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Hey, it's John. I want to talk to you about Shopify. A lot of people talk to me about starting podcasts. This podcast is 10 years old. It's in a different place from a lot of podcasts because we're obviously part of a nonprofit institution and it's not a way that we are seeking to earn our livelihoods. But a lot of people look at this and say this is something I can really do to create a business and run the business and do it in a really comfortable, practical and serious way. Gotta wear a lot of different hats when you start your own business. Can be very intimidating. But one of the things that I know from a lot of people is that if your to do list is growing and growing and growing and that list starts to overrun your life, you need a tool that not only helps you out, but simplifies everything that can be a game changer for millions of businesses. That tool is Shopify, the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world and 10% of all e commerce in the US from household names to brands. Just getting started. You get started with your own design studio. With hundreds of ready to use templates, Shopify helps you build a beautiful online store to match your brand style. You can accelerate your content creation because it's packed with helpful AI tools that write product descriptions, page headlines, and even enhance your product photography. You get the word out like you have a marketing team behind you. Easily create email and social media campaigns wherever your customers are scrolling or strolling. And best yet, Shopify is your commerce expert with world class expertise in everything from managing inventory to international shipping to processing returns and beyond. If you're ready to sell, you're ready for Shopify. Turn your big business idea into Kaching. With Shopify on your side, sign up for your $1 per month trial and start selling today at shopify.com commentary. Go to shopify.com commentary that's shopify.com commentary Hope for the.
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Expect the words Some.
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A
Preacher pain Some die of thirst no way of knowing this way it's going Hope for the best Expect the worst Hope for the best welcome to the Commentary Magazine daily podcast. Today is Wednesday, September 10, 2025. I am John but Horace, the editor of Commentary. With me as always, Executive Editor Abe Greenwald. Hi Abe.
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C
Hi John.
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Senior Editor Seth Mandel. Hi Seth.
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B
Hi John.
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A
And Washington Commentary columnist Matthew Got Netti. Matt, hi.
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D
Hi John. I have some news. I know that we have serious matters to discuss on this program, but I have to begin with a story that I saw yesterday and I thought was a joke, but I see this morning is actually real. And that is the news that Oliver north and Fawn hall are married. Yes, our audience of a certain age will remember Oliver north, the around Contra figure and his stunning secretary Fawn hall who were both caught up in that pseudo scandal, that whirlpool like so many others, including people we know and yet we have the them coming together at last in a secret marriage ceremony just last week. Oliver north is Now I believe 80. 81.
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A
81, I think.
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D
Yeah, yep. And Fawn hall is in her 65. 60s. 65. And so I know many people are excited about the Taylor Travis wedding forthcoming. But I just wanted to start the show with this because it's a certain like cosmic unity now that Ollie north and Fawn hall are together at last.
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A
When Oliver north testified before Congress after becoming a household name who had said nothing and would say nothing about his involvement with the Iran Contra scandal. So much so that there was an SNL sketch in which he was played by William Shatner where they sang the Ballad of the Mute Marine to the tune of the Ballad of the Green Berets. And Ollie north showed up on Capitol Hill and blew the Congress away at the congressional hearings with his charisma, his corn pone humor, his incredible fluidity and facility with facts and details and became a almost instantaneous kind of legend as a public figure. And since you brought it up, I just have to because I was. I'm fascinated by this story for many reasons. I knew Fawn Hall a little bit and have some personal involvement with the horrors that were the Iran Contra investigation. Ollie North. There was this idea that Ollie North's beautiful secretary Fawn hall might have been his mistress. And he. There was this detail about how north had traveler's checks that he had gotten from a Nicaraguan Contra named Adolfo Calero and that those travelers checks had been cashed at various stores in the Washington area, including one called Park Lane Hosiery. And the idea was had Ollie north gone and bought lingerie for Fawn Hall. And in a moment where he was choked with emotion, he said the following. I'm not going to quote this directly because it's a. It's a moment that helps define how politics in many ways changed going forward from Ollie North's appearance, how you could use go over the heads of the elite class directly to the American people. Even if you weren't a politician or even if you weren't Nixon, you could do this as a heretofore unknown person wearing a lot of medals on your chest and known to have been a war hero. And he said this. I want to make it very clear that when you put up things like Park Lane hosiery and you all snicker at it, and you know that I've got a beautiful secretary and the good Lord gave her the gift of beauty and people snicker that Ollie north might be. Might have been doing a little hanky panky with his secretary. Ollie north has been loyal to his wife since the day he married her. The fact is, I went to my best friend, meaning his wife, and I asked her, did I ever go to Park Lane hosiery? And you know what she told me? Of course you did, you old buffoon. You went there to buy leotards for our two little girls. And nothing was ever the same after that moment. And here we are 38 years later, and we should note that north died of cancer about a year ago and. And now Ollie North.
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D
And they reconnected and they've. They've been married and it was just. It was just a nostalgic moment for me to see those two names.
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A
I mean, it's weird for you to describe it as a nostalgic moment since you were seven.
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D
I know, but I was a news junkie at a very young age.
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A
Okay, fair enough.
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B
Our friend Holly north also wrote the episode of the Americans that was about their mission to infiltrate the Contras. Well, he's credited with it.
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A
Fake news.
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B
He's credited with it. And that's what happened.
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D
And that's an American hero. I wish them all the happiness in the world.
