Speaker 1: Hey, guys, ready or not, twenty twenty four is here
Speaker 1: and we here at breaking points, are already thinking of
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Speaker 2: let's get to the show.
Speaker 3: Good morning everybody, it is Monday. We have a great
Speaker 3: show for everyone today.
Speaker 4: What do we have, Prissel, Indeed we do.
Speaker 1: There is a lot happening that we are tracking right now.
Speaker 1: The two big stories are increasing strikes in Lebanon and Syria,
Speaker 1: both from the US and from Israel. Break that down obviously,
Speaker 1: concerns about a wider war developing, and actually concerns from
Speaker 1: US official that Israel wants a wider war and is
Speaker 1: pushing for that will break all of that down for you. Also,
Speaker 1: all eyes on Alshifa Hospital in Gaza City. They have
Speaker 1: run out of food, fuel, everything, patients are dying as
Speaker 1: Israel is claiming that Hamas operates underneath of this hotel.
Speaker 1: We have some really dramatic and very disturbing eyewitness testimony
Speaker 1: from inside of that hospital, so we will tell you
Speaker 1: everything that's going on there as well. Also bombshell new
Speaker 1: report about what really happened with regards to nord Stream pipeline. Surprise, surprise,
Speaker 1: Ukraine behind it. Jeez, did the US know anything despite
Speaker 1: our insistent denials at the time.
Speaker 4: We will tell you all about that.
Speaker 1: This coming from the Washington Post, by the way, so
Speaker 1: very interesting developments there. We also we have not covered
Speaker 1: this yet, but this is a huge story unfolding in
Speaker 1: New York City. Eric Adams, the mayor of New York,
Speaker 1: had his phone seized by the FBI. One of his
Speaker 1: top fundraisers had her house rated also.
Speaker 3: By the FBI.
Speaker 1: We have new details this morning about what exactly it
Speaker 1: is that they are looking for and investigating, so that
Speaker 1: is quite astonishing. We'll dig into that one. Also record
Speaker 1: breaking fine levied against the National Association of Realtors that
Speaker 1: could completely upend the real estate industry, so we'll tell
Speaker 1: you about that. And a story that Sager has really
Speaker 1: had his eye on high end brothel that was busted
Speaker 1: up by the FEDS that says on their client list
Speaker 1: they have military officials politicians, pharma.
Speaker 4: Executives, politicians.
Speaker 1: They aren't naming names yet, but we are keeping our
Speaker 1: eyes on that one.
Speaker 3: Yes, these geniuses, just to tease it. We're so smart.
Speaker 2: They sent in their full names, their occupations, and full
Speaker 2: id and the FEDS are sitting on that.
Speaker 3: So I personally I'd like to see it, but we'll
Speaker 3: save that.
Speaker 2: It's going to be our fun story at the end.
Speaker 2: Why don't we go to Israel and find out what's
Speaker 2: going on there.
Speaker 1: Indeed, so one of the big developments this morning, and
Speaker 1: obviously something we've been watching very very closely, is the
Speaker 1: risk of a wider war. And we had the Israeli
Speaker 1: Defense minister. You have Galant warning Lebanon specifically and actually
Speaker 1: threatening the civilians of Lebanon. Let's take listen to what
Speaker 1: he had to say.
Speaker 5: Well, Milican citizens of Lebanon, I can see the citizens
Speaker 5: of Gaza waving white flags as they move south. Hesblar
Speaker 5: is pushing Lebanon into a possible war. It is making mistakes.
Speaker 5: It is the citizens of Lebanon that will pay the
Speaker 5: price of these kinds of mistakes. What we are doing
Speaker 5: in Gaza we can do in Beirut. I hope that
Speaker 5: Hesbela will behave and that Nazaala will stop provoking us
Speaker 5: because this aggression is unacceptable.
Speaker 1: So a real threat being leveled here. He says, what
Speaker 1: we are doing in Gaza, which we've all seen what
Speaker 1: they're doing in Gaza, and how horrifying it is, we
Speaker 1: can do in Beirut.
Speaker 4: He goes on to say, the.
Speaker 1: Citizens of Lebanon are the ones who will pay the price.
Speaker 1: And as I said before, we can put this up
Speaker 1: on the screen. This comes as there are increasing strikes
Speaker 1: from the Israeli military firing on what they say are
Speaker 1: Hesbel militant positions. Fighters fired rockets into israel injuring civilians
Speaker 1: and again raising fears of an escalating conflict. This comes
Speaker 1: as well as the Israeli military has been dropping flyers
Speaker 1: to residents of Lebanon.
Speaker 4: Let's put this up on the screen. This is southern Lebanon.
Speaker 1: They've been dropping these flyers, encouraging residents to evacuate their
Speaker 1: homes and relocate further north. So again the commentary from
Speaker 1: this individual is breaking and pending Israeli planned attack on
Speaker 1: Lebanon because of these Israeli army flyers and saber. We
Speaker 1: are not the only ones apparently, who are concerned about
Speaker 1: what these escalating attacks could mean.
Speaker 4: Put this up on the screen from Axios.
Speaker 1: This is really a pretty bombshell report from this news outlet, Scoop.
Speaker 1: This is from Barack Revied, who's been doing some good reporting.
Speaker 1: Austin warned Gallant about Israeli military actions in Lebanon. They
Speaker 1: say that administration officials are concerned israel Is trying to
Speaker 1: provoke Hezbola and create a pretext for a wider war
Speaker 1: in Lebanon that could draw the US and other countries
Speaker 1: further into the conflict. That is, according to sources briefed
Speaker 1: on the issue, Israeli officials Flatley Tonight whatever. In one
Speaker 1: incident that they were particularly concerned about, US officials and
Speaker 1: Israeli airstrike hit a car in southern Lebanon. They killed
Speaker 1: an elderly woman and three of her grandchildren. Took days
Speaker 1: for the Israeli military to even acknowledge it. The second
Speaker 1: incident that really concerned US officials happened on Saturday before
Speaker 1: the call between Austin and his counterpart Galant, when the
Speaker 1: Israeli military conducted a drone strike about twenty five miles
Speaker 1: north of the border. Was the longest range strike in
Speaker 1: Lebanon since the war started. And finally, Biden administration officials
Speaker 1: are concerned by some of the video that we just
Speaker 1: played you public threats from Galant against HESBLA, and they
Speaker 1: think these threats only increase tensions.
Speaker 4: According to an Israeli.
Speaker 2: Source, what's really concerning Crystal is that as of this morning,
Speaker 2: one hundred and twenty five thousand Israelis have been evacuated
Speaker 2: from the northern border. It's the largest internal resettlement in
Speaker 2: the history of the State of Israel, way specifically from
Speaker 2: the northern border, where the Hezbola Front could open up,
Speaker 2: and that's why we should be the most concerned. We've
Speaker 2: also laid this out from a strategic perspective, the Gaza war,
Speaker 2: it's not going to bleed out only because Humas for
Speaker 2: all their capabilities we're talking about again Piddley rockets, Yes
Speaker 2: they have tunnels, Yes they have lots of fighters, but
Speaker 2: it's effectively impossible for it to really penetrate Israeli air
Speaker 2: defense systems and to spiral out out of control and
Speaker 2: to embroil the US. Hezbullah is an entirely different story.
Speaker 2: I was just reading this morning. The attack yesterday penetrated
Speaker 2: Israeli defense systems is actually injured several Israeli citizens. And
Speaker 2: these are anti tank missiles as well as rockets and
Speaker 2: missiles and others that the Israelis internally acknowledge will absolutely
Speaker 2: penetrate their air defense systems. And it is why we
Speaker 2: have so much US muscle that is in the region
Speaker 2: right now. In fact, I was just reading patriot missile
Speaker 2: defense systems probably the single most prize asset in the
Speaker 2: US capabilit at least right now, when we're talking about
Speaker 2: groups like you know, Hezbola Iran, and we have them
Speaker 2: in Ukraine, we sent them over there. We also they're
Speaker 2: very valuable toward the Taiwanese, the Japanese, the South Koreans,
Speaker 2: and more. On top of the THAD missile defense system
Speaker 2: which we've already sent, we are scrambling the most patriot
Speaker 2: defense missile systems that we've ever had to to the
Speaker 2: Middle East, basically drawing away assets that the Asian people
Speaker 2: are allies in Asia and even the Ukrainians are scrambling for.
Speaker 2: Also in highlighting there are always trade offs in conflict,
Speaker 2: especially when you're talking about zero sum things like highly
Speaker 2: valuable missile systems. The point is that with the immense
Speaker 2: amount of US military assets now in the region, as
Speaker 2: well as the missiles and more the evacuations, we also
Speaker 2: see on top of these new flyers that have been dropped,
Speaker 2: urging civilians to urge all the piece. The set pieces
Speaker 2: are in place for one or two or three things
Speaker 2: two go wrong and we are in a totally completely
Speaker 2: different situation. The war right now is only a month
Speaker 2: and a week old, five weeks or something old.
Speaker 3: That there's almost nothing you know, in terms of conflict.
Speaker 2: And you ask the Israelis and what do they say,
Speaker 2: We're preparing for a year's long low intensity conflict.
Speaker 3: You ask that Hesbola and all them like what, you know?
Speaker 3: What's the situation? What can change? For now?
Speaker 2: In nosraela has not escalated, but these crossfire border things,
Speaker 2: it only takes one or two one anti tank missile
Speaker 2: fired from Hezbolah. Let's say it kills fifty guys. It's
Speaker 2: one wrong target, fifty sixty people. Israelis don't have no
Speaker 2: choice to respond, and we're in it. The Trey yanst
Speaker 2: Over at Fox News put it pretty succinctly. He was
Speaker 2: like Hesbola's climbing the escalation ladder. And you know, based
Speaker 2: on his reporting, he's very clear he's hearing from the Israelis.
Speaker 2: They may not stay silent for much longer. This, this
Speaker 2: could enter a new phase of quote unquote defense.
Speaker 1: Well, and that report from Astios to me is chilling
Speaker 1: that even administration officials here are worried that Israel actually
Speaker 1: wants to provoke that broader war because you know, this
Speaker 1: is something we talked about with regard to Ukraine that
Speaker 1: I'm sure you guys heard us discussing at some point
Speaker 1: in this show. The fact that yeah, a Lens he
Speaker 1: has no problem, you know, really being incredibly provocative, striking
Speaker 1: targets in Moscow, in Russia, including in Moscow, and you know,
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about the North Stream pipeline.
Speaker 4: Looks like they were behind it after all. Surprise, surprise.
Speaker 1: He's not afraid of doing those things because he actually
Speaker 1: wants the bigger war. He wants us to be drawn
Speaker 1: in on his side, because frankly, that at this point especially,
Speaker 1: is the only way they really have a shot to
Speaker 1: actually win. There's some similar dynamics here with israel I
Speaker 1: mean net Nyahu and the Israeli government overall has long
Speaker 1: despised Ron, you know, been incredibly aggressive. They hated the
Speaker 1: Iranian nuclear deal and the reduction and the intentions that
Speaker 1: that represented. That's you'll recall during the Obama administration, net
Speaker 1: Nyahu travels here gives the speech before Congress incredibly partisan.
Speaker 1: That's when you start to see this partisan split with
Speaker 1: regard to Israel. So when you even have Biden administration
Speaker 1: officials who were very encouraged by the fact that in
Speaker 1: that big speech that Soralla, the head of Hezbolah gave
Speaker 1: that he you know, is the normal sort of like
Speaker 1: threatening rhetoric but no actual concrete commitment to any specific actions.
Speaker 4: They were encouraged by that.
Speaker 1: They felt like that was partly the result of them
Speaker 1: working their contacts in Lebanon and trying to diffuse things
Speaker 1: on that side. They're actually really fearful that Israel is
Speaker 1: going to force Hesbela's hand. Hesbel is kind of caught
Speaker 1: between two places. I mean again, listen, remember, analysis is
Speaker 1: not justification. It's just important to understand how, you know,
Speaker 1: how people are thinking about things.
Speaker 4: So they have Lebanon.
Speaker 1: The domestic economy is a mess, it's sort of in
Speaker 1: political freefall as well, so the general population there doesn't
Speaker 1: necessarily want to be involved in war because they've got
Speaker 1: enough going on and they've got enough suffering on their
Speaker 1: hands as it is, which is why part of why
Speaker 1: you've got Yuev Goalan directly speaking to the civilians of
Speaker 1: Lebanon and threatening them directly. On the other hand, HESBLA
Speaker 1: also has to keep their sort of like street cred
Speaker 1: as you know, Islamic resistance fighters, and there's only so
Speaker 1: much crap that they can take from Israel without getting
Speaker 1: more involved and escalating again up the chain. So that's
Speaker 1: part of why this is such an incredibly incredibly volatile situation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's really well said. Let's go and put the
Speaker 2: next one up there on the screen. I just wanted
Speaker 2: to again highlight this. Seven Israeli troops wounded ten others
Speaker 2: along the border. IDF has not released full casualty numbers,
Speaker 2: but we know it's the number is less than at
Speaker 2: least there is more than at least five of IDF
Speaker 2: soldiers been killed by Hezbolah. I mean, just imagine that
Speaker 2: a lot of this is not being escalated yet in
Speaker 2: terms of the rhetoric and all of that, but you know,
Speaker 2: the pieces are in place, as we showed you from
Speaker 2: the Israeli Defense Minister and others, and things could pop
Speaker 2: off really at any moment. Let's go and put this
Speaker 2: one up there as well. There's also a tit for
Speaker 2: tech game going on right now. US Air Force actually
Speaker 2: carried out two new strikes just yesterday against Iranian proxy
Speaker 2: targets in Eastern Syria. They bombed a weapons and AMMO
Speaker 2: depot by Iranian backed militias, which largely have been responsible
Speaker 2: for the continued attacks on US forces. I don't think
Speaker 2: we can underscore how these low grade attacks and all
Speaker 2: this is in nightmare and a disaster just waiting to happen.
Speaker 2: I mean, you know, it's one rocket, one missile after another.
Speaker 2: We have multiple troops with TBIs, these guys, some of
Speaker 2: them even had to go back to Germany for healthcare.
Speaker 2: Most have been returned. I believe all have been returned
Speaker 2: at least to active duties.
Speaker 3: So that's great.
Speaker 2: Nobody's been killed or injured yet, but are seriously injured
Speaker 2: or wounded yet. But you know, it's only a matter
Speaker 2: of time when you have people sitting out there basically
Speaker 2: in the middle of the Syrian desert. It's not like
Speaker 2: we have a large force or any of them around them.
Speaker 2: They've been vulnerable from the beginning. And the crazy part
Speaker 2: to me, Crystal, is all these guys are there ostensibly
Speaker 2: on an anti Isis mission. I think we won against
Speaker 2: Isis last time I checked. And you know, it's just
Speaker 2: a bit built under this ridiculous fallacy that just because
Speaker 2: we're just we have to sit there for basically all
Speaker 2: of eternity, just to make sure Isis doesn't come back.
