← The Majority Report with Sam Seder
The Majority Report with Sam Seder
3539 - Israel Bombs Damascus, Tariff Induced Inflation Starts to Rise w/ Meron Rapaport
01:12:59
Despite Emma's absence, it's hump day Wednesday and there's a lot to talk about. Inflation is slowly starting to rise to its highest number since February. The effects of these tariffs will be rearing their head eventually. Award winning Israeli...
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Sam Seder
You are listening to a free version of the Majority Report. Support this show@jointhemajorityreport.com and get an extra hour of content daily. It is Wednesday, July 16, 2025. My name is Sam Seder. This is the five time award winning Majority Report. We are broadcasting live steps from the industrially ravaged Gowanus Canal in the heartland of America, downtown Brooklyn, usa. On the program today as Israel bombs Damascus, cuts off water and electricity to UNWRA in Gaza, attempts to expel an Arab member of Knesset, Baron Rapoport award winning Israeli journalist and editor of the Local call, contributor to 972 Mag. Also on the program today, Trump to Bondi released the Epstein stuff that doesn't include me. Also on the program today, Stan, it moves ahead with its $9 billion rescission. More cuts. Trump tells Texas to do a rare mid decade gerrymander ostensibly to pick up five Republican seats in the House. Meanwhile, a Trump appointed Texas judge overrules a Biden era Consumer Financial Protection Bureau rule to remove medical debt from credit reports. Florida lawyers still denied access to their clients. And DeSantis's Gulag Dem leadership okays Democratic votes for Republican crypto bills but suggests they don't. Amid Trump's tariff threat and trade investigation. Lula approval rating rises in Brazil. And the Pentagon safely withdraws 2,000American troops from the city of Los Angeles. Trump releases more Trump meme coins adding $100 million to his wallet. And Josh Hawley supposedly wants to repeal the Medicaid cuts that Josh Hawley just voted in favor of. All this and more on today's Majority Report. Welcome ladies and gentlemen. Thanks so much for joining us. Emma Vigeland out today. However, it still remains hump day. More on that as we proceed. A lot to talk about today as per usual. I mean I say that every day now, but there was a time where I wouldn't say there's that much to talk about. We got new inflation numbers yesterday and some today. The wholesale inflation numbers are somewhat muted. However, it is clear that we're starting to get dribs and drabs of the tariff inflation. However, if you were to listen to someone say, like Larry Kudlow, I think Larry Kudlow shows us that if we do enough day drinking, we really barely can see anything. Go ahead. That hits. All right, so let me ask you about this. Energy was up a little in this report. Wait, no, no, I got to go back. Go back. Sorry, one second. Well, that clip started in the end of it. Here it is. Tariff inflation. Okay, so bear with me. Yes, some items are affected by tariffs and the prices have gone up. Okay? Household furnishing being one, computers being another. But Sean, here's what fell in this report and no one's reporting this, okay? Used cars down, new cars down, airline fares down. Prices, eggs down, snacks down, hotel and motel price. This is should just say got to go back here. But there's a reason why airline fares are down and that is because tourism is down dramatically. International tourism is down dramatically. And you have international travelers not coming to the States. It's starting to feel, they're starting to feel it in, in places like Vegas in Florida and New York, California, all across the country, especially any place that gets Canadian travelers like Maine. I've seen a lot of reports and that's, and that's not going to impact necessarily flights. Right, right. But, but flights are down and so prices come down. The other thing that's happening is our, our economy is contracting, so demand is starting to soften for some of these things. But go back, we're still getting the inflation from the things that would be impacted by tariffs and we haven't even seen nothing yet. Go ahead. Fell in this report and no one's reporting this, okay? Used cars down, new cars down, airline fares down. They all fell their prices. Eggs down, okay? Eggs are not down. Snacks down, hotel and motel prices down. Milk down, butter down, cereals down. I mean, come on, there's no energy inflation here. Energy down, that hits. All right, so let me ask you about this. Energy was up a little in this report, okay? Gas prices are at the low. Okay? So there you have it. And this is probably a functioning to the extent that these things have, have fallen, some of them, you know, we have less of a bird flu issue with the, with the cattle and that's probably why we're see of those prices down. But utility inflation 14%. Car insurance 6% electricity 5.8%. Meat and eggs, eggs are not down, ladies and gentlemen, 5.6%. Car repairs. In other words, people are, are not in the market to buy cars as much as they are going in and getting their cars fixed. Homeowner inflation up by 4%. Hospital services inflation, rent 3, almost 4%. Food away from home 3.8%. And here is Justin Wolfers, who we're going to have on the program next week in anticipation of August 1, which may or may not be a firm or sort of firm or slightly