Useful Idiots
Politics • Comedy
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
post photo preview

Subscribe for the full episode at the bottom of the page. Watch a free preview here:

“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)

Thanks for supporting independent media. Subscribe for the full episode here:

Only for Supporters
To read the rest of this article and access other paid content, you must be a supporter
0
What else you may like…
Videos
Posts
Articles
Sanctions Are a Form of Warfare

“Sanctions are a form of war. They’re economic warfare. And they destroy people’s lives.”

Joshua Landis (https://twitter.com/joshua_landis), Sandra Mackey Chair in Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma, is one of the foremost experts on Syria. This week, as Syria, along with neighbor Turkiye, grapples with the aftermath of the devastating earthquake, Professor Landis joins the Useful Idiots to explain the deadly consequences that sanctions pile on to the damage.

“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:

The ...

00:01:17
"Shameful" New York Times Changes Headline to Protect Sanctions

“Sanctions are a form of war. They’re economic warfare. And they destroy people’s lives.”

Joshua Landis (https://twitter.com/joshua_landis), Sandra Mackey Chair in Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma, is one of the foremost experts on Syria. This week, as Syria, along with neighbor Turkiye, grapples with the aftermath of the devastating earthquake, Professor Landis joins the Useful Idiots to explain the deadly consequences that sanctions pile on to the damage.

“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:

The ...

00:01:24
Free preview: Matt Taibbi Exposes Russiagate Bots

With Matt Taibbi’s Twitter Files and Jeff Gerth’s new in-depth reporting for CJR exposing the years of lies spread by Russiagaters, bitter attacks from outed journalists are rolling in.

Gerth and Taibbi, who come from the old style of journalism where you fact check your work and don’t accept government officials’ claims on faith, have each shown clear, indisputable evidence of disinformation campaigns pushed by corporate reporters. And since the so-called journalists can’t argue the facts, they dig themselves a deeper hole with more lies and name-calling.

Jeff Gerth has been working as a reporter for decades and published, in the very mainstream Columbia Journalism Review, a 20,000-word report on his findings, only to be called a liar and misdirecting magician in the most self-important article by Mother Jones’ David Corn (“The true media failure is that Trump got away with it and that articles like this one that you are now reading are still necessary.”) And possibly worse ...

00:54:34

Emphasized "Dancing with 88

I have altered space here—   to

a rupture in the silent fabric,

where every atom reclaims its song.

A change, seen on my 90° angle,

becomes the pivot of a daring ballet,

the precise intersection where fate unspools.

In that crisp right-angle lie the secrets

of all absorbed twilight and reborn dawns,

a moment where geometry becomes prophecy,

transmuting static lines into dynamic rhythms,

inviting the cosmos to twirl in unexpected arcs.

And then—

I find myself dancing with 88,

a numeral of resonance, a muse of mystery.

It whispers in binary beats,

each pulse a portal leading into

symphonies scribbled on the canvas of space-time.

This is no choreographed routine,

but a wild, liberated waltz

where dimensions bend and merge—

where the old order crumbles

under the heat of relentless transformation

and every step unearths a layer of being.

At that 90° juncture,

the universe unfolds like a secret map,

revealing uncharted realms in every fracture,

while 88 becomes the score for a cosmic ballet,

...

Has the Gaza Pier Been Beached? | Army Watercraft come ashore off Gaza and Israel

March 26, 2024

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.

post photo preview
Beware Iran! The Colony of Reptile Quarterback Hookers!
Plus, mocking two celebrity Zionists who expose themselves for knowing NOTHING about the genocide in Gaza

We’ve got an extended Friday Free-for-All this week, jam-packed with ignorant Zionist professors, racist senators tripping over mixed metaphors, Hollywood agents unraveling over Macklemore, psychopath economists drooling over “choking” Iranian civilians, and even the Hasan Piker craze reaching all the way up to Netanyahu himself.

And Katie and Aaron don’t pull punches.

Just look at NYU Professor Scott Galloway, also known as the “Pervy Prof.” While interviewing Abdul El-Sayed (a chat that was really more of a monologue by the Pervy Prof), Galloway unleashed a lecturing tirade over why his religion gives him special power to judge whether Israel is committing genocide or not. The problem is, he admits he doesn’t actually know the definition of genocide.

But it gets worse:

Only for Supporters
To read the rest of this article and access other paid content, you must be a supporter
Read full Article
post photo preview
Antisemitism Czar Claims Macklemore is HIJACKING Concerts in Plot to Destroy Israel
Plus, JD Vance begs voters: “Give us another chance”

The rapper Macklemore said “Free Palestine.” It set off a Zionist meltdown.

This week, after pressure from New England Patriots owner and sex-worker employer Robert Kraft, Ed Sheeran proved himself a coward and removed Macklemore from his tour. The move led to widespread backlash against Ed Sheeran and Israeli power, but Ed can rejoice that he’s got at least one friend in his corner:

That’s right, it’s Donald Trump’s former antisemitism czar and CEO of the Adelson-funded Israeli-American Council Elan S. Carr!

In an interview, Carr gave some wild takes that certainly fit in with the Zionist stereotype of tone-deaf insanity:

Only for Supporters
To read the rest of this article and access other paid content, you must be a supporter
Read full Article
post photo preview
Hillary Clinton Claims Netanyahu KNEW About October 7 Before Attack
Plus, Hillary compares the DSA to neo-Nazis and Morning Joe gets in a Zionist screaming match with Donny Deutsch over Israel
A telling screenshot of today's episode
A telling screenshot from today's episode

Meet Hillary Clinton: tin-foil hatter!

During a crazy episode of Morning Joe (which had so much ridiculous content that it takes up the majority of this extended Friday Free-for-All), Hillary Clinton made the astonishing claim that Netanyahu (much like 9/11 theorists believe about George W. Bush) KNEW about the October 7 attacks BEFORE they happened and still let them occur.

Which begs the question:

Only for Supporters
To read the rest of this article and access other paid content, you must be a supporter
Read full Article
See More
Available on mobile and TV devices
google store google store app store app store
google store google store app tv store app tv store amazon store amazon store roku store roku store
Powered by Locals