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The Opinions
Why Starvation in Gaza Has Reached a Tipping Point
00:36:17
And what it could mean for the future of the conflict in the Middle East.
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Podcast Host
This is the Opinions, a show that brings you a mix of voices from New York Times Opinion. You've heard the news. Here's what to make of it.
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Michelle Cottle
I'm Michelle Cottle and I write about national politics for New York Times Opinion. And today I am joined by my friend, fabulous colleagues David French and Lydia Pgreen. Guys, welcome.
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David French
Hi, Michelle. Thanks for having us.
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Lydia Pgreen
Hi, Michelle. So nice to be here with you.
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Michelle Cottle
Lydia is reunited. Reunited. Okay. I won't sing. I won't do that to people. So we're recording this on Thursday and we're talking Gaza, where things have reached a new level of horror recently. A UN affiliated group stated that the worst case for a famine scenario has been reached there. So this seems to have caused a tipping point both globally and here in the US and now politicians who had been mostly quiet when it came to criticizing Israel are starting to speak out. On Monday, MAGA stronghold Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene ramping up her criticism, becoming the first congressional Republican to call Israel's actions in Gaza a, quote, genocide.
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David French
We can save a lot of people. I mean, some of those kids are. That's real starvation stuff. I see it. And you can't fake that. US Taxpayers have spent many, many billions of dollars in support of the racist, extremist Netanyahu government. Enough is enough.
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Michelle Cottle
So let's just dive right in. Lydia, kick us off. You've been reporting on this issue for years and in particular since October of 2023. Seems like there has been a sea change now in the number of calling what is going on genocide and denouncing it. What do you think shifted and why now?
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Lydia Pgreen
Yeah, you know, obviously in the immediate aftermath of the horrific attacks by Hamas on Israel, everyone expected a response and a strong response, and that is indeed what we got. But I think that there were many people, myself included, who were listening closely to the kind of rhetoric that was coming out of elements of the Israeli government and worried that this was going to, you know, quite quickly tip into war crimes and possibly genocide. And we've reached A point now with the freezing of aid to Gaza, where we're seeing what is just a kind of undeniable level of human suffering involving hunger. And, you know, hunger, I think, is particularly resonant because it's such a universal human experience. Right. And historically, as I've covered, you know, famine and hunger across the world, it does have this ability to activate a response in people. You know, it's interesting because hunger is very intimately linked with the birth of the idea in the coining of the word genocide. Raphael Lemkin, the man who invented the term in the Holocaust, really identified hunger and starvation as a critical weapon in this type of war. And I think people know it when they see it. When you see these pictures of emaciated children, women who are unable to nurse their newborns, it just reaches a level of horror, I think that becomes hard for really anyone to, including President Donald Trump, to countenance. And so I think that's a big part of why we're seeing this shift. There are a lot of longer term issues that are at play here, but I really think that the emotional resonance of that is a big part of it.
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David French
Yeah. And I'm seeing a shift even amongst people who've long supported Israel in this war like me. And why would you see that now? I think one of the reasons why you would see it is it's beginning to dawn on people it's a very different scenario than October 8th, 9th, 10th. It's a very different scenario than even the months immediately following. Because what happened in the months immediately following, if you were supporting Israel, you were sort of presuming three things were going to occur. Number one, there was going to be a very strong Israeli response, just as there would be from any country attacked the way Israel was on October 7th. Number two, you knew immediately it was going to be very, very tragic, bloody, messy, horrible, because Hamas had wormed its way into the Gazan infrastructure to such an extent that taking on Hamas was going to mean something like what happened when we took ISIS out of Mosul, for example, or out of Raqqa in Syria. This was going to be brutal, brutal urban combat. And the third thing that a lot of supporters of Israel knew is that immediately big parts of the international community were going to turn on Israel. And that happened as well. Even in the first few days after the attack, you began to see harsh criticisms of Israel based on its early response. But so that number three thing did something that immediate harsh criticism of Israel really began to almost inoculate friends of Israel against criticisms of Israel, because what you saw was, wait a minute, right after civilians have been massacred in their homes, you're already after us for a military response. That is exactly the one your own nation would do. And what that did is it hardened people against critique. And now why would they start to soften now? There's been fighting for a long time. Hamas has been utterly decimated as a fighting force. Hamas is not what it was before now. It's not completely dismantled. It's not completely gone. And so I think there's a very logical question that people ask, which is, wait a minute. After Hamas has been utterly decimated, it has a fraction of its fighting power. It has a fraction of the ability to govern and control Gazans. Why are we having possible famine conditions now? Why now? Isn't this when Hamas is on its back? Isn't this when Hamas is the weakest it's been in decades? Why now? And I think that that is what has penetrated through. And now this sort of. The consequences of that Israeli approach are fully coming home to roost now. And unfortunately, it does not appear that the Israeli government is reacting with alacrity to the crisis that it absolutely contributed to causing. Now, we talk about Hamas here. Hamas not laying down its harms, Hamas not surrendering the hostages is a grave, grave issue. And that needs to be discussed more. However, Hamas's failures to comply with the law of war, Hamas's failures to release hostages do not relieve Israel of its own obligations.