Speaker 3: Don't forget this.
Speaker 2: Syria is ruled by Bush are all asade, okay, and
Speaker 2: he doesn't want us there, So did anyone in Congress ever,
Speaker 2: you know, authorize this. It's one of those that had happened,
Speaker 2: and we just happened to stay there. And now these
Speaker 2: guys are incredibly incredibly vulnerable, so the Biden administration not
Speaker 2: pulling them back. We also have all these troops all
Speaker 2: across Iraq, and it's just it's a disaster waiting to happen.
Speaker 2: I guess I keep using that phrase, but it's just
Speaker 2: because you can see the extraordinary vulnerability and then you know,
Speaker 2: once a US soldier or US service member is killed,
Speaker 2: it's game on. I mean, it's just one of those
Speaker 2: where and why would we want that situation. We should
Speaker 2: avoid that at all costs. But we're not doing anything
Speaker 2: to do it because at this point the Republicans and
Speaker 2: neocons and others are probably a lot of Democrats who
Speaker 2: would be like, oh, it's surrender to pull our troops
Speaker 2: out of Syria.
Speaker 3: I'm like, well, it's not surrenders, like, it's just common sense.
Speaker 2: At least pull them back to a rack where we've
Speaker 2: got more military capabilities as opposed to sitting ducks in
Speaker 2: the middle of the desert.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1: And at the same time, probably both because of this
Speaker 1: risk of a broader conflagration and also because of the
Speaker 1: you know, civilian just humanity in crisis that is unfolding
Speaker 1: on the ground in Gaza at the hands of the
Speaker 1: Israeli military. This was the first Western leader, Emmanuel Macron,
Speaker 1: President of France, has come out and officially called for
Speaker 1: a ceasefire and a direct cessation of hostilities in an
Speaker 1: interview with the BBC.
Speaker 4: Let's take a listen to what he had to say.
Speaker 6: Day one.
Speaker 7: We say that this reaction and the fight against rourism,
Speaker 7: because it is led by a democracy, should be compliant
Speaker 7: with international rules. All of war and imanity and international law,
Speaker 7: and day after day what we saw is a permanent
Speaker 7: bombing of civilians in Gether And I think it's it's
Speaker 7: very important to say the whole story, but I think
Speaker 7: this is the only solution we have. This is fire,
Speaker 7: because it's impossible to explain. We want who fight against robism,
Speaker 7: my coming innocent people. I'm not a judged, I'm a
Speaker 7: head of state. I just remind everybody international law. I
Speaker 7: call for this his fire.
Speaker 1: That last response thereas I'm not a judge, I'm a
Speaker 1: head of state and I'm calling for a ceasefire was
Speaker 1: in response to a question where she asked him is
Speaker 1: Israel committing war crimes? And sagara, I mean, the reality
Speaker 1: of what Israel is doing on the ground is undeniable.
Speaker 1: You know the number of international groups who have said
Speaker 1: war crimes are being committed. These are blatant violations of
Speaker 1: international law. You cannot target civilians. I mean the civilian
Speaker 1: death toll is somewhere between eighty and ninety percent of
Speaker 1: the casualties in Gaza. So for these heads of state
Speaker 1: who have talked about you know, international rule based order
Speaker 1: and their commitment to humanitarian causes, it becomes increasingly difficult
Speaker 1: to stand by and watch what Israel is doing and
Speaker 1: not come out with this position.
Speaker 4: So the fact that you have, you know, the head.
Speaker 1: Of France, the first country in the West, really coming
Speaker 1: out and calling for a ceasefire is extraordinary. Bb reacted
Speaker 1: to it very negatively and was you know, pushing back,
Speaker 1: et cetera, et cetera. But I think it's an incredibly
Speaker 1: noteworthy development.
Speaker 3: Well, of course it's no worthy and people should remember
Speaker 3: this too.
Speaker 2: You know, despite what some of the rhetoric is, the
Speaker 2: European populations have never been nearly as pro Israel as
Speaker 2: the US, and in fact, in twenty fourteen was a
Speaker 2: pretty big turning point against Israel in terms of the
Speaker 2: people taking the steeds streets. BDS has actually been far
Speaker 2: more widely accepted amongst a lot of their population. I'm
Speaker 2: not just talking about Arabs and refugees who have been
Speaker 2: let into Europe over the last twenty five years. The
Speaker 2: Median European thinks about Israel far far differently than an
Speaker 2: American citizen. The quote bond and all of that there,
Speaker 2: politically is not the same. So their actual small d
Speaker 2: democratic incentives are a lot different than our politicians in
Speaker 2: terms of the organized like political efforts to make sure
Speaker 2: that this stuff doesn't happen, but really in terms of
Speaker 2: how they're own populations are going to respond. And of
Speaker 2: course it's highly noteworthy because I think the Europeans in
Speaker 2: particular are caught in the biggest bind. They have spent
Speaker 2: the last two years screeching about Ukraine to try and
Speaker 2: get us to pay all their bills, using all the
Speaker 2: rhetoric of oh, Russia's destroying Ukraine and all of this.
Speaker 2: Look it is true, certainly, but I'm saying they've been
Speaker 2: using moralistic arguments in order to justify their extraordinary expense
Speaker 2: and then also pressuring us. So they're actually caught in
Speaker 2: the hardest place because Ukraine matters way more to them
Speaker 2: than it does for us. We can turn our back
Speaker 2: on it's going to have no impact, but you know,
Speaker 2: the fate of Ukraine is far more important to France, Germany,
Speaker 2: the UK and others. So they especially feel in a
Speaker 2: very difficult position as to how they navigate this conflict,
Speaker 2: especially whenever everything is relied upon the international rule of law,
Speaker 2: about the laws of war, about the Dava Convention and
Speaker 2: all of that, and so you know, Macron is going
Speaker 2: in the more logical direction I think for a European
Speaker 2: head of state, because I think he sees some of
Speaker 2: the incongruity for that.
Speaker 1: Right now, Yeah, I don't want to give them too
Speaker 1: much credit because they're also the ones that outright banned
Speaker 1: propels to be in protests, So don't want to go
Speaker 1: too far. But yes, the fact that he called firsteas
Speaker 1: fire is noteworthy, and you know, I think it also
Speaker 1: sober to your point, like the hypocrisy between how they
Speaker 1: talked about Russia and Ukraine versus what we're seeing unfolding
Speaker 1: and what Israel is doing in Gaza is just it's
Speaker 1: so naked. What Russia has done in Ukraine is horrific,
Speaker 1: And none of these leaders had any trouble saying that,
Speaker 1: you know, war crimes and let's let's file charges against
Speaker 1: Putin and you know, bring them up on charges that
Speaker 1: the Hey, they.
Speaker 4: Didn't have any trouble with that.
Speaker 1: But now what Israel's doing in Gaza, I mean, it
Speaker 1: makes what Russia did in Ukraine pale in comparison, just
Speaker 1: by the numbers, the number of kids killed, the number
Speaker 1: of journalists killed, the number of un workers killed. The
Speaker 1: short period of time, the amount of destruction on the ground.
Speaker 1: I mean, there's no comparison here the attacks on infrastructure.
Speaker 1: I mean, how much do we hear about like, oh,
Speaker 1: it's you know, it's such a crime to attack civilian
Speaker 1: infrastructure or electricity and mess with this. In Ukraine, they've
Speaker 1: a complete siege on all of Gaza for the entirety
Speaker 1: of this war. So at some point, if you have
Speaker 1: even a modicum of self respect, you've got to acknowledge
Speaker 1: some of what is going on. This is a good
Speaker 1: place to transition to what is happening right now on
Speaker 1: the ground in Gaza City. So Israel has made a
Speaker 1: big show of trying to claim we'll get to those
Speaker 1: claims a little bit more in a moment. That Hamas
Speaker 1: is operating underneath of this hospital, Al Shifa Hospital. This
Speaker 1: is the main hospital remaining operating in Gaza City. They
Speaker 1: have hundreds of patients there at one point. How many
Speaker 1: people have fled at this point, But at one point
Speaker 1: they were sheltering tens of thousands of Palestinians who had
Speaker 1: to flee their homes, who thought this would be a
Speaker 1: safe place because it is a hospital, and hospitals are
Speaker 1: supposed to be protected under international law. Let me go
Speaker 1: ahead and play for you. So Israel now has based
Speaker 1: surrounded this hospital. They are threatening it with destruction. Already
Speaker 1: they have no fuel for the generators. So you have
Speaker 1: horrific situations unfolding. Patients already dying from a lack of
Speaker 1: care and lack of electricity. Let's go ahead and hear
Speaker 1: what one doctor there in the hospital said is unfolding
Speaker 1: right now.
Speaker 8: Also there's a sniper attack for patients from the inside
Speaker 8: the hospital. One of them have the dentual Diequinsnic and
Speaker 8: the Evo Portovigia, and the other one he has a
Speaker 8: denture in the atomats. Some of the people which actually
Speaker 8: go outside the hospital, they want to go their sell.
Speaker 8: They bumped them. Also, they bumped a family. There is
Speaker 8: no water, there is no food, so our humaitic sustaine.
Speaker 8: We have the two in unit, the patient by actually
Speaker 8: because the incubator it's not working because there is no eclicity.
Speaker 8: Also we have the adult patient and the U can
Speaker 8: die because the ventilator is shut down because there is
Speaker 8: no exlicity. We can see actually the smoking, the smoke
Speaker 8: around the hospital. They hit everything around the hospital and
Speaker 8: they have the hospital many times, but we want someone
Speaker 8: to give us the guarantee that we can evacuate the
Speaker 8: patient because we have about six hundred in patient person
Speaker 8: we need a medical care and we need to evaculation.
Speaker 8: The problem is to be sure that we can evacuate
Speaker 8: the new need patient because we have about fifty seven
Speaker 8: to forty kids of the new needs the premature baby,
Speaker 8: we have about seventeen other patients in the ico, and
Speaker 8: we have about six hundred admit the patient pretty operated,
Speaker 8: which need a medical care.
Speaker 1: Some of the images that are coming out of this
Speaker 1: hospital are just like, I don't even know what to say.
Speaker 1: One in particular put this up on the screen. So
Speaker 1: they have a high number thirty seven babies who were
Speaker 1: born premature, some of them because their mothers actually were
Speaker 1: killed in Israeli air strikes and they had to be
Speaker 1: cut out of their dead mother's bellies. Some of them,
Speaker 1: you know, the stress of what's going on also can
Speaker 1: trigger premature birth. So that's part of why they have
Speaker 1: such a large number of premature babies in this hospital.
Speaker 1: Thirty seven of them without electricity, had to be removed
Speaker 1: from their incubators. This is a picture of them wrapped
Speaker 1: in blankets I also read that doctors were trying to
Speaker 1: put hot bottles of water around them to try to
Speaker 1: keep them warm, because they can't regulate their own temperatures
Speaker 1: when they're born at this early age. And at the
Speaker 1: time of this this was as of yesterday, at least
Speaker 1: three babies had already died because of the lack of electricity.
Speaker 1: I mean, I saw doctors operating using iPhone flashlights because
Speaker 1: there are no lights on. They don't have clean water
Speaker 1: in terms of basic sanitation, also just in terms of
Speaker 1: being able to drink, the amount of you know, diseases
Speaker 1: and bugs and whoreror. There are dead bodies piled up
Speaker 1: at the entrances because they can't do anything with them.
Speaker 1: It's just you cannot imagine in the scenes of horror
Speaker 1: that are unfolding at this hospital. And you know, truly,
Speaker 1: like we talk about heroic human beings doing things that
Speaker 1: are unimagined, Like these doctors know that their lives are
Speaker 1: at risk, and they have been working round the clock
Speaker 1: for weeks and weeks now in absolutely impossible conditions, and
Speaker 1: yet many of them are still there doing whatever they
Speaker 1: possibly can to try to keep these patients alive.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so the Israelis are claiming that, and we've showed
Speaker 2: this graphic before that the hospital itself covers some of
Speaker 2: the biggest command and control facilities for Hamas, which is
Speaker 2: built like an underground network beneath that.
Speaker 3: There's no way to know whether it's true. Hamas says
Speaker 3: it's not true.
Speaker 2: The director of the hospital said that it's not true,
Speaker 2: although I find it difficult to believe a director of
Speaker 2: the hospital would be allowed to remain in place if
Speaker 2: he wasn't also that so I have no idea.
Speaker 1: We also have the lots of doctors, you know, if
Speaker 1: people mistrust Palestinians because they might be Hamas, a lot
Speaker 1: of the doctors here with doctors.
Speaker 4: Without borders, they're international.
Speaker 1: I mean we've seen you know, British doctors and other
Speaker 1: for nationals who were talking about this. We're saying, you know,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't be here if this was some Hamas headquarters.
Speaker 1: So those Israeli claims I also just would put out there.
Speaker 1: Israel at this point has claimed that like everything is Amas.
Speaker 1: You know, all of these houses that they destroyed, all
Speaker 1: of the hospitals, they already attacked, all of the schools,
Speaker 1: they already attacked. They came out recently and said the
Speaker 1: un workers are actually Hamas, so you know, they anything
Speaker 1: that they want to destroy, they just say, oh, it's Amas,
Speaker 1: and you know, we can't really show you the proof,
Speaker 1: but just trust us.
Speaker 2: The only reason I'm inclined to believe it is because
Speaker 2: the pr value of destroying a hospital is so bad
Speaker 2: that there's basically no other reason to go in.
Speaker 4: And they've already so many other arts.
Speaker 2: But I mean, destroying a house in collateral damage because
Speaker 2: you have it's on top of a tunnel, is different
Speaker 2: than surrounding a hospital and trying to take it.
Speaker 3: So look, I don't know if it's true.
Speaker 2: According to them, they claim that it's actually completely underneath
Speaker 2: the hospital complex. You knowed they have been proven in
Speaker 2: the past Hamas to use the human shields. I'm not
Speaker 2: justifying necessarily, like the mass death or any of that.
Speaker 2: I think the US, for example, if the United States
Speaker 2: were to find a terrorist complex that was underneath the hospital.
Speaker 3: I've gone back.
Speaker 2: I've been reading a lot about the counter iis campaigns
Speaker 2: is actually very different.
Speaker 3: So one of the rules of the United.
Speaker 2: States always had for at or at least tried to
Speaker 2: have with drone warfare, and particularly with killing ISIS leaders
Speaker 2: going after command subjects is that they would wait.
Speaker 3: In some cases were almost a year.
Speaker 2: They would put a subject under surveillance and they would
Speaker 2: wait for them to slip up for the one moment
Speaker 2: and they were away from their families so that they
Speaker 2: could kill them. To deny ISIS the opportunity to claim
Speaker 2: that they were killing civilians.