firm, maybe somewhat flaccid deadline for Donald Trump in his retaliatory tariffs. But here's Justin Wolfers explaining why we're not seeing as much tariff inflation as anticipated on Liberation Day, which, remember, Liberation Day was postponed. We're not quite liberated yet. We may be again in August. But that's not a firm liberation. It's somewhat limp liberation. But here's Justin Wolfers. Are the tariffs raising prices here at home a little bit for now and a lot more in the future. So just to explain that to viewers at home, the first of the tariffs, the first two big tariffs came in in April. They didn't apply to goods that were already on ships. It takes about a month for a ship to get from China to the US Then they have to get through customs. So that takes us from April to May and then May to June. And so this was the June data. So we're just starting to see it in things like apparel appliances and the like. But given that the big tariffs actually weren't even on back in April, then there is that two month delay and then stores have to decide whether or not they want to change their prices. This is, you are extremely accurate in saying this is going to play out a little slower than I think a lot of the news media are ready for. So we don't know when that's going to hit. But because we don't know what's going to happen with these tariffs in August. But inflation's coming, there's no doubt about it. Donald Trump is now, it is being reported as of just an hour ago, maybe a little bit less. He has supposedly made the decision to fire Jerome Powell. That's not the way it usually works. And presumably he's going to do so for a Fed chair who will come in and cut rates, I would imagine aggressively. That doesn't necessarily mean that the rest of the board of the Fed board will go along with it. We'll see. But in the event that the tariff inflation hits at a time where they start to lower interest rates, that could be quite a problem heading into 2026, at least in the midterms for the Republicans. But they've got a couple of plans and the polling doesn't look as good as one might hope at this juncture. We will talk about that later in the program. First, we got a couple of words from our sponsors. First off, oh, it's I always appreciate when we get these, these ads because it reminds me to take it. I've been taking Neutrophil now for about a year and a half and I did so because I started getting a little bit thinning. I'm getting up there in age one of my, one of my few attributes at an age this thing is that my, my hair is in pretty good shape. And so we had some bottles of Neutral fall around for a while. I started taking those. 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That's blueland.com majority get 15% off. Also, I also highly recommend the cleaning bottles because you can buy three plastic spray bottles, color coded and then they send you tablets that are also color coded in just paper packaging. You drop one in, fill it full of water, cost you about $2 and I don't know, $2.50 maybe. And you got great cleaning products. All you save room. It's awesome. Check it out. We will put the links to those products in the podcast and YouTube subscription. Now we're going to take a quick break. When we come back, Maron Rapoport, award winning Israeli journalist, editor of the local call, contributor 972mag. Lots obviously to talk about what's going on in Israel and its slaughter in Gaza and increasingly its attempts to expel Palestinians and the violence that's taking place there in the west bank, not to mention the bombing of Syria. We'll be right back. It it. We are back. Sam Cedar on the Majority Report. Emma Vigland out today. Want to welcome back to the program Marone Rapaport. He's an award winning Israeli journalist and editor of the Local call, contributor to 972 magazine. Maron, it's been some time since we spoke in just, I don't know, a couple hours ago, Israel bombed Damascus. I wanted to get your sense of this from my perspective. It seems that the new regime and leadership in Syria has really been doing everything it can to disincentivize or to, I guess, appease Israel. And yet the, the bombing happened today. What's your sense of what, what that's about?
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Maron Rapoport
It's a little bit hard to say, but I would, I think it's true that the Syrian regime, it's not clear what is this regime. Still, Ashara is trying to appease Israel. That's the sense he's giving public statement and otherwise. At the same time, it seems that Syria is not really under his control. It's not very clear if these are soldiers of the government, if these that are attacking the Druze in Syria, are they some kind of militia that Ashara does not control? It does not seem to have full control over Syria, maybe around Damascus and Aleppo, but not in other parts of Syria, certainly not in the north where the Kurds are and maybe not in the west where the Alawis are and not in Druze area to the south. So it's not very clear. And Israel is pushed by two things. One is the sort of commitment to the Druze in Israel who are serving in the army and are pushing very hard to an intervention. And secondly, I think Israel has developed since, for at least a year or even more sense that it is the hegemonic force in the Middle east and it will decide who will govern where and how in the Middle East.