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Michelle Cottle
So taking a piece of what you're talking about and what Lydia is talking about, it does seem like we've reached a point where nobody in good conscience or who's being honest about this can look at the situation and think this is a situation that's a regular war, so to speak, where you have hostility on both sides once you reach the famine point. I mean, whatever Hamas is still doing, there's something about starving a people to death that feels different in kind than just bombing, which everybody assumes is a part of war. And, you know, no matter how horrific it is. So it does seem like nearly two years down the road we've come to this. And I do think it's just got a lot of people thinking about, well, what is the end game on some level?
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Lydia Pgreen
Well, I think that's a great point, Michelle, because, you know, there's also been some really excellent reporting on this. There was a fantastic New York Times magazine piece earlier in July that really laid out in kind of forensic detail. You know, Benjamin Netanyahu decided to essentially prolong the war in order to hold his coalition together. And you know, there's a, there's also been other reporting that has discounted the idea and sort of shown that there's really no concrete evidence that there's been widespread aid diversion by Hamas. Now, aid diversion happens in every conflict situation. David knows this, I know this, having reported, you know, and been on the ground in these places. But there have been these kind of fig leaf explanations. And I think that really tough minded fair reporting, I think has really raised questions about those justifications, and rightly so.
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Michelle Cottle
So now Europe is upping the pressure, as David has pointed out. Britain has said they will recognize Palestine as a state if Israel doesn't end the humanitarian crisis. France has said they will recognize statehood in September, period. So given the escalation of international pressure, what about Prime Minister Netanyahu and his coalition? What impact is this having?
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David French
It's very uncertain because you have to look at this also in a larger context, because in a larger context, Israel is riding very high right now. October Sevent was arguably even worse than the surprise before the Yom Kippur War because so many Israeli civilians were killed. So that from that low ebb when the arguably the worst day in the IDF's military history as far as allowing harm to Israeli citizens, the Israeli military has recovered and has won on every front in a way that I think very few people expected. And I think that that has created a sense of impunity in some ways that Israel has pressed forward, shed off a lot of restraints that people in the international community wanted to put upon it, and won a series of very decisive and very important military victories. And that has led, I think, Israel to this position where it might be feeling a lot stronger and a lot less dependent on foreign approval and authority than it has in generations. But, but that is extraordinarily shortsighted thinking, just extraordinarily shortsighted. And I think what you see is the European powers using whatever levers they have, and we saw Canada come into this as well recently. So the European powers are using what leverage they have, which is not a lot, to be honest, to try to ease this crisis. And so in one sense you would say, well, is Europe rewarding Hamas by sort of saying, hey, you get recognition even when Hamas is not dismantled? And I think I see that. Argum. However, however, I keep circling back to the point that I made before. Hamas is decimated. It's not destroyed, it's utterly decimated. And I know why this all occurred because of the initial Israeli approach that it stuck to which is they did not want to occupy parts of Gaza and take responsibility for the safety and the security and the sustenance of its citizens. That we did that in Iraq, in the surge. We took responsibility for the safety, security, and sustenance of the. In my area of operations. And that way we were able to secure it and hold it against Al Qaeda. When Al Qaeda tried to come back, they didn't do that. They played sort of this game of whack a mole with the, with a giant mallet where they're just pounding every place where they saw terrorists and then did not move in to the decimated and destroyed areas and provide safety and security and make sure that Hamas didn't come back. And so you just have this endless round of, of whack a mole. What it is doing is it is annihilating Gaza and it's creating exactly the conditions that you have now.