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A
Our friend Andy Ferguson was in the room, in the hearing room covering the Iran Contra joint Congressional Committee's hearings. And he said you could feel the air go out of the room for the first, from the first few minutes, meaning that, you know, they were basically going to deliver the coup de grace and bring down the Reagan administration by going at Ollie North's jugular. And instead he ate their lunch. So it was a big populist moment in a strange way. Anyway. Okay, so to go from the sublime to the ridiculous, or the ridiculous to the sublime, shall we say, talking about Ali north and Iran Contra and the history of Western civilization. Let me take a second and talk to you about what kind of education a free society requires to be able to examine such events as the Iran Contra hearings and the role of Oliver north, the National Security Council figure who was involved in this. Well, one place you can turn to, or one essential place is St. John's College, where students study the great books of Western civilization where they learn to think independently, hear others perspectives and understand the foundations of democratic society. It's an education for citizens, thought leaders and those who will carry forward the best of the American tradition. Our BA is equivalent to a double major in philosophy and the history of math and science and a double minor in literature and classical studies. It's demanding, it's not for everyone. It might be just right for your child. Learn more at sjc.edu. that's sjc.edu. and this puts me in mind of another moment in the north testimony when he was talking about his relationship with then CIA director or I'm not quite sure where he was, whether he had just died or not. But William Casey, who was his mentor and he said that William Casey was the most brilliant man that he had ever met. And they were once on a flight somewhere and Cayce had a big, thick, huge book and he read the entire book cover to cover on that flight and that it just showed what a studious, serious person he was. And someone said what was that book? And he said, I believe it was Modern Times by Paul Johnson.
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D
There you go.
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A
So a work about contemporary that fits very much in with the St. John's College Missions.
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D
Incredible work of history.
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A
Yes. And, and, and Paul Johnson, somebody who is, would represent the best of a St. John's College education. Not that he went to St. John's but. Okay. Abe Greenwald. Yesterday, after we got news that 10 Israeli bombs had struck in Doha, Doha, Qatar, against the Hamas abroad, as Israelis call it, the Hamas political leadership outside of Gaza that has been living comfortably in the Ritz Carlton in Doha for years while the population of Gaza sits there like their sock puppets and different kind of hostage to their ambitions than the hostages that they are holding so evilly somewhere in Gaza. We still don't know what the results of the strike are. And I think it's important to note that there's a lot of skepticism being expressed about whether or not senior targets were hit and maybe they weren't and we don't know. But I note that none of those senior targets has come out and waved at a camera to, to say, aha, you tried to get me and you didn't get me, and thumb their nose at the camera. It's not clear to me what's happening or to anybody what's happening and talk about all the responses. But Abe, in the immediate aftermath of the news that Israel had hit Doha, you wrote your newsletter and I wanted you to, to read it aloud. Obviously you could read it to yourself, but what good would that do? You wrote it now, and then we can use it as a jumping off point for our conversation. Please read it silently. Yeah, yeah, hold on. I'm almost like. I mean, die. Yeah, you read it aloud and then we'll all read it and then.
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D
Well, then we'll repeat it.
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A
Yeah, exactly.
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C
Okay, sure. It's called Israel Is Remaking the Map. It's becoming clear that Israel is in the process of creating a new world. In the pre October 7th world, legitimate governments let terrorists kill a little, then hide a little, negotiate a little and kill a little more, and Israel was expected to play along. In the world being born, Israel kills terrorists wherever they are and whatever point in their cycle. This is to be a world of greater moral coherence, swifter justice, and more enduring security. In short, it's a saner, more civilized world, which means the unstable populations of the west can't bear to watch it take shape. Too bad. You can wrap yourself in a keffiyeh and chant Hamas slogans from freshman year until you're eligible for Social Security. But Hamas, that entity that Israel supposedly couldn't destroy, is all but destroyed. Hezbollah is on its way out, the Houthis are under attack, Iran is under rubble, Assad, Syria is history, and Qatar is out of the terrorist resort business. You can board flotillas, declare phantom states, boycott companies, publish blood libels and propaganda images, blackball artists relitigate the entire history of the 20th century, and even attack Jews on the street. But none of it will stop the proud men and women of Israel from ridding the world of your terrorist heroes. None of it will defeat the Jews or extinguish the enduring flame of Zionism. And if you couldn't accept the long established fact of a Jewish state, you're really going to hate what comes next. Instead of Israel being erased from the map as Iran's leaders have long promised, Israel is redrawing the map and erasing its enemies as it goes along. It's toppling the Iranian imperium, reestablishing Lebanese sovereignty, laying the ground for a potentially stable Gaza, ensuring the Druze's place in Syria and more. I could note here that in taking out its enemies, Israel is also taking out enemies of the United States. But that's an argument in defense of Israel's actions and the and I no longer feel compelled to defend Israel for anything it's done since October 7, 2023. If you find yourself defending the very idea of Israel's survival, you're wasting precious breath on a weak mind or a wicked heart. The first cannot be made to understand righteous force and the second understands but abhors it. You're having an argument that doesn't matter. The only argument that matters, the only one that ever mattered, is the one Israel is making in the skies and on the battlefield. Not because might makes right, but because eliminating terrorist organizations and terror sponsors is a win for decency and humanity, no matter what jihad supporters have to say about it. Israel was morally in the right from the start of this war, whether or not it proved to be mighty as well. Thank God it did. So I'm not arguing, I'm praising. I'm praising Israel for its strength and clarity and for its steadfast vision of a world that refuses to accept terrorists as anything but targets in a gun scope.
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D
Great piece, great piece.