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Sam Seder
How much? I mean, my sense is that over the course of the past year plus, we have seen Israel wage a campaign against Hezbollah, obviously Hamas, but also obviously the people in Gaza, civilians in Gaza and the Houthis. And that seemed to be a predicate to attacking Iran by making sure that any potential Iranian proxies or those might be sympathetic for Iran or an attack on Iran might open up other opportunities for others to attack Israel. Is it your sense that this, this is in any way a. A predicate to resuming a bombing of Iran in any way?
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Maron Rapoport
I'm not sure about Iran, but I think the whole proxy theory is quite, not, not too strong. I think, yes, Hezbollah was certainly a proxy of Iran and so were the Assad regime to a certain extent or to a large extent. Hamas is not. It's not really a proxy of Iran. It did not decide to attack Israel because Iran told it to do so. It's quite clear now, and certainly now the current regime in Syria is anti. Iran has more or less allowed Israel to attack Iran during the 12 days war. So it is certainly when it is attacking Damascus, it is not attacking a proxy of Iran. It is attacking a force that does not obey Israel orders. That's more or less, I think if you look at it in this way, then you can understand it better.
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Sam Seder
All right, let's turn to Gaza. It's unclear to me what the status of any type of ceasefire talks are, other than to say broadly, it does not feel like the Israeli government has any interest at the end of the day of any type of ceasefire that goes beyond its own sort of, I guess, its own timetable. There's increasing talk of attempting to ghettoize, I guess, to shrink the size of the ghetto that Palestinians are in. And just yesterday, the power and electricity was cut off to UNWRA providing, trying to provide at least some aid. We had, I think, 28 aid seekers killed yesterday. Is there. I'm curious, from your perspective, the appetite for the Israeli population, is there any forces? It's certainly not coming from the United States, as far as I can tell. But are there any influences that may change the direction of what Israel is doing in Gaza?
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Maron Rapoport
We are in a very strange situation at the moment, according to the polls. There was a recent poll, I think On Friday and Channel 12, the biggest, the most popular one and the most credible one, at least in the Israeli public's eye, saying that 82% of Israelis want a ceasefire, want an end to the war in return to releasing the hostages, and only 12% wants the. Want the war to go on. This is huge. I cannot think of any so called democratic state in modern history where we have seen such numbers. I'm not that familiar with the Vietnam War, but I'm sure that in no stage it was 82 against 12. This is, I think, unprecedented in any democratic country. And you ask yourself, how can a government can continue a war where the huge majority of its population of its citizens are against it? And then you reach the conclusion that this is really Israel is governed today by a very small group of very extreme right wings that are in government and are not going to give up. And all the demonstration that were held in the last two years did not achieve anything, no matter how big they were. I think in a paradoxical way, I think the only. And Trump who came in with great promises that he will stop the war in a week or no time at.
- [28:42]
Sam Seder
All.
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Maron Rapoport
Is he is proving himself that if there was one thing he does not know is the art of the deal. He does not know how to make a deal. Not in Ukraine and not in Israel, Palestine. So there's no real pressure from Trump. I think, strangely enough, the only force that can stop the war now is the army itself, is the Israeli army itself. There are signs that first of all, the army is very, the soldiers very, very fed up, tired people don't show up to the reserve. Even among the regular army, people are not, not willing to come in. And there's a lot of, you know, I see it from the amount of soldiers that are talking to the press. What we didn't see in the beginning that nobody spoke to the press. Now it's, it's a wave of soldiers talking about what they do in Gaza and how they oppose it and so forth. But above it, I think the army itself, even the Chief of staff, is hinting that it has more or less fulfilled its task in Gaza. It cannot go further. The talk, the talk, it's not the talk. The Minister of Defense, Israel Katz and Prime Minister Netanyahu are talking openly about building a humanitarian city in the south of Gaza Strip, which is practically a concentration camp, because people would be allowed in, but not out. And I think the army itself understand that these are crimes against humanity and they are quite hesitant to go that far. The government wants the Ethnic cleansing of Gaza. This is what Netanyahu wants. This is what Saul Katz wants. This is what Basar Smotrich wants. Itamar Bengvi, all these people, they openly say that they want the ethnic cleansing of Gaza. I think the army is a little bit hesitant. If the army will say no, I think then there is a problem.
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Sam Seder
How do you reconcile? And I'm curious because that 82% poll and, and you'd have a better sense of I than whether that's an outlier poll. We've seen polls that, you know, something like that go in the other direction. We've seen polls that have suggested there are no, you know, no innocence in Gaza. I'm curious as to like, what has been the trajectory? Was there a particular inciting event recently that turned things there? Or is it just simply some form of attrition? Is it your sense that it's coming out of a sympathy for or a repulsion of what's happening in Gaza, or rather and exhaustion?
