Thanks for doing this. Thank you for having me.  Um, is this deal real? I think so. I think this   is a significant achievement, but nothing is  fully real until they manage to get to the   final agreement. And we already have a precedent  in which we also see that when there was a final   agreement, which there was in 2015 that Obama  struck, it didn't mean that it necessarily would   last because Trump walked out of that deal. So if  this is something we want, we have to work at it.   We have to work to keep it. These things are not  part of the background that you can keep without   putting any effort into it. And right now, we're  not even halfway to the distance. But this is an   important development. So what are the key deal  points as they're emerging to the extent we know   now? Yeah. First of all, we don't know enough  because at the end of the day, there's been just   so many different versions that have been floating  around and some of them frankly do seem to be   sabotage efforts. There's some of the hardline  media in Iran that has been sending out these   versions of the deal that I think deliberately  were trying to raise people expectations in order   to make the final deal look bad. And they're doing  it because they're trying to sabotage the pay   um uh faction in Iran. Super hardliners are dead  set against it. In fact, there were protests that   they organized, not huge ones in any way, shape,  or form, particularly for a city of 10 million or   plus in Thran, but they were protesting outside of  the Iranian foreign ministry and calling for the   death of the foreign minister and the speaker of  the parliament who've been negotiating this deal.   So, we should not for a second forget that there's  a faction in Iran that is really against this. But  

based on what it seems likely to have included,  there's going to be an opening of the straits.   It's going to take some time. you know they have  to do some demining etc to be able to fully make   it safe. The US is going to lift its blockade of  the blockade which I think ultimately complicated   this matter much more so than help the US. I think  there will be some release of funds, but it will   be done in a manner in which Trump can say that he  never released the funds and the Iranians can say   they got some of their money back. And it's going  to be something that some of the GCC countries   do in the middle to make sure that there's some  money going to the Iranians while they're waiting   for the actual Iranian money to be released. And  it's very important to keep this in mind. This   is Iran's own money. They had about 120 to$150  billion in various banks around the world. That's   how you do international trade. You have the money  there and if you buy food or whatever from there,   you use that money. These were frozen by US  sanctions. So the Iranians could not access   it. For how long have they been frozen? Well,  they were frozen first under the Obama era until   they struck a deal and then it was unfrozen. And  then once Trump walked out of the deal in 2018,   it was refrozen. So since 2018, almost 10 years,  a lot of Iran's money has been in these banks and   they've not been able to access it. Out of that  120 to 150, the Iranian demand has been that   for theou they should get 12 roughly 8 to 10%  released at the outset and another 12 released   by the time that theou is concluded. And this is  their money just to this is their money. So this  

is different. You know the story about how Obama  released $1.7 billion when he signed JCPOA. Yeah.   He sent pallets of cash. Pallet of cash. That  is true. But that was very different. That was   not frozen money. That was because there was a  lawsuit between the United States and Iran since   the beginning of the revolution. Because during  the time of the Shaw, we're talking about 1977,   the Shaw had ordered American weaponry. I don't  remember if it was airplanes or tanks or whatever,   but he was the biggest purchaser of American  weaponry back in the 1970s. But between him   paying for it and they're supposed to be  delivered, the Iranians had a revolution.   They took 52 American diplomats hostage.  So the US clearly and understandably never   delivered the weapons but also never returned  the money. So the Iranians took the US to court   in the Hague International Court of Arbitration  and the US was about to lose that fight. So the   Obama administration chose to settle it as part of  the JCPOA. It was only supposed to be 400 million   but because of interest it added up to 1.7.  Here was the problem. How do you transfer the   money to the Iranians when you have sanctioned  every Iranian bank? Because of US sanctions,   they actually had to put it on an airplane as cash  and fly it to Switzerland where another plane was   the on the tarmac taking the money into that  plane. Had there not been for the US sanctions,   they could have just been a wire transfer. But  that was also Iranian money. That was Well, it is   Iranian money plus the interest because the US had  kept it for so long. There's no deal in which the  

US will pay Iran any American money. There wasn't  in the JCPOA and I don't believe that that will be   the case with the Trump deal either. So straight  gets reopened. That takes well. How long do you   think if both sides decide they want it? I you  know it will be gradual but I think you will start   seeing ships going through the straits in larger  and larger numbers already from 5 days from now.   But you have to remember there's a large number  of of ships that are stuck in the straits and   they're not in great shape by now because they've  been standing still in extremely warm water right   now. So as soon as they get out of the straits and  get to their home wherever they're supposed to go,   they have to go in for significant cleaning and  that's going to create another um uh problem   when it comes to the flow of oil because there's  just not going to be enough tankers on the seas.   Hm. Straights open. Some of Iran's cash gets  unfrozen. What else in the deal? And then of   course after that the real stuff begins in terms  of the negotiations over the nuclear issue. But   one other thing that will happen before that is  what the Iranians have insisted on and I think   the administration correctly agreed to which  is that there has to be a regional ceasefire   for this to be an end to the war. It cannot allow  for other wars to continue in the region that can   drag the US and Iran back into it. And this is  where also the biggest weakness or vulnerability   of this deal is because it means that the United  States has to constrain Israel and the Iranians   are going to have to constrain Hezbollah. And we  saw just hours before the announcement of the deal  

that the Israelis did everything they could to  sabotage the deal by attacking southern Beirut,   which they knew was a red line for the  US and a red line for the Iranians.   What tell us about those attacks. So there had  been exchanges of fire between Hezbollah and   uh Israel prior to that, but the Israelis were  striking southern Lebanon. Uh the Hezbollah was   striking both at Israel itself as well as Israeli  forces inside of Lebanon because the Israelis are   uh uh inside of Lebanon right now. Yeah, they  invaded it. Yeah, they invaded it. But it was   not at a level that justified an escalation from  the Israeli side to strike at Beirut itself.   Particularly after what happened about 10 or so  days ago in which they did strike Beirut knowing   very well that there had been a warning both from  Trump and by the Iranians. And this time around,   the Iranians did strike back at the Israelis,  which is a very important development because for   the first time, the Iranians were striking  at Israel for Israel striking Lebanon,   not because Israel had struck Tehran, which was  an attempt by the Iranians to essentially after   having established their own deterrence  or reestablished their own deterrence,   they were now going to extend that deterrence  to Lebanon. They do so for a variety of reasons.   One of them is, of course, that if the Israelis  are allowed to just continue to bomb Lebanon and   Gaza, etc., that war, that fighting will spill  over into an Israeli Iranian war at some point,   and that will likely drag the US into it again.  That's exactly what already has happened twice  

since October 7th. So if you want to have a deal  with the US and the US wants to have a deal with   Iran that ends this war in a durable fashion,  then you cannot allow the Israelis to continue to   be able to restart that war. So on the one hand,  the Iranians wanted to establish that deterrence   in order to make sure that the Israelis didn't  do this. On the other hand, it is also a longer   guarantee for the Iranians, what they call  their forward defense defense, meaning that   they want to have this presence or the support  in Lebanon as a deterrent against the Israelis   attacking Iran. Period. Because this is what they  had before Assad fell, before Hezbollah was really   uh weakened by the pager attacks. Let me give  you u a quick story. In 2006, as you recall,   you were there when Israel and and Hezbollah went  at each other. In the midst of that, I ran into   Ephraim Sn at the time the deputy defense minister  of Israel. I had interviewed on several occasions   before and he told me very explicitly that uh  Lebanon and Hezbollah is just uh a pit stop.   The war with Iran is inevitable, but they have  to essentially finish off Hezbollah first before   they take the war to Iran. But precisely because  the Israelis never managed to defeat Hezbollah.   In fact, the Israelis were defeated in that war,  the war with Iran didn't start in 2006. This was a   manifestation of the efficiency of Iran's forward  defense. By being able to have Hezbollah there,  

they stopped the Israelis from taking the war  to Iranian territory. and the Iranis are now   trying to reestablish that which of course the  Israelis are going to fight tooth and nail against   uh so that the Israelis will not be able to attack  Iran again without knowing that they will have a   very very tough time uh with the Lebanese right  on their own border. You know what's really rare   these days? A company that makes things  in America, not just designed in America,   conceived in America, assembled in America, but  actually made in America start to finish in a   factory with American workers. Brooklyn Betting is  that company. Every mattress from Brooklyn bedding   is built in their Arizona factory. No middlemen,  no cut corners to boost the margins. The founder   started with nothing. No degree, no corporate  backing. Just learned the craft, built a factory,   created a product that is awesome. That's the  American story that we support. We think you   probably do, too. At TCN, we love the Thermo  Balance mattress collection. It's made a huge   difference in the quality of sleep for a lot of  people who work here. If you ever woken at 2:00   a.m. sweating for no reason, well, you don't have  to anymore. The cooling technology actually works   and your back feels better in the morning. They're  endorsed by the American Chiropractic Association,   so it's real. They also give you 120 nights to try  out the product. If you don't like the mattress,   they'll take it back or swap it out. No hassle.  That's how confident they are in the products   they make. Visit brooklynding.com. Use the promo  code Tucker at checkout for 30% off sitewide. This  

offer is not available anywhere else. So why  would Donald Trump I mean this does not sound   like a win for the United States relative to where  we were in midFebruary? Explain the pressures on   both Trump and the Iranians that got them to this  point. What's motivating Trump? What's motivating   them? Yeah, look, I think this war was a mistake  from the outset. And I told the administration at   the time this should not have been done. Craziest  thing any president thing and I specifically told   them that you are misreading Iran. You think that  the Iranians are much weaker than they are. I'm   not saying that they were strong. In fact,  I didn't think that they're going to be as   successful as they frankly ended up being. But  they were never as weak as the administration   thought they were or as the Israelis were telling  the administration. But also there was another   major mistake I think in the administration's  outlook on Iran. They thought that the Iranians   feared war more than they feared um capitulation  and surrender. And Trump thought that by just   taking onethird of the US's navy there, all of  this mobilization, the Iranians would realize that   war was real and as a result they would surrender.  It was a complete misread. The Iranians feared   surrender far more than they feared war. They  believed that they could survive war, perhaps even   come out on top in that war, which I think they  have in some ways. surrender would be the end of   the Islamic Republic. They would never surrender.  Their system is incapable of surrendering their   system. Who would ever surrender? Who would  ever profer an unconditional surrender? Well,  