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A
And what's interesting to me about this conversation that we're now having is that you the war became the war that people like Jonathan Schanzer and others said it had to be in a way that Israel would have been initially unwilling to acknowledge that the course it had to pursue, which is to say that Hamas was the villain, Hamas was the evil, Hamas was the cause of the destruction. And Hamas needed and still needs to be destroyed. But Hamas is not a singular, unitary, isolated phenomenon. Hamas was part of a, an alliance directed by Iran, transnational that involved it Hezbollah in Jordan and Syria, the Houthis in Yemen and of course Iran itself. And as the war proceeded, it became clear that you there was no point in dealing with Gaza and Hamas in isolation, largely because Israel was not being let alone by Iran and its Kadamite organizations, but was still being challenged. Targeted shot at drones, missiled all of that and that its failure, it had to respond and to make its moves in order to secure its own future. Even these aggressive efforts, the Beeper operation, the bombing of Beirut, the bombing of obviously leading up to the bombing of the Iranian nuclear sites were fundamentally defensive, not offensive. It was not. Israel does not, you know, is not looking to create regime change in Iran, though it would like it or wasn't looking to create regime change in Syria, though that has happened. It was pursuing its own interest and trying to secure the safety of its own population within its borders. And therefore the map that it is remaking, it is remaking not because it has a messianic ambition to redraw the contours of the world order, but in pursuit of a very tangible, realistic and necessary self interested goal. And I was thinking of a moment in our war in Iraq where We did not do what logic would have required us to do in the same way had we viewed the war in Iraq properly and conducted it properly, which is that Iran was attacking the United States inside Iraq. Iranian proxies and literal Iranian forces. Something like 600 to 1,000Americans died in either direct or indirect Iranian attacks on American forces in Iraq. And we refused to retaliate. And my father actually had a conversation with George W. Bush in which he, he went to the White House to urge that Bush hit Iran's nuclear sites. And Bush said, you know, I can't, we can't expand the war out. And we have, you know, we need to, we need to secure Iraq and we're in Afghanistan and we can't expand the war out. And maybe this was just an absolutely wrong headed, as we can now see 17 years later, wrong headed idea because there was no way to win the war in Iraq without dealing with Iran. There was no. The logic of what we were doing in Iran also would have necessitated us taking action against Iraq. And what is, what Israel has done since October 7th is follow the logic of what it meant to protect Israel against these threats that could not rise up again in the future. Which is why the attack in Doha is so important, because that was the last redoubt. This small group of people, the political leadership of Hamas that was, had been granted some kind of immunity. They were directing, leading, raising money, whatever it was that they were, whatever they're doing in Qatar and they were immune from the war.
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Well, it's also the difference in, when you say expand, right? I think the lesson of that is that it wouldn't have expanded the war to take out Iran's nuclear sites. Because the point is that Iran joining the war against the United States in Iraq had expanded the war, we would have simply met the enemy. That's what Israel is doing. That's the point Israel is making, right, that it's not expanding the war. Hamas is. No one made Hamas go to Qatar. No one made them go and direct terrorism against Israel from abroad, from Qatar, from Turkey, from Iran, where, you know, a previous Hamas leader was taken out in Tehran last year. Nobody is making them expand their map of the war against Israel. It was not Israel's choice for, you know, the Slaver Putschitz in Yemen to fire rockets at, shut down, you know, maritime business on the, in the, on the Red Sea route and then fire drones into Israel. It was all these things, were somebody else expanding the war already and Israel fighting back. And that's, I think the key point is the definition of, you know, the word that gets used more often is escalation. Was an escalation because Israel struck at somebody who had already been striking at Israel. And it's called an escalation. And I think that that's the lesson from the we can't expand the war is that the war has expanded. And you can decide whether or not to, you know, tie a hand behind your back or, or restrain yourself. But the war cannot be stopped from expanding. It already has expanded.
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A
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D
Was call out this false distinction between Hamas's military wing in Gaza and the quote unquote political leadership that resided abroad a lot in Qatar. There's also some in Turkey. And what Israel is saying is it doesn't matter if you put on your peace negotiator cap, nor does it matter if you put on an Al Jazeera vest. If you're a terrorist. If you're tied to Hamas, we're going to take you out. And this was a very important strike. We don't know the actual results of the strike quite yet, but it's important for a few reasons. One collapsing that false distinction. Two, showing up Qatar as a two faced regional power that's played both sides for a decade or more and Qatar now has the distinction of being bombed by both Iran and Israel in the space of a few months. That just a military representation of how this Janus faced regime. Can't, can't walk, you know, can't, can't play both sides forever without cost. And then the third thing that I think makes the strike important isn't so much the strike itself, but it's what was declared right at the moment of the strike, which was a full evacuation order for Gaza City. And this means that the IDF incursion into Gaza City, which has already been going on for some time, is going to take on the full task of rooting out Hamas from Gaza City, destroying the Hamas tunnel and skyscraper infrastructure. This means that Netanyahu has convinced his security cabinet to or persuaded his security cabinet that the goal here is destroying Hamas. And as Abe says, this can be done. When you take the constraints off and you say if you are a member of Hamas, it doesn't matter what role you play in the organization and it doesn't matter where you happen to be in a given moment, Israel is going to take you out.