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Maron Rapoport
It is certainly there is a repulsion of what Israel is doing. It's more than we have seen in the last 21 months since the beginning of the war. We are hearing more and more voices, even from the mainstream. The ex Prime Minister Eud Olmert, coming from the right wing is almost doing a campaign. Likewise Bogie Alon, ex Minister of Defense and the ex Chief of Staff and ex Likud member. And not to speak about soldiers and other voices that are growing up. But this is not the main force that pushing for ceasefire. I think it's attrition and I think in again after the war, in the end of the war in Iran.
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Sam Seder
That.
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Maron Rapoport
Is still conceived victory in Israel. I think the Israeli population is asking itself, okay, if we have won over Iran this mighty power that can destroy us or was supposed to have the ability to wipe Israel off the map, is it impossible to have a ceasefire with Hamas completely broken, have very little arms that can really hit Israel? Is it really impossible to have a ceasefire with them, to have the same arrangement even that we have with Iran? There's no formal ceasefire with Iran. Israel just stopped bombing and Iran stopped bombing. Is it not possible to do the same with Hamas? And of course, 21 months, the hostages, the attrition, the soldiers that are being killed, almost, you know, almost every two days there's one soldier killed at least. So all this I think is a mounting. The pressure is mounting. But as I said, I think Netanyahu does not heed to this pressure coming towards popular pressure. It doesn't really care because he has a majority. But you have to add here one thing. I think Netanyahu, and we've seen now the problem in the coalition, he has lost the majority in the, in the parliament just today. Shass Party, another ultra religious party, has withdrew from the government and it has now it's a minority government at the moment. So I think that he has a weak government. And I think Netanyahu is considering maybe for the first time really having a ceasefire and ending the war and releasing all the hostages and go to an early election with claiming that he won over Iran, he won over Hezbollah, he toppled Assad, he crushed Hamas, he destroyed Gaza and Gaza is no longer a threat. And in this way he can go to an early election and maybe have a chance to win because according to the polls now he's lagging behind. And with the hostages at his side, Salah Netanyahu, his wife and him, you know, having fought up with the hostages, I think he may consider that this is a chance to win the election that are already not that far away anyhow. We will have an election anyhow in a year's time, in a year and three months time. So he may be considering. I think he's still afraid. He's afraid first of all that his government will fall more quickly than he wants. But I think there is, and I think I said it before, I think for Netanyahu he is really hesitant, really hates to see the war ends. Because I think Netanyahu is afraid that once the war end, some pet towards negotiation with the Palestinian on some kind of a Palestinian state under pressure by the Gulf state and others and Europe and other. He really is afraid that the end of the war may lead to at least a beginning of such a process. And Netanyahu heritage, he came into politics 30 years ago in order to prevent the Palestinian state. That's his goal in life. That's the heritage he wants to leave behind. And if he will finish the war and we'll see the beginning of a process towards a Palestinian state, that will mean that all what he did in Israeli politics in the last 30 years has failed. And I think this is why Netanyahu is so hesitant. Although he sees now a reason to end the war politically for political gains.
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Sam Seder
And how much, I mean, I know that how much does the potential charges against him also continue to play a role in his decision making?
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Maron Rapoport
I tend to think that less there are many commentators that think that this is the main thing. I think less, I think he sees that that he, if there is an attrition. It's the, the judges, the attrition is in the court. He is, he's not winning the trial, but he's not losing. The trial may go on for years. It may go on for at least two years. So I'm not sure that this is the main, the main thing, yes, of course, if, if he will not be prime minister, then, you know, the pace of the trial will certainly will be, you know, it will be more quick and maybe also the sentence. But, but I'm not sure that this is really the main fear of Netanyahu.
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Sam Seder
Let's talk about what's happening in the West Bank. One of the things that was reported in the run up to the US election was that Muriel Adelson was leveraging her 120 some odd million dollar outside expenditure on behalf of Donald Trump in return for US recognition of the annexation of the West Bank. And there's some, you know, past performance is no guarantee of future results. But Miriam Adelson got what she wanted last time in the form of the embassy in Jerusalem, or I should say the US Embassy in Jerusalem. And as a bonus, I guess she got the annexation of the Golan Heights. What is. You've written a piece about militias in the west bank. And this should, I should also say, and I don't know that this, you would have a better sense obviously, than I, the US Lifted its sanctions on violent settlers in the West Bank. I'm sure that's not the only green light that they were getting at all, but it's, I guess it makes that green more vibrant, perhaps. Tell us what's been going on there, because we've had some discussion over the past couple of weeks here about the plan to begin to sort of create facts on the ground to pave the way for annexation. What have you found in your reporting?