from Trump's perspective, having just gone through  Venezuela, he probably thought that the Iranians   would be no different, but they were very, very  different. It's very important to understand right   now the difficulty they have had in getting their  system to agree to this deal. And as I mentioned,   some of the ultra hardliners are dead set against  this. A surrender would require a full consensus.   And there's no way they could ever get that  in that system, particularly if you don't   have a strong supreme leader that can actually  push it through. And the new supreme leader   um uh is just weeks into his job and was not  really necessarily expecting to get that job,   particularly not in this matter. So surrender  was never in the cars. Now try to make the case   to them that this is going to lead to you if you  think you're bluffing but they are going to fall   fear of bluff you're gonna actually actualize this  bluff and it's not going to work out the way you   thought at all. So I do think that obviously we're  worse. So you gave that advice I think you said   that in public as well. I did. Yeah. What kind  of response did you get? Very little. I mean they   were taking note but nevertheless never got a real  response. And it seemed to me, of course, I didn't   have access to Trump himself, that his mind was  set and that it was really difficult for anyone   in on the inside to be able to change his mind.  Why he had reached that position, that's clearly   true. Yeah. Why he had reached that position,  I have less insight into, but I think over time   that perception he had of Iranian weakness had  been reconfirmed over and over again because the   Iranians did not respond as harshly as they could  have against the attack on Foro, for instance.  

I mean, the Pentagon called it a polite response.  They gave a heads up. All of these different   things. Yeah. They took the Americans off the air  base in Qatar. Yeah. All of this just reinforced   the idea that the Iranians don't have what it  takes to actually face the United States. And   I think it created this overconfidence. There was  another thing in my view as well that reinforced   this in Trump's mind and this is speculative on  my end uh but I do think there's some truth in it.   The Iranians committed a huge mistake before this  war, which is they never agreed to talk directly   to Trump himself. And from their standpoint,  they thought that by refusing this, which they   did for a variety of reasons, but nevertheless,  by refusing this, they showed strength, they   showed that they're willing to say no to the sup  to the superpower of the world. But I think from   Trump's perspective, it was the opposite because  Trump came in as president and said, "I'll talk   to anyone. I'll talk to Kim Jong-un. I'll hang out  with uh the former founder of al-Qaeda in Syria.   You know, I'm capable of talking to everyone  because I am strong because I am stronger than   all previous presidents." Yeah. He had Tim Cook  from Apple to the White House. Exactly. But in the   inverse of that of course is that if someone  else is not talking to you and are unwilling   to talk directly to you, that's not a sign of  their strength. That's a sign of their weakness   because Trump again believes that talking to other  people is a show of strength. So inadvertently,   I think the Iranians actually reinforced Trump's  own view of them as being weak by refusing to talk  

to him. And obviously there's no guarantee that  the war could have been avoided had they done so.   But I think that if there was anyone who could  have actually convinced them, convinced Trump,   this is going to be a war. They're not going to  capitulate. You might want to rethink this. And   you might want to rethink the entire idea that  you're going to get them to surrender at the   negotiating table uh or anywhere else. The only  ones that ultimately could have done this would   be the Iranians themselves. And they stood up that  opportunity. They had plenty of opportunities. And   I think that again it reinforced Trump's view that  they're weak. And as a result, he thought that he   could have this war over with. Well, one of the  problems is Iran is not a dictatorship. I mean,   there's a very complex series of power sharing  agreements going on inside the country. Like,   who who runs the country to outsiders? Me anyway.  I I made a good faith effort to figure it out. I   I couldn't. It's uh deliberately opaque. Back in  the That's on purpose. Yeah, exactly. Back in the   2000s, the Iranians had a deliberate policy that  they called simulated irrationality in which they   wanted simulated irrationality. It's essentially  their version of madman theory in which they on   the one hand wanted to make sure that they  were seen as somewhat irrational because if   you're irrational, the other side has a greater  difficulty calculating what your next move is.   This is again what Nixon did, but they called  it simulated irrationality. at the core of it,   they're extremely calculating and extremely  rational. But there was also another problem.   Their experience in the 1800s, particularly  with the British um uh interference in Iran,  

is that the British never really had to spend  much money collecting intelligence in Iran. The   Iranians were just volunteering it all the time.  And it enabled the Brits to really manipulate   the system and manipulate Iran. They didn't  even have to colonize the country. they got   exactly what they wanted from Iran without  formally colonizing it. A counter to that,   a reaction to that has been for them to try  to create as opaque of a system as possible   because that opacity makes it much more difficult  for outside countries to be able to interfere,   manipulate or use factions within the Iranian  system. Uh but it's also a negative for them at   the end of the day because the more opaque you  are, the more untrustworthy you will be in the   eyes of other countries. You can't really trust  a country whose system you don't understand whose   processes. So whereas it may give them a degree of  security in a very bad situation in the long run,   it doesn't provide you with peace and security  if everyone around you believe that you're   untrustworthy because they don't understand your  system. So the Iranians at some point hopefully   will transition away from that, but I don't  think they will as long as this enmity between   the United States and Iran is as intense as as  existential as it has been in the last couple   years. So again, what do you think drove both  sides to this? I think at the end of the day,   both of them absolutely need this deal. Why  I I understand I think why the pre why Trump   needs it because the economy is going to fall  apart if it's not resolved quickly. Why why the  

Iranians need it? Look, the Iranians ultimately  both need it because of sanctions relief. Their   economy was in a terrible shape before this war.  That's before $300 billion dollar of damage was   inflicted on them as a result of this war. beyond  the loss of human life but you're also talking   about infrastructure their steel industry the  prochemical industry have taken huge hits so this   is going to be very difficult for them uh so they  need sanctions relief look the Israelis pushed the   United States to sanction Iran already in the  early 1990s because they saw Iran emerging as a   rival to Israel in the region prior to that they  had actually had a long history of collaborating   with the Iranians and having a tacid partnership  and alliance But if you want to destroy and weaken   a country, you can do so by bombing them, which is  what we saw here. And you can also do so by having   decades of sanctions on them that slowly but  surely suffocate them, destroy their industries,   etc. And this is what we saw in Iraq. This is what  we're seeing in Cuba right now. So that type of a   sanction even though the Iranians have managed  to resist it even as the Russians currently are   resisting a lot of these different sanctions  over time it destroys this fabric of society.   In Iraq, there was actually a study by the State  Department, I think from 2004 as the US discovered   how difficult it is to govern that country. And  they did a study to try to better understand   where the roots of the problems were. And one of  the chapters dealt with the years of sanctions  

that had been imposed on Iraq. And it pointed out  that Iraq's economy under Saddam Hussein and the   sanctions had shrunk to no more than 16 billion  dollars total. total and as a result you had   a situation in which the incentive structure for  ordinary people to even send girls to schools was   no longer there. What was the point of educating  the children when there is no economy? So you had   a plummeting of uh literacy in Iraq particularly  amongst the female population. So you tell me how   can you actually transition a country towards  democracy when you have rising illiteracy and   this is Iraq a country that historically has  been the center of education and literacy in   the Arab world. 50% of all books in Arabic used  to be printed in Iraq. It's a long long history   that even precedes the arrival of Islam in Iraq.  So sanctions slowly but surely destroys these.   Why did the US remind us what were the pressures  that pushed the US Congress to impose sanctions on   Iraq on Iraq? This is this is because of Saddam  Hussein's attack on Kuwait and then later on   the suspicions of his nuclear weapons program,  right? And so you had UN sanctions, you had the   food for oil program. I was working at the UN  at the time in the security council. Iraq was   part of my portfolio. This is when I was working  for the Swedish foreign ministry. And I remember   those meetings, you know, where I remember the  Brits objected to toilet paper and lipstiff uh   lipstick as a dual technology. Dual use, dual use,  could not send it into Iraq. I mean, it was it it  

is the suffocation of a country and the Iranians  need sanctions lifted. And from their standpoint,   their best moment for the last couple of decades  to actually have a real negotiation with the   United States in which they do have leverage as  a result of this mistaken war to be able to get   a deal that actually really lifts the sanctions,  not the way it did in the JCPOA, but actually also   takes away primary sanctions. They've never been  in a better position to do so. Now, they may not   entirely see it that way. Certainly, some of the  hardliners are opposed to it. they think the US is   going to betray the deal etc. Uh but nevertheless  it is a strong position for them to have that   negotiation. So I certainly think that they should  and I think they also recognize that at the end of   the day they cannot sustain this situation the  closure of the straight etc for a very long time   without creating problems with other countries  such as Russia and China and others who do matter   to the Iranians. Yeah. And all of Asia I mean  South Korea and the world needs it open. Cost   of living is already making it hard to live here.  And it's not getting any better. Unfortunately,   it's likely to get worse. And a lot of Americans  fill the gap with credit cards, not just for fancy   dinners, but to cover things like groceries and  bills. That is a disaster. It's understandable,   but don't go down that road because there is a tax  in effect, a survival tax of 20% interest or more.   Why would you do that? Why would you hand money  to the big banks when you could keep it for your   family? Our friends at American Financing have a  better way. If you're looking to buy your first  