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A
I think even more to the point, or kind of a reverse version of the point Netanyahu said yesterday this war can end tomorrow. We have hit Lamas leadership in Doha. We have made it clear that we do not consider them, that we are, that they are now part of our targeting if they weren't killed yesterday. Now Donald Trump said this is the one time you get to hit Doha basically is what, what he said. Whether he means it, we can get into that a little later. But he said this could end tomorrow, meaning he willing to call off the operation in Gaza City, return the hostages alive and dead and the war will end tomorrow. That's what, what he has said. This has been the American and Israeli position now for a week or two, basically all the hostages back, no more negotiations by the way, not even the offer on the table that was rejected, which was all the hostages back, cease fire and thousands of political prisoners. I think the thousands of political prisoners thing is now off the table, but he is willing to suspend the operation to go door to door in Gaza City. Now I don't know why Hamas apparently I think it was clear by releasing the hostage videos that they released and, and various other things over the, over the last two weeks. They are worried, they're frightened, they're, they do not want whatever Hamas is in Gaza. They do not want this systematic urban warfare, door to door fight and they would prefer not to have it and they would like to temporize and play games with negotiations. To see if they can put it off. They know, by the way, Israel has a record of successful operations in this regard, not only in Gaza over the last two years, but in Jenin a generation ago when they went into this west bank town and destroyed the entire infrastructure of the second intifada, which was the. These bomb making, these suicide belt making factories and training grounds and all that. So it is written in the Palestinian consciousness that Israel knows how to do this. Did it before, it can do it again, it can do it on the scale. And so maybe this could really be an end to it. And we'll see what happens. Because every time Israel acts and there's like, haram thing and, you know, Israel's, it's really, oh, boy, you know, now we don't know what's going to happen. And, you know, the counterattack would be really savage and terrible and, you know, everyone needs to live in a shelter for a year and all of that. And the net result, as Seth has been writing, you know, on our blog for two years now, is the history of Israel's aggressive efforts to defend itself against its enemies is generally the response of its enemies, which is to turn tail or to say, okay, you do. All right. We were basically, we're full of hot air. We're going to go back and, you know, go. We're stopping now. Let's. Let's drop this, you know, okay. Uncle. They don't even say uncle. It's more like, okay, we gave it a shot. You made it clear you're tough. We're going to sort of go back in our hole now and talk about the.
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C
Well, they also, I just want to say the enemies always say that they did damage to Israel.
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A
Right? Yeah.
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C
And then they turn tail.
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A
Well, they tell, they tell their own people that they did. Right.
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D
So just to talk about the harrumphing.
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A
Yeah.
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D
For a moment, I'm really struck by the liberal commentary on the strike because it boils down to a lament for the end of the negotiating process. But David Ignatius says in his column today in the Washington Post is, you know, the tragedy here of the Israeli strike against the Hamas leadership in Qatar is there's just no way to negotiate an end to the war after this. And on my new. My new Hate Listen, I have.
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A
I'm a new one. Oh, good.
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D
Spreading my wings. My friend Ryan Williams recommended a new Hate Listen. It's the Playbook daily podcast, Dasha Burns. And I like Dasha Burns, I should just say, but her colleague is, is going to be good fodder for the podcast, he went on a rant about how can you end a war when you blow up the negotiating team? To describe Khaled Mashal and his evil cohort as a negotiating team is moral and intellectual lunacy of the highest order. These are terrorist masterminds. They don't want to end the war.
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C
Sure.
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D
They want to end the war on their terms. Their terms is the IDF just picks up and goes home. Right. And that, because that's been the Hamas demand for two years, there has been no diplomatic solution to this war, and there won't be one. So this strike, one of its many messages, I mentioned a few of the others, is that, you know, time's up, guys. You either give us the hostages or not. This continued back and forth where we make all these proposals. We get Witkoff in there, we say, well, how many Palestinians can be exchanged for one Israeli hostage who hasn't been seen by the Red Cross in two years? Even as you have this propaganda campaign that's convinced all the dunces of the world that there's starvation and famine in Gaza. That's done. We're now just going to roll back your organization. And that's why I think even if some of these evildoers survived the strike, they're not going to show up in Qatar anymore. That's their fair game now. You know, it might not be. Might not be an airstrike next time. It might be a drone.
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B
The message was to Qatar really not my.
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D
It might be a Mossad agent. Finally, the Haram thing about Israel's violation of Qatari sovereignty. Everyone who's making this argument should just kind of, I don't know, roll the tape back to 2011 and examined their feelings. When Barack Obama ordered SEAL Team 6 to cross the border into Pakistan to destroy Osama bin Laden, that was a violation of Pakistani sovereignty.
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A
Well, what about. What about every Obama drone strike? During the Obama administration, there were hundreds of drone strikes. Again, terrorist targets, Yemen, and by the.
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B
Way, taking out bin Laden. That was the end of negotiations with bin Laden. How are you going to make peace with bin Laden when he's at the bottom of the seat?
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A
Also, philosophically, not to get pretentious, but logically, wars don't end by negotiation. Wars end when somebody says, when somebody loses, when somebody wins. And this is a liberal delusion, totally, that has been going on, and by the way, with great success, because we've written about this, we've published articles about this, we've talked about this on the podcast. The United States has not won a War since World War II. I mean, it's one it won in Panama one and one in Grenada. I even think we won in Iraq. But it's not like the enemy sat down and said, we're done. We're out. You win, we lose. Appomattox was not a negotiation.
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D
Right.
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A
It was robbery. Lee coming. It was coming in in supposedly honorable fashion, to surrender and not being killed on the way in the door, even though he was the leader of the opposing army, given immunity to sit down and sign the terms of surrender. This notion, the negotiations, are a way of keeping the hostage problem alive forever. Because what are they negotiating? They're not negotiating over the return of all the hostages. There is no negotiation necessary. They return all the hostages. They're negotiating over the return of 10 and then keeping 10 and then 4 and keeping 6 and holding onto the bodies and not returning the bodies. That's what the negotiations are over. The negotiations are over allowing them to continue the war in using the one asset they have to fight Israel and make and put Israel in this intolerable position.