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Lydia Pgreen
Well, and I think it's also, in thinking about the European response and frankly, the American somewhat shifting Trump administration position on all of this, it's helpful to look at the broader regional context, because David is absolutely right that Israel has had this string of quite spectacular victories. They've knocked out the leadership of Hezbollah in Lebanon, the spectacular strike on the leadership in Iran, obviously not including the supreme leader, but other major figures there, the things that they're doing in Syria, for example, that threaten to be incredibly destabilizing. I think that when European leaders and frankly, when the Trump administration looks at this broader picture and looks at the way that Israel is seeking to essentially export its mow the lawn strategy from Gaza, which is essentially to kind of do these occasional decapitations and keep the situation under control beyond its own borders, and acting almost like a kind of emerging imperial hegemon in the region that starts to conflict with other core interests of these countries. Right. You know, the Syrian civil war was a powder keg, tremendous suffering for Syrians, but it completely reordered the politics of Europe. Right. The last thing Europe wants is a destabilized Syria that's going to send huge numbers of, of Syrians, you know, that they're desperately trying to get back into Syria, back towards Europe, or even to Turkey, you know, and so I think that. I think that there are a variety of complex interests, even beyond the humanitarian horror that are creating a significant amount of daylight between Israel. And I think you're starting to see countries like, like Germany, for example, which, you know, literally claims as its reason. You know, it's Stott's reason, its reason of State is the protection of the state of Israel and the Jewish people. For very understandable reasons, given the history. I think there's been a real sense of discomfort and having to reassess, like what are actually our interests as Germany in this region of the world and what should our commitment to this particular government and its prosecution of this particular war be?
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Michelle Cottle
So where do either of you think this is going and how it's going to end? I know that's a really open ended evil question for something this big and complicated, but I mean, for instance, a senior Hamas official has told news outlets that the group would hold out for a deal that ends the war with a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. Can Israel fight Hamas indefinitely in this way?
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David French
It cannot fight Hamas indefinitely with this degree of intensity. But what you're hearing about Hamas saying they want a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, that's a big part of the problem. What nation, what nation, after what Hamas did, would not create buffer zones, would not expand its ability to interdict if Hamas stays in power. Okay, if Hamas is still a governing authority, this is the consequence of the fundamental mistake Israel made with its approach, which was it did not want to occupy Gaza, but it wanted to defeat Hamas. Pick one, pick one. Okay. And so that's the problem. They set a goal that was not attainable with the tactics that they chose. Now, I'm not saying that if Israel had chosen the path, the more conventional path in response to an armed attack like that, which is an occupation, a temporary governance, and a handing over to civilian authorities following the cessation of hostilities and the restoring of peace, that that would have been extremely difficult. It would not have been neat and easy and clean. It would have been infinitely better than this. And yes, the international community would have been yelling at Israel over an occupation. There's no question about that. And here's my concern. Has the ship sailed on that? Is this something now where when I talk about it, it's just like a bunch of academics and a panel discussion, right?
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Michelle Cottle
Yeah.
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David French
And are we now at a point where Israel just has to say, okay, we're going to negotiate a hostage release, we're going to negotiate a ceasefire and then have what kind of influence on the ground in Gaza allow aid in. But what happens next? It feels a lot more like ceasefire, although incredibly valuable, is a prelude to almost like a Mad Max type situation as people sort out Gaza. Who's going to run Gaza? And one other thing, there's been a lot of defense of Israel on the grounds that, like when America has fought Particularly In World War II, we were very violent, no doubt, no question. But I will tell you this. When we attained control of an area, we took care of the people in it. And what happened is that people then in Europe voted with their feet. They could have gone over to the Soviet side or they could have gone to the American British side. And by the millions, they moved to the American British side. Why? Cause we took care of people as best we could. And that is not just humane, it's not just legal. It's smart to do that. It helps you over the long term to do that. And it's just so sad, tragic, and infuriating to see the total disregard of these lessons from history.
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Michelle Cottle
Lydia, do you have any sense of what could happen? What, you know, what should happen that would make this.