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call with Netanyahu every once in a while, or  to do so in reaction to Netanyahu actually uh   violating some of the US's red lines. There needs  to be consistent pressure on the Israelis to make   sure that they don't do this. And I would go one  step further. Part of the reason why the Israelis   would do this is because they believe that if they  restart the war, the US has no choice to re-enter   the war on Israel's side. If the United States  makes it very clear to the Israelis, that that   equation is over. If the Israelis start a war  against not only a deal that Trump has struck,   but what I think he hopes becomes part of his  legacy, then the US is out and the Israelis going   to have to deal with the Iranians on their own,  which I don't think they can do. Without all of   the support of the US, particularly the defensive  support in terms of shooting down Iranian missiles   that are heading towards Israel, the Israelis  cannot tolerate a war with Iran for very long.   So if they know that they cannot drag the US in,  their incentives for sabotaging the deal will also   diminish because the outcome that they're looking  for is no longer secured in any way, shape,   or form. So I think Trump has that ability and I  think proactively he should make it very clear. If   Israel restarts another war with Iran, regardless  of how it starts, the US is out. What do you think   the chances are of the United States would allow  Israel to lose a war against Iran? I'm just going   to say zero. All depends. I mean, I think you're  absolutely right. We've seen it so far that the  

US, you know, there will be a tremendous amount  of pressure domestically to support it. But I   think also things are changing. I mean, right now  the standing of Israel has plummeted amongst the   American public in almost every demographic except  for boomer Republicans that want genocide hurts   your reputation. It does. Well, who would have  thought, right? And also I think on the republic   side or the conservative side I think it's  become very clear particularly to the younger   uh uh demographics there that Israel is a key  factor as to why the United States has been   involved in so many different wars and since  the key factor in the decline of the United   States and since so many of these young uh folks  have completely turned against these endless wars   etc. It's always been a bit of a an issue, I  think, for some of the younger Republicans in   the sense of being against the forever wars,  being against overextended the United States,   all of these bases around the world, while at  the same time trying to stay neutral or positive   on Israel. And that cognitive dissonance worked  for a while. It doesn't work any longer because   it's just so crystal clear. I've experienced it  firsthand for many years. Yeah, you don't want to   fight about Israel. People are hysterical. Totally  hysterical and ruthless. It's just not worth it.   But when you see it that relationship destroying  your country, I mean, you just you have to say   something. Yeah. And again, you know, it's going  to take a while before that really impacts the   politics of this. But I think it's going to  become increasingly clear. I think it's going   to be very interesting to see what happens in the  midterm elections, both on the Republican and the  

Democratic side on this issue. It will still take  a couple of more years and it will be a couple of   more years needed in order to produce foreign  policy thinkers on both sides of the aisle that   have broken free from this conventional thinking  about what the US's role in the world should be,   what the US's role in the Middle East should  be and what the US's relationship not just with   Israel but any type of a special relationship  whether those should be kept or not. I don't   understand what what Netanyahu's plan is. What's  Israel's plan? So they want to keep the war going.   Okay. So what does victory look like? This is a  really good point because everyone else is looking   at this. Every other country is like, "Okay,  what's the win here?" Yeah. And best case, how   does this turn out? Exactly. And I think on the  Israeli side, there's just been a transition to a   completely different type of a security thinking.  This happened long time ago, but it's just become   more blatant. I remember it was actually David I  the legendary um air force general uh in Israel   who was actually the lead pilot that struck the  Osra Iraq reactors in Iraq in 1981 who explained   this to me. He said look on the Israeli side all  of the countries they define a threat as being   a combination of intent and capability. On the  Israeli side we assume that intent to destroy us   is always there. So we only focus on capability,  which means that regardless of whether a country   is disposed negatively towards Israel or not,  Israel's only way of surviving in the region is  

to always outgun everyone in the region and every  other combination of countries in the region,   keeping them weak, keeping them uh at a much lower  level. It's deranged. It's military hegemony on   crack. But it's also that world view that like  everyone hates us by definition. That's just   not true. It's not true. People's view of you is  determined mostly by your behavior. That's just   a fact of life that applies not just to Israel,  but to you and me and every other living person.   And but if you go into any scenario, if you go  to a cocktail party imagining everyone at the   party wants to kill you, yeah, you're not going  to have a good time. You're crazy. That's crazy.   So look, there's been an experience that they've  had that I think has contributed to it. I agree   with you that I don't think it's healthy. I don't  think it's good. And also historically, I don't   think we can see any examples of any country,  particularly a small country, being able to pursue   that doctrine successfully for a very long time.  It's not a good survival strategy. Now, they think   it is the only way to survive. But what this has  done, and this goes back to your earlier question,   I remember speaking to another Israeli military  official. This is 2004. So this is 22 years ago.   And he was very worried about Israel's future. He  said that when I fought in ' 67, when I fought in   73, I genuinely believed, we genuinely believed  that if we won this war against the Arabs, the   Arabs would eventually realize they cannot defeat  us militarily. So they will have to sue for peace.  

So the military victory, the best case scenario  as you asked, was a transition to peace. But he   said to me, I look at the Israeli youth now, 2004,  22 years ago, and I don't see any belief in peace.   They believe that we're going to be in constant  warfare all the time and that this is just normal,   that there is no such thing as a victory. You  just have to constantly fight and that's the   only way for Israel to survive. And he said that  this worries me because this is not sustainable   and this is going to change Israeli society in a  profound and very negative way. And I think he was   proven absolutely right. So when it comes to your  question, what is Netanyahu looking for? Looking   for he thinks that Israel is going to always be in  an endless state of war and as a result you just   constantly have to fight that battle and make  sure that you have the tactical advantage. But   baked into that assumption is endless literally  limitless American support. That's the thing.   This is all presuming because Israel could never  do this without this constant support uh from the   United States. So they've structured their entire  approach based on the idea that you know the US   is some sort of a cash cow or intelligence cow  or weapons cow that will just constantly end up   giving. And that is one of the most important  things that has now changed in the last five   or so years and will change even further. So  this is a strategy that simply does not work.   Things around the world are moving so fast  right now, it's impossible to keep up with   all of the changes. But we do know that  when those changes happen, markets change,  

too. And nothing changes faster than the price  of precious metals, gold and silver. It just   shifts in an instant because it is a reaction to  and against what's happening in the world. So,   timing is essential. If you're thinking about  adding precious metals, and you definitely should,   we do. You need to know when prices are going  to move and why they're moving. And Battalion   Metals makes that all really simple. You can buy  the dip when it happens. So, if you want realtime   alerts sent directly to your inbox when gold and  silver prices move, go to battalionals.com/alerts. Markets move fast. Stay ahead of  them. So, it's battalion.com/alerts. So from the because I think it's important to  understand other people's perspective. This is   central. We didn't understand Iran's perspective  going into this and we lost. So it's important   to understand Israel's perspective going  forward. American unconditional American   support for the Israel's regional projects is  the centerpiece of their security strategy.   Like they they can't exist as a nation without  that support. Is that correct? Absolutely. and   they know that. And that means that anyone who  threatens that is an like what wouldn't you   do? It's a literally an existential problem if  somebody threatens that. Yeah. And this is part   of the reason why they're so aggressive against  anyone who questions that relationship. And again,  

you can question that relationship. I would,  for instance, never argue in favor of having   a negative relationship with between the United  States and Israel or between the United States or   Saudi Arabia. I want the United States to have  a sound and healthy relationship with as many   countries as possible. But this is not sound. This  is not healthy. And I would say a lot of this is   also our own fault at the end of the day. Well,  it's all our own fault. When we're giving endless   support without questioning, without any restraint  on it, it actually fuels the worst instincts of   any country. Israel is no exception in this. I  would point to how uh Saudi Arabia was conducting   itself up until 2017 to 2019. MBS came in and was  extremely reckless and he constantly thought that   whatever he would do the US would come in and  bail him out. And then there was these attacks   by the Iranians against Saudi oil fields in 2019  over a dispute and you know with the effort that   the Trump administration was doing to stop the  Iranians from selling their oil. And the Saudis   were stunned to see that Trump said this was not  an attack on the US. This was an attack on Saudi   Arabia and I'm not going to go to war with Iran  over Saudi Arabia. This was a betrayal of the   Carter doctrine that essentially said that the  US would do this. But Trump, of course, being   a non-conventional thinker and probably didn't  even know about the Carter doctrine was like, "No,   I'm not going to do this." This was stunning for  the Saudis and for everyone else in the region.   And what happened? The conventional thinking in  Washington would be that if we are abandoning our   allies, there will be more chaos in the region.  There will be more war. The opposite happened.  

Once the Saudis realized that the US was not  going to bail them out from every war that   they would start or any reckless behavior they  did, guess what they did? They secretly reached   out to the Iranians and began a secret negotiating  pro process that eventually led to years later the   normalization of their relationship through the  help of Oman, Iraq, and ultimately China as well.   They opted for diplomacy when they could no longer  hide behind American military power. And if we do   the same thing with the Israelis, eventually they  will also come to that conclusion that they're   going to have to find a way to manage threats,  manage relationships, rather than thinking that   domination is the only way for them to be secure.  It's hard if you've got a country of 9 million   with no resources and not actually a real economy,  just an economy based on spy software. Um, it's   it's kind of hard to maintain a dominance posture  for very long. It's a completely fake domination.   I mean the talk I clearly there is a perception  in the region that Israel is trying to become   the military hegeimon and their attack against  Doha. You saw how a lot of the GCC countries   explicitly started talking about Israel's attempt  of establishing hijgemony. But I think we have to   be very frank. Israel doesn't have the capacity to  do so. This is a fake hijgemony. This is the tip   of the spear of someone else's hijgemony. It's the  US's hijgemony. But the difference is the US has   grown tired of being the hegeimon of the region  because it's not particularly fruitful. In fact,   I would not wish hegemony over the Middle East on  my worst enemy. No, of course benefit of it. You  

know, we're we're not in the 1950s or60s, etc.  in which the geopolitical circumstances were   different. So, the US has grown tired of it. We  have four or so presidents in a row promising the   American people to bring troops home from the  Middle East. There were even a moment in which   the Biden administration was considering as you  remember there was that force posture review in   the first year or so. Yes. They were considering  closing down 17 out of 19 bases. They ended up   not doing so. And the main argument against it was  well if we close these bases the Chinese are going   to go come in and replace us. The Chinese would  never be so stupid to take on that role. There's   no benefit in it. they have completely benefited  from the fact that we have taken on that stupid   role and they have been free riders uh on this  and they would never do anything like that. But   nevertheless, that was part of the reason why the  Biden administration didn't do what they at least   at one point were seriously considering and now  it's been done for us. So when right when this is   resolved however long that takes the United States  will not have you know almost 20 bases in the   region. Is that fair to say? I find it extremely  unlikely that 10 years from now we're going to   have that many bases there because you have to  also ask yourself first of all what was the use   of these bases? Every time the United States  attacked Iran, it emptied those bases because   they knew that the Iranians have the capacity  of striking all of those bases. And in order to  