Speaker 3: Obviously a lot of civilians were killed in the.
Speaker 2: Drone campaign, but the counter ISIS campaign was reasonably well
Speaker 2: conducted in terms of reducing civilian casualties, especially when you
Speaker 2: compare it to the Israeli operations. So if it is
Speaker 2: a command and control subject, I think some of the
Speaker 2: tactics should really come down or some of the questions
Speaker 2: should come down to the tactics in the way this
Speaker 2: is being subjected. As you said, the doctors claiming that
Speaker 2: there were straight up firefights are going on inside of
Speaker 2: the hospital, that snipers were targeting them. The Israeli say
Speaker 2: that that's not true, that they haven't had any firefight.
Speaker 2: I mean, clearly carnage and all of that is happening.
Speaker 2: They've also claimed that they've delivered fuel to the hospital,
Speaker 2: that the hospital itself or Hamas denied fuel for it,
Speaker 2: so they're putting blame on Hamas for you know, doing it.
Speaker 2: It's one of those where we have unreliable narrators in
Speaker 2: these two situations. But it would make sense if you
Speaker 2: are Hamas to embed yourself deeply in the civilian population
Speaker 2: and use the hospital, which is the most emotive place
Speaker 2: that you can, knowing that you're gonna have tons of
Speaker 2: collateral damage if somebody tries to take you. I think
Speaker 2: the issue for the Israelis is that they are basically
Speaker 2: not caring that much about collateral damage and they're going
Speaker 2: through and practicing. So I think it's a GORDIANKNT situation.
Speaker 2: I genuinely don't know how I genuinely don't know what
Speaker 2: alternative is if you are committed also to destroying Hamas leadership,
Speaker 2: which is is really military is. I think they definitely
Speaker 2: should have made a different.
Speaker 4: To punishing the civilian population.
Speaker 1: Sure, but that's what they're committed to, and that's why,
Speaker 1: you know, listen, I don't know. I can't confirm the
Speaker 1: intelligence and just tell you that israelis literally everyone is
Speaker 1: moss that they have killed, and thousands of the people
Speaker 1: they have killed are actually women, children.
Speaker 4: I think seventy percent of.
Speaker 1: The latest death toll, which by the way, the US
Speaker 1: government is now saying is actually undercounted from the health ministry,
Speaker 1: I think seventy percent are women, children and the elderly.
Speaker 1: They again said un workers are hamas. So they just
Speaker 1: throw this out there with no proof, and they put
Speaker 1: out these also like totally ridiculous audio recordings, like the
Speaker 1: one that they put out from the hospital previously.
Speaker 4: Which brings me to another point.
Speaker 1: Remember how just a few weeks ago, when there was
Speaker 1: that strike in the hospital parking lot and all this
Speaker 1: debate about who was behind it, we still don't have
Speaker 1: definitive proof on either side.
Speaker 4: All of the language, Oh, we would never target a hospital,
Speaker 4: We never target a hospital. Of course we wouldn't.
Speaker 1: And now they spent weeks and weeks and weeks and
Speaker 1: weeks trying to develop the case to target this hospital.
Speaker 1: We're already patients have died because of their actions and
Speaker 1: because of the cruelty that they are exhibiting towards.
Speaker 4: All of the people of Gaza.
Speaker 1: So no, they on the content, they don't care about
Speaker 1: pr On the contrary, they actually want it to be.
Speaker 4: As brutal as possible.
Speaker 1: That is the whole objective of what they're doing militarily,
Speaker 1: because otherwise the entirety of their campaign makes no sense.
Speaker 1: And so you know, in addition, like you were pointing
Speaker 1: to Stager, you have multiple doctors in the hospital. Snipers
Speaker 1: are picking off patients inside.
Speaker 4: Of the hospital.
Speaker 1: Quadriplegia was shot in the neck through a window by
Speaker 1: an Israeli sniper, according to the doctors who are there.
Speaker 4: So yeah, I don't take I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't believe a word that Israel says with regards
Speaker 1: to this particular hospital or any of the many other hospitals,
Speaker 1: refugee camps.
Speaker 4: Et cetera.
Speaker 3: But they have a word Hamas says either.
Speaker 2: And I am to see international in twenty fifteen, so
Speaker 2: that the hospital was used, at least in some cases
Speaker 2: by Hamas in order to torture people, in order to
Speaker 2: house people.
Speaker 3: So it is a noble let me.
Speaker 1: Say, even let me let me say, even if there
Speaker 1: are under around Hamas layers under this hospital, which again
Speaker 1: the doctors here say they have seen no sign of.
Speaker 1: Even if that is the case, you can't bomb and
Speaker 1: target these patients, innocent civilians. Babies thirty seven, you know,
Speaker 1: premature babies that are at this hospital, so and your
Speaker 1: words don't mean a lot when again you've already destroyed
Speaker 1: and evacuated all the other hospital. What is every hospital
Speaker 1: in all of Gaza? Are they all hamas?
Speaker 8: Like?
Speaker 1: At a certain point becomes preposterous.
Speaker 2: Well, I listen, I think we can come at this
Speaker 2: from different angles. Is Israeli's done themselves any favors by
Speaker 2: claiming everybody's basically declaring it a free fire zone no,
Speaker 2: which makes it very difficult for anybody who doesn't trust
Speaker 2: them to believe a word that they say.
Speaker 3: Have Hamas made it?
Speaker 2: Also so that we have proof that they've used hospitals, yes,
Speaker 2: So then it becomes a question of military tactics, and
Speaker 2: I think that's where it's.
Speaker 3: A difficult situation.
Speaker 2: As I said in that, I agree, I think the
Speaker 2: US military, I think any other world, a Western style military,
Speaker 2: would not have conducted themselves this way. They would have
Speaker 2: conducted a totally different operation. And to be honest, really,
Speaker 2: what the Israelis have done, from what I can tell,
Speaker 2: is try to minimize their casualties to absolute zero, such
Speaker 2: that they are willing to take as many civilian casualties
Speaker 2: that there are. Now that might sound smart, and intuitive,
Speaker 2: but actually the US military, specifically in the Point counterinsurgency
Speaker 2: campaign and onward, made the explicit decision, if we're going
Speaker 2: to operate in this type of environment, we're going to
Speaker 2: take military casualties at the expense of trying to take
Speaker 2: at the expense of trying to save civilians. So we
Speaker 2: would have conducted this, I think, completely differently in terms
Speaker 2: of surround, in terms of going in, in terms of
Speaker 2: in some cases like actually just sending bodies in without
Speaker 2: the bombs and trying to clear it out manually, which
Speaker 2: again you would take a lot of casualties in that scenario,
Speaker 2: but they would do it just for the purpose of
Speaker 2: trying to maintain as much civilian purpose as much of
Speaker 2: the civilian reducing civilian casualties as much as possible. So
Speaker 2: I think we can criticize the tactics, but we do
Speaker 2: have to accept, like there is a core of this,
Speaker 2: there's a small part where there is a legitimate military objective,
Speaker 2: which is destroying Hamasi A. Israelis have decided to do
Speaker 2: it in such a way that they just don't care
Speaker 2: at all about civilian casualties, or they can pay voice
Speaker 2: to it. I disagree with that I think that's wrong,
Speaker 2: but I do think the military objective itself is true.
Speaker 3: And you know, I mean, we can't say that every place.
Speaker 2: That has a Hamas command and control place is off limits, but.
Speaker 4: They've destroyed like all of Gaza City.
Speaker 1: I mean, if this hospital they are arguing, they are arguing,
Speaker 1: this particular hospital is like the granddaddy command central of Hamas.
Speaker 1: If that's the case, then why wasn't the focus on
Speaker 1: this hospital to start with? Okay, then you can have
Speaker 1: time to evacuate patients to the other hospitals. Those hospitals
Speaker 1: aren't operating at this point. There is nowhere for these
Speaker 1: patients to go. And by the way, they're being you know,
Speaker 1: killed by sniper fire while they're in the building. And
Speaker 1: also there are reports that the supposed you know, safe
Speaker 1: passage to the south, that they've been bombed and fired
Speaker 1: on there as well. So you know, that's why, listen,
Speaker 1: I just cannot take what the Israelis are saying at
Speaker 1: face value.
Speaker 4: The animation thing.
Speaker 1: That they released that they said was their proof was
Speaker 1: preposterous and silly. We both mocked it at the time
Speaker 1: as being ridiculous. They have offered no public evidence outside
Speaker 1: of these laughable audio recordings. But to your point, even
Speaker 1: if it is true, and this is hamas grand central
Speaker 1: underneath of this thing, you cannot just go in and
Speaker 1: starve and deny them fuel and bomb them and target
Speaker 1: these civilians who have done nothing wrong and these doctors
Speaker 1: who are genuine heroes who are doing their absolute best
Speaker 1: to take care of patients and absolutely impossible circumstances. Even
Speaker 1: the Biden administration is uncomfortable with this hospital being targeted
Speaker 1: in this way. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan was asked
Speaker 1: about what was going on here at Al Shifa.
Speaker 4: Listen to his response.
Speaker 9: Well, Dan, I think your question just points out the
Speaker 9: difficulty and complexity of this conflict. You've got a terrorist
Speaker 9: group using civilians as human shields, even use sick and
Speaker 9: injured civilians as human shields. And you've got, at the
Speaker 9: same time an Israeli defense force that is seeking to
Speaker 9: try to root out this terrorist group and to make
Speaker 9: sure that it can no longer represent a threat to Israel.
Speaker 9: And the hospital puts this question into stark relief. But
Speaker 9: the bottom line for the United States is that we
Speaker 9: do not want to see firefights in a hospital. We
Speaker 9: do not want to see innocent patients who are sick
Speaker 9: or wounded, be injured or killed in the crossfire.
Speaker 1: Now, do I think that the Netan Yahoo government and
Speaker 1: the IDF cares that Jake Sullivan is weekly out there.
Speaker 4: Like, well, we don't want it to be a subject
Speaker 4: of a firefight.
Speaker 1: No, but you can see even they are very uncomfortable
Speaker 1: with what is unfolding. And part of soccer of what
Speaker 1: I think has happened is Israel's kind of tested the
Speaker 1: waters of what they could get away with, you know,
Speaker 1: And that's why the conversation around that the first hospital,
Speaker 1: you know, disputed hospital parking lot bombing was so different
Speaker 1: than now over weeks and weeks as they've gotten away
Speaker 1: with Okay, we got away with the complete siege, we
Speaker 1: got away with the bombing of all these civilian targets,
Speaker 1: we got away with the bombing of the refugee camp.
Speaker 1: And the IDF dude going on CNN and being like, yeah,
Speaker 1: we know there are civilians there, what are.
Speaker 4: You going to do's? You know, it's war. It's just
Speaker 4: what it is.
Speaker 1: That's how you build the you know, build that ladder
Speaker 1: to where they are now and they know they can
Speaker 1: do whatever they want with impunity and get away.
Speaker 4: With it, no matter how brutal, no matter the civilian toll.
Speaker 4: And you know, I think that's where we are.
Speaker 2: Well, it's part I mean, I think about it this way,
Speaker 2: where with the hospital and with all of that, at
Speaker 2: each one of these they are chipping away at the
Speaker 2: ability for the Biden administration to withstand it. I actually
Speaker 2: don't think that this is indefinite. And really what it
Speaker 2: is is that there was an interesting excerpt from two
Speaker 2: thousand and twenty one where we had that Gaza operation
Speaker 2: in Franklin Ford's book, and what he describes is how
Speaker 2: at a certain point Biden called bb and he was like,
Speaker 2: all right, man, it's enough. And the operation actually ended
Speaker 2: the next day. And so what it was is that,
Speaker 2: you know, the US could take it. They could take it,
Speaker 2: they could take it, but Biden got to a point
Speaker 2: where he's like, I can't take the domestic pressure at
Speaker 2: this point anymore.
Speaker 3: You've got to cut it off.
Speaker 2: And so I think that the Israelis also are playing
Speaker 2: with fire a bit because at the same time, the
Speaker 2: US administration can only hold really, I think, for so
Speaker 2: long in terms of what the center is when you
Speaker 2: have the massive protests since two thousand and three is
Speaker 2: dominating the conversation. But more importantly, I actually think from
Speaker 2: a big picture perspective, is that this is drawing so
Speaker 2: many military assets that we are in such a point
Speaker 2: of vulnerability where just like Israel drew from Ukraine, we
Speaker 2: are one another Ukraine away from drawing away from Israel.
Speaker 3: At the end of the day, none of this actually
Speaker 3: matters to the US taxpayer. Yes, it may be emotional and.
Speaker 2: All that, but Israel, you know, like Israel and what's
Speaker 2: going on there, has zero impact on the US economy,
Speaker 2: just like Ukraine did. And so for to have all
Speaker 2: of the you know, concentration of these assets and all
Speaker 2: this others, I think that's probably the most realistic scenario.
Speaker 2: And more importantly, what I mean by that is it
Speaker 2: by chipping away, it's going to make it easier to
Speaker 2: walk away from should the time ever come, if it
Speaker 2: does come. In terms of political support. That said, I
Speaker 2: don't know. We did watch those Prime Minister Netanyaho discussed
Speaker 2: some of this. Let's take a lesson.
Speaker 10: We offered actually last night to give them enough fuel
Speaker 10: to operate the hospital, operate the incubators and so on,
Speaker 10: because we have obviously no battle with patients or with
Speaker 10: civilians at all, And I think every civilian death, dead
Speaker 10: baby is a tragedy, but that tragedy should be placed
Speaker 10: squarely at the responsibility of Hamas, that is, keeping its
Speaker 10: military installations inside hospitals, its command posts inside hospitals, inside schools,
Speaker 10: inside unra UN facilities, and so on. So we obviously
Speaker 10: don't want to give them immunity, but at the same time,
Speaker 10: we're sensitive to this issue. So we offered this help.
Speaker 10: They refuse it, but they want to get fuel that
Speaker 10: they'll take from the hospitals to their tunnels to their
Speaker 10: war machine, the electricity they need to fire the rockets.
Speaker 10: They fire ten thousand rockets as we speak against israel cities,
Speaker 10: and they continue to fight from those underground bunkers. So
Speaker 10: what we have to do is separate the two. We'll
Speaker 10: try to help those who need it in the hospitals,
Speaker 10: but not help the Hamas war machine.
Speaker 1: So a bit of a contradiction what he's saying there.
Speaker 1: On the one and he's like, yeah, we totally offered
Speaker 1: them fuel, and on the other hand, it's like, well,
Speaker 1: we can't really give them fuel because it's just Hamas
Speaker 1: wants to take it and use it in their tunnels.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of questions about this offer of fuel,
Speaker 1: whether it even happened or not, the amount of fuel
Speaker 1: that was offered. There was one person who saws the hospital,
Speaker 1: you know, that directly rejected it, and another one said,
Speaker 1: I no, Hamas wouldn't let them take it.