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Lydia Pgreen
I think the great difficulty in seeing a positive future comes from the cynical and tragic choices that were made in the past. You know, and that. And that, I think, is. It definitely aligns with a lot of what David just said. But, you know, I will say that, you know, the fact that Hamas was in power in Gaza and was able to sustain itself for so long in Gaza was the result of a deliberate strategy by Benjamin Nutt Netanyahu to sow division between the Palestinian Authority, which he wanted to be weak, and allowing Qatar to funnel billions of dollars to the horrific Hamas administration in Gaza. Right. So there's just. There's so much history here, and there's so much. So many terrible and cynical decisions that have been made that make it very hard to sort of, like, clear away the cobwebs and see a future. And I think Israel is riding high in one sense, having had all of these military successes bey the kind of envelope of its own territory and the occupied territories. But I think it's also showing tremendous strain. One story that I've been tracking for some time is just the extraordinary amount of mental health strain on IDF soldiers. We're seeing a spike in suicides. I would not be surprised if, just as during the Vietnam War in the United States, we're gonna just see more and more young people in Israel saying, look, I don't want to be a part of. There was an American, former Green Beret, who was hired as a contractor to work for the Gaza Humanitarian foundation doing whatever this supposed aid distribution was. And he's come back and just given absolutely chilling accounts. And I think that takes a toll. And so I do think that there's just a deep, deep rot that Israel is gonna need to contend with, both in its policy postures, but also just in its populace and its own psy.
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Michelle Cottle
Well, let's dig in a bit on President Trump and the situation. So he has said that he wants to make sure that humanitarian aid is reaching Gaza, which this is breaking from Netanyahu's claim that there is no starvation. That's not, however, incredible that seems. But I want to hear from both of you on how you think Trump's shift potentially changes the entire equation, at least in terms of America's relationship with Israel and the support.
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Lydia Pgreen
Yeah, I mean, I think one of the striking things about Donald Trump because he's such a kind of brutish and crude person who seems to enjoy cruelty. I think one of the repeatedly surprising things about him is that he really does have this. It's almost an ick response to seeing suffering children. But I don't know that that actually has, like, real longev in terms of policy. Right. And I think it's quite possible that we could see a quasi, you know, return to just enough aid to, you know, certainly not stem off a wave of death, because I think we're a little bit too far gone for that. But I think we could sort of turn the page enough to satisfy that. That impulse of Trump's to be able to just kind of say, okay, this is fine. But, you know, Trump has said so many different things about, you know, what the end state looks like here from his perspective. We all remember the crazy a video of the Gaza Riviera. He wants America to take it over. There are going to be bearded belly dancers and glitzy resorts and a gold statue of Donald Trump. I think my big fear is that the Trump administration will essentially enable an ethnic cleansing of the area. I have complicated feelings about that because I think that if there are people who are in Gaza who want to leave Gaza in order to be safe, who am I to say they shouldn't? I mean, obviously, you know, people have a right to live. At the same time, you know, this is one of the most explosive questions of modern times. You know, what. What happens to the Palestinian people who are currently experiencing incredible violence not just in Gaza, but also in the West Bank? There is just an incredibly complex set of questions that need to be answered here. And so do I have a lot of faith in, you know, Donald Trump and his administration can somehow finally, magically find a way to solve this problem that has bedeviled American presidents for generations? Absolutely not.
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David French
You know, I think right now, Trump is riding high a little bit because of the Iran strikes, and he's Also very much riding high with a specific part of his base. And that would be sort of the evangelical conservative base, very, very, very happy with the way he has backed Israel. But at the same time, there are other parts of maga. The right is beginning to split on Israel. It used to be quite united on Israel, but now you have, you know, outright anti Semites like Tucker Carlson, like Candace Owens and others who have million audience, sadly, millions and millions strong, and they are relentlessly attacking Israel, just relentlessly attacking Israel. So one of the things that could end up up out of this conflict for Israel is it could end up with a big military victory, but an American public, both on the right and the left, that is substantially less likely to support Israel in the future. And my question would be, what did they then gain? What did they gain by continuing and pressing and pressing and pressing? If it's fracturing relationships that Netanyahu may not need, who knows how much longer he's going to be leading the Israeli government, but Israel will need.
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Michelle Cottle
I have been completely fascinated by the growing objections from certain parts of maga, like say, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has come out and called the situation genocide. And they are pressuring for Congress and the administration to do something about this crisis. Do you.
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David French
But I'm necessarily surprised that Ms. Space Jewish Space Lasers is do. I mean, like, that's. She's.
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Michelle Cottle
I know, but she had been pretty supportive of Israel ahead of time. Yeah.