minimize any casualties, the bases were empty. The  material was even the equipment was taken out. So   if you can't use the bases in a war, what's the  bases there for? And from the GCC standpoint,   they thought that these bases were going to be a  deterrent against Iran. turned out that they were   a magnet, the reason why they were being attacked.  Now, American weaponry was very useful for the GCC   states, but the bases were not. So, I suspect that  going forward, you're going to see a scenario in   which they will continue to buy and probably even  buy more American weaponry, but they're not going   to invest in the bases. And again, many of these  bases have been destroyed. Who's going to pay for   them being rebuilt? I don't think the US will.  And I'm not so sure that the GCC states will do   either. So if no one is paying for them, they're  just going to sail into the sunset one way or   another. I suspect at least with most of them  that will be the case. Here's an opportunity.   If the region now understands there is no such  thing as an external security guarantor for them,   similar to what I mentioned with the Saudis  realize that the US is not going to come in and   support them, they're going to have to deal with  their security issues on their own. They're going   to have to through diplomacy see if they can build  a security architecture that intensifies economic   integration and other things perhaps transitions  towards collective security thinking in order to   create stability. That I think is a blessing for  the United States because it actually enables the   US to also extract itself finally from the Middle  East while supporting an effort by the region  

itself to create its security architecture. So,  we're not leaving chaos or anything like that. It   won't be Afghanistan 2021, but it will be stable  and is no longer on the shoulders of the United   States. I think that would be very popular with  the American public and strategically it would   be very very good for the United States, but it's  a nightmare for Israel. It's the nightmare. Yeah,   because again as you said 9 million or whatever  the only way you can actually not forget about the   hegemony but just have this type of extended  maneuverability in the region is to have the   United States artificially put its finger on the  scales and tilt the balance in the favor of the   Israelis. And if the US leaves then Israel is  going to be faced with a completely different   scenario. Now, I don't think Israel will get  destroyed at all, but Israel is going to have to   deal with the region in a completely different  manner. Not based on domination or, you know,   creating all of this chaos that they have helped  fuel in order to keep everyone else weak. The   goal of the war was not to in my view was not to  eliminate the Iranian nuclear program. That was   not the main goal. The main goal was to eliminate  rivals to regional hijgemony. Absolutely. From the   very beginning, this has been the case. Yeah.  Including, I would argue, the United States.   I I do think there's deep resentment toward  the United States in Israel. They like Trump,   I guess, or have liked Trump, but I don't they  don't like the United States. Why would they? In   the same way that teenagers resent their parents,  but the opposite happened. So now you've got Arab  

states which have really deeply resented hated  Iran for a long time now making overtures toward   Iran after getting bombed by Iran. Look, what  did the Europeans do after World War II? They   realized that the effort to contain and isolate  German after Germany after World War I only led   the way paved the way for World War II. Exactly.  So they shifted towards the European Union,   the steel and coal union etc. in order to increase  economic interdependence between themselves to   create as many buffers as possible for another war  making it as costly as possible for the states to   go to war and Germany became more central even in  Europe than it was before the war. Absolutely. It   took some time of course but it emerged as a major  power and and a force for stability in Europe as   well. And you know, I grew up in Europe. When  I grew up, it was completely inconceivable that   France and Germany would ever go to war with  each other again. And that's still despite the   fact that 50 years ago they were butchering each  other that made Middle Easterners look good. That   transition is a remarkable transition. And it is  because they transition to collective security and   recognizing that any country's security is based  on everyone else's security. Yes. And the region,   I think it's going to be very difficult. I don't  want to in any way, shape, or form put forward   some sort of a naive picture, but I think they've  had a close encounter with death and that tends to   sharpen your mind. Yes, it tends to make you a bit  more mature. And despite the fact that there is  

a lot of anger, a lot of anger in Kuwait and on  the the GCC side, there's a lot of anger on the   Iranian side as well because they believe that  there is plenty of evidence and some evidence   has been verified by independent actors. France  24 showed for instance that there were a lot of   attacks on Iranian soil from the US from Kuwaiti  territory. Yeah. And the Iranians believe that   the Emiratis were far more involved in the war  than they thought earlier during the war. So   nevertheless there's a lot of common angles and  that Israel was using Arab states as staging Yes.   rounds for attacks on Iran. Exactly. So and  you know they have two secret bases in Iraq   for instance. Yeah. We didn't know that. How did  the Israelis get bases in Iraq? I have no idea   how that happened, but it makes me wonder how many  more bases there may be. Because if it's two that   we know of now, how many more may there actually  exist? And remember, for years, the Iranians   were actually fighting uh shooting missiles into  Iraqi Kurdistan, saying that they were destroying   uh Mossad uh houses. I don't think they ever  said that they struck a base, but nevertheless,   and it was often times dismissed. Um, no  clear evidence was provided by the Iranians,   but it is unmistakable that the Israelis have  had a very long presence in Iraqi Kurdistan. And   this goes back before the revolution as well, in  which frankly back in the 60s and the 70s, it was   the Iranians and the Israelis together with the  CIA that established Israel's presence in Iraqi   Kurdistan. One of the reasons that the Kurds get  such great coverage in the United States, everyone   loves the Kurds in the United States except Trump.  Trump doesn't like the Kurds for some reason,  

but everyone else, the American media, loves the  Kurds, the brave Kurds. By on that issue that you   mentioned that is never about enrichment, I was  at a track 2 meeting. This must have been 2012,   I think. And uh and I wrote about it in one of  my books. Um, it was a remarkable moment because   you had several Iranian officials, some of them  former, some of them actual nuclear negotiators,   together with a couple of American uh military  folks and then five people from the Israeli side,   all military except one who was a top intelligence  person. In fact, it was the former head of Mossad.   And at one moment, he just laid it out. He  said, "This was never about enrichment." No,   this was about preventing Israel from becoming  f Let me see remember exactly how he put it. He   said Israel would not tolerate the United States  making friends with Iran unless Iran first makes   friend with Israel. It was not going to allow  the United States to resolve its tensions with   Iran because the Israeli fear and this is a very  legitimate fear. If the US manages to resolve its   tensions with Iran, one of the things that would  happen, which is also what the administration is   talking about now, we would potentially start  leaving the region as we should. The threat   of Iran has been a key reason for justifying all  of these bases, etc., etc. And the Israelis then   asked themselves a very valid question. If the  United States reduces its tensions with Iran,   does that mean that there will be a proportionate  reduction in Israeli Iranian tensions? And they  

conclude I think erroneously but nevertheless  they conclude no the Iranian Israeli tension   will remain but now the U the Israelis will have  lost the support of the United States and this   is what they call the fear of abandonment. They  need to keep the US in the region prevent it from   making friends for these different countries  because if it does make friends with these   different countries it will exit the region. The  Israelis will have to deal with them alone. This   is a very sick relationship. You can only have  one friend. We're your only friend. Um, yeah,   this is like this is like seventh grade girls  locker room stuff. Um, but it's diseased. So,   but from the Israeli perspective, because I think  this really matters what's happening right now and   what's almost certain to happen, whatever happens  to thisou or this particular set of negotiations,   but like ultimately it's really clear that Iran  is going to emerge as a major world power. Like   how could it not? because it has de facto control  over one of the most important pieces of geography   on the planet. So like that alone it's it's  a very important development for them and   however yet it ends even if there's no there's  not going to be any toll but what potentially   will be there I suspect will be there is some  sort of a environmental management fee uh and   whether that is handled just by Iran and Oman or  if it's regionalized nevertheless something will   be there but the important thing to understand is  that their control of the strait is not because   they have mind sweepers or that they have a  couple of islands there. That was the case 20  

years ago. In all of the war games that the US did  back then, the Iranians would close the straight   by mining the strait. Yes. And it would take the  US about 2 weeks to reopen it. What happened now   is because of technology, the Iranians can shoot  missiles and drones from anywhere of their 1500   km shoreline at any of these ships and just the  risk of being hit is enough for them to transure   them. just a completely different scenario that  capacity does not go away. That's what I'm saying   with so it will still be there. So this is a  very very important development but without   sanctions relief I don't see the Iranians being  able to fully live up to their potential and on   top of that I have to say their political system  is a huge inhibitor of their own potential. It is   not a free system. It is not a dictatorship like  Saddam or Gaddafi or uh Assad's systems in Syria   and Libya and Iraq. It is a weird system. It  has democratic elements. But most importantly,   the power is dispersed throughout a system. It  it's not a family. This is not you kill. This is   what I think Trump was sold. You kill the supreme  leader, the whole system implode. Not at all. This   is not Saddam in which you take him out and his  kids out and the dynasty is over. This is a system   that was designed specifically to be able to  survive a counterrevolution because it was itself   a revolutionary system and it's also assassination  proof. Yes. Yes. I mean 135 or so senior officials  

have been killed immediately replaced. Immediately  replaced in fact replaced by more hardline people   most times where that's a durable system. But even  if you were to take out the entire infrastructure   of government in in Iran, even if you were to nuke  Iran, you still couldn't return to February 27th   status quo on Hormuz because it could be closed  by piracy. Yeah. So you have to have a powerful   central government in Iran. The world needs that  in order to keep the straight open. Look, bottom   line, we need it's a very bad scenario if we have  a weak central government. That's what I'm saying.   It's terrible. It's a recipe for instability. It's  a rep recipe for a country turning into Lebanon in   which the state is so weak that you could have  non-state actors performing the uh the duties of   a state. But even if it were to turn into Lebanon  or Syria or Somalia, which would be a disaster   for the people of that country and for the region,  it would it that's a massive threat to the global   economy. Definitely. That's the difference.  Yeah. And and and by the way, we had what 25   to 30% of the Syrian population becoming external  refugees as a result of that civil war. Yes. And a   country of whatever 20 30 million people. So, and  that profoundly changed the politics of Europe,   right? So, what if that happened to a country of  almost 100 million? Yeah. Exactly. It would be   an absolute disaster. I said this to Trump before  it started. you the the migrations could be just  