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D
It's the point Abe makes. You can't defeat Hamas when you let Hamas sit in luxury hotels in Doha and negotiate for its own survival.
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B
Can I read something today from the Washington Post that underlines this? Especially what Abe wrote, but underlines the point? Okay. Today's Washington Post has a story on Elizabeth Surkoff, who. Who was a researcher and writer taken hostage in Iraq by an Iranian militia two years ago, and she has been released. I think now she's at the US Embassy in Iraq, but she has been released from captivity. And I know her a little bit. I'm very happy that she is out. But here's the Washington Post. From the Washington Post story on Elizabeth Zirkov's release, a senior Iraqi official, who also spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive diplomacy, said Kataib Hezbollah, the name of the terror organization that took her hostage, was convinced its leaders would be targeted by Israel for assassination, quote, which is why they eventually gave in, end, quote. The official said, quote, both sides agreed that her release would spare Iraq from. From being dragged into the regional conflict. So there were negotiations for two years. But here's the Washington Post saying Elizabeth Zherkov is free because Israel goes around taking out terrorist leaders. And Kataib Hezbollah in Iraq assumed they'd be next once they heard that Israel wanted Surkov.
- [40:52]
A
Well, you're missing a. You're missing an important point, which is also a point about the American Israel relationship and how remarkable things are. Elizabeth Serkhoff is not an American citizen. She's an Israeli citizen. Her sister is an American citizen. Not only is she an Israeli citizen, she worked for former Commentary roastee Natan Sharansky. She was at Princeton. She was doing research for a doctoral dissertation from Princeton when she was taken captive. But. So there are two faces of this. Number one, they're afraid that they're next, that Israel will feel no compunction about going into Iraq and figuring out how to rescue Tsurkov and destroying this Hezbollah offshoot. Number one. And number two, America negotiated the release so that we have here the ability. Israel provides the muscle. America says, all right, let's make the deal. Will, Will, Will. Israel will. Get Israel to agree not to pursue you. You. You let us, you know, you let her go. Yeah. Without Israel going cross border like you say, as it has in the past, really since September of 2024 with, you know, with, with its actions in, you know, bombing Beirut particularly, and then moving on and doing stuff in the last couple of weeks where they're, you know, going into Syria and working to protect the Druze in Syria from. From these terrorist forces because of the deal, because of the spiritual connection between Israel and the Druze population in Israel. Yeah. Remarkably creative things can happen when people, you know, the prospect of a hanging concentrates the mind wonderfully, as Samuel Johnson said. And that's what's going on here. And it's important from this moment forward that this weird characterization of this strike, since we don't know what its end effect was of being a success or a failure, and it being failure, if it took out, you know, know, if it didn't take out Khalid Mashal and the others.
- [43:12]
D
Oh, well, the preposterous. The pro Hamas side is just rushing to declare it a failure. It's incredible.
- [43:20]
A
But, but so are. But so are liberal for. I mean, there is the oh, no, how are they going to negotiate line, and then there's the well, a, they only got one shot. Trump says, you're not going to go into gutter again. You're in trouble. Those guys are going to be dead by Israeli force. Maybe not. Maybe it didn't happen yesterday, maybe it won't happen tomorrow. Every single one of them is a dead man. Israel established this precept in 72 after the Munich massacre. It killed every single person once it figured out who they were, who were the leaders and participants in the Black September massacre. And it was a very, very important thing to do because the world in which Israelis were being, you know, this didn't happen again. You know, 11 guys take, you know, 14 guys taking 11 Israelis hostage. Then there was Entebbe. Then the, then the taking of Israeli hostages stopped for 20 for 30 years until Gilad Shalit was kidnapped or there were a couple of other incidents.
- [44:32]
B
And by Inteb, you mean violating the sacred soil of Uganda.
- [44:37]
A
Uganda, exactly. But I mean, I'm just saying, like, these things, they change the rules on the ground, which is Abe's ultimate point is they're talking about Israel is sort of changing the map, but they change the rules on the ground. Khaled Mashal's life is different today if he's alive than it was yesterday, and it will be different forevermore. He will never be able to step outside anywhere on this planet without thinking that there is a red laser target.
- [45:07]
D
And it's not going to end well. Right. The lesson from Hassan Nasrallah or Yaya Sinwar or his brother, at the end of the day, Israel is going to get you and this protective shield you thought you had in Doha, Qatar, no longer exists.
- [45:24]
A
And it was. Yeah, it was the last protective shield. Okay, go ahead.
- [45:27]
D
We should probably talk a little bit about the American response, because there is very bad.
- [45:32]
A
Which is, which is everybody. Can I just say quickly, before we go into the details, everything that was said yesterday, the fact that you have to. You. You need to be a scholar of. Able to analyze Finnegan's wake and make sense to under. To parse what Trump said yesterday and make sense out of it is a sign that everything that he said yesterday is disingenuous and people need to understand that. I don't know in what way it's dis. I don't know at what time the Israelis informed America that it was doing this. I don't know if America was more or less involved. I don't know if he's mad at Israel or he's not mad at Israel. My guess is we were involved. He's not mad at Israel. He's signaling in his own way that he's not. He said it's a worthy goal to eliminate Hamas. Who shouldn't have done that? Our friends in gutter. That's not good. He had to say that. It's a, it's a, it's an exercise in disingenuousness. As far as I can tell. I could be wrong. I've been wrong.
- [46:39]
B
I think.
- [46:39]
C
I don't think you're wrong at all. Just, just, just. Because, briefly. Because when Trump is displeased with another head of state for doing something, it's very clear. There's no mistaking. And this was nothing like that.
