced work on a film project called "The Habbakuk Conspiracy," which he described as a "study of life within an Arab guerrilla cell on the West Bank of the Jordan." The project was sold to United Artists but never filmed, which resulted in lingering resentment toward the studio.