like you know really really really a big deal and  I think he understood he did it anyway but I guess   what I'm saying is I don't see a way that this is  not the nightmare scenario for Israel totally is   no matter what yeah and they can you know from the  Israeli side there will be I mean Netanyahu will   keep on insisting that they set back Iran a decade  or two and absolutely they really have damaged   Iran's infrastructure tremendously. There is no  doubt about that. That can be rebuilt. However,   what they have done that is really difficult to  undo is that I'm not saying that the system in   Iran has necessarily gained um popularity. I don't  think the actual support base of that system is   more than 15 to 20%. And then you have 60 or so%  15 to 20 15 to 20. That's unpopular. Yeah. 60 or   so percent of the population that absolutely would  like to see a different type of a government,   but they're not willing to risk war or revolution  over it. They want to see gradual change. And then   perhaps 20 or so% of the population that are  just so fed up with how this system has been   so repressive, so corrupt, so um incompetent in  many different ways, mismanaging the economy that   they've gone gone so desperate that they're  willing to try almost everything. Right?   But what has happened because of this war,  which always happens in these types of wars,   is that you have a rallying around the flag  phenomenon, has not necessarily made the   system more popular, but the performance of  the Iranian military in all of this has made  

the confidence of the 15 to 20% of the population  that do support the system absolutely skyrocket.   It has made them think that you know they  themselves had question marks about the   viability of the system. It faced so many problems  so many of them self-inflicted. Many of them also   of course absolutely a result of the sanctions  but there was actually a very low confidence in   that system in December and January uh January of  this year that has just completely shifted because   now they feel that as you said they have become a  global power. They have managed to not only resist   the attack of two nuclear powers, one of them a  superpower, but in some ways they may have come   out on top and strategically inflicted a defeat on  them. And this has just really just boosted their   uh uh their confidence and that is going to  make the Islamic Republic much stronger at   least temporarily than it was before February. It  seems so obvious. Absolutely. And the rest of the   world sees that and the rest of the world is to  some extent dependent on Iran. Like that's what we   all learned. Oh, absolutely. They have the South  Korea needs Iran. Japan needs Iran. These are real   countries with huge economies like and even if  they try to reduce their dependency at first of   all they were not dependent on Iranian oil. They  stopped buying Iranian oil 10 years ago because   of US sanctions. So they were not buying a thing  from Iran. South Korea has been in the Iranian   market for so long. It's only during this last 10  years that they were completely chased out by US  

sanctions. Samsung was so massive. Oh, no. I mean,  they need Iran because Iran controls the outlet   to the Persian Gulf. Exactly. So now you don't  have to have any dependence on Iranian goods,   but you still need Iran cuz it's a question  of geography. Yeah. Only in America, I as an   American, I hate to say this, but only our policy  makers are so stupid they don't look at maps.   No, I I'm serious. They're so caught up in this  ideology, rogue state, terror state, Hitler,   Chamberlain, Churchill. It's like they're all in  this weird fantasy world where no one consults   Google Maps. It's like, hey, hey guys, they could  like shut down a fifth of the world's commodities.   And I remember I was in some these were um not  formal government, but several people who were   in and out essentially. And this question came  up and I was actually quite stunned the degree   to which a lot of people actually thought the  Iranians would not close the straight that thought   that that would be a suicidal move by them and I  had to remind them that they will see this as an   existential threat. So all of the patterns we've  seen in the past in which they responded politely,   they didn't even respond to certain attacks.  You have to set that aside because if they're   actually faced with an existential threat, their  behavior will likely be very different. We framed   it as an existential threat. The president of  the United States demanded in the first days,   and I'm quoting, unconditional surrender. Yeah.  Once you say that, it couldn't be clearer. You're   fighting for your life. What wouldn't you  do? Exactly. Exactly. One of the things I  

think is also very interesting, and I I don't  know the answer to what exactly what happened,   but the Israelis were remarkably successful in  penetrating Iran intelligence-wise. Uh, and how   did they do that? Over the course of years, they  had recruited uh, a lot of Iranians. They had   flipped them essentially. And this is something  that the the Islamic Republic absolutely needs to   understand. That game is a game of numbers. If  you have a lot of options, a lot of candidates   that you could turn into a spy or to turn against  their own country to work for the MSAD, you will   get a larger number of them successfully flipped.  What the term is if there's a large number of   candidates, well, part of it is the repression  of the Islamic Republic itself. Because it was   so repressive, it actually created a very large  pool of people that the Israelis could turn to   and try to see which ones of them could they flip.  Three days before the war, those people started to   they had been extracted out of Iran, trained.  Three days before the war, they went back into   Iran and they were conducting attacks from inside  of Iranian territory, similar to the way that the   Ukrainians have done it in Russia. In fact, the  methodology seems to be identical. In this war,   we saw none of that. whatever happened either they  expended all of their uh Mossad assets inside the   country or something else happened because we just  did not see that same repeat of a pattern in this  

war and again I don't know the answer to it but  it is a very very big question mark exactly what   happened how were they so successful in June  and apparently achieved nothing in this war   in terms of penetrating Iran well the Iranians  rounded up a bunch of They certainly did and   I'm sure they also rounded up a large number of  innocent people that were executed. But again,   I don't know if that's the full answer. Will  attitudes change immediately during war? Yes,   absolutely. But those people were not It takes  much more than 6 months to be able to recruit them   and train them. So they would have to be recruited  and trained for a much longer period of time. So what does Israel do in the face of this?  Because just with the stipulation that this   is they're always talking about existential  threats, everything's an existential threat.   This feels like an actual existential threat  to Israel. I don't think it is an existential   threat. I think Israel's own security doctrine  is the real existential threat to Israel. I of   course I agree with you completely. I mean, if  Israeli assumptions about its that country's place   in the world, its own place in the world remain  unchanged, this is an existential threat to them.   like they have to change or else they have to  change. I agree with that. Absolutely. Uh and I I   want to point out one thing. This whole idea that  Iran is or was an existential threat was a talking   point. I'm aware of that. It is a talking point  that they always use in the United States because  

it was necessary to try to get the United States  to make Iran its top national security threat,   which in of themselves is absurd. Not to say  that Iran is not a challenge, but to be the top   national security threat. Go back to some of these  when the drug cartels control New Mexico are big,   which they do. And so our and parts of Texas and  Arizona and like our own countries collapsing,   the biggest threat is Iran. Look at the debates  in 2012. I think it was between Obama and Romney   or was it the vice president? I think it was  Obama and Romney. And the ABC anchor asked him,   Iran is the top net US national security threat.  I was like, how is this just accepted as fact?   You just keep repeating a lie and people just  start. This is something the Israelis had been   pushing for since 1994 or so. But the Israelis  themselves internally were not necessarily   saying this. Ephraim Halevi Parole, Mayor Dagan,  three consecutive uh heads of the Mossad openly   said Iran is not an existential threat. Iran is  a threat but is not an existential threat. Ahud   Barak, former prime minister, defense minister  already back then said to say that Iran is an   existential threat is to diminish Israel's own  power. But it was a very effective talking point   to push the United States towards believing that  the United States needs to attack Iran or sanction   Iran or just treat it as a top national security  threat because it is an existential threat. And in   the New York Times and all of these papers, it's  just as religion repeated that the Israelis view  

Iran as an existential. They never question as  to whether that is really how they see it. Well,   what's ever questioned is why that would be our  problem. True or false? That's an even deeper   question that would like, okay, I'm sorry that you  don't get along with one of your neighbors and you   feel deeply threatened. I, you know, good luck  resolving that. What do we have to do with that?   I you know I wrote my dissertation on Iranian  Israeli relations and I spent some time in   Iran and in Israel interviewing top officials  about this issue. I wanted to get to the heart   of the matter. I didn't want to rely on secondary  documents and I couldn't get access to the primary   documents. Of course they don't have that type of  transparency. So I needed to sit down with them.   And one thing that always came through with my  interviews with the Israelis. I had been in Iran   a couple of weeks earlier. So I almost every door  in Israel was open for me because in my email or   letter I told them I just came from Iran. And  I spent time interviewing top officials about   Israel. Do you have time to chat? And they almost  all did, including very senior people, including   people in the intelligence and community. Some  of the most valuable things I got from those   interviews were not my questions of them. Is that  they almost always kept me for another 30 minutes,   another 60 minutes interviewing me, trying to see  what I had found out. And government officials,   they always know how to conceal the true  motives, etc. When you ask them a question,   when they ask a question, they reveal what they're  actually looking for. I've noticed. And there you   could clearly see the premise was not that Iran  is an existential threat. The premise was not   that Iran is irrational or that it is suicidal. It  was exactly the opposite. That they were dealing  

with an adversary that was far more cautious,  calculating, and and rational. But in order to   get the United States on your side, you have to  portray a completely different image. That Iran   was suicidal, that it was uh irrational. Because  if they're irrational and suicidal, it means   diplomacy doesn't work. Of course, deterrence  doesn't work. And because they're suicidal, the   only thing that will work is to take preemptive  military action. Killing them before they kill   themselves and you. Yeah. Um but again I just have  to keep asking the same question. What option? I   mean in real life this leaves Israel in a ha,  you know, manufactured hysteria and hyperbole   and lying and propaganda. Leave that aside.  It's easy to be mesmerized by that and all of   Israel's many agents in the United States are all  hair on fire all the time. But like in real life,   I do think this is a major problem for Israel. Oh  yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. for real like biggest biggest   problem since 73 I would say and I'm worried that  by now they just don't have the creativity to   think in a different manner and adjust to meaning  if it's not an assassination it doesn't even seem   like a real solution to them I think look they  have a track record of successfully not only   preventing diplomacy between the US and Iran  sabotaging talks when they were happening even  