Speaker 4: So anyway, this is there, this is his pr is.
Speaker 1: We offered them fuel and you know, Hamas said they
Speaker 1: can't have it. Whether it's true or not hard to say.
Speaker 2: It is difficult to say. And I think it also
Speaker 2: raises why the US, you know, is so skeptical in
Speaker 2: some of these conversations, and more importantly behind the scenes,
Speaker 2: is trying to pressure them. I do think the analysis
Speaker 2: on your part is correct in that nothing is going
Speaker 2: to change. They've chosen the way they want to conduct war.
Speaker 2: It is what it is. Either swallow it or don't.
Speaker 2: And it's actually interesting the support. If you talk to
Speaker 2: people who support Israel and you're like, hey, what what
Speaker 2: was going on there?
Speaker 3: And they're like, yeah, I do. They got to do
Speaker 3: what they got to do.
Speaker 2: They're not trying to talk about it in terms of
Speaker 2: like laws of war or any of that. They're like, yeah,
Speaker 2: I just look, it's us to them, and I support it,
Speaker 2: and you've got to kill a lot of them. And
Speaker 2: I think, actually, here's the thing that's honest. At least
Speaker 2: is honest in terms of what they are saying. I
Speaker 2: also hear it in terms of the vice versa. Some
Speaker 2: people are like, well it would help him us, and
Speaker 2: they're like, yeah, well I care more about Palestinian life
Speaker 2: than I do about degrading this terror organization. And it's
Speaker 2: one of those balances that we just have to have. Again,
Speaker 2: I think that's a completely honest and legitimate take. It's
Speaker 2: just those we're all trying to talk in fake language,
Speaker 2: which personally always has driven me nuts.
Speaker 1: But here's the other thing. We're going to talk a
Speaker 1: little bit more about this. If your goal is long
Speaker 1: term security for the Israeli people, this is foolish think
Speaker 1: of the radical I mean, this is like a super
Speaker 1: radicalization event that is unfolding. This is not only am
Speaker 1: I going to not going to learn the lessons of
Speaker 1: nine to eleven, the war in Iraq and the war
Speaker 1: on terror, et cetera, but I'm actually going to quadruple
Speaker 1: down on the mistakes that were made that led to
Speaker 1: the blow the development of ices and the blowback that
Speaker 1: we saw in the complete destabilization of this whole reachion.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's what's unfolding here. So even if you
Speaker 1: are like, well, I don't really care about the palace
Speaker 1: and civilians is too bad, whatever, But you know, I
Speaker 1: got to look out for mine first. This is a
Speaker 1: foolish course of action. And it's clear that you know this.
Speaker 1: This goal of oh, we're going to eliminate Hamas number
Speaker 1: one is probably not possible. And number two, they are
Speaker 1: not actually executing a military strategy that is targeted at
Speaker 1: that goal. And they have burned any credibility, like all
Speaker 1: of the justified global sympathy outpouring of support for Israel
Speaker 1: in the wake of the horrors of October seven. I mean,
Speaker 1: they have burned through that, like there's no tomorrow, to
Speaker 1: the point that even the Biden administration, which you know
Speaker 1: by and showed up and gave Netna who the bear
Speaker 1: hug and Blincoln came and said, hey, I'm here as
Speaker 1: a Jewish person first, that's my primary goal, Like we
Speaker 1: have no red lines for them, et cetera. Even the
Speaker 1: US is starting to get a little nervous and a
Speaker 1: little uncomfortable. Now again, I think that the situation, so
Speaker 1: I wonder if you agree with this, is different than
Speaker 1: the last time when Biden now apparently famously calls NETNA.
Speaker 1: I was like, all right, we got to wrap it up.
Speaker 1: First of all, do we know if that's really true?
Speaker 4: Who knows?
Speaker 1: But anyway, let's assume that it is okay. I think
Speaker 1: the situation is very diff different now too, because the
Speaker 1: emotions in Israel are so high, and because Biebie is
Speaker 1: on such political shaky ground that I think it would
Speaker 1: take a lot more than Biden just calling and saying
Speaker 1: all right, buddy, wrap it up. I think it would
Speaker 1: take actual like no, you're not going to get these weapons.
Speaker 1: We are going to withhold aid, we are going to
Speaker 1: let some of these un votes go through, like we're
Speaker 1: going to publicly distance ourselves, condemn what you're doing, and
Speaker 1: deny you the weapons that you need to continue these attacks.
Speaker 1: I think it would actually take something like that for
Speaker 1: them to change course at this point, in part again
Speaker 1: because of the you know, incredibly shaky ground than that
Speaker 1: Nyahoo is on politically.
Speaker 2: It's possible because we also have to break up the
Speaker 2: military operation into phases, so like right now, we're in
Speaker 2: like the destruction and the fighting phase, but next comes
Speaker 2: the security phase, and what does that phase look like?
Speaker 3: We could move to more low intensity compuk.
Speaker 2: That the analogy would be like that Phase two of
Speaker 2: Iraq was after President Bush did mission accomplished. We defeated
Speaker 2: the Iraqi army, we made it all the way to Bagdad,
Speaker 2: we pulled down the thing. It's like, Oh, turns out
Speaker 2: now is when the real war begins. So I think
Speaker 2: that that phase could very much show things differently the
Speaker 2: Israelis also, I mean, they could wrap up, you know,
Speaker 2: conventional military operations pretty quickly, but then they'd have to
Speaker 2: move to the security operations.
Speaker 3: They could say, we cleared out northern Gaza, cleanse.
Speaker 2: The tunnels, We've basically occupied it, and that leads to
Speaker 2: the now what question.
Speaker 3: That's really why I always bring up Iraq.
Speaker 2: So I actually think we probably have even more leverage
Speaker 2: during that phase because then they're the ones who are
Speaker 2: now responsible for security. Now there's a lot of diplomacy
Speaker 2: because who's going to govern it not which we're going
Speaker 2: to get to. So in the current phase, I don't
Speaker 2: think anything's going to change. I also do think though
Speaker 2: that it's possible. The Israelis are Look, they're not stupid.
Speaker 2: They also know that a lot of international capital and
Speaker 2: political capital is being burned and they probably want to
Speaker 2: clean this up in the next month or so. They've
Speaker 2: been pretty militaryly successful. I'm talking about the like matt
Speaker 2: the bombing campaign, hospitals and all that. They have their
Speaker 2: zone that they've declared, and they're just going to occupy,
Speaker 2: cut off and level as much as they can and
Speaker 2: they can try and have their mission accomplished moment. I
Speaker 2: actually think what really awaits them for the danger that
Speaker 2: awaits them is nothing that's happening right now, especially with
Speaker 2: the way they've chosen to conduct war. It's, you know,
Speaker 2: day two after their mission accomplished, Now what security operations?
Speaker 3: Who's going to govern this?
Speaker 2: The PA Those are the big meta questions, and that's
Speaker 2: what leads exactly what you've flagged and pointed out counterinsurgency,
Speaker 2: a massive terror campaign. You know, in terms of the
Speaker 2: big diplomatic questions between Iran, Saudi Arabia, what's politically acceptable
Speaker 2: to the Arab world, who's going to fund this new organization,
Speaker 2: who's going to elect it?
Speaker 3: The UN.
Speaker 2: It's one of those where those questions actually become stickier,
Speaker 2: in my opinion, would lead to much more prolonged and
Speaker 2: dangerous conflict in the future.
Speaker 4: Let's talk about that in one minute.
Speaker 1: There's one more piece of Al Chifa that I just
Speaker 1: want to get to before we move on to you
Speaker 1: know what this Raelis are saying at this point about
Speaker 1: the future of Gaza, which is again another like rebuke
Speaker 1: and humiliation of the Biden administration. But just to keep
Speaker 1: the focus on the human beings who are involved here,
Speaker 1: there was a doctor who doctor Hammam Aloe, who was
Speaker 1: a physician in aphrology at the hospital. He was one
Speaker 1: of the people who was doing you know, his English
Speaker 1: language speaker, was doing a lot of press interviews to
Speaker 1: talk about the dire situation on the ground. He was, unfortunately,
Speaker 1: just killed by an airstrike. I believe this was yesterday
Speaker 1: morning with his father in their house which is right
Speaker 1: next to Al Shifa Hospital. This is Ryan Grim actually
Speaker 1: tweeted the sound. I'll read a little bit of this.
Speaker 1: His mother is also a doctor. She is trapped with
Speaker 1: other relatives including children, in the vicinity of the house.
Speaker 1: This was again as of yesterday. They were unable to
Speaker 1: move any attempt to move comes under heavy Israeli fire
Speaker 1: people polled one of his last I think this may
Speaker 1: have been his last interview that he gave with Amy
Speaker 1: Goodman on Democracy Now, talking about why he decided to
Speaker 1: stay at the hospital, knowing very well that it could
Speaker 1: be a death sentence.
Speaker 4: Le's take a listener to what he had to say.
Speaker 3: Why don't you go with your family south?
Speaker 6: And if I go, who treats my patients? They are
Speaker 6: not animals? We have that I to receive proper health. Scared,
Speaker 6: do you think I went to minician school and for
Speaker 6: my postic graduate degrees for a total of fourteen years,
Speaker 6: so I think only about my life and not my patience.
Speaker 6: I'm asking you, ma'am, do you think this is the
Speaker 6: reason why I went to midd school to think only
Speaker 6: about my life? This is another reason why I became aductive.
Speaker 1: Incredibly sad that he has now been killed in an
Speaker 1: Israeli airstrike, and you know, just speaks to some of
Speaker 1: the real heroism that is going on in the ground
Speaker 1: and soccera. I feel like you're seeing like the best
Speaker 1: in the worst of human nature right now brought out
Speaker 1: in this conflict. I guess that's the way that war
Speaker 1: always is.
Speaker 3: That's the way war always is.
Speaker 2: That's right, And yeah, I mean you can't forget any
Speaker 2: of the innocents that were caught up in all this.
Speaker 3: In fact, you know, Biden.
Speaker 2: Revealed yesterday there is a three year old American baby
Speaker 2: citizen whose parents were killed on October seventh, who's currently
Speaker 2: being held by Hamas.
Speaker 3: Which is that poor child.
Speaker 2: And there's I mean, she's one of I think we
Speaker 2: don't know the gender of the child, but there are
Speaker 2: multiple other children also were being held without their parents.
Speaker 2: You can only hope they're being cared for too. It's
Speaker 2: just a terrible situation.
Speaker 1: All right, Let's get on to what you were alluding to, Sagar,
Speaker 1: which is this big question. All right, you bomb the
Speaker 1: hell out of Gaza, You killed all these civilians, you know,
Speaker 1: declared mission accomplished. What happens now?
Speaker 4: Now?
Speaker 1: The Biden administration has increasingly said two things. Number one,
Speaker 1: it would be a big mistake for Israel to reoccupy Gaza.
Speaker 1: And number two, they've recently been pushing this more aggressively.
Speaker 1: We think the Palestinian authority should be the ones who
Speaker 1: are tasked with some at least of the governance of
Speaker 1: the Gaza strip In a new interview, BB go ahead
Speaker 1: and rejects both of those things. Will take a listen
Speaker 1: to what he has to say.
Speaker 10: Gaza has to make sure that we it's not a
Speaker 10: threat to Israel. We said destroy Hamas, and for that,
Speaker 10: if we want to have peace, we have to destroy Hamas.
Speaker 10: This is what Israel must do, and this is what
Speaker 10: Israel will do.
Speaker 7: Would you accept an international force, mister Prime minister, would
Speaker 7: you accept?
Speaker 10: I think that the only force right now that can
Speaker 10: guarantee that Hamas, that terrorism is not not reappear and
Speaker 10: take over Gaza again is the Israeli military. So overall
Speaker 10: military responsibility will have to be in Israel. As far
Speaker 10: as the civilian management of Gaza, we need to see
Speaker 10: the following two things. Gaza has to be demilitarized and
Speaker 10: Gaza has to be deradicalized. And I think so far
Speaker 10: we haven't seen any Palestinian force, including the Palestinian authority,
Speaker 10: that is able to do it. They teach their children
Speaker 10: to hate Israel. They're not fighting terrorists, they're paying for slag.
Speaker 10: That is, the more terrorists, Palestinian terrorists murdered Jews, the
Speaker 10: more they get paid. And to this Day, thirty six
Speaker 10: days after the word savagery perpetrated on the Jewish people.
Speaker 10: Since the Holocaust, the Palestinian Authority president has yet refuses
Speaker 10: to condemn the savagery. So you know, we need a
Speaker 10: different authority, we need a different administration, surely to say Chris,
Speaker 10: and I think it's surely to say, but I could
Speaker 10: say one the first task we have to achieve is
Speaker 10: defeat Comas. The first task the Allies had to achieve
Speaker 10: before they could reconstruct Germany was to defeat the Nazis.
Speaker 1: So we get another World War I vio analogy there.
Speaker 1: I mean, listen, there are a lot of practical reasons
Speaker 1: why the Palestinian Authority is likely unable.
Speaker 4: Like, it is very farcical.
Speaker 1: To imagine that they could actually govern the Gaza strip
Speaker 1: because they have no legitiacy in the West Bank, let
Speaker 1: alone in Gaza. So you know, they are rightly seen
Speaker 1: as like collaborators with the Israeli Security State and the
Speaker 1: IDF directly, so again they have they're very weak. They
Speaker 1: have no legitimacy really in the West Bank, so imagining
Speaker 1: them in control of Gaza is pretty preposterous.
Speaker 4: But this is what the US has been pushing. Of course,
Speaker 4: we know the real reason why nan Yah, who.
Speaker 1: Is totally opposed to it, is the same reason he's
Speaker 1: always been totally opposed to it, because he does not
Speaker 1: want some sort of unite of union between the Palestinians
Speaker 1: in West Bank and the Palestinians in Gaza, or any
Speaker 1: sort of a partner that you could reasonably negotiate with,
Speaker 1: because that would lead to questions, all right, well, let's
Speaker 1: move forward with maybe a two state solution, let's move
Speaker 1: forward with some sort of a peace process. And he
Speaker 1: does not want that and has been very overt about it.