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Maron Rapoport
I think annexation is one thing and the action of the settlers in the west bank is another. They are interrelated, but not necessarily the same thing. There's certainly, if we have talked about militia before, I think now it's almost an army. The settlers are acting as an army. They have central command. It does seem that I'm talking about what is called the youth heels on the youth of youth. I think this is now, it's not some sporadic local action. These are planned geographically. They first of all pushed most of the Palestinian communities in the east part, eastern part of the West Bank. Now they are moving westward towards Ramallah and Nablus, trying to push, attacking regularly Palestinian villages and towns. This is very Organized. The idea is really to cleanse this area and from Palestinian and widen the settlement and the settlers control. This is very clear. At the same time, they do declare that they want annexation. I think what there are more aiming is, is ethnic cleansing. I think they see what's going on in Gaza. They want to imitate what is being done in Gaza, either in destroying the central, the refugee camps in the west bank, this is being done in Jenin and Turkaren and elsewhere, and putting a lot of pressure on the population. And they want to imitate and they want that the army will do the same thing that he's doing in Gaza, start to push the Palestinian population. And so annexation. I think certainly Smotrich and Nathaniel Bengri and others in the Likud Party also are very keen on annexation. I think Netanyahu is more hesitant there. I think he understands, or at least he is afraid that annexation will be a first step towards a binational state. Maybe not now, but over the years, if Israel will annex the west bank, then the way towards a binational state is quite open. Yes, at the beginning it will be an apartheid state, formal apartheid state, but at the end, as we've seen in South Africa, it will lead to a binational state. And Netanyahu prefers to leave things as they are, that there is some kind of Palestinian Authority that is responsible for running the lives of the Palestinian in the west bank, that he has someone to blame and that they are not part of Israel as such, that there is some kind of an illusion that this is not a final status. I think Netanyahu prefers it. Smotrich, who is messianic, does not think in these realistic terms. I think that there is an historic opportunity, maybe he's right to annex and it's not clear who will have the upper hand. But for the time being, what is being done is using this army, this militia army of the settlers. They're not. They don't need great numbers because they are aided by the army to really attack systematically the Palestinian now on the eastern part and slowly moving towards the central part of the West Bank.
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Sam Seder
You write too that recently they have begun attacking the Israeli soldiers. What is the sense of your average Israeli citizen as to what is going on there? I mean, I would imagine the attacks on the Israeli soldiers is influencing their perspective on the settlers. But prior to that distinct of that, because it also seems to me that as the settlers are doing this ethnic cleansing, they are in their minds paving the way for an easier annexation that would be less likely to end up as a binational state. But where is the Israeli population? On what has been going on in the West Bank? Has there been a. An increase in awareness of what's going on there or has there been just a. A determination not to know or what.
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Maron Rapoport
The settlers and are not popular, even extremely not popular. I think Smartrich, you know, who is the strong man of the government. In the government current currently is the strongest person, seems like the strongest person, maybe sometimes stronger than Netanyahu does not pass the threshold in order to enter the next parliament. He is below the 3%, 3.3.25% needed to enter the parliament. So he's not popular. The settlers are not popular in the Israel and certainly settler tax on soldiers only. Only affect their popularity even worse, make the popularity even worse. But they are in power. They are. They have a very strong symbiotic relation with the army in the West Bank. Many of the commanders in the West Banks are settlers themselves. So there is, you know, even when they attack, they attack the soldiers, the soldiers themselves, or at least their commanders, then they try to say, no, the settlers were not that violent. It's not their fault. There was misunderstanding, things like that. We have to remember, of course, that Bengal controls the police. He is the Minister of Internal Security, so he controls the police. The police are supposed to do these inquiries, not the army. So these inquiries are not being done. And the Israeli public is aware to a certain extent, of course, not out of sympathy to this, to the Palestinian, but Israel, you know, calling Smotovich and Benvir messianic became very common in, you know, in the protest against the government. So they're not popular, but they have the power, they have the army, they have arms. And the Palestinian cannot really resist because every time they try to resist, the army comes in and kill them.