when a deal was struck, fight tooth and nail  against it in Congress and even when they lost two   years later convinced the next American president  to walk out of it. I remember I sat down with some   um folks from Apac after the JCPOA. I was  very involved in that fight and I thought   I was going to come there and kind of see, okay,  how are they going to adjust to this new reality?   Iran had been a cash cow for Apac since 1994. In  my first book, Treacherous Alliance, I I spent a   lot of time interviewing the Apac folks as well  on how they started just becoming so anti-Iran   um and become the leading force pushing for  sanctions, etc. Although they never said that they   pushed for war, it was very clear that they were.  And they said that, you know, once 1993, the Oslo   process started, Apac was having an existential  crisis. How are they going to raise money if their   cash cow Yaser Arafat no longer was a terrorist  but a peace partner? Exactly. And I have it   quoted from an Apac official saying that Iran was  what saved them because now suddenly all of the   focus was shifted towards Iran. It saved Apac. It  became a boon for fundraising particularly once   Ahmed became president and started questioning the  Holocaust etc. It was massively uh uh helpful for   them. Uh, so I thought that once we were going  to get there, I would see an AP pack that was   starting to have questions of how they're going  to adjust to the situation. And I walked away   realizing they're going to fight tooth and nail  to destroy this deal even once it's been achieved,  

even once it's starting to be implemented. And  I was I would suspect that the Israelis can   think of other options than to do exactly that if  there is a final deal. I don't see how that works   because the last sort of reservoir of support  for unconditional, you know, love of Israel in   the United States is Trump loyalists. And Trump is  now, you know, on the record attacking Netanyahu,   on the record endorsing this deal. How do  the Israelis blow that up? Everyone's going   to know if the deal falls apart. The Israelis  did it. Well, at this point, the Israelis are   not trying to hide their fingerprints in any way,  shape, or form. Very different from 20 years ago.   Basically, they're now on a course for  conflict with Trump, open conflict with Trump,   but their only supporters of the United States are  Trump voters. Yes. Well, look, so I mean, I don't,   you know, it's it's a very different environment  and they've played the last card unless I mean,   look, they still have Ted Cruz and Tom Cotton  and and Lindsey Graham in the Senate. Okay,   they got all and Tom Cotton just introduced this  bill or this amendment that would essentially   more or less merge US intelligence and Israeli  intellig uh intelligence by making it mandated for   the United States. He's the chairman of the Senate  Intel Committee. Mandate the one of the most evil   things that's ever come out of our Congress. It's  one of the most anti-American, you know. Anyway,   I encourage everyone go to Responsible Statecraft.  Uh what is that? What is the Tom Cotton story? I   don't know the story. I don't know exactly  why he ended up I mean he was a protetéé of  

u uh Bill Crystal and uh served in Iraq if I'm  not mistaken. I'm not really sure exactly how   deep his ideological commitment to this is or if  it's other reasons, but Paul Par, former CIA um   legend in many ways, someone who really stood up  against the manipulation of intelligence uh during   the Bush years uh trying to get us into that Iraq  war, has a fantastic piece laying out exactly what   this is on responsible statecraftraft and showing  that this is an extremely dangerous situation.   And what they're trying to do not only with that  but also with 224 is to in which they're trying   to take away the aid because the aid is public,  it's scrutinized, etc. They're all trying to do   it in some sort of a procurement um uh accounting  exercise. So it will continue to happen probably   even more money for Israel, but it will all be  hidden in the bureaucracy with no congressional   oversight. So they're recognizing exactly what  is happening. They're losing the American public,   but they can use some of their last juice that  they have in Washington to go push through these   different reforms and it will become a structural  impediment towards the type of healthy break,   healthy detachment. They should be in  prison, all of these people. But this   is happening right now. So when you're saying  that, look, they're losing Trump, you know, yes,   you're absolutely right, but they're doing other  things that will make it very difficult for future   presidents and members of Congress to be able  to break free from some of these things. What   So where is this process? It is right now in  the the NDA in Senate. It's going to be voted  

for if I'm not mistaken. Some parts of it has  already been voted for and now it's going to go   to a final vote. And this is happening in front  of the American pass. Most likely it will pass.   And what is it? Can you just summarize what it  will mean? Well, the intelligence part is really   devastating because essentially it means that it  is mandated for the US to share significant amount   of intelligence with the Israelis and it can only  be prevented if the president himself goes in and   stops certain things. The president does not have  the time should not have the time to micromanage   the intelligence relation. Why would the United  States share any intelligence with Israel? Why   would we be I mean there's always going to be  sharing of intelligence but it's going to be   very careful because we will get intelligence from  them. I have no idea whether the intelligence we   get from them is fundamentally untrue. Well that's  for certain and particularly when it comes to some   of the things that they try to sell us. I don't  know if that relationship is sufficiently balanced   but we're making it increasingly unbalanced  and essentially saying that for something to   be stopped the president has to intervene. And  this is also very problematic because it means   that we would have to share intelligence about  other partners that we have with the Israelis   that actually could be betraying them in a way.  So again, it's once again putting the relationship   with Israel above all other relations that the  United States above all other concerns including   like the most basic concern which is how is  America doing? Yeah. That's subordinated to   how do we support Israel? Absolutely. It's it's  and you look, I think because they see that the   writing is on the wall, that they're losing the  American public, they're trying to do as much as  

they can now before they're going to be faced with  an environment in which a lot of these things are   going to be completely unthinkable. And pushing  for this war, I think also Netanyahu thought of   it as probably his last chance. Of course,  I just I think that was clear in February.   This was their last chance. I mean, they're not  they're certainly not stupid and they're laser   focused on what they think their interests  are. I think they are not good at assessing   their own interests. I don't think they're  long-term thinkers. I think they're nihilists.   I think they're kind of crazy actually in their  behavior. Bombing Doha. Yeah. On September 9th   was But again, I we we have to also take some  responsibility when we have put forward so few   um consequences. We've created this. There's no  doubt on them doing things like this. We shouldn't   be surprised. When you see a child like this,  you point to the parents and you say, "You're   a bad parent for creating a kid like this." Oh,  I totally agree. It's our fault. I guess I just it I just don't see this getting resolved  peacefully and it feels like the United States   is vulnerable to attacks from Israel. I I can't  I can't even fathom what that would mean. I think   there's precedent for it. Um, yeah, there is there  is, but I mean that would be such a suicidal turn   of event uh turns of event for unless you lie  about it and classify everything for decades.   I think I think there there absolutely has to be  ways to prevent that. And again, these are not  

technically difficult measures. It's just making  sure you don't give any country Israel Saudi. If   the US and Iran has a relationship in the future,  I sure as hell hope that it doesn't get structured   like this because it's ultimately bad for both  sides. It's not good for Israel to have turned   into this type of a um having this type of  a security uh appraised welfare case. Yeah,   no, I agree. So, you know, we just have to take  away some of those things. And I think Joe Kent   has been right on the money of certain type of  restrictions that need to be imposed in my view   now. Not after they've done something, not even  as a threat. If they do it, take it away now.   Make it very clear they're not going to be able  to drag the US into another war. So, creating   false flags or creating these things is not going  to lead to the US re-entering the war. Once that   is entirely clear, the incentive to do so is or  at least the incentive to use those methods to   do so is going to be significantly diminished. So  I think there are a lot of means by which foreign   countries exert influence in the United States up  to and including violence and blackmail. That's   all real. But on the most basic and powerful  level, it's campaign contributions. It's the   donors pushing policies that the public doesn't  want. That's not good for the United States.   That's why Tom Cotton exists and Lindsey  Graham and the rest. So for the Republican   party to be a party that serves the interest  of its own country, an America first party,  

it has to break with these donors. You can't have  Miriam Adlesen who's not even an American. Yeah.   Use her gambling fortune to hijack the political  process. It's like do you think the Republican   party, Democratic party is hopeless in my view,  but the Republican party there was hope and now   it seems like until they break that addiction,  there's no hope. I frankly don't have any hope   with any of the parties right now unless they  fundamentally change the leadership. Um I think   we need to move towards a postartisan situation.  Yes. Um, I have to have to say, you know,   I'm very skeptical about the two-party system  when you have a public in which the spectrum of   views are as wide as they are right now. Yes.  If this was a European parliamentary system,   I'm not saying it's superior in all ways in any  way, shape, or form. But these two parties would   at least have been five or six parties. And many  of them would actually have been able to work much   better together because they were in different  parties. But now you put so many different views   in the same party and they're supposed to have  one line and it just creates all of this internal   infighting and it also shoots out pushes out a  huge amount of the spectrum that the American   public holds today. There's a reason why young  people don't watch mainstream media any longer.   They don't trust it. But it also is a very narrow  set of views that are constantly being presented   there. And those narrow views do not represent  the majority of Americans. I don't know. I I want   to believe I want to agree with you, but I don't  see I don't see any liberal democracy representing  

its population. It seems like no matter how many  parties you have, your options are neoonservative   foreign policy and neoliberal economic policy.  Yeah. Both of which are just totally wrong. Don't   serve the populations, destroy countries,  and they're so intertwined, by the way. I   know they are. And they're also just basically  immoral and anti-Christian from my perspective.   So um yeah, monopoly capitalism and more wars in  the Middle East for Israel. Like that's but that's   true. All European political parties support  this and the ones that don't are called Nazis   and like prevented from even participating. So I  think there are like no options under our current   system in any Western country. But correct me if  I'm wrong. You may be in a darker place than I am.   And it might be well just looking at the evidence.  Yeah, it may be because I haven't spent enough   time thinking about it. might be as skeptical  or cynical or just um pessimistic about the   situation. Um I do I mean you I've said it before  in order to be able to make any change you have to   have a degree of irrational optimism. If you're  entirely rational about the processes there's no   way you're going to be able to succeed. You have  to believe further. And again this may be a case   that's really wise. No that is wise what you just  said. You're you're absolutely right. But you also   have to marry that irrational optimism. Let's  go to like a rational understanding of what the   problems are and what the structural impediment.  Definitely. Yeah. Absolutely. Uh there should be   absolutely no illusion of what the problem is. And  the problem is as you pointed out the neoliberal  