Speaker 1: So that's why he has always worked to keep the
Speaker 1: Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza in Gaza
Speaker 1: separate and to prop up Humus so that he can
Speaker 1: have this talking one of like, eh, they're terrorists, Like
Speaker 1: you can't work with them, you can't negotia. Of course
Speaker 1: we want peace, but we can't negotiate with these people.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think the biggest danger actually to the Israelis
Speaker 2: from the future perspective all lies within this. As I
Speaker 2: laid out, one of the big problems is going to
Speaker 2: be who is governing this and if they don't accept
Speaker 2: the PA or any other actor that could legitimately lead
Speaker 2: in the eyes of the West to a Palestinian state
Speaker 2: which they want to avoid. Then they're going to profine
Speaker 2: themselves almost perpetually in charge of the Gaza Strip. You
Speaker 2: found this quote, which I honestly find insane. Let's go
Speaker 2: and put this up there on the screen. Quote we
Speaker 2: are rolling out knock but twenty twenty three and Israeli
Speaker 2: minister says on the northern Gaza Strip evacuation. This is
Speaker 2: the Lacud minister avi dictor. He says that war is
Speaker 2: impossible to wage in their masses between the tanks and
Speaker 2: the soldiers Nantonia, who does not support resettling the Gaza Strip.
Speaker 2: He says he will not give up security control over
Speaker 2: it under any circumstances. And he is not only a
Speaker 2: member of the Israeli security Cabinet but also the Agricultural minister, a.
Speaker 3: Member of the Lacud party.
Speaker 2: You should probably know better than to use terms like
Speaker 2: Gaza Knakba twenty twenty three, saying that that's how it's
Speaker 2: going to end. He's also a former director of the
Speaker 2: shin Bet, which is I guess more analogous to our
Speaker 2: FBI here in the US. They are setting themselves up, really,
Speaker 2: I think for a disastrous future. If they're going to
Speaker 2: commit to any sort of occupation or any sort of resettlement,
Speaker 2: they will find even their most exuberant supporters here in
Speaker 2: the West on the democratic side are gone. And when
Speaker 2: you lose that and the support of the population. But
Speaker 2: even more importantly, I think once again they have still
Speaker 2: a tremendous amount of goodwill from what happened on October seventh,
Speaker 2: but this has become some sort of imperial and colonial project,
Speaker 2: then you really are going to completely lose any of
Speaker 2: that legitimacy in the eyes of even some of.
Speaker 3: Them, except your most art and supporters.
Speaker 2: And I think the problem strategically for them is increasingly
Speaker 2: their current government has no ability to rein in these forces.
Speaker 2: I think they would be so much better off with
Speaker 2: a better coalition type government which is entirely focused on
Speaker 2: the military strategic question of destruction of Hamas and not
Speaker 2: pairing it almost overwhelmingly with these colonial ambition, with the
Speaker 2: refusal to condemn settler violence in the West Bank, with
Speaker 2: the refusal to silence people like this.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's just one.
Speaker 2: Of those where we were very careful if Nettinel, who
Speaker 2: likes to talk about World War Two. We were extraordinarily
Speaker 2: careful to demand unconditional surrender, but also not to telegraph
Speaker 2: any sort of like inflammatory occupy. Now I'm saying the West,
Speaker 2: not not the Russians. They talked about things a little
Speaker 2: bit differently, but at least on our end, we wanted
Speaker 2: to minimize like civilian German resistance at the same time
Speaker 2: of making clear that we demand the unconditional surrender of
Speaker 2: the Nazi regime. And by separating those two questions actually
Speaker 2: I think a smarter play than the way that they
Speaker 2: are currently going about it. I also don't think it's
Speaker 2: a particularly useful one because it's like, well, you know,
Speaker 2: how did that end up? In terms of Germany, we
Speaker 2: ended up occupy. We still still have one of the
Speaker 2: largest bases in the world in Germany and in Japan.
Speaker 2: It's like, so is that we're committing to a seventy
Speaker 2: five year presence in the region, because that's insane. Any
Speaker 2: of these needs to end with some sort of political resolution,
Speaker 2: But again they don't. They don't really want to talk
Speaker 2: about the legitimacy of that. And if I think the
Speaker 2: single biggest threat to the Israel nation state. Right now
Speaker 2: is this faction of the party and the nets to
Speaker 2: Nahu government which finds itself in a position where the
Speaker 2: longer the war goes on, the better off it is
Speaker 2: for him.
Speaker 3: He every interview he gives.
Speaker 2: Including this one, they're like, hey, what about you did
Speaker 2: you fail? And he's we'll talk about that later. It's
Speaker 2: also historically ridiculous. I went back and was looking at this.
Speaker 2: In two thousand and six, Natanyahu demanded that the Prime
Speaker 2: Minister of Israel at that time take immediate responsibility for
Speaker 2: what happened in the two thousand and six Lebanon which
Speaker 2: was a disaster. So yeah, so a little bit of
Speaker 2: history of checking what he's doing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, Sontnahu's party is Lakud. This dude who
Speaker 1: said it, Yeah, but twenty twenty three, Gaza, but twenty
Speaker 1: twenty three, that's how it will end. Is a Lakud ministry,
Speaker 1: is the agriculture ministries also a member, as Soccer said,
Speaker 1: of the security Cabinet. So it's not like this is
Speaker 1: a fringe view. This is the view of the of
Speaker 1: Netnyahu's party. Of certainly they are very upfront about it
Speaker 1: that some of the extremist coalition partners who he insisted
Speaker 1: remain in the you know, Unity Security government during the
Speaker 1: war cabinet. So so, you know, this is the mainstream
Speaker 1: view of the people who are running the government, and
Speaker 1: let's be honest, it's the mainstream view of a lot
Speaker 1: of Israeli citizens as well. It's not like there's huge
Speaker 1: internal backlash to you know, this dude coming out and
Speaker 1: being like, yeah, god's a nakba. Which the other thing
Speaker 1: just historically that is worth noting here too, is that
Speaker 1: Israeli's long denied that there was even was an akpa.
Speaker 3: You know, their.
Speaker 1: Story for decades, which has become sort of impossible to
Speaker 1: maintain given the revelations of historical documents, but which nonetheless
Speaker 1: they've been sort of committed to, was like, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: we didn't push people out. They left, you know, their
Speaker 1: leaders told them to leave, and they just left. There
Speaker 1: was no violence, there was no you know, displacement. They
Speaker 1: just willingly went. And so they've always denied the idea
Speaker 1: that there even was an original nakba. So I guess
Speaker 1: we're now like openly admitting that as well. But again,
Speaker 1: this is very consistent with that Israeli Ministry report that
Speaker 1: came out and said, our ideal solution is ethnic cleansing,
Speaker 1: pushing all of these people out of Gaza and forcing Egypt,
Speaker 1: compelling Egypt to take them in and resettle them. And so,
Speaker 1: you know, when you've got a member of the Security
Speaker 1: Cabinet and former should Bet director saying these things.
Speaker 4: Openly, you should take note.
Speaker 1: You had another the Minister of National Security, Itamark ben Gavie,
Speaker 1: who is again one of the most extreme elements of
Speaker 1: the net Nahu government, saying, quote, to be clear, when
Speaker 1: we say that Hamas should be destroyed, it also means
Speaker 1: those who celebrate, those who support and those who hand
Speaker 1: out candy, they are all terrorists and they should also
Speaker 1: be destroyed. So again laying out that, you know, even
Speaker 1: people who weren't involved in October seventh, who just you know,
Speaker 1: maybe expressed some sort of support for Hamas or you know,
Speaker 1: just exist in Gaza and you know, are Palestinian, that
Speaker 1: they are also terrorists and they should be destroyed. Which
Speaker 1: is part of why there needs to be a lot
Speaker 1: of hard questions asked about when you say Hamas should
Speaker 1: be destroyed, what exactly do you mean by that, because
Speaker 1: that is actually in reality a very very squishy and
Speaker 1: very potentially you know, large scale concept who is hamas?
Speaker 1: And when you see the Israeli government going and being like,
Speaker 1: actually un workers are also habas, you can see how
Speaker 1: broad their definition of who qualifies as hamas actually is.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right, let's go to the next part here,
Speaker 2: my bad, I meant the next element come upon me
Speaker 2: three two one.
Speaker 3: Let's go and put this up on the screen. It
Speaker 3: was making the rounds.
Speaker 2: It was actually a pretty interesting interview from The New
Speaker 2: Yorker by Isaac Choytner. He's kind of famous for doing
Speaker 2: these barbed interviews with unsuspecting victims, and this one it
Speaker 2: was the quote the extreme ambitions of West Bank settlers,
Speaker 2: and he interviews a woman who is a West Bank
Speaker 2: settler and activist and asked her about her vision for
Speaker 2: a Jewish state. This is Danielle Wise. She's one of
Speaker 2: the biggest leaders in the settlement community. Has been involved
Speaker 2: in settlement politics ever since the nineteen sixty seven war
Speaker 2: and has been living in the region since after that war.
Speaker 2: So it's been a long time. Suffice it to say,
Speaker 2: what exactly did she say? Which everyone found very noteworthy. Well,
Speaker 2: there's one particular quote, which I think really put everything
Speaker 2: into perspective, which was quote in Israel, there's a lot
Speaker 2: of support for settlements. This is why there's been right
Speaker 2: wing governments for so many years. The world, especially the
Speaker 2: United States, thinks there's an option for a Palestinian state.
Speaker 2: If we continue to build communities, then we will block
Speaker 2: the option for a Palestinian state. We want to close
Speaker 2: the option for a Palestinian state, and the world wants
Speaker 2: to leave that option open. It is a very simple
Speaker 2: thing to understand, which she says. Yes, she says quote
Speaker 2: settlement is the way to return to resion. She says, yes,
Speaker 2: there's the dispersion, the beginning of the revival of a
Speaker 2: Jewish nation. What are the borders of the Jewish nation?
Speaker 2: The borders of the homeland the Jews are the Euphrates
Speaker 2: in the east and the Nile in the southwest. Palestinians
Speaker 2: sometimes use that slogan they're talking about river to the sea.
Speaker 2: What you're saying is also about this in relation to
Speaker 2: a Jewish homeland, She says, quote. Of course, if someone
Speaker 2: wants to invent a new religion today, who will decide
Speaker 2: the rules?
Speaker 3: The first nation that got the.
Speaker 2: W or from God, the promise of God, the follow
Speaker 2: that others Christian on Islam with their demands and their perceptions.
Speaker 2: So they are just imitating what existed already already, So
Speaker 2: why in Israel they would be anywhere in the world
Speaker 2: that came after us in a double sense of the word.
Speaker 2: So anyway, I think she lays out pretty plainly what
Speaker 2: some of the what a pretty sizable coalition of people
Speaker 2: in Israel do believe in and support, and as I said,
Speaker 2: I think it is probably the single biggest threat to
Speaker 2: Israel in the future, just given the sensitive nature of that,
Speaker 2: and also really just where our interests in terms of
Speaker 2: diplomatic resolution and theirs diverged on an almost completely different
Speaker 2: plane and have been for a long time.
Speaker 3: We're also being honest.
Speaker 1: Well, and also how we have long of the politicians
Speaker 1: in this country of long time maintained this fiction of like, oh,
Speaker 1: working on the two state solution. You know, I actually
Speaker 1: appreciate and I'm horrified by, but appreciate the candor here
Speaker 1: of like, yeah, that is the settlement project. That's why
Speaker 1: it's popular in Israel. That's why it's been going on
Speaker 1: while all of these you know, potential peace deal negotiations
Speaker 1: et cetera, etc.
Speaker 4: Were going on.
Speaker 1: The settlement building never stopped, even though it's clear violation
Speaker 1: of international law. That's why you know, you've had this
Speaker 1: while this war is ongoing, You've had this incredible escalation
Speaker 1: in violence and pushing Palestinians off of their land in
Speaker 1: the West Bank. And it's not just that the government
Speaker 1: is silent about it. It's that the IDF is actually
Speaker 1: directly involved in more than half of these incidents of
Speaker 1: Jewish settler violence against Palestinians and efforts to push them
Speaker 1: off of their land. So this is an overt government project.
Speaker 1: It's really not a secret in Israel. Again, you could
Speaker 1: talk to people like Daniella Weiss and she'll tell you
Speaker 1: flat out what's going on here. But you know, you
Speaker 1: also when this is something we flagged from the beginning,
Speaker 1: Like you see the rhetoric when BB goes on with
Speaker 1: Kristen Welker very different, different than when you're speaking in
Speaker 1: Hebrew to israelis where these sorts of things are much
Speaker 1: clearer and much more naked, and you know, very widely
Speaker 1: supported by the public. Israel, interestingly, is one of the
Speaker 1: only countries, I think developed countries in the world where
Speaker 1: the younger population is actually more right wing and more
Speaker 1: radical than the older population that still has some connection
Speaker 1: to that previous like labor Zionism and social democratic state.
Speaker 1: And so this has been the trend in Israeli politics
Speaker 1: for a long time. And there are a lot of
Speaker 1: people who are looking at this moment and a lot
Speaker 1: of people with power in the government up to and
Speaker 1: likely including net Yahoo, who say this might be our
Speaker 1: chance to once and for all be able to quote
Speaker 1: unquote solve the Palestinian problem, especially in Gaza. And you know,
Speaker 1: they're coming out and saying it. So when you see
Speaker 1: American leaders being very precious about, you know, all their
Speaker 1: plans and ethnic cleansing and these sorts of things, like
Speaker 1: they just come out and say it, and then we're
Speaker 1: supposed to pretend like this isn't going on, and this
Speaker 1: isn't what.
Speaker 4: The goal ultimately is.
Speaker 3: It's a big problem.
Speaker 1: So one of the things we've been talking about here
Speaker 1: is what are this military operation, this war on Gaza
Speaker 1: actually even is going to increase Israeli security. Elon Musk,
Speaker 1: in an interview with Lex Friedman, sounding some concerns of
Speaker 1: his own.
Speaker 4: Let's say, to listen to what he had to say.
Speaker 11: If you're not going to just outright commit genocide like
Speaker 11: against an entire people, which obviously would not be acceptable
Speaker 11: to to to I really shouldn't be acceptable to anyone,
Speaker 11: then you you're going to leave basically a lot of
Speaker 11: people alive who subsequently, you know, hate Israel. So really
Speaker 11: the question is like, how for every Hummas member that
Speaker 11: you kill, how many did you create? And if you
Speaker 11: create more than you killed, you've not succeeded. That's the
Speaker 11: you know, the real situation there. And it's safe to
Speaker 11: say that if you know, if you know, if if
Speaker 11: you kill somebody's child in Gaza, if you've you've made
Speaker 11: at least a few uh HAS members.
Speaker 1: And I would add to that, Sagar, They're not just
Speaker 1: going to hate Israel, They're also going to hate us.
Speaker 4: They're also going to hate us because they know.
Speaker 1: That they know that the way that we have unequivocally
Speaker 1: supported Netanyahu, they know where those bombs are being made.
Speaker 1: So it's not only increasing the risk to Israel, but
Speaker 1: also the risk to the United States.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and the top US General actually speaking on this,
Speaker 2: let's put this up there on the screen. This is
Speaker 2: the new chairman of the Joint chiefs of Staff and
Speaker 2: actually says that the Israeli military stated aim in Gaza
Speaker 2: with the destruction of Hamas was quote a pretty large order.