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Lydia Pgreen
But I think even, you know, quite significant also though is you're seeing the Joe Rogans, the Theo Vaughns. Right. You know, people in this kind of podcast universe. And I think they represent, not necessarily the MAGA base. They speak to the MAGA base, but I don't think either of represent like a kind of core maga. Right. But they definitely represent the kind of soft fringe that drifted towards Donald Trump in the 2024 election. Right. And there are a number of forces that are pulling that fringe away from Trump. You know, maybe they go to the Democrats, maybe they become just disengaged. But I do think that the relationship with Israel and Gaza, you know, just kind of feels wrong to that group of people. And, you know, and I think there is this. I'm always suspicious of the idea of common sense, but there is this version, I mean, common and common to whom? There is this version of just kind of an ordinary person looking at this situation just being like, what the hell? How can we be part of this?
- [25:37]
Michelle Cottle
Well, one of the things that I do think has come out of Trump taking the new stand he has is it gives permission for Republicans in Congress who are just, you know, they're Trump's ride or die group to also come out and be a little bit more critical. And I just, I don't know where that will go. I mean, none of us know where that will go in terms of, like, does any action get taken? But I do think that if the, if the leader has opened up a little bit of wiggle room there, he's given his followers permission.
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Lydia Pgreen
Yeah. And if you give, if you give, like any kind of credence to the notion that there is an actual idea behind Trump's America for foreign policy. Right. Then you could argue that we're moving in a direction of having more transactional relationships and fewer relationships that are based on these kind of like ironclad, you know, we're always with you no matter what. You know, we've seen that play out in Ukraine. We've seen, you know, we're seeing that play out with NATO and, and other allies. And it's been interesting to see how that attitude towards foreign policy actually plays out both on the left and the right. Right. I think that there was a tremendous amount of praise, for example, for, for Trump to recognize Al Sharra, the new president of Syria, and drop the sanctions there, you know, and talk about, you know, not giving lectures about human rights to countries and things like that. I think, I think that's something that was welcomed not just on the right, but also on the left. And trying to sort of pull America out of these entanglements, I think is something that has broad support in various political pockets.
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Michelle Cottle
That speaks to, like, David's short sightedness point about what Israel's done. Because in recent years there has been a split in the Democratic base. And I think that has gotten very dramatic in recent months with what's going on over there. This has long term implications for what Israel can expect from America in terms of support. This is not just domestic political machinations that we're talking about. This has major global repercussions. And do you think this is a permanent issue in the Democratic Party, or at least semi permanent? Lydia?
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Lydia Pgreen
I think this is an absolutely. I mean, I don't like the word permanent because nothing is permanent, but I think this is a huge realignment within the Democratic Party. I mean, it's notable to me that Bernie Sanders has put up these resolutions repeatedly in the Senate to try and block the sale of certain kinds of weapons to or, you know, to Israel. And, you know, you've just steadily seen ticking up the number of Democratic senators that have voted in favor. And, you know, the most recent vote was a high water mark of 27 senators. And, you know, it included people like Jeanne Shaheen, who's the, you know, hardly a, you know, hard left figure, who is the, you know, the ranking member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Amy Klobuchar, Tammy Baldwin. I mean, these are, these are normal sort of centrist Democrats. They're not wild and woolly leftists. The most recent Gallup poll, I think the support for Israeli military action among Democrats was at 8%. So I think there's a feeling that this is the direction that it's going. And of course, we just had this historic Democratic primary here in New York City where I think there was an assumption that the stances that Zoran Mamdani took on Israel. Israel were going to be essentially disqualifying. And the latest analysis of the vote, it seems that it was actually the opposite. That him taking a principled stand on this issue that I think particularly for voters under the age of 45, was actually really crucial in sort of pushing him to victory. So I think there's gonna be a lot of revisiting of this question around the 2024 election and other ancient history and what's going to happen in the past.
- [29:47]
David French
Past.
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Lydia Pgreen
But I think in the future, I think there's just a fundamental break, yeah.
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Michelle Cottle
I've just noticed among the generational split in the party on the question of Israel, with younger voters being much more outspoken in their criticism. And for a party that's struggling, having lost ground with the young voters, I'll be interested to kind of see where this goes.