- [46:53]
D
Or even look at how he enforced his ceasefire with the 12 day war. He dropped the F bomb, right. He was very deliberate in showing that the conflict needed to stop.
- [47:07]
A
Well, my sister, by the way, pointed out to me on the phone yesterday that he said a couple of days ago we should have a peace deal or the hostage be coming home in about two weeks. The last time he said, I think there's going to be some form of a deal to end the Iranian nuclear program in about two weeks was three days before the strike.
- [47:30]
D
And remember his truth just a few days ago, saying this, Hamas, this is your last warning. And yeah, I confess on this myself and others on this program and other programs voice skepticism. Oh, is this really going to be the last chance? Well, it seems, it seems like it. And even before the Trump truth, there had been some reporting by Amit Seagal, the Israeli journalist and others that the Americans and the Israelis were discussing how to increase pressure on Hamas Hamas. And part of those discussions involved actually targeting the Hamas officials and personnel inside, inside Qatar. So this did not come out of nowhere. I mean, it was a surprise attack. When we all got the phone notifications, it was like, wow. But if you look retrospectively, you can see that there were some signs of this being prepared at the. As an aside, what Amit reported at the time, I think it was last week, was that there was major concern that Hamas would try to stop the Gaza incursion by killing one of the hostages. And that if that were to happen, then he, his sources said the Hamas leadership would be targeted in Qatar. We seem to have, well, two things happen.
- [48:52]
A
Two things happened in Israel in the two days before, right. And Bibi Netanyahu said this at the American Embassy. He happened to go to the American Embassy yesterday. It was a, there had been a Fourth of July celebration at the American Embassy that was postponed because of the Iran conflict. And so it was rescheduled for yesterday, September 9th. And Bibi, who had sent a video message instead went in person and apparently said, or it was, you know, that the killing of four Israeli soldiers in Gaza who were ambushed and then this, this bus murder spree in Ramot at the, at the gates of Jerusalem, at the, like the entry to Jerusalem. The day before that, that was when they said, okay, you know, not no more Mr. Nice Guy, but we're, you know, we're done playing footsie. They're trying to escalate the battle. They're hinting that they want to start inflaming the west bank with this remote attack. We are. We are going. We can't not. We can't leave them immune no longer, no more.
- [50:19]
D
And what I think Trump is doing is playing the same sort of game that the Saudis and other Gulf states have done for years, which is they publicly denounce. And Trump didn't even really denounce it. He said, well, I'm a little unhappy, Unfortunate. Unfortunate that this happened. But what the Egyptians and the Saudis routinely do is they'll denounce an Israeli action publicly. Well, privately, they're all for it when. When they're targeting Hamas, which both the Saudis and the Egyptians would like to see erased from the earth just as much as the Israelis and Americans would. So Trump's statements need to be taken with some skepticism that is just not present in a lot of the media coverage. I also see some reporters kind of rushing to brand what happened yesterday. As, you know, Bibi really embarrassed Trump. Well, how is this an embarrassment of Trump? Trump? Trump is an Israel supporter. Trump has said this was Hamas's last chance, even in his kind of discursive Joycean statement that you mentioned, John. He said Hamas needs to be destroyed and the hostages need to be freed, which neither of which can be done with this leadership remaining in place. Moreover, one thing we haven't really been paying attention to, there is a serious effort on Capitol Hill championed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, to declare the Muslim Brotherhood, of which Hamas is a member, a terrorist organization.
- [51:54]
A
Yeah.
- [51:55]
D
So this is.
- [51:56]
A
It's. It is.
- [51:57]
D
It just. Liberals just have to understand this is a pro Israel administration.
- [52:02]
B
Okay.
- [52:02]
D
The Republican Party is pro Israel. And. And this is the type of action that will be taken now that you would not see under a Democratic administration.
- [52:10]
A
Okay, I need to. I need to echo your point here about the media and the coverage, because the story, the specific story I think you're mostly referring to is in the New York Times by Erica L. Green. And I want to read a little bit of it because it's demented and. And I can't believe that it was published.
- [52:30]
B
And if you had to suffer reading it, the rest of us have to suffer as well.
- [52:34]
A
Right. And what it shows is, so the New York two leaders in the world that the people who populate places hate the most are Donald Trump and Bibi Netanyahu. I think it's fair to say that they are the two most hated people in sort of the world of liberal opinion. Right. So the question is, who's hated more And I would say this story makes it clear that right now, right at this moment, Netanyahu's hated a little more. Because here's the only story you'll ever read in the New York Times about how Donald Trump has been treated unfairly by someone is this story by Erica L. Green. President Trump said on Tuesday that he found out about Israel's airstrike in Qatar from the United States military rather than Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whom he often describes as both a friend and his strongest ally in the Middle East. It was a familiar surprise. In June, Israel launched a 12 day war with Iran with minimal notice, initially drawing a rebuke from Washington until Mr. Trump decided to join in on what he saw as a winning campaign. Blah, blah, blah. This is not what happened in June. The United States was intimately involved in the 12 day war with Iran. It was not a surprise. Israel did not go at Iran in a surprise. That was, it wasn't a joint operation. That's not the right way to look at it. But if you think that Trump decided that he was going to hit Iran at the end of the 12 days only because it really looked good there for a couple of minutes when they ended up creating entirely new battle plans, flight plans worldwide, ways in which the B2s flew in order to evade notice and went the other way that they would have, and all of that. The New York Times is willing to buy Donald Trump's possibly disingenuous complaint that Bibi caught him unawares yesterday because they hate Bibi more. In this one instance, they're willing to say Trump's not a liar and that, oh, you know, Israel really shouldn't have done this to its one friend and ally. How is this a way to treat Donald Trump, Bibi Netanyahu? That's nuts. That's not the story of the last three months, which has been Trump pressuring Bibi to end the war by beating Hamas.