Speaker 2: He also said Israel's focusing on the targeting of senior leadership.
Speaker 2: But I think that the longer this goes, the harder
Speaker 2: it can become. This is what he told reporters.
Speaker 3: Quote.
Speaker 2: That's why when we talk about time, the faster you
Speaker 2: can get to the point where you stop the hostilities,
Speaker 2: you have less strife for the civilian population that turns
Speaker 2: into someone who now wants to be the next member
Speaker 2: of Hamas. So one of the reasons why I think
Speaker 2: that this is important is that these people, all of
Speaker 2: our senior brass came up in a time of counterinsurgency
Speaker 2: in Iraq and have a deep and personal experience in
Speaker 2: Iraq and Afghanistan fighting exactly these types of conflicts, seeing
Speaker 2: their men die, being charged with similar missions, watching strategically
Speaker 2: the goals shift move out of you know, where they
Speaker 2: originally were, and their own soldiers and the civilian populations
Speaker 2: where they were also paying the price. That's why I
Speaker 2: would these are the first people I would listen to,
Speaker 2: people who are the most experienced fighting this type of war.
Speaker 1: You can bet this guy will probably never say anything
Speaker 1: that's honest. Again, he's new, so they'll probably get him
Speaker 1: on the talking points here pretty quickly. But just take
Speaker 1: in what he's saying. Okay, the chair of the Joint
Speaker 1: chiefs of Staff are in top general saying that basically
Speaker 1: this idea you're going to destroy himas is pretty preposterous,
Speaker 1: in his words, a pretty large order. Okay, So he's
Speaker 1: you know, diplomatically saying really, I don't really think you're
Speaker 1: going to be able to pull that off, and then
Speaker 1: also saying you are radically so many people right now
Speaker 1: that you know you have less strife for the civilian population.
Speaker 4: The faster you're able to wrap this up.
Speaker 1: That turns into someone who now wants to be the
Speaker 1: next member of AMAS, just coming out and outright saying it.
Speaker 1: And so you know, you had Biden who kind of
Speaker 1: weakly suggested when he was in Israel, like, let's remember
Speaker 1: after nine to eleven, our response wasn't so great. Let's
Speaker 1: keep that in mind, but not actually doing anything to
Speaker 1: make sure that those mistakes are prevented. And clearly at
Speaker 1: least some people, you know, in terms of our top
Speaker 1: brass know what a risk this is and what folly
Speaker 1: it is in terms of the long term security situation.
Speaker 1: But our government not willing to use any of our
Speaker 1: considerable leverage to try to prevent this outcome. So you
Speaker 1: know that's where we are. It's horrific toll for civilians
Speaker 1: on the ground. Risk of a broader war, I would say,
Speaker 1: escalating by the day, and then the long term possibility
Speaker 1: of blowback and increased radicalization and terrorism very much and ongoing.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't just say concerned. I mean, at this point,
Speaker 1: I can't imagine that there will be any other outcome
Speaker 1: coming out of the horrors that have been inflicted on
Speaker 1: the civilian population.
Speaker 3: Very possible.
Speaker 2: And at the same time, you know what he's probably
Speaker 2: the most worried about is that we've got all of
Speaker 2: these thy tens of thousands now service members in the region.
Speaker 3: Tragically.
Speaker 2: Yesterday, let's go and put this up there on the screen,
Speaker 2: five US Special Operators were killed in a weekend crash
Speaker 2: after a training mishap. It appears the circumstances of this
Speaker 2: were a mid air refueling that was gone wrong, and
Speaker 2: it was five members of the one hundred and sixty
Speaker 2: at Special Operations Aviation Regiment known as the knight Stalkers.
Speaker 2: So these are some of the most elite flyers and
Speaker 2: crew in the entire United States military. Often tasks which
Speaker 2: the most hairy missions getting in and out. We're all
Speaker 2: familiar with them over the years, and to lose five
Speaker 2: of them is absolutely devastating to the Special Operations community.
Speaker 2: It also raises a lot of questions about what they
Speaker 2: were training for. It appears Crystal they were training in
Speaker 2: nighttime night operations specifically for some sort of evacuation or
Speaker 2: hostage rescue situation whenever it comes to Lebanon and Tagazo.
Speaker 2: So this is a direct result of the forward deployed
Speaker 2: you know, of our troops who are involved now in
Speaker 2: this and obviously you know, training mistakes do happen, but
Speaker 2: it's really it's awful, you know, just to lose five
Speaker 2: service members in a situation like this, and it just
Speaker 2: highlights the fact like when you mobilize a lot of
Speaker 2: guys and you just send them and you start training
Speaker 2: and doing all this stuff, people are gonna die. People
Speaker 2: are gonna you know, there's going to be follow on
Speaker 2: twentieth and thirtieth order effects to all of that, and
Speaker 2: I think that that's something that we often don't think about.
Speaker 2: A statistic I learned recently which blew my mind is
Speaker 2: that we killed I believe, either more or nearly the
Speaker 2: same amount of pilots training for World War two than
Speaker 2: we did actually in World War two.
Speaker 8: Wow.
Speaker 2: Yeah, some twenty thousand were killed in training. And the
Speaker 2: reason why is that I were like, we need the
Speaker 2: pilots so bad that we got to subject them to
Speaker 2: so many real world conditions that we're willing to sacrifice
Speaker 2: I mean literally thousands of lives in order to make
Speaker 2: sure they have battle hard and well tested guys when
Speaker 2: they're sent out there. And then even then it was
Speaker 2: one of the most dangerous jobs in the entire US military.
Speaker 2: So anyway, history lesson for today.
Speaker 4: That's wild.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And last thing I'll say on that is, you know,
Speaker 1: obviously the risk.
Speaker 4: I think it just underscores the volatility.
Speaker 1: And the danger of having so many of our men
Speaker 1: and women in this region who then become targets for
Speaker 1: hostilities and potentially trigger that esculatory effect we've been warning about.
Speaker 2: Yes, all right, let's go to the next part. Nordstream,
Speaker 2: a story which has only gotten more interesting by the day.
Speaker 2: Let's go and put this up there on the screen
Speaker 2: in a snooze that will shock absolutely nobody. A Ukrainian
Speaker 2: military officer quote coordinated the Nordstream pipeline attack. Roman Chernivsky,
Speaker 2: who was a colonel in the Ukraine Special Operations Forces,
Speaker 2: was quote integral to the brazen sabotage operation, say people
Speaker 2: familiar with the planning.
Speaker 3: Now, all of this.
Speaker 2: Is one of the most arcane, bizarre ways that we've
Speaker 2: finally learned the truth, because Tirvinsky is now actually being
Speaker 2: prosecuted by the Zelensky government and he is speaking out
Speaker 2: into i guess a face saving operation to try and
Speaker 2: to save his own hide by finally telling us the truth.
Speaker 2: The details though themselves, according to both him and many
Speaker 2: of the other intel officials and others who are familiar
Speaker 2: with the plan, is that this went crystal all the
Speaker 2: way up to the very top of the Ukrainian military.
Speaker 2: It was overseen directly by the head of the Ukrainian
Speaker 2: Armed Forces, according to them, and as always they're like, well,
Speaker 2: Zelenski had no idea about the operation. But the reason
Speaker 2: why we should really pay attention here is that the
Speaker 2: details on this show a highly coordinated Special Operations mission
Speaker 2: led by the Ukrainians to blow up the no Or
Speaker 2: stream pipeline. Where when you start to pair that with
Speaker 2: the past reporting that we've done here on the show,
Speaker 2: I believe Ryan was in for you at the time,
Speaker 2: was the level of entanglement between the CIA and the Ukrainians.
Speaker 3: That story I now.
Speaker 2: Believe was probably a precursor to releasing the details on this,
Speaker 2: and it basically described how CIA operations in Ukraine, specifically
Speaker 2: with their special forces are unprecedented in the way that
Speaker 2: we have trained them, stood them up, basically running half
Speaker 2: of their operations for them, paying all of their salaries.
Speaker 2: We never even did anything like this like we did
Speaker 2: in Afghanistan or in Iraq.
Speaker 3: That level of support.
Speaker 2: Well, if you put that then together with this about
Speaker 2: these Ukrainian Special Operations forces, it's effectively impossible that the
Speaker 2: United States did not know now the cope from the
Speaker 2: media and from the people leaking this is the US
Speaker 2: intelligence community quote learned about it earlier and warned them
Speaker 2: not to do it.
Speaker 3: Well, that's one possibility.
Speaker 2: The other possibility is that that's all smokescreen for we
Speaker 2: were actually the ones who directed the operation. But nonetheless
Speaker 2: it raises several like crazy things. At the time, you
Speaker 2: had a lot of speculation that this was actually Russia. Obviously,
Speaker 2: there were tons of questions, who can just you know,
Speaker 2: unequivally come out with any evidence. The Biden quote was
Speaker 2: going around about, Oh, Joe Biden says, you know, we're
Speaker 2: going to make sure that would get rid of the
Speaker 2: nord Stream pipeline is not gonna be a problem.
Speaker 3: I forget the exact quote of what he.
Speaker 2: Said, but there was a plausible, I guess, you know,
Speaker 2: scenario where this had been some sort of Russian operation.
Speaker 2: But as more and more details have come out, and
Speaker 2: as the longer the investigations have come and basically been abandoned,
Speaker 2: now by the West and now Intel been eleaked, we
Speaker 2: have to grapple with this. Ukraine, at the very least
Speaker 2: with US support and possibly at US direction, is responsible
Speaker 2: for one of the greatest acts of industrial sabotage ever,
Speaker 2: a bombing of a multi billion dollar pipeline system that
Speaker 2: also was used directly at the time to try to
Speaker 2: draw the United States into war. And these people are
Speaker 2: our alleged allies. More so, they put our diplomats or
Speaker 2: maybe our domains report in this position again, we don't.
Speaker 3: Know who where.
Speaker 2: They blatantly lied to the American public and to the
Speaker 2: world about who was responsible for this.
Speaker 3: Here's a flashback. Let's take a listen.
Speaker 12: The United States was not involved in any way period.
Speaker 12: The United States categorically refutes Russia's unfounded allegations leveled against us.
Speaker 12: The charges that have been made by Russians are just
Speaker 12: flat out wrong, plain and simple.
Speaker 2: That is the Robert Wood, he was the alternate US
Speaker 2: Ambassador to the United Nations there at the time, responding
Speaker 2: there about our alleged involvement in the pipeline. President Biden
Speaker 2: also denied this from the White House podium. The highest
Speaker 2: levels of the Ukrainian government. So I don't know, I mean,
Speaker 2: to grapple with so many terrifying possibilities a that the
Speaker 2: Ukrainians clearly, I mean, we've always known this directly want
Speaker 2: to draw us into this war. But this was September
Speaker 2: two thousand and two, September of twenty twenty two. Think
Speaker 2: political conditions of that time were very different. This was extreme,
Speaker 2: ordinary event. Oh yeah, that happened, and it was clearly
Speaker 2: they really wanted us to get involved. And again, the
Speaker 2: only reason we're learning the truth is because the guy
Speaker 2: planning the operation is now being persecuted by the Zelenski government.
Speaker 2: You could almost not make that up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And it's also important to keep in mind the
Speaker 1: context of like why they would want to do this,
Speaker 1: and it's not only to draw us into that wider war,
Speaker 1: but it was also to put a lot of pressure
Speaker 1: on the European populations, basically cut off the possibility that
Speaker 1: they could benefit from this pipeline. And so, I mean,
Speaker 1: it really was Remember all the talk that we heard
Speaker 1: so much about like attacks on civilian infrastructure and how
Speaker 1: horrific that was and how brutal it was and what
Speaker 1: a war crime, et cetera.
Speaker 4: Here's a Ukrainian attack on a large.
Speaker 1: Piece and critical piece of civilian infrastructure and we're just
Speaker 1: now learning, you know, more than a year later, what
Speaker 1: really sort of we're learning what really happened here. And
Speaker 1: remember also the way that this all unfolded. First they
Speaker 1: were very strong suggesting and the media basically ran with
Speaker 1: the assumption that I was Russia.
Speaker 4: Yes, Russia does terrible things. They did this thing.
Speaker 1: They blew up their own pipeline for reasons we don't
Speaker 1: really understand why, but they did it. It's definitely them,
Speaker 1: but we're not going to offer any evidence. And then
Speaker 1: it was like, and we don't really want to do
Speaker 1: an investigation either. This became increasingly untenable, and so then
Speaker 1: you had these suggestions of like, well, it might have
Speaker 1: been some Ukrainian partisans, but they definitely didn't have any
Speaker 1: canaan Lensky had no idea. Was the Ukrainian Rotary Club
Speaker 1: or remember we were talking about out there they were
Speaker 1: freelancing and he had no knowledge whatsoever. Now we get
Speaker 1: to and the way that this was framed also in
Speaker 1: this article I thought was very interesting because the headline
Speaker 1: is about this Ukrainian military officer coordinated the nord Stream
Speaker 1: pipeline attack, but really the headline here is that it
Speaker 1: was the top dude, the highest ranking military officer in Ukraine,
Speaker 1: who they're saying was in charge of the operation. So
Speaker 1: it went all the way up the chain as far
Speaker 1: as it could.
Speaker 4: But they go on to oh, but.
Speaker 1: Zelenski still had no idea, which, as you pointed out, Sager,
Speaker 1: either way is terrifying plausibility. Yes, so if you really
Speaker 1: have these people who are completely separate from Zelenski freelancing
Speaker 1: carrying out one of the most dramatic, you know, one
Speaker 1: of the most dramatic episodes of industrial sabotage in world history.
Speaker 1: They're just over there freelancing and he has no control
Speaker 1: over them. That's terrifying. And the possibility that he was
Speaker 1: directly involved in behind it, and that, by the way,
Speaker 1: we were as well is also quite something. So it
Speaker 1: is I mean, this is a bombshell astonishing report and
Speaker 1: I don't think it.
Speaker 4: I also don't think it's.
Speaker 1: An accent that comes so long after the fact, when
Speaker 1: people have moved on, and obviously attention is very much
Speaker 1: distracted right now.
Speaker 4: By what's going on in Israel.
Speaker 2: Yes, exactly, and I mean, look, it's convenient for them
Speaker 2: to forget, but it's one of those where we cannot forget,
Speaker 2: especially because we're watching in real time as everybody just
Speaker 2: like forgets that Ukraine ever happened about all these most
Speaker 2: brain dead takes that I've ever seen at the time, like, oh,
Speaker 2: the fate of democracy is at stake in Ukraine.
Speaker 3: Now they're like, well, maybe we have a.
Speaker 2: Piece deal, and it's like, oh, so is it real
Speaker 2: politic or is it not? Because which one? Those are
Speaker 2: totally incongruent. There's no actual there's no overlap between those.