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Sam Seder
I want to just turn to the piece that you wrote just a couple of days ago about the attempt to oust Eamon Odette, a member of Hadash, a. An Israeli Knesset member, an Arab Israeli Knesset member. That that effort failed yesterday. But, and, and I have to say that I read your piece. We had it translated into English from Hebrew. So it's, you know, some of the nuance may be gone, but the. Your sense is that this is an attempt to change, to change the, I guess the national character from a. A nation state into a tribe. And you know, I mean, to some extent it feels from the outside like that's, that's that you're already there. But tell us more about that.
- [50:13]
Maron Rapoport
Yes, I think it's a piece I wrote with Amir Fakhoury who is himself as a Palestinian citizen of Israel. Yes, I think to a certain extent Israel from the first, from the beginning is some kind of ethnocratic state where the Jews are the dominant Jewish state. So it exists from the early days of Israel. But I think what's happening now, it's not only. It was not only an attack on Ayman Ode as a parliamentarian and an attack on the Palestinian minority and trying to dissuade them from going to the polls to vote to win the election. I think what we have wrote in our piece is that there is an attack also on the Palestinian citizens of Israel, also in the civil side, meaning there was an attack on the. As maybe you don't know, but something like 40% of the personnel in the health services are Palestinian, Palestinian citizen officers, something like 40% doctors, nurses and medical staff. So there was an attack on this, trying to prevent them. A member of the Knesset from the Likud attacked them and said that they should not be. They should not go to the. To. To. To. To be doctors and things like that. This is, you know, really one of the biggest gains, let's say, of the Arab minority in Israel in terms of prestige that, you know, everyone goes to a hospital and. And sees Arab doctors, but also in terms of economic success, because the Arab middle class, there is some kind of an Arab middle class in Israel and it is based to a large extent on doctors, lawyers, etc. So there is an attack on this also. And I think really that the whole notion of how Israel is fighting in Gaza is really fighting as a tribe. It does not represent no more estate. You know, soldiers are chanting Amisrael High. The people of Israel is alive. Long live the people of Israel. This is something that of course exists always, but now really it's. It seems that Israel is acting as more and more in a tribe. But we have to say that this has failed. And this is quite interesting and maybe a little bit encouraging in the sense that at the beginning when this move against Simon Oda began, many in the center left joined in. Yair Lapid, the head of the opposition, joined in and said, yes, he thought, and maybe others in the center left thought that, you know, that going against the Palestinian minority will gain them votes and they will look patriotic and then gain votes. But what happened is that the protest movement that is very strong now in Israel declared quite openly that any leader that will support Aymean Order demise, expulsion of Aymean Order from the Knesset from the Parliament will not be allowed to approach these manifestations. And there was a pressure, a mounting pressure coming from this manifestation movement against these leaders, representative of the center left. And they had to withdrew and they had. They didn't vote against his removal, but, but they abstained or didn't go to vote. So the 90 votes needed were not obtained. And it's interesting that still within the center left, the people of the center left are more, let's say, progressive than their leaders.
- [54:59]
Sam Seder
I think we have that dynamic to some extent here. But what, what has turned in that? I mean, we spoke a couple of years ago now about the protests against the attempts to change, to make the judiciary less independent. And at that time, I remember your sense that there was a hope, but you did not see much of that developing, that people protesting against the authoritarianism that, that those provisions represented might understand that it is the same dynamic that is being basically, I mean, imported. It's not that far of a distance, but imported from the way that Israel has been controlling Palestinians in the West Bank. And you know, this is prior to October 7th and in Gaza, and that there was a hope that the, this protest movement would sort of begin to see the, the similarities and perhaps increase empathy and solidarity. Has that dynamic changed me? Because it, as far as I can tell, you did not feel like it was happening at that time. Has that dynamic changed in some way? Or is it more of this post Iranian war sense of like, what's the end game here?