- [30:12]
David French
You know, and this is more consequential than I think Republicans realize. I think Republicans have drunk their own Kool Aid for a long time on this idea that the Democrats are the anti Israel party. This has been a talking point. You know, when I, when I decided way back in 2016, I'm definitely not supporting Trump, the argument was, you know, say what you want to say about Trump, but you're abandoning Israel if you're not supporting Trump. And my argument was that was always extraordinarily exaggerated because when the chips were down, Democratic administrations came through for Israel in big ways. So the, the, one of the largest arms deals that Israel has ever had with the United States was with the Obama admin administration when Israel was attacked by missiles from Iran. Earlier in the Biden administration, Biden put American planes in the air to defend Israel. This is a very, very, very big deal that the US Under A Democratic administration gave Israel a huge arms deal. It's a very big deal that a Democratic administration protected Israel physically with American pilots. And so the question that I have, how will that happen in the future? And there's another thing that's happening here that let's put this in an even bigger context. We're getting to a point where negative polarization, the US Is beginning to leak into our foreign affairs in some pretty substantial ways. And so you could end up in a situation where Israel is the Republican's ally and Ukraine is the Democrats ally. And so depending on who wins the election, that orients who our allies are and are not. And it's just a terrible formula, not just for us, it's a terrible formula for Israel going forward.
- [31:56]
Michelle Cottle
Okay, so obviously we've just skimmed the very surface of all this and there's a lot going on that people could dig into. Is there anything either of you want to recommend that people read or watch or listen to to get a good sense of the situation?
- [32:17]
Lydia Pgreen
I have a couple of recommendations. Our mutual friend Michelle, Isaac Chotner did a rather extraordinary interview, as he often does with Amit Sehgal, who's quite a right wing journalist in Israel. And in classic Isaac Chotner style, I think he brings out something really interesting about that helps us understand the sort of right Israeli's perspective in this interview that's on the New Yorker website, anybody? And the other thing that I've read recently that I think that's quite a long read, but I think very much worth looking at is an essay by the writer Adam Schatz in the London Review of Books called the world since October 7th. And what Adam does in that piece is really kind of zoom out and take in the totality of everything that has happened both since October 7, but with the context of history and looking forward to the future. And I think it's just a kind of magisterial and quite deeply felt piece that people will benefit from reading.
- [33:21]
Michelle Cottle
Okay, David, what you got? Hit me.
- [33:23]
David French
Well, Lydia got one of mine, which is the Isaac Chotiner interview, which by the way, I love the way Lydia, you said, you know, that way that he interviews. Because I have often thought if I get a call or a text or something that says don't do it, Isaac Chotner wants to interview you.
- [33:36]
Michelle Cottle
I've known Isaac since he was baby. He's now officially scary.
- [33:42]
Lydia Pgreen
Having been once interviewed by Isaac Chotiner, I can tell you he's a sweetie pie. As long as you're not a total lie.
- [33:50]
Michelle Cottle
I mean, that's how the situation obviously answer Isaac's calls.
- [33:56]
David French
Yes, yeah, of course, of course.
- [33:58]
Lydia Pgreen
Sorry, David.
- [33:59]
David French
Anyway, I definitely recommend because you can see the cognitive dissonance. You can see it's so hard for him to rationalize or justify what's happening right now. Even this person. The other thing that I would say is one of the things that we have a problem with is just we have an enormous amount of just background ignorance in American society about a lot of the things that are so important. And so I'm going to recommend a book. And it's not about Gaza and Israel. It's about the US And ISIS and Mosul. And it's written by our former magazine colleague James Verrini. And it's called they Will have to Die Now. And it is the story of the battle of Mosul. And the reason why I recommend it is two reasons. One, it demonstrates to you the extraordinary difficulty that a military force faces when they fight a terrorist force that's embedded in a city. But it also shows that, yeah, in fact, in fact, there are better ways to do this. Now, I'm not gonna say we're perfect in this in any way, shape or form. It is, let's emphasize, it's horrible, but. But you never had to get where we are today.
- [35:14]
Michelle Cottle
Okay, well, there you go. I now have my excellent beach reads for the week. Thank you both.
- [35:19]
David French
So uplifting.
- [35:22]
Michelle Cottle
It's gonna be a doozy. And with that, let's just land this plane, guys. Thank you so much for coming in and explaining all of this.
- [35:30]
Lydia Pgreen
Oh, thanks for a great conversation, Michelle.
- [35:32]
David French
Yes, thanks, Michelle. Thanks, Lydia.
- [35:59]
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