Speaker 2: So overwhelmingly, we are also watching the Ukrainian state a
Speaker 2: month now, starved of its blank check from America, basically disintegrating.
Speaker 2: You have the top military commander who apparently was behind Nordstream,
Speaker 2: who's like, it's a stalemate, it's a technological problem. As
Speaker 2: things are right now, nobody's gonna win. Then you have
Speaker 2: Zelenski coming out literally begging for money, being like, listen,
Speaker 2: if you can't give us a check, like just we'll
Speaker 2: pay you.
Speaker 4: Back alone for it.
Speaker 3: He pay us back with what you know? What exactly
Speaker 3: do you make again? Nothing? Oh that's right.
Speaker 2: And especially now you lose twenty percent of your country,
Speaker 2: how exactly is that going to work?
Speaker 3: You can't even pay your own government salaries.
Speaker 2: So it's one of those where he's in desperate straits,
Speaker 2: he refuses to abandon it. People in his team are
Speaker 2: a straight up corruption. Now he's his own political opponents
Speaker 2: are running against him. He's canceling elections. You have all
Speaker 2: of this consternation with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and all
Speaker 2: that that's not being scrutinized by America. I mean, it's
Speaker 2: a it's a chaotic situation, which, let's be clear, it's
Speaker 2: actually been like that from the beginning, it's now that
Speaker 2: you're allowed to talk about it. And in that we
Speaker 2: are again grappling with the fact that our supposed closest
Speaker 2: ally and all of that committed an insane act of
Speaker 2: industrial sabotage. Dare I say even international terrorism that would
Speaker 2: have had the biggest Like they they wanted to draw
Speaker 2: America into this war. They wanted to back the West up,
Speaker 2: you know, into a corner, to make sure they had
Speaker 2: no possibility of relying on you know, Russian energy and
Speaker 2: any of that in the future. And in my opinion,
Speaker 2: really what they did is that they just showed Western
Speaker 2: leaders and the population too that if for you know,
Speaker 2: in the clearest way, our interests are not the same,
Speaker 2: like at all, our interest is peace. They're interest is
Speaker 2: to draw us into this war. And let's just keep
Speaker 2: learning that lesson.
Speaker 3: Over and over again.
Speaker 1: The last thing I want to say about this is,
Speaker 1: I mean, we really are watching the utter destruction of
Speaker 1: even a semblance of commitment to the quote unquote international
Speaker 1: rules based order like this has collapsed completely in real time.
Speaker 1: And think about just do a little intellectual exercise if
Speaker 1: it was Russia that they could prove bomb the Nord
Speaker 1: Stream pipeline. Think about how different they talk about if
Speaker 1: it was Hamas who managed to pull off such an
Speaker 1: act of international terror and industrial sabotage. Think about the
Speaker 1: different way that they would talk about it. And so
Speaker 1: when you have the Russia War on Ukraine unfolding at
Speaker 1: the same time as the Israel War on Gaza, and
Speaker 1: you see so clearly that these rules.
Speaker 4: Are not rules.
Speaker 1: They're just applied selectively, weaponized against the countries that we
Speaker 1: don't happen to like. And it's so brazen, and it's
Speaker 1: so out in the open. I mean, this is the
Speaker 1: end of even being able to pretend that this country
Speaker 1: actually cares about such things. I just don't know how
Speaker 1: you even say it with a straight face going forward,
Speaker 1: And I really do think, I mean, you know, there's
Speaker 1: been lots of things you could point to, but in
Speaker 1: the modern era it really starts to come and glued
Speaker 1: with the Iraq War and the bullshit pretext we used
Speaker 1: to go in. And you know, that's it's no accident
Speaker 1: that Putin pointed to the Iraq War and what we
Speaker 1: did there as his excuse for why it's okay for him.
Speaker 4: To do what he does.
Speaker 1: Natan Yahoo uses the Iraq War and the toll that
Speaker 1: took on civilians as his excuse to do what he's
Speaker 1: doing in Gaza and Saga. I think you're absolutely right
Speaker 1: that while there, look, I'm not going to deny there
Speaker 1: were horrors that we commit it during the Iraq War.
Speaker 1: The number of civilians killed and the torture and Abu
Speaker 1: Grab and Guantanamo Bay, like it really does pale in
Speaker 1: comparison to what is unfolding in Gaza right now. But
Speaker 1: we started this unraveling in the modern era with the
Speaker 1: Iraq War, and now we've just seen a complete dissolution of,
Speaker 1: like I said, even the ability to have a pretext
Speaker 1: of commitment to the supposed higher values.
Speaker 4: And you know, it's.
Speaker 1: It's an extraordinary and horrifying thing to watch in real time.
Speaker 2: At the same time, turning our sites here, Eric Adams
Speaker 2: one of the luckiest people in the world that the
Speaker 2: everybody's attention is diverted because the details of what's happening
Speaker 2: to him right now are insane. Let's go and put
Speaker 2: this up there on the screen. Eric Adams is currently
Speaker 2: being investigated by the FBI as to whether he cleared
Speaker 2: red tape for the Turkish government. So the details here
Speaker 2: are that after winning the twenty twenty one Democratic mayoral primary,
Speaker 2: Eric Adams successfully pressed city officials to allow the opening
Speaker 2: of a Manhattan high rise housing the turn Turkish Consulate General.
Speaker 2: This alleges that Eric Adams, weeks before his election pressured
Speaker 2: the New York Fire Department to sign off on the
Speaker 2: Turkish government's new high rise consulate in Manhattan quote, despite
Speaker 2: safety concerns with the building. After winning the primary in July,
Speaker 2: Adams contacted then the Fire Commissioner in late summer of
Speaker 2: twenty twenty one and urged him to allow them to
Speaker 2: occupy the building, at least on a temporary basis.
Speaker 3: Quote.
Speaker 2: The unusual intervention by mister Adams is being examined as
Speaker 2: part of a broader public corruption investigation by the FBI
Speaker 2: and federal prosecutors in Manhattan that led to the seizure
Speaker 2: of the Mayor's electronic devices by federal agents earlier this week,
Speaker 2: and mister Adams' intervention paved the way for Erdowan quote,
Speaker 2: whose fondness for massive building projects is well known in Turkey,
Speaker 2: to then preside over the grand opening of a three
Speaker 2: hundred million dollar thirty five story tower on his September
Speaker 2: twenty twenty one visit to New York for the UN
Speaker 2: General Assembly.
Speaker 3: So let's again just lay it all out.
Speaker 2: Eric Adams, after he wins the primary, calls New York
Speaker 2: Fire Department. He tries to issue a temporary building permit
Speaker 2: to the Turks so the Turks can open up this
Speaker 2: building so that when Erdowan comes to New York he
Speaker 2: can stand in front of said building and be like, cool,
Speaker 2: look at this awesome new building that we have in
Speaker 2: New York City. I think those are the overall details now.
Speaker 2: To be clear, what they are investigating is did any
Speaker 2: money change hands? I personally just don't believe that Eric
Speaker 2: Adams is such a great friend of the Turkish people
Speaker 2: that he was doing this for free.
Speaker 3: But that's just me. What do you think, Crystal?
Speaker 1: So apparently the warrant so there were two rates. There
Speaker 1: was a search of his twenty five year old fundraiser,
Speaker 1: Brianna Suggs, and then there was the season of his phones.
Speaker 1: And apparently the warrant to search the home of the
Speaker 1: fundraiser focused on this fundraising event that they had on
Speaker 1: May seventh. On that day, forty eight donors, including the
Speaker 1: owners of this KSK Construction company, employees and their families,
Speaker 1: along with others in the industry, donated forty three thousand,
Speaker 1: six hundred dollars. And this fundraiser was organized by Turkish immigrants.
Speaker 1: I believe this KSK Construction company is owned by Turkish immigrants.
Speaker 1: So this fundraising event, everybody throws in a lot of money,
Speaker 1: forty eight different donors, and then when you get that
Speaker 1: money in New York, you get public matching funds, so
Speaker 1: it actually doubles the amount of money into Eric Adams campaign.
Speaker 1: So yeah, Basically the idea is that either the campaign
Speaker 1: contributions led to this treatment special treatment for this Turkish building,
Speaker 1: enabling Ertawan to come and do the grand opening, et cetera,
Speaker 1: et cetera. It's also worth noting like this is actually
Speaker 1: sadly consistent with Erdowan's record in Turkey as well, where
Speaker 1: you were called they had that horrific earthquake, and part
Speaker 1: of why they had such a high depth toll was
Speaker 1: because he had aggressively pushed a lot of shoddy construction
Speaker 1: that didn't wasn't up to code in that crumbled in
Speaker 1: the earthquake. So it is a little too on the
Speaker 1: nose for him as well. But apparently Adams, this is
Speaker 1: all just so classic New York. Apparently Adam's relationship with
Speaker 1: the Turkish immigrant.
Speaker 4: Community goes way back.
Speaker 1: As Brooklyn Borough President, he actively wooed wealthy members of
Speaker 1: the Turkish community in South Brooklyn. So apparently they were
Speaker 1: trying to return the favor, and he was trying to
Speaker 1: return the favor. Of course, he denies that there was
Speaker 1: any funny business here, et cetera, et cetera. But this
Speaker 1: is one of those stories that if it was another time,
Speaker 1: I mean, think of the headlines.
Speaker 4: Walldwall covers the.
Speaker 1: Mayor of New York, who was so celebrated by the
Speaker 1: media at the time when he was elected, having his
Speaker 1: phone seized by the Feds, and his top fundraiser having
Speaker 1: her house rated by the Feds.
Speaker 4: Pretty wild. What's going on here?
Speaker 10: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Apparently the Consular Building is the most expensive foreign mission
Speaker 2: in the history of turn It's curving facade inspired by
Speaker 2: the crescent on the Turkish flag, with its tulip shaped
Speaker 2: top a nod to the country's national flower. The building
Speaker 2: includes not only consular offices, but apartments, a prayer room,
Speaker 2: and exhibition space and auditorium according to its architects. And
Speaker 2: the reason again why he had to intervene is because
Speaker 2: it was July and Airdowan was coming in September. And
Speaker 2: I think if you trace it back to his ties
Speaker 2: to the wealthy Turks in New York City that are
Speaker 2: there already and apparently some previous trips that he's taken
Speaker 2: there over the time, he again is not just doing
Speaker 2: this out of the goodness of his heart. It was
Speaker 2: clearly at the very latest I think something was going on.
Speaker 2: It also calls into question, as you alluded to the
Speaker 2: investigation to one of Eric Adams's actual finan find fundraisers.
Speaker 2: Let's put this up there on the screen, because this
Speaker 2: is a really crazy story. The top fundraiser for Mayor Adams,
Speaker 2: as Breonna Suggs, was actually raided by the FBI day's
Speaker 2: for all of this happened, where again there were quote
Speaker 2: addressing a matter and that they were seizing some materials
Speaker 2: in investigation about the donation of this construction company.
Speaker 3: But what's really nuts.
Speaker 2: Is about Eric Adams's possible intervention and knowledge of this.
Speaker 3: Because let's put this up there please.
Speaker 2: The NYPD was actually sent to this woman's home hours
Speaker 2: ahead of the FBI raid in a probe of this
Speaker 2: campaign cash for Turkey investigation. For quote, a wellness check,
Speaker 2: a move that people say is very unusual. Obviously, you
Speaker 2: don't say a wellness check unless it's somebody who is
Speaker 2: like usually elderly. The NYPD then showing up giving a
Speaker 2: wellness check, possibly a tip off, possibly taking some stuff
Speaker 2: out of there, maybe or making it easier.
Speaker 3: In order to get rid of evidence.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of different possibilities that open up as
Speaker 2: to why the city controlled NYPD even be doing something
Speaker 2: like that hours before the FBI rolls into the house
Speaker 2: to try and seize campaign related documents and electronic records
Speaker 2: that are directly related then to this broader investigation which
Speaker 2: is tied to Eric Adams, now the freaking mayor of
Speaker 2: New York.
Speaker 3: Right, this is wild.
Speaker 1: And they have a quote from a former federal law
Speaker 1: enforcement official in that news piece that says a wellness
Speaker 1: check request at an address with unidentified occupants is highly
Speaker 1: unusual and that it suggests a leak about the investigation.
Speaker 1: So not only do you have the actual allegations here
Speaker 1: as reported by the New York Times about you know
Speaker 1: this whatever is going on with the Turkish government and
Speaker 1: this building and these fundraisers and looking into that. Again,
Speaker 1: no charges have been filed yet, they're just asking questions
Speaker 1: and seasoned phones and doing raids.
Speaker 4: You know, no biggie.
Speaker 1: But then you also have the whiff of a potential
Speaker 1: attempt to cover up here in terms of this quote
Speaker 1: unquote wellness check.
Speaker 4: So that's kind of the state of affairs.
Speaker 2: Yes, sir, certainly not looking good right now. I think
Speaker 2: for mister Adams.
Speaker 4: He was going to be the future of the Democratic Party.
Speaker 2: Well, I think he screwed himself on that one. This
Speaker 2: one is only the in the coffin. Okay, let's move
Speaker 2: on to the next one. This was a story. You know,
Speaker 2: we have all these things that are bubbling underneath the surface.
Speaker 2: It's not just Asrael Palestine. We want to give people
Speaker 2: an update and this one obviously. We know you guys
Speaker 2: care a lot about housing, and this is probably one
Speaker 2: of the most significant housing stories in decades. Let's go
Speaker 2: and put this up there on the screen. The real
Speaker 2: estate industry right now is in a state of complete
Speaker 2: turmoil after a federal investigation, or sorry, after a lawsuit
Speaker 2: in federal court found that the was a scheme by
Speaker 2: the National Realtors Association to inflate commissions. Now, the changes
Speaker 2: that could come to the business as a result of
Speaker 2: this lawsuit and of the successful verdict after a Kansas
Speaker 2: City jury found that these National Association of Realtors and
Speaker 2: major brokers quote conspired to keep commissions artificially high could
Speaker 2: lead to will complete change in the way that the
Speaker 2: realtor business itself works, could lower housing prices, but also
Speaker 2: could shake up a huge section of the US economy.
Speaker 2: So what this piece really gets into is that a
Speaker 2: settlement between the National Association of Realtors and these people
Speaker 2: who sued basically to say that their prices were artificially
Speaker 2: high means opens up oh case law and future lawsuits
Speaker 2: and changes to the real estate which means that they
Speaker 2: would have to change the way that the current commissions
Speaker 2: are split. And what it comes down to is the
Speaker 2: split of commission basically agrees that the buyer and the
Speaker 2: seller agent will have some sort of fee usually I
Speaker 2: think it's like three to six percent that they will
Speaker 2: then split upon the sale of the house. This pre
Speaker 2: negotiated fee between these two real estate these two realestate realtors.