- [56:41]
Maron Rapoport
It's interesting, I think prior to October 7th, this realization that the repression of the Palestinian in the west bank has something to do with the repression or with the efforts to make Israel inside Israel against the Jews in Israel, to establish a more authoritarian regime inside Israel. That this has, that these are related the repression of the Palestinian and the repression of democracy inside Israel. It has been growing up in the demonstration. You almost saw it by the week that every week there was more and more realization that these are interconnected. This of course collapsed on October 7 once the war began. And of course the massacre by Palestinian, you know, made all the issue very far away. And of course the feeling of revenge and the feeling that the Palestinian, all Palestinian, wants the Jews to be exterminated. And this was very strong. Now, I think, yes, it has not come back in this sense, but the attrition and the feeling, the strong feeling that Netanyahu is continuing the war for political aims, for yes, maintaining his government, but also maintaining this approach that an everlasting war, that this is almost the Sparta like That Netanyahu is talking about openly about Israel being a modern Sparta and what we've seen in Syria is part of that. Of course, I think this is something that people are quite wary of. It's not only the war in Gaza. They are wary of this eternal war, that there's no future. People talking about emigrating from Israel, I don't know, the numbers maybe are not that huge, but certainly the discourse exists. You know, you hear it everywhere in every cafe, in every small talk, in the, in the buses, everywhere. You can hear people talking about wanting to go away and, and what we've seen with Ayman order is interesting in this sense that the protest movement itself, almost from bottom up, without any leader, political leader telling them, listen, you have to enlist in order to stop this attempt to oust Ayman Ode. It came from below, from the protesters themselves. I think maybe there's more realization of this interconnectivity than we might imagine because it has very little space in politics among the political leaders. It has very little space in the mainstream media. But maybe the undercurrents here are stronger than we imagine. Maybe that's my take, I think from the fact that the move to outside quite, you know, they needed 90 votes. They had only 73, meaning only more. You know, the coalition has 68 members in parliament, so they have only 73, meaning that they gained only five votes from the opposition. It's far below what they expected the coalition. And maybe it's a positive sign that such an awareness exists more than we may think.
- [61:15]
Sam Seder
Does the Israeli Jewish, the Israeli Jewish population, are they. Is there a sense that the. Amongst them, that the country is becoming more isolated internationally? Is there a sense that the economy is suffering from what's going on? I'm curious as to the. Where the average Israeli Jew sees themselves in the world and how they, if they see themselves, you know, reflected differently than maybe two years ago or five years ago.
- [61:54]
Maron Rapoport
The isolation plays a part, plays I think an important part. I think this is one of when we're talking about the attrition. I think this is also the fact that that Israel is feel more and more isolated, that we hear voices concerning, for example, this humanitarian city. We hear even from more mainstream pundits saying, no, this will lead to complete isolation of Israel, of Israel being regarded completely as a war criminal. This plays a part, I think this plays a part also in the will of people to run away from here. As for the economy, I think maybe this is one of the main issues why Netanyahu's government Did not fall earlier. The economy, considering that we are in war for 21 months, is quite, doing quite well. The stock market is skyrocketing. The situation is not that bad. Yes, maybe there are some difficulties, but it's not dramatic. You would have imagined that after such a long war and such huge expenses on military, the situation would be much worse. It is not. The streets of Tel Aviv are quite full. The cafe, the bars, the restaurants are quite full. There's no sense that we are in a crisis. In a sense, strangely enough, people are being paid quite nicely for going to the reserve. People are almost competing on going to reserve, not to act, not to go into Gaza. But doing rear in the rear, doing jobs in the rear in the reserve is quite, you gain quite a lot of money. So there are almost ads that people are being asked, we have a job opportunity in the reserve. You have it a lot on Facebook, you see it a lot on social media. So I think the situation, the economic situation and Smartrich, who is also the finance minister is bragging about it. Certainly during the war in Iran, he every, every morning he used to have, you know, himself photographs that on the background there are the graphs of the stock market coming up and saying this is a miracle. Israel is very strong. Although we are going to war, the economy is doing very well. I think this is maybe the weakest point of the protest movement. Let's say that the prediction that Israel will collapse economically did not materialize.
- [65:19]
Sam Seder
Interesting. Marone Rapoport, we will put a link to your work at local call and 972mag and the various pieces that you've had over the past couple of days. Really appreciate you coming on the program and congratulation on the investigation of the year award that you won. I guess it was last month or so for I think we spoke to you, I think about that piece on Israel's covert war on the International Criminal Court which appears to have been at least somewhat successful and if not ongoing. Marone Rapaport, thank you so much for your time today. Really appreciate it.
- [66:12]
Maron Rapoport
Thank you.