economic system that is just destroying societies  left and right atomizing them uh combined and   again there is a strong link between that and  this essentially empire type of a foreign policy.   You know, I I helped co-found the Quincy Institute  and we named it after John Quincy Adams because   we wanted to remind Americans that there's  a long tradition of American foreign policy   that actually is nothing like what we're seeing  right now. Uh he gave that speech on July 4th,   1821 in which he said, "America goes not  abroad in search of monsters to destroy."   And later on in the passage, he points out if she  does, she can become the dictresses of the world,   but it will come at the expense of her own liberty  and her own spirit. Boy, that's exactly what we've   seen. The first thing that happened after 9/11  was the Patriot Act and the significant removal   of Americans civil liberties and it's just been  a trend that has continued ever since. Yes. So,   we were told the war started, the attacks  on New York and Washington were inspired   by a hatred of our freedoms. Yeah. By uh 19  Arabs with box cutters. Yeah. And then we   took away those freedoms. The first thing they  do is eliminate our freedoms. Yeah. Yeah. No,   I it was not locked on me. But it's important  because so many people have been led to believe   that the current foreign policy we have this  idea that we need to have liberal hegemony,   we have to dominate every corner of the world,  750 bases around the world, that that's what   we always have been. that this is like written  into the American DNA from the outset and it's  

just not true. We haven't the American Revolution  to get pride parades and that's kind it's kind of   why we did it. Yeah. Well, it the good news is  it's so absurd that it's going to come crashing   down within my lifetime without question. And you  know, the only question is like what do we get in   its place and I just really want it to be a good  thing. Yeah. But the but you don't think there's   any hope that the Republican party like changes  just in this one specific way that it stops taking   orders from people who don't put America look the  money bit outside of my expertise but the money   in politics obviously is I mean how could you  not conclude that that's going to be corrupting   particularly mindful of the manner in which the  amounts are just so astronomical as it is right   now and then there's also other areas that are  not astronomical but nevertheless are so opaque   non-transparent that it's become a loophole. So  for instance, one of the things uh our team Ben   Freeman and um Eli Clifton and Cleveland at uh  my shop really work on is the manner in which   American think tanks are taking huge amounts of  money from foreign governments. It's unbelievable.   And there's no transparency around it at all. If  you give $250 to an American candidate, it will be   in the public record and people can see that. But  you can give 10 million plus to a think tank that   pretends that it is completely neutral and then  they produce all of these different reports in  

support of the country that supported it or these  weapon companies that are giving that money and   there's no transparency at all. Most of the people  that are testifying in Congress are coming from   these think tanks. never have to announce in any  way, shape or form that I'm coming here to testify   about this specific problem, but you should know  I'm funded by this country that is very much part   of this problem or I'm very much I'm funded by the  weapons uh uh company that is producing the very   system that you're having a hearing about. That  transparency is completely non-existent. So, you   know, there's going to take a lot to be able to  change the system given how much it's essentially   been neoliberalized, totally corrupt. Remember  when I first learned that Heritage was taking   money from foreign countries or foreign interests?  I was like shocked by it. I couldn't believe. It   was a long time ago, too. I couldn't believe it.  Yeah. AI and Hudson and Brookings and, you know,   I think there are smart people. I know people at  all those places and they're smart and some of   them are good people, but the system itself is  just so rotten beyond redemption. So that kind   of but that is fixable. I mean, you could have a  piece of legislation that essentially ensures I   mean, you have it in California. You cannot I  mean, there's limitations on how much you can   give to a nonprofit. You could just make sure that  think tanks are the separate type of a category or   research institutes that have to have transparency  about who they are funded from. Uh you can have a   situation in which if someone is testifying in  Congress, they have to disclose any potential   conflicts of interest. There's ways to fix these  things and they're very simple. We just don't do  

it. It's just it's fascinating to me. Uh you're  born in Iran. You grew up in Sweden. You spent   most of your life in the United States, which is  why you don't have an accent, I think. Um but you   have the most But you're a foreigner. I didn't  even know you weren't a citizen. I just found out   and I want to ask you about this, but you have by  far the most pro-America kind of take on all this   of, you know, almost anyone in Washington, which  is kind of weird since you're not an American.   Um, but I think objectively you're you have  a pro-America position on on these questions   because you have a pro-America position. There was  this story that emerged last week, which is why I   called you initially, um, that there was a move to  get you deported. Can you explain what happened?   So, there was this hit piece in Bari Weiss's Free  Press, very ironic name, uh, for that outlet, uh,   that just listed, I mean, it was 10 pages long,  just listed this long, um, uh, list of lies   against me that has been repeated by the neocons  in Washington for the last 20 plus years. Well,   and, oh, I'm an agent of the Islamic Republic, all  of these different things. Uh, in order to kind of   cancel me, shut me down. You're an Iranian agent.  Exactly. I'm an Iranian agent essentially and   uh all of that. But the only thing that was new uh  is that they claimed that the State Department was   now investigating me in order to have me deported  and it took only a couple of hours but the State  

Department itself came out and denied this and  made clear that they have no plans of doing so at   least not for now. They said obviously so this ran  in and Barry Weiss is a free press which exists to   promote the interest of a foreign country Israel.  I mean that that's that's the reason there is a   free press is to promote Israeli government.  The elements that have been constantly trying   to silence me have come from that direction.  And it's a lot because of you know I I wrote my   dissertation which ended up becoming my first  book treacherous alliance on Israel and Iran.   And no one had written a book on it for about 20  years prior to me writing that book. But everyone   was constantly talking about it. It was on the  news all the time. Should we bomb Iran and all   of Iran is an existential threat. And I try to  get to the bottom of the story. And I did so by   actually really spending time in Israel to try  to understand their perspective, understand the   perspective of the Iranians and then do it as a  dissertation. uh but it revealed a very different   picture of what they were saying and I got a lot  of play in media and that really threatened them   and they started to do everything they could to  silence me. Later on when we started Quincy that   became an even greater threat because we were  trying to br build bridges between the anti-war   left and the anti-war right for such a long  time. Andy Basovich was one of the people Andy   Andrew Basovich the absolute legend was our first  chairman and one of the co-founders who had been   I mean I first dealt with him when he I worked at  the weekly standard run by Bill Crystal and he was   writing for us yeah at the time I thought of him  as a neocon and then his son was killed in Iraq  

and uh a war that was waged on behalf of Israeli  interest not American interests and he changed   this is my read as someone who doesn't know him  He changed before that. He did. He was against the   war from the outset. Towards the end of the 1990s,  he uh actually after he left the military, um he   started to I mean I think he's one of the absolute  sharpest and deepest American intellectual critics   of American. I agree with you. And so the the um  tragic loss of his son happened already after he   had completely turned against that foreign policy.  He was against the Iraq war from the outset.   his son still deployed went there and sadly got  killed. That's it's a but we were trying to build   bridges between the anti-war left and the anti-war  right. There had been collaboration between the   two sides. Roana was working with Mike Lee in the  Senate for instance to prevent to stop the support   for the war in Yemen. But it was episodic. It was  never something structural. And we thought that   if we can establish this institute that tried  to marry the two uh it would be a real strong   counter to the uni war uni party war machine. And  that became an even greater threat to uh than but   it remained this kind of tiny island in a sea of  people who disagreed with you in in Washington.   Well, at least there's an island. There wasn't  an island at all before we founded Quincy. I   guess what I'm saying is even though you represent  onetenth of 1% of you know opinion among powerful   people in DC but probably 80% of public opinion  nationally but within Washington like it's you  

and not many other people they couldn't tolerate  that. No no absolutely not they don't tolerate   anything. They don't tolerate the slightest  question marks because at the end of the day,   if people start to question the very foundational  premises of this foreign policy in a structured   and in a rational way, it's going to collapse. You  can't defend this. You can only silence the voices   that are trying to That is the truest thing  right there. And the more reasonable you are,   the bigger the threat you are. Absolutely. Yeah.  And I laid this out try to you know on my substack   try to explain exactly what happened here. And  I think the most critical thing that has caused   this significant spike against these attacks  because you know look they tried to silence   me for a long time. They never elevated it to try  to actually deport me. And I think a lot of that   has to do with the fact that despite the fact  you're absolutely right, we're a small island   in Washington, but nevertheless, there is an  island now and we are making inroads and we   certainly have the support of the American public.  That is a massive threat to that's for sure. So   this piece in Barry Weiss who now I guess runs C  CNN and CNN CBS I got to give her credit. I mean,   she is just, you know, mid-level IQ, zero talent,  very charming, relentless, great with people.   She's great with people and on the right side of  the donors. And she has done, she has outperformed  

her ability. Like, I've never seen it. Like,  America still is a land of opportunity for certain   kinds of people. Amazing. Uh, so she commissions  this or runs this piece that claims something   factually untrue that the State Department is  planning to deport you. Who wrote the piece? Uh,   the G guy's name is Jay Solomon who is a former  um he was fired from Wall Street Journal for   ethical violations. He was apparently involved  in an arms deal. What? With one of his sources   in the region as a reporter. As a reporter.  Yeah. So they fired him in 2017, I believe.   He was involved in an arms deal. Yeah. I mean,  this is all public. If I remember the details   correctly, he was involved in a lot of different  business deals with this source that he was   relying on a lot for his reporting. And at least  some of those uh uh business deals were actually   arms deals in the region and he was covering the  region. So, I've never heard of anything like   that before. Wow. But it's it's funny again, you  know, you can be on you can commit something as   egregious as that. and still have a successful  journalistic uh career afterwards as long as   you are on that side of the aisle because  that's where the money is. Barry Weiss can   run CNN. Yeah. Zero experience running any news  organization. I mean, the whole thing. Yeah. And   she made a name herself countering cancel culture  and most of what she's doing right now is exactly   that. Actually, she initially made a ma a name  for herself as a proponent of cancel culture,  

cancelling people critical of Israel. Exactly.  At Colombia. So that that's when I first read   about her. I don't know. Next thing I know, she's  like a conservative hero. Someone who shares not   a single one of my beliefs or values at all.  They're all repugnant to me. Socially liberal,   economically neoliberal. Um that that's not the  program that I thought I was defending. It's the   opposite. Pride parades, monopoly capitalism,  and bombing Iran. Okay. Now, um sorry. So I'm   the third worlder. Yeah. Okay. I'm the American  actually. Anyway, so she gets that guy to write a   piece falsely claiming that the State Department  is planning to deport you because you're not   enthusiastic. I don't know if it was falsely in  the sense that again I don't have full insight,   but we had a lot of conversations uh as well as  folk inside the administration that made it clear   this is not actually happening. And it may have  been that there was a rogue element inside the   administration who was wanted to push this. You  know, Laura Loomer had been tweeting about this   for weeks trying to get me deported. And really,  oh yeah, Lauren Lumer had like 7,000 retweets on   all of her tweets trying to get me deported.  This been going on for several weeks. Um,   and deported. How long have you been here?  I've been here since 2001. I have three   American kids. I love this country. I'm in the  process of getting a citizenship, but you know,   you've got three American you you've got three  kids born here. Born here, absolutely. Yeah.  