Speaker 2: In addition to the MLS system, which is used in
Speaker 2: order to list a lot of these houses, which are
Speaker 2: then you know, I think data mind and placed on
Speaker 2: places like redfin and on Zillo is a huge source
Speaker 2: of revenue. That's why actually the lawsuit itself and the
Speaker 2: verdict actually plunges Zillo shares by seven percent, because that's
Speaker 2: where a huge portion of their realtor advertising dollars actually
Speaker 2: come from.
Speaker 3: So this is shaking things up on multiple levels.
Speaker 2: Number one is it could make being a realtor way
Speaker 2: less profitable, especially at the higher end of the business. Too,
Speaker 2: is that while it could lower prices for housing, it
Speaker 2: could change the way that all Americans, or at least
Speaker 2: most Americans, actually find real estate deals, which is in
Speaker 2: these websites. So the fee structure and the commissions and
Speaker 2: all that are likely to move to what they believe
Speaker 2: is going to be an a la carte model where
Speaker 2: maybe you pay one percent fee for this level of service,
Speaker 2: you'll pay the pre existing three percent fee for more
Speaker 2: of a boutique concierge service. But this still threatens obviously
Speaker 2: a massive monopoly of the MLS system, the National Association
Speaker 2: of Realtors, and just general fee cost structure that's been
Speaker 2: baked into real estate now for almost three decades from
Speaker 2: whatever is So if those who work in the industry,
Speaker 2: I apologism do my best to try and summarize what
Speaker 2: has always been the mystery of quote unquote closing costs,
Speaker 2: which no one is ever quite sure what it all means.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So the government has apparently long been kind of
Speaker 1: curious about whether this constituted anti competitive behavior, and this
Speaker 1: federal court which leve this massive fine and you know,
Speaker 1: found in favor of home sellers that these prices were
Speaker 1: artificially inflated and that this was basically.
Speaker 4: Like cartel like behavior.
Speaker 1: That's what has sent the whole industry into turmoil because
Speaker 1: the way that it works right now is technically it's
Speaker 1: the home sellers that pay all of these fees, and
Speaker 1: you really can't sell your house unless it's on MLS.
Speaker 1: So it's like, okay, well, if you're going to be
Speaker 1: on MLS, you're going to agree to this particular fee structure.
Speaker 1: That's why it's the home sellers who sued, because they
Speaker 1: technically are the ones who are on the hook, and
Speaker 1: then that fee gets split between both the buyer and
Speaker 1: the seller's real estate agents. But it's not like the
Speaker 1: buyers get off scott free either, because normally what happens
Speaker 1: is that cost is just added into the house of
Speaker 1: the price the price of the house, so you are hit,
Speaker 1: you know, with a higher mortgage cost and those costs
Speaker 1: are included ultimately for you as well, even though you're
Speaker 1: not the one who's paying it upfront. And so, I mean,
Speaker 1: it makes some logical sense that basically like, look, we
Speaker 1: have this one system. You're sort of forced into this
Speaker 1: free structure fee structure. There is no competition here, and
Speaker 1: other countries don't have this same system. So it's very
Speaker 1: easy as an American to just assume this is the
Speaker 1: way that things operate. But in other countries they do
Speaker 1: things differently, And you know, it could it could be
Speaker 1: that the buyer and the seller both pay those commissions
Speaker 1: upfront and there is some sort of a competitive system,
Speaker 1: and you know that you may have that a la
Speaker 1: carte model where if you're paying one percent, you're going
Speaker 1: to get a lower level of service than if you're
Speaker 1: paying three percent or if you're paying five percent, et cetera.
Speaker 1: But it could completely upend the way that all of
Speaker 1: this works, and really is a massive story within the industry,
Speaker 1: huge follow on effects for places like Zillo and Redfin, which, like,
Speaker 1: like you said, soccer.
Speaker 4: I never actually knew exactly how Zillo made.
Speaker 3: Money, but I apparently the same thing.
Speaker 1: Apparently it's because you And this makes sense now having
Speaker 1: spent some time on Zillo. They make their money from
Speaker 1: real estate agents who were advertising on Zillo. So if
Speaker 1: the real estate agents are getting hit, then Zillo gets hit,
Speaker 1: and presumably probably Redfin and these other services.
Speaker 8: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I don't know what's going on. I do wonder, though.
Speaker 2: This is a great disruption opportunity. I mean, something has
Speaker 2: got to change. So anybody out there who wants to
Speaker 2: change the real estate business, I didn't know this. One
Speaker 2: hundred billion dollars were paid by US consumers last year
Speaker 2: just in real estate commissions one hundred billion, which actually
Speaker 2: makes the settlement that we're about to get into, which
Speaker 2: kind of sparked all of this.
Speaker 3: Look paltry. Let's put that up there on the screen.
Speaker 2: All of this is after the home sellers won the
Speaker 2: one point eight billion dollars in damages for the quote
Speaker 2: unquote real estate conspiracy. That's one point eight billion for
Speaker 2: just a quarter of a million homes in the Midwest
Speaker 2: that said that the brokers forced them to pay oversized commissions,
Speaker 2: and under US antitrust law, that amount actually could be
Speaker 2: tripled to more than five point three billion. This is
Speaker 2: just Missouri, Kansas, and Illinois last I checked. None of
Speaker 2: those are the most prosperous states of the nation with
Speaker 2: crazy housing markets, except maybe Illinois and Chicago. Imagine what
Speaker 2: that's going to look like for Manhattan, Washington, DC, Los Angeles, Austin, Texas,
Speaker 2: any of these booming real estate markets where these real
Speaker 2: estate people are being clean and up on some of
Speaker 2: their commissions. I mean, these commissions that they're talking about
Speaker 2: were particularly egregious. It was five point five percent to
Speaker 2: list their homes, which I think is nuts. But the
Speaker 2: overall fee structure itself is being revealed to at least
Speaker 2: be anti competitive, possibly in nature, especially when you consider
Speaker 2: the MLS system and the way the entire new market works,
Speaker 2: and they're moved to then more of an a la
Speaker 2: carte which is dramatically reduce the amount of fees. It
Speaker 2: also does make sense why you know, you always hear
Speaker 2: it's like almost a joke. It's like, Oh, someone's got
Speaker 2: their real estate license and they're making like quarter million
Speaker 2: dollars next year.
Speaker 3: I did always wonder how does that work, Like, what
Speaker 3: is that?
Speaker 2: Well, this is apparently how it works, So I don't
Speaker 2: think it's going to be as lucrative then in the future.
Speaker 2: And then of course think about the lobbying and the
Speaker 2: interest groups that are going to be behind this. I mean,
Speaker 2: one hundred billion dollars in revenue a year is a
Speaker 2: crazy amount.
Speaker 1: So they're real, you know, and also those they're powerful
Speaker 1: ice here in Washington.
Speaker 2: God, yeah, realtors, And I mean think about this too.
Speaker 2: Every time. It's like a very local thing. Every town
Speaker 2: has a lot of people who are realtors. Realtors are smart,
Speaker 2: They ingratiate themselves with leaders in the community, and very often,
Speaker 2: I mean by definition, they just have to meet a
Speaker 2: ton of people and they have a lot of connections.
Speaker 2: And if you're going to threaten thirty something percent of
Speaker 2: their revenue, well they're probably.
Speaker 3: Going to fight back.
Speaker 2: So and I'm intrigued to see whether this could lead
Speaker 2: to at the very least a reduction in home price.
Speaker 3: That would be the best thing.
Speaker 2: From what we can tell, all of this has basically
Speaker 2: been tacked onto higher prices. I mean, you're talking six
Speaker 2: to eight percent at least in some cases, that's a
Speaker 2: lot of money when we're talking about a million dollar house,
Speaker 2: and that's exactly why they get paid so much. So
Speaker 2: it very much could change everything on that on the
Speaker 2: real estate system for sure. Last thing, here a very
Speaker 2: interesting story, one that I've personally been consumed by distracting
Speaker 2: myself from Israel Palestine, That's what I tell myself. The
Speaker 2: Department of Justice has announced the bust of a quote
Speaker 2: high end brothel network. This high end brothel network was
Speaker 2: operating in Boston and in Tyson's Corner, Virginia, outside of Washington,
Speaker 2: d C. Normally we would not carry about such a thing,
Speaker 2: but it turns out that this quote high end brothel
Speaker 2: network included a website where prospective clients were required to
Speaker 2: enter baron, name their occupation, exactly where they worked, provide
Speaker 2: proof of ID, and then became repeat customers after they
Speaker 2: quote cleared by whoever was running this brothel, who have
Speaker 2: now been arrested well. As part of the investigation, it
Speaker 2: appears federal investigators have gotten their hands on the client
Speaker 2: list and who they described, at least in terms of
Speaker 2: the types of positions that they held, are very interesting.
Speaker 3: Let's take a listen.
Speaker 13: They are doctors, they are lawyers, their accountants, they're elected officials,
Speaker 13: they are executives at high tech companies and pharmaceutical companies.
Speaker 13: They're military officers, government contractors, professors, scientists, pick a profession.
Speaker 13: They're probably represented in this case.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what he failed to mention there was elected officials
Speaker 2: as well, and the elected officials a lot of it
Speaker 2: traces back to this. It's in Tysons Corner, Virginia, which
Speaker 2: is outside of thirty minutes or so of Washington, DC.
Speaker 2: One of the things they also put in their press release,
Speaker 2: which is very important. We could put that police up
Speaker 2: there on the screen, is that many of the people
Speaker 2: who were being implicated in this apparently also had some
Speaker 2: of the highest levels of security clearance in the US government.
Speaker 2: And you know, that's part of the thing is people
Speaker 2: are like, why do you care somebody. I'm like, listen,
Speaker 2: it's not about what these people are choosing to do
Speaker 2: in their personal life. For me, it's like, you are
Speaker 2: putting yourself in the most blackmailable position possible. We have
Speaker 2: multiple actually foreign individuals here who apparently were running this
Speaker 2: entire high end broth on network. Either of Korean or
Speaker 2: Asian origin of some kind. And then these are scientists,
Speaker 2: high level pharmaceutical executives, technology executives, elected officials, and others
Speaker 2: that are all now embroiled in probably what the greatest
Speaker 2: blackmail scheme of all time. So then it comes into
Speaker 2: the question of like what kind of judgment do you
Speaker 2: have to have extremely high level security clearance to be
Speaker 2: a military officer, you know, possibly working at the Pentagon
Speaker 2: on who knows, God knows what, and then also be
Speaker 2: implicated in a crazy blackmail scheme that could be happening
Speaker 2: here possibly and at the very least we see that
Speaker 2: you don't have all the best judgment.
Speaker 3: I guess we could say a.
Speaker 4: Thing to be like, how do you not go?
Speaker 1: You know, I probably shouldn't be like entering my driver's
Speaker 1: license into this brothel website, like maybe that's not the
Speaker 1: best idea, and entering my occupation and you know, making
Speaker 1: sure I provide them proof of both the occupation and
Speaker 1: the that I am who I say I am. One
Speaker 1: thing people should know who don't live in this area
Speaker 1: about Tyson's Corner.
Speaker 4: It's literally minutes.
Speaker 1: Away from McClain, Virginia, which is sometimes the wealthiest zip
Speaker 1: code in the entire country, because you have this is
Speaker 1: where lots of lobbyists live, This is where lots of
Speaker 1: defense contractors live.
Speaker 4: This is where a.
Speaker 1: Lot of the wealthiest elite of the Washington, DC area,
Speaker 1: this is where they choose to make their homes. And
Speaker 1: so you know, when you're talking about this network right
Speaker 1: outside of McLean, right outside of DC, and you have
Speaker 1: the government actively saying you'll never believe who's on the
Speaker 1: client's list, Yeah, I'm sure a lot of people's ears
Speaker 1: perked up. I'm see there are a lot of people
Speaker 1: who are very panicked right now within this builtway radius
Speaker 1: at the moment.
Speaker 3: Here's the thing, we got to see the list. There's
Speaker 3: just we have to see it.
Speaker 2: If you're an elected official, like, it has got to
Speaker 2: come out. And also, like we said on the security
Speaker 2: clearance thing, there's got to be a legitimate investigation actually
Speaker 2: into this. And if you were one of those people,
Speaker 2: like honestly you got to lose your clearance, you should
Speaker 2: be fired because clearly you have awful judgment and your
Speaker 2: viable to blackmail. So it's one of those where the
Speaker 2: actual investigation into this could just tell us about the intelligence.
Speaker 2: I think of some of the highest level of people
Speaker 2: in the US government. And it's one of those where
Speaker 2: we've already learned over the years many of.
Speaker 3: These people lack horrible judgment.
Speaker 2: David Petraeus running this freaking CIA and then having an
Speaker 2: affair and trying to do some what was it, some
Speaker 2: scheme where they would log into a communal Gmail account
Speaker 2: and then write drafts of emails and save them in
Speaker 2: the drafts folders to each other. And this was actually
Speaker 2: something he picked up from watching terrorists operate, which I
Speaker 2: always thought was very interesting. But it goes very deep
Speaker 2: to the I think it goes very deep to the
Speaker 2: questions about like, who are these people who are supposedly
Speaker 2: so much better and running all of this. It's like, Oh,
Speaker 2: they're human beings, and the reminder of that is a
Speaker 2: potent thing that with this also, we should just see
Speaker 2: what the lengths that they go to Crystal to try
Speaker 2: and cover this up, because I actually think that, I mean,
Speaker 2: there's always a joke, you know, with the Epstein client list.
Speaker 2: The FBI has it, nobody even knows where it is.
Speaker 2: It's probably been long destroyed now at this point. But
Speaker 2: that's really I mean, that's the most extreme situation. How
Speaker 2: many of these happened that we have no idea about,
Speaker 2: Like it's possible even that the DOJ got over at
Speaker 2: SKIS on this one, because this came out of the
Speaker 2: district of Massachusetts. It didn't come out of Washington, DC.
Speaker 2: So it's like, now, what are they are? What pressure
Speaker 2: will be put from the top if the wrong people
Speaker 2: were implicated from the governments persons.
Speaker 1: Yet another reason why I think sex work should be decriminalized.
Speaker 1: I think it should come out from the shadows so
Speaker 1: you don't have this blackmail risk, and also so that
Speaker 1: the women who are involved can be producted.
Speaker 2: Even if decriminalized, though, do you really want high level
Speaker 2: security clearance guys who are putting themselves in that situation?
Speaker 2: I think that is a different conversation, Different conversation for
Speaker 2: another day, But anyway, we'll continue to track the story.
Speaker 2: I'm very interested in who the client list is. Thank
Speaker 2: you very much to all the premium subscribers who have
Speaker 2: been helping us out. We've been working over time here
Speaker 2: on Israel Palis and we appreciate you very much deeply,
Speaker 2: and we will see you all tomorrow.