- [55:09]
B
This was, I mean, I mean, can we just, I think we should just say it. This was a message from Trump to Qatar. That's really, that's, that's the big story here, is that we all agree that, that Trump knew and approved of it, right? I mean, it's, it's unthinkable the way things have gone, really, that it would have been otherwise. Which means it's a message from Trump to Qatar. Trump said, you know, it's time to get a deal done or end the war. And Qatar is the one hosting these Hamas nicks. And obviously, if Qatar is going to have all These, you know, people keep saying, well, you know, we've entrusted Qatar with doing this and, and Qatar, we've entrusted Qatar with, you know, transferring funds to Hamas to try to keep things quiet in Gaza over the years. So isn't this really awful?
- [55:58]
A
No.
- [55:58]
B
The point is that if you give somebody, put somebody in a position of influence, they need to use their influence. We put Qatar in a position of influence with Hamas. They are in a position to tell Hamas, you have to leave now. They are in a position to stop transferring cash to Hamas nicks in Gaza. They are in the position to cut off lifelines to Hamas or to use the threat of cutting off those lifelines to coerce Hamas into agreeing to these deals. And they're not doing it. This was Trump saying to Qatar, you're useless.
- [56:38]
A
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B
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- [57:39]
C
Say, to the extent that it was that I'm pretty shocked, pleased. But I didn't think he had that in him because of all the entanglements. So much playing footsie with the Qataris and the rest of it. So this was yet this was a sort of another pleasant surprise from him.
- [58:02]
A
If we follow this logic, and I'm not sure I'm willing to say that we know enough to say without question that what that the scenario that you laid out, Seth, is true. It makes perfect sense in this sense, which is that we think that he's a little supplicatory toward gutter, right? Because they're buying the Trump coin and they Witkoff has deals and they're making deals and all of that. Trump doesn't think that he is anybody's, that he is indebted to anyone. He thinks everybody's indebted to him. And if Gutter there may have been, who knows, there may have been some moment in which Gutter acted as though they seem to think that they had him in his pocket. And at that moment, he's got to take him. Trump logic would say, let me just, you know, take a, take a battering ram and smash your door open. Don't, don't think for a minute that you have one up on me. I. That's not you. You do not understand the balance of power here. I'm the most powerful man in the world and you're this, you know, little, you know, oil, you know, this oil rig that has a, that has our base on it, you know, with 3 million Arab slaves doing all your work for you. And I don't, you know, I, you can go hang, you know, I'll, I'll, I'll. Again, I don't know this, you know, I'll let Israel blow up your hotel. What do I care? Who the hell do you think you are?
- [59:44]
D
I mean, I think that's the thing. He doesn't, he doesn't care. And I think it's worth comparing his attitude toward Israel and his policies toward Israel and Iran and terrorism with his lack of action in Ukraine and Europe. Just last night, briefly, it seems Polish airspace was closed and Polish jet fighters had to disarm destroy Russian drones that transited into over Poland as part of an attack on Ukraine. There's, you know, it's unknown whether this was intentional on Russia's part. Zelensky seems to think it was. Others seem to think it was. That Russia deliberately flew the shahed drones into Poland, another provocation that Putin has enacted since the Alaska summit. These extremely deadly attacks on Ukraine. No movement toward a cease fire. And yet Trump has not imposed any sanctions on Russia since Alaska, despite having many cars he can play. And so the question is why? And what I think is going on is this administration cares about the homeland. And to the extent it cares about the homeland and the drug crisis, it therefore cares about the Western Hemisphere. But what we are seeing is it does not really care about any other region. And so in the Middle East, Israel is a regional superpower. It takes action, is against terrorism in the same way that the United States says it's against terrorism. And so Trump is like, yeah, you do what you need to do, and we're going to work with you. And when this window of opportunity to strike the Iranian nuclear program, which is a direct threat to the United States, opens up, we're going to we're going to seize that opportunity. What's he doing in Europe and Ukraine? Well, right now it seems the administration is spending most of its time and energy arguing with the Europeans to do more. Arguing with the Europeans to impose secondary sanctions, to continue to reduce the percentage of Russian oil that the Europeans have been purchasing throughout the conflict with Ukraine. And I even think arguing with the Europeans to do more to defend. Defend Ukrainian airspace. Right, to create some type of de facto cease fire by essentially insulating Ukraine's civilian population through air defenses. But America is not. America's not there. And America is more concerned about Venezuela, the Panama Canal trend, and blowing up the drug smuggling boats.
- [62:53]
A
You know, I think this is a really interesting point, that if Europe were behaving toward Russia the way. Granted, this is a weird analogy, because it's not, but we're behaving toward Russia the way that Israel is behaving in the Middle east, toward. I see no sign that he would not be entirely supportive. Every time Europe says it wants to step up and help Ukraine increase its defense spending, you know, be a bulwark, do whatever it can, he praises the Europeans. He says, this is great, you guys, are you. You're really changing. I'm so glad I pushed you to do this. If they were to say after what happened yesterday that obviously Poland is a member of NATO, an attack on one is an attack on all, and that just doesn't involve the United States. States, they're on the front lines. Let them fashion a military response to Russia's aggression in over flights over a NATO ally. And, you know, they don't really want to do it. They want to. They do. They don't. They want. They want, as has been the case for the last 70 years, they want us to take the lead. I would prefer that we take the lead because we're better at it than they are. But he's the president. He's got his head. I don't think he would stand in their way. As I say, I think he would be probably impressed and happy that somebody let this cup pass from his lips.