Born and bred here. Do you ever um Are you  on the SNAP program? You taking welfare? No. What are you MS-13? I don't think I am. Last time  I checked. You ever sold fentanyl? Never even seen   it. Okay. So So, but you're the priority. I'm  the priority. Exactly. Exactly. Interesting. So,   it seems like again a theory. I can't claim that  I have full evidence for it. That there were some   people inside that wanted to get this done who  thought that this hit piece would further push   um uh the State Department internal process to  move it forward. They even produced an AI video of   me getting arrested by ICE. It's actually I mean  it scared a lot of my family members cuz it's so   realistic. They even got my ball spot right in  the AI video. Um, and at the end of that video,   there's a smiling Marco Rubio, and it really made  it clear he is the audience for this video because   the the statue that they're using, he is the  ultimate decision maker on this. And what what's   the statute? Are you in violation? I don't know  the full details of it, but essentially that the   State Department determines that someone who is on  a green card is acting against the US's interest.   And the case they would use for that in me is that  I've opposed this war. I posed it for 25 years.   I've argued so strongly against what we have now  seen. There's no longer a theoretical argument.   It's practical. We've seen what a disaster  this is. I've argued in favor of diplomacy,  

argued in favor of a different approach  to the region, a different relationship,   not a hostile relationship to to Israel, but  nevertheless a different much more healthy   relationship. And that they are trying to say  is a threat to US national interest and the   basis for getting me. So what happens when this  is the logical outcome of conflating Israeli   interests and American interests or whatever  Netanyahu says Israeli interests are. By the way,   remember I mean that very premise is something  they would even disagree with because there's no   such thing as a difference between them. They're  one and the same. So you're not conflating   two different things. Israel and America's  interest from their perspective is the same. Um so you're not getting deported that you know  of? Not that I know of, but uh I don't think this   episode is entirely over. Uh I think this first  attempt by them probably backfired. There was   also a lot of public support that came out that  was completely organic. We had nothing to do with   that. That I think was uh potentially a factor in  all of this. I suspect that it was. But I don't   again as we talked I want to add to that organic  public support. Thank you because I think you're   one of the most reasonable pro-American voices  on this question. Yeah. But as you said before,   they're relentless and I am and the work of  Quincy is not designed to be against them. It's   designed to be in favor of a much better American  foreign policy that actually serves US interest   and serves the American people. It doesn't serve  the American people to be in these endless wars.  

it doesn't serve the American people that so  much of our involvement in the world is not   even structured to be based on our interests but  is based on the interests of our allies. I mean,   if you take a look at a m any average think  tank report in Washington DC on the Middle East,   if they even would bother to define what the US  interest in the region is, and often times they   don't even do that, but if they do, it would be  a long list of things and at the end it would be   stand with our allies as if that is a core vital  interest. What does that mean? That's a catchall   variable. That means whatever interest they have  is now suddenly our interest because we have to   stand by them. This is part of the reason why  we're at war all the time because the bar for   us to use military force, the bar for what is a  vital interest has just essentially been pushed   down to the very ground. Whatever some foreign  politician wants. Exactly. Do you think Gaza   changes everything? You can't do something like  that and get away with it. They will not get away   with it in the end. They will be punished for what  they've done. Everyone knows what they've done.   And anyone who defends it will be um diminished  at best, punished at worst as anyone who defended   the Nazis was in the end. And their memory is  soiled for all time cuz you whatever else you did,   you defended the Nazis. And no normal person  thinks that's good. It's awful. It's absolutely   terrible. And defending the genocide in Gaza is  not different from that. no matter what they say.  

Yeah. And we're also gonna have to reckon with our  role in this. We made it possible. And it started   under Biden, of course. And you know, Biden  explicitly, well, I don't know if he used the   term, but they said that the strategy they had was  to bear hug Israel, give it everything it wants,   and as a result of that have leverage to be able  to constrain the Israelis. It's a completely   nonsensical and idiotic approach. First of all,  it presumes that the US doesn't have leverage with   Israel unless it first gives Israel everything it  wants. The United States has tremendous amount of   leverage with Israel. It's just that we don't  have politicians with the backbone to use that   leverage. But the idea that once you've given  them everything, suddenly they would not go and   act as recklessly as they did is of course also  nonsensic. It was obvious that if we never imposed   any cost in which the B administration even lied  to Congress, Tony Blinken lied to Congress about   the fact that the State Department itself had  concluded in their reports that the Israelis   were violating international law in a manner that  would according to US law not make them eligible   for military support any longer. but lied to  Congress and said that that was not the case that   they have not come to any such finding whereas in  reality they had but they suppressed those reports   and you had several people resigning of course  from the administration not as many as I wish of   seen in fact I think it was a is a big point of  shame for the Democratic party that were so few  

power who wrote a book scolding the world for  tolerating genocide in Rwanda in 1994 aided and   emedded genocide she did sorry and then gets very  defensive when you ask her about it in Gaza. But   it it's it almost doesn't matter. Like everyone's  internalized this upside down moral structure   where criticizing the killing of innocents is the  crime. No, killing innocents is the crime. The   crime. We're supposed to object to that. And we're  just in upside down world. But everything returns   to true north in the end because it's nature. Yes.  Exactly. Exactly. And anyone who has defended this   or participated in it, knowingly sent money to it,  made excuses for it, attacked its critics, all of   those people are going to at some point be treated  as a betters of Nazism have been treated for the   last 80 years, which has, you know, accompllices  to a crime. And we're going to see the reckoning   of that in the Democratic party, I hope, because  whatever yet happens, whether they win in 2028 or   not, there's going to have to be um a reckoning.  There's going to be people rising up in that party   and their challenge to the existing leadership  is very much going to center on Gaza. And the   fact that the DNC reports it's a conversation.  Exactly. It's like you're lecturing me. Oh,   I'm sorry. You support the genocide in Gaza? I  don't have to listen to you. What are you even   talking about? Adults are talking. Right. And you  saw the DNC report that was going to be an autopsy  

of why they lost and they didn't even mention  the word Gaza in it. So they're still afraid of   touching this subject and that's going to be again  part of the reason why I'm skeptical about their   ability to be able to make the type of changes  that are necessary unless they have a complete   overhaul of that leadership at that point. It's  just crazy. I I'm sorry I will stop after this,   but it's like the I I don't like moral lectures.  I regret when I give them. I really don't like   receiving them. The self-righteousness is  disgusting. It's prohibited in Christianity,   by the way. But I just noticed a connection  between the people committing or making excuses   for the worst crimes of my life are also the most  self-righteous and the most to call themselves   victims and like attack you. It's like what?  Have you noticed this? Absolutely. I know it's,   you know, it's a selfp protection mechanism. I of  course it is. And I guess we all we all do it. No,   I not to have to deal with the reality that they  supported a genocide. You're right. And it's not   just supporters of Israel. It's like it's all of  us. We're all that way. People are that way. I'm   sure I've been that way. And I don't want to be  self-righteous in my attack on self-righteousness   cuz I do think people have that capacity. But it's  so ugly. Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. And then   when you make it into a foreign policy doctrine in  which we're going to run around and just lecture   every other country and think that all they're  yearning for in those countries is for us to come  

and save them and recreate them in our image. I  mean this is highly highly problematic and again   something I think the younger American demographic  is not on in line with at all. Recognizing that we   have plenty of learn to from everyone else and  they have plenty to learn from us. But you only   learn it if it's two-way street and if it's  voluntarily. No one is running around really   thinking that their 5,000year culture needs and  some sort of Americanization and neoliberalism   and McDonald's on every street corner. You know,  we have to be humble about these things about we   have to be humble about everything. Yeah. So  for people who've made it through these two   hours and want to know more about your views  and what you think the right path forward is,   where do they go? They should go to the Quincy  Institute's website which is quincy inst.org.   We have also a foreign policy magazine online  responsiblestatecraft.com or.org sorry. Uh that   has really become one of the biggest. Sure has.  And it's frequently cited even by mainstream media   now. And it's really a home for this alternative  restraint and realism um line of thinking which   is getting so much support. You've been proven  right. So that helps. Yeah. And they can go to   my Substack which is treat.substack.com or to  Twitter. But we're out there. Uh we're going to   continue to fight and and get our views out there.  And you know, you mentioned that we're an island,   but that was the entire point. You have to  take the fight to Washington at the end. Well,   it actually worked. And I I do think you have  reality on your side. It's a good thing to have on  

your side. Parcy, thank you very much for doing so  much for having me. Really appreciate. Thank you.

Neocons Move to Merge CIA & Mossad While Netanyahu Desperately Begs Trump Not to Leave His Side

Summary