- [66:15]
Sam Seder
All right, folks, that does it for the first hour of the program. We're going to move into the fun half. Try and get to your calls a little earlier today. Got plenty of fun things to discuss on the on today's fun half. Just a reminder, it's your support that makes this show possible. You can support this program by going to jointhemajorityreport.com when you do, you not only get the free show, free of commercials, you get to Imus in The fun half. And you also be able to say that you're a member of the Majority Report, which, you know, if you're going around with your max left hat, both the trucker version and the so called dad version, I don't. Is it a dad hat? People say that. I call it a baseball cap. It's a baseball cap and you can, you can wear that around people. You a member of the Majority Party? Yes, I am. Oh my gosh. Let's hang out. Let's, you know, let's, let's formulate an escape plan. Let's start a business or let's, I don't know, let's sabotage some things. It's all up to you. My point is become a member of the Majority Report and the world is your oyster. @jointhemajorityreport.com Also Just Coffee Co Op. It is a co op in Madison, Wisconsin that takes care of its farmers, its sources of coffee all around the world. And so started, I think they first had some farms in Chiapas decades ago. Coffee. They have all sorts of single origin and blends. And check it out, you can buy the Majority Report blend just coffee Co op. Matt Left reckoning. Yeah, left reckoning. Last night we had Brian Goldstone on talking about his book There Is no Place for Us, which I think is an exceptional book on how unfair society is to people that are just scraping to get by and stay in, say, shelter alongside, say, Barbara Ehrenreich's Nicholand. I think it's an instant classic. Everyone should read the book we had Brian on last night talking about all the different companies that are set up to monetize homelessness instead of treating it like extended stay Americas and all that sort of stuff. So check that out. Patreon.com left reckoning we also talked about Jeremy Corbyn's new party that's already polling, even with labor, who expelled him several years ago. And now they're complaining about splitting the party. I'd say if you don't want the party to be split, don't cleave off the popular parts. And that would be a good message for Democrats domestically as well. That feels like a sort of really incredibly obvious thing. If you don't want to split the party, what you should start by doing is not literally splitting the party. Exactly. Don't split them off with a meek cleaver and then be like, hey, why aren't you unified with us? So we talked about that a little bit. Patreon.com left reckoning all right, folks, See you in the fun half. Three months from now, six months from now, nine months from now. And I don't think it's going to be the same as it looks like in six months from now. And I don't know if it's necessarily going to be better six months from now than it is three months from now. But I think around on 18 months out, we're gonna look back and go like, wow.
- [70:05]
Maron Rapoport
What?
- [70:07]
Sam Seder
What is that going on? It's nuts. Wait a second. Hold on. Hold on for a second. Emma, welcome to the program. Fun half. Matt. Boo. Fun. Ha. What is up, everyone? Fun hat. No M. Did it. Let's go, Brandon. Let's go, Brandon. Bradley, you want to say hello? Sorry to disappoint everyone. I'm just a random guy. It's all the boys today. Fundamentally false. No.
- [70:41]
Maron Rapoport
I'm sorry. Women.
- [70:42]
Sam Seder
Stop talking for a second. Let me finish.
- [70:45]
Maron Rapoport
Where is this coming from?
- [70:46]
Sam Seder
Dude? But. Dude, you want to smoke this? 7A. Yes.
- [70:54]
Maron Rapoport
All right.
- [70:55]
Sam Seder
You're safe. Yes. Is this me? Is it me? It is you. Is this me?
- [71:07]
Maron Rapoport
Hello?
- [71:07]
Sam Seder
Is this me? I think it is you. Who is you? No sound. Every single freaking day. What's on your mind?
- [71:16]
Maron Rapoport
We can discuss Fremont Kids.
- [71:18]
Sam Seder
And we can discuss capitalism. I'm gonna go snow white. Libertarians. They're so stupid. Though common sense says of course. Gobbledygook. We nailed him. So what's 79 plus 21? Challenge. Man.
- [71:30]
Maron Rapoport
I'm positively quivering.
- [71:31]
Sam Seder
I believe 96. I want to say. 8, 5, 7, 2, 1, 0. 8, 5 5, 0, 11 half. 3, 8, 9, 11. For instance, 3, $419, hundred. 5, 4, $3 trillion. Sold. It's a zero sum game.
- [71:47]
Maron Rapoport
Actually.
- [71:47]
Sam Seder
You're making me think less. But let me say this. You call it satire. Sam goes satire. On top of it all, my favorite part about you is just like every day, all day, like everything you do. Without a doubt. Hey, buddy. We see you. All right, folks, folks, folks. It's just the week being weeded out, obviously. Yeah. Sun's out, guns out. I. I don't know.
- [72:20]
Maron Rapoport
But you should know.
- [72:23]
Sam Seder
People just don't like to entertain ideas anymore. I have a question. Who cares? Our chat is enabled. Folks. I love it. I do love that. Gotta jump. Gotta be quick. I gotta jump.
- [72:37]
Maron Rapoport
I'm losing it, bro.
- [72:41]
Sam Seder
Two o'. Clock. We're already late and the guy's being a dick. So screw him. Sent to a gulag.
- [72:48]
Maron Rapoport
Outrageous.
- [72:49]
Sam Seder
Like, what is wrong with you? Love you. Bye. Love you. Bye. Bye.