- [64:26]
D
And this is why the European criticism of Israel is so despicable. Because on the day of the strike against Hamas in Qatar, Ursula van der Leyden of the European Union Union announced a full slate of sanctions against Israel. So here's this representative of this decadent, declining continent, a continent that has seen its economic power vanish, its military power vanish, its cultural power vanish, attack and attempt to degrade the sole democracy in the Middle east, right, that has been on a Campaign of self defense against enemies that want to destroy it, but has the capacity and the will to actually achieve its goals. And so the envy, the grievance that's like at the root of this European hatred of Israel and the Jews on full display here.
- [65:33]
C
And also, I just want to say Israel's enemy is part of the axis that is on Europe's doorstep.
- [65:41]
D
I mean, Iran. And those are shahed drones.
- [65:45]
C
Absolutely, yes.
- [65:47]
B
And they were. And they were Iranian missiles that were being shot into Ukrainian territory until Israel literally blew up the factory building those rockets.
- [66:02]
A
So obviously the European countries that we're talking about, particularly obviously Macron, is in the middle of a political crisis. I, I will frankly admit I don't understand. And I don't understand because I'm not reading about it, because I don't care. I don't care about French internal politics. They can all drop dead as far as I'm concerned. But he's in the middle of a political crisis. He Great Britain, France, Germany, what do they all have in common? Fast growing Muslim populations that have increasing political power. And we cannot look at the rise in anti Semitism and this decision to go at Israel and be so aggressive against Israel without understanding the domestic political ramifications inside these countries, which, as Stephen Pollard wrote when in commentary, when, when the Labour Party won its gigantic election last year and Keir Starmer became the Prime Minister, was the high watermark for labor that election, and that its popularity was going to instantly start to decline. And as a result, the Muslim cohort inside the Labor Party was going to become more and more and more and more important, such that a Muslim Brotherhood aligned person is now the Home Secretary in the uk. Now, why do I bring this up? Aside from the fact that it seems a weird echo of Michelle Wellebeck's 2015 novel Submission, about how France gets taken over by an Islamic regime, which was sort of like a kind of Swiftian warning about the future that now doesn't seem so swift in or like it, you know, or like a kind of dystopia, but some kind of a possibility over the next generation. Everything that's going to go on over the next two weeks, whatever's going on at the UN with the declaration of the Palestinian state, All of this has to be understood in light of the fact that Europe is now, European politics is now turning on an axis that involves the Muslim immigrants and the Muslim cohort that is becoming increasingly powerful. And what does that do? Implicitly, it implicitly makes the case, and I say this as I've said for many years, as an immigration dove for Trump's extraordinarily aggressive anti illegal immigration policies, we're seeing Europe's civilization turn in a terrifying direction. I don't think that that's what immigration means here, but I do think that the view, the view of Europe becoming a kind of satrapy of this sort just gives ballast in some fundamental sense to Trump's argument that immigration is a net negative for the United States, not a net positive. I'm still not willing to believe that myself. Well, I mean, because we're a different kind of culture and a different kind of society.
- [69:40]
C
But I think it could have happened here. So given the certain, a run of certain type of leadership, it could have happened.
- [69:49]
A
A little bit of it has happened here. A little bit. We took in 450,000 Somalis. And who is the leading Somali in the United States now? Ilhan Omar.
- [70:00]
D
And he's the leading Palestinian.
- [70:02]
A
Yeah. Rashida Tali.
- [70:03]
D
And who will be the high, like, prominent Muslim politician in America next January?
- [70:08]
A
Imam Donnie. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [70:10]
B
Right.
- [70:11]
A
So, yeah, it's no joke, like it's a real thing that these three people not born in the United States are in positions of either power authority or spiritual or social authority or something like that. And so, you know, we, I'm just saying that what, what Trump would like to see, I think is some old fashioned, oh, you flow a drone over, over Poland here. We're going to, you know, we're going to give you, we're going to give you. Go give them a zette. Don't let them do that to you. I'm not going to stop them, but you better stop them. And I don't know what's wrong with that.
- [70:52]
D
No, I don't think there's anything wrong with it. I do, I do think it's not going to happen because of the European weakness. And what that means, though, in the absence of an American response, is that it's just going to get worse.
- [71:03]
A
Right.
- [71:03]
D
And so last night was, I think, incredibly alarming for those of us, incredibly alarming who want somehow to contain the conflict.
- [71:12]
A
Right, right.
- [71:12]
D
In Europe.
- [71:13]
A
Yeah. I mean, unless something went wrong. And, you know, it's not as though the Russians are incredibly, you know, militarily competent in the way.
- [71:23]
D
But he's the way Putin has been acting, though.
- [71:25]
A
Yeah, I know.
- [71:26]
D
It seemed like it was an accident.
- [71:28]
A
Right.
- [71:29]
B
And Poland is, is also, it's not just its own NATO country, but it is a key part of support, the support structure for Ukraine. I mean, in other words, Poland is.
- [71:41]
A
It is.
- [71:42]
B
It's not. It's not. It's not crazy at all to think that Putin sees Poland having to brush back Poland as key to his ability to finally conquer Ukraine.
- [71:57]
A
Absolutely. Okay, we'll leave it there. Back tomorrow. For Seth, Abe and Matt, I'm John Potoretz. Keep the candle bur for a limited time at McDonald's, get a Big Mac Extra Value meal for $8. That means two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun, and medium fries. And a drink. We may need to change that jingle. Prices and participation may vary.