Useful Idiots
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How Biden and Netanyahu PROVOKED the War in the Middle East – with Lebanese Political Scientists Bashir Saade and Karim Makdisi
Hezbollah's leader agreed to a 21-day ceasefire. Then Israel killed him.
October 04, 2024
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“It's very bloody and very violent and very dangerous.”

Lebanese political scientists Bashir Saade and Karim Makdisi shed light on Israel’s attacks on Lebanon, Hezbollah, Hasan Nasrallah and more.

Since the situation is so volatile, news is constantly breaking: after we recorded the interview, Lebanon’s Foreign Minister told CNN that Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah had agreed to a 21-day ceasefire just before he was assassinated by Israel. The temporary ceasefire, he claimed, was called for by President Biden, President Macron and other allies during the UN General Assembly. 

During the interview Karim and Bashir predict what is to come. “The cost is going to be very high,” warns Karim. “It’s going to be very bloody.” They also reflect on why Israel’s attack on Lebanon was inevitable, but not because of Hezbollah. 

“I think this is a war that has been coming,” Karim explains. “It's a war that was going to happen. And if it wasn't going to happen now, it would have happened a year from now. You have an expansionist Israel. It has always been expansionist.” And, Bashir adds, “Hezbollah is prepared for this.”

They discuss the double standards faced by the IDF, which is called the most moral army in the world, and Hezbollah, which is described by western media and politicians as terrorist. As Karim explains:

“Hezbollah could target civilian areas. But it's just not in their doctrine, in a sense, to hit civilian areas for the sake of it. In the way that for the Israelis, with the Dahiya Doctrine, you can level the entire civilian area if you think there's some kind of military target inside. This is something the Israelis have been doing since 1948.” Coming tragically full circle, Israel’s Dahiya Doctrine, which calls for disproportionate military responses and the targeting of civilians (war crimes), was named after a Beirut neighborhood where Nasrallah wound up being murdered. 

The West justifies Israel’s war crimes by claiming that Hamas uses civilians as human shields. But this week, when Iran launched a missile attack on a Mossad weapons base, CNN itself admitted that the base was embedded in a civilian area.

“The Mossad headquarters and military and defense ministry,” Karim explains, “are in various very civilian areas inside main Israeli cities. So does that mean they’re targets? Does that mean all the civilians working there and around there are targets? Does that mean that it's legitimate under self-defense or any other kind of doctrine? Does it mean that Hezbollah can blow up cell phones and pagers?”

Notably, the very same western politicians and media who accuse Hamas of using human shields are absolutely silent when it comes to Israel’s documented use of Palestinian and Israeli human shields.

Subscribe for the full interview with Bashir and Karim on the state of Hezbollah after the assassination of its leader Hassan Nasrallah, how corporate media is constantly working to cover up Israel’s crimes, how martyrdom is portrayed differently based on who does it, and what Bashir and Karim are calling “political suicide” for the Democratic Party.

Plus, catch this week’s Thursday Throwdown: John Kerry Wants to Save Democracy (By Ending Democracy)

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“America likes to talk about all its precision bombing and hitting someone with a drone to avoid collateral damage,” Landis explains. “But sanctions? It’s all about collateral damage. Very little of it is targeted.”

But if you read corporate media outlets like the New York Times or Washington Post, you’d find a much different story. Both papers this week published headlines that were hastily changed when they realized they were being a little too truthful. See if you can tell the difference:

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“America likes to talk about all its precision bombing and hitting someone with a drone to avoid collateral damage,” Landis explains. “But sanctions? It’s all about collateral damage. Very little of it is targeted.”

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Good to be part of the community. I think that Aaron and Katie do a brilliant job in these hellish times when such great in - depth research and reporting are essential.

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Vice President JD Vance went on Joe Rogan’s podcast this week and surprisingly took some big shots at an unnamed target who sounds suspiciously close to President Donald Trump, who has bragged about taking large sums of money from Israel donors like Miriam Adelson, got manipulated by Israelis like Benjamin Netanyahu, and continued to bomb Iran amidst the peace deal his administration worked to reach.

See if JD’s comments sound familiar:

I don’t actually mind that certain elements of the Israeli government want to criticize the [Iran] deal or have disagreements about the deal. I don’t even mind an effort to try to influence [us]. Foreign governments try to influence the United States all the time.

What bothers me is when American leadership allows that influence to affect their judgment and to affect what they are advocating for. That’s what really bothers me.

When I open up the pages of Time magazine and I see that there’s a literal foreign influence campaign being funded to tank the very deal that I was pursuing… my response to that is, well, ‘go to hell.’

After telling (maybe) President Trump to go to hell, Vance continues on, calling out (maybe) President Trump, who most recently bombed a children’s hospital in Iran, for using the military over diplomacy.

There are people who are super hawkish in the American system who have attacked the deal and frankly in some ways have tried to derail the deal. What I always say to those people is: ‘What is your proposal? What is your actual argument?’

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So, we got to use all tools at our disposal. The military is one tool, but diplomacy is another tool. And I’m very frustrated by the Americans who are like, ‘You cannot negotiate with the Iranians.’

So what you’re saying, JD, is “President Trump is an idiot who can go to hell.”

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Analysis: Establishment Dems are seizing the Graham Platner scandal to slander progressives across primary elections
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After AIPAC-funded Congressman Dan Goldman lost his primary race to Zohran Mamdani-backed Brad Lander, Israel activist and CNN host Jake Tapper hosted Goldman to slander both Mamdani and Mahmoud Khalil.

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So as Tapper sides with Trump and Israel, Katie and Aaron take aim at their favorite Zionist target. It’s a mocking you don’t want to miss.

Also in this Friday Free-for-All: CNN’s Kasie Hunt strikes out after thinking she had the perfect gotcha question for Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed, Fox News has no choice but to call out the Trump family for blowing Biden-family corruption out of the water after reports show they’ve profited over a billion dollars in cryptocurrency alone while in office, and Republicans freak out over Zohran Mamdani’s air conditioner.

Everybody’s being extra ridiculous this week. Katie and Aaron are swinging away. Thanks for supporting our work, subscribe to watch the full episode here:

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