Political scientist and author John Mearsheimer shares his thoughts on Ukraine, which he considers the West's fault, October 7, which he said was "not terribly surprising," the war on Gaza, which he considers genocide and why World War III could be around the corner. John Mearsheimer is the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor in the Political Science Department at the University of Chicago and the author of "Why Leaders Lie: The Truth About Lying in International Politics," "The Great Delusion: Liberal Dreams and International Realities," and co-author of the controversial and ground-breaking "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy."
Transcript
Intro
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[Music]
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down C down hello everyone and welcome to the
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Katy helper show we have such a great episode for you today we are interviewing the inimitable John mimer
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before we bring on Professor me shimer though I just want to remind people to please give give the stream a like give
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that's patreon.com theey helpers show and you get extended interviews bonus content for this week you actually get
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some artwork by Brad he uh uploaded a really cool video that he did and um
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down the pike we'll have extended interviews with David Cross you already have an extended interview with Michael
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Tracy brace Beldon so uh more to come and I think that's it I'm just gonna uh
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start the show so excited to be bringing on Professor Mir shimer a political
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scientist and author who is the a co-author of the seol book The Israel
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Lobby and US foreign policy he's the author of several other books including the great delusion liberal dreams and
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international realities and why leaders lie the truth about lying in international politics so and he's also
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uh Wendell Harrison distinguished service professor in the political science department at the University of
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Chicago so welcome Professor Mir shimer thank you Katie I'm glad to be here
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thank you we're so glad you're here you are very prolific in your writing and in
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your interview appearances so I actually wanted to ask you some questions about
How John came to his Realist political ideology
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um your not your personal life in a in a an inappropriate way but how you got to
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become the person who you are today um what kind of politics were you raised in
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were your parents political and have you always had this political realist perspective that you are so well known
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for well my parents were not political at all I grew up in I was born in New York City and grew up in New York City
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and then the suburbs of New York uh and my parents were not political my father
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was basically a Republican and my mother came from a very Democratic family they're ba both basically New York
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ethnics and uh they ever hardly ever talked about politics uh and uh it wasn't until I
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went to uh West Point and towards the end of my time there where I got
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interested in international politics not domestic politics International politics
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politics uh that I became fascinated with the subject of course it was hard to avoid politics uh when I was uh in my
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late teens and when I was at West Point in large part because of the Vietnam War uh and I remember very well you know the
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events of 1968 so I began to get a taste for politics in a serious way then but
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not any real intellectual interest until I started studying international
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relations and then I got into a PhD program at Cornell and eventually became a professor at the University of Chicago
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and I think what happened over time uh in large part because I am intellectually very curious is that I
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started asking all sorts of questions about politics in general going Beyond
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International politics and at some point I came to the realization that everything is connected and if you want
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to know a lot about how the International System works you have to know a lot about domestic politics and
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vice versa uh so with the passage of time I learned a great deal about
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politics in general and uh the same time
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uh I started off basically as a straightforward academic and the idea of
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commenting on the real world and acting as something of let's call it a public intellectual really didn't cross my mind
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but I always felt that my academic work had relevance for what was going going on in the real world so what happened is
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that over time I got increasingly involved in the public debates that were
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taking place uh inside the country and really inside uh places like Europe and
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Asia as well and with the passage of time I've gotten more and more involved
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and as you well know that's certainly true with the outbreak of the wars in Ukraine and Gaza but in the nutshell
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that's sort of how it all happened interesting and have you had kind of
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political IDE ideology influence you at all because I know that you are again a
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student oh a professor of the school of political realism I'm just kind of fascinated and curious about how that
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can intersect with uh political ideology it's funny when I first went to
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graduate school uh this is in 1975 there were sort of three dominant
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par imms for looking at the world in the field of international relations one was
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liberalism two was realism and three was Marxism it's hard to believe now but
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Marxism was a very important Paradigm for thinking about International politics whether you accepted that
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Paradigm or not you knew a lot about it and I actually read a lot of marks back in the day I took a course on Marxist
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theories of the State uh and of course this has all gone away now but those were the sort of big paradigms of the
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day but when I went to graduate school and even when I was a postdoc at Harvard for the first two years after I got my
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PhD I did not really view myself as a realist I didn't think about realism
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versus liberalism versus Marxism I knew the literatures but I didn't pay much
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attention to sort of categorizing myself but after I got to the University of
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Chicago uh and I started teaching a basic IR Theory course I came to the
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realization that I was effectively a realist now why did I decide that I was
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a realist a lot of people say oh it's because you went to West Point and therefore how could you be anything but
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a realist I really don't think that's true and I could point to a number of people who went to West Point who got
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phds who fit in the liberal category not the realist category I think that I
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became a realist because concluded and one doesn't have to agree with this but I concluded that it was the best of
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those three paradigms for explaining how the world works I think realism is far
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from a perfect set of theories but it is the best among those three sets of
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theories and for that reason I sort of settled on self-identifying as a
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realist well we're going to get more into that um because I want to kind of uh show people what that looks like
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and we're actually going to play a clip from Pierce Morgan where uh Pierce
Johns PERFECT response to Piers Morgan
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Morgan is talking to you and this clip he's talking about Afghanistan and I think your response uh sheds a lot of
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light on what it means to be a political realist although I am curious if there's not actual overlap potential overlap
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between the Marxist school and the realist School in some ways more than there would be between uh the liberal
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school and the other two but we'll we'll we can talk about that after this clip okay unless yeah
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okay so here's Pierce Morgan you want to remember that if you look at what's happening in the
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conventional War it looks like Putin's going to win despite the fact that we've now passed start at 104 Brad sorry in
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saying that given what's happened since I thought throwing the the country back to the Taliban was a catastrophic error
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of judgment and it wouldn't have happened in the way it's happened if America kept a couple of thousand troops there as it does all around the World in
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Endless bases so it seemed to me having done you know many many years of hard
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work in Afghanistan as a response to 911 to then simply just overnight uh throw
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everybody out uh and leave the country to the Taliban particularly for women's rights never mind nothing else I thought
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was an abrogation of America's Duty and the UK right but this is your world view
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which is the United States has a responsibility to be everywhere uh and to never quit they should certainly be
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preserving freedom and democracy otherwise why why self style yourself as leader of the Free World you either a
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leader of the Free World and America still has I think half the world's military uh Firepower uh and obviously
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one of the biggest economies you're either are that that entity leader of the Free World or you're not and if you
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are then what comes with that is a responsibility to protect freedom of democracy when it comes under attack
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from totalitarian regimes I would think
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I think if you look at the history of American foreign policy it's very hard to make the case that our principal goal
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has to been to protect freedom and democracy the United States has a rich
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history of overthrowing uh democracies around the world and we have a rich history of
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siding with some of the world's uh biggest dictators so this idea that we're out there protecting freedom and
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democracy and it's our principal goal in my opinion doesn't mesh with
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reality so what is the thing that is motivating the United States and other
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Western Powers I mean I uh for people who aren't familiar with your work and with uh political
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realism well I think there's no question that during the unipolar moment and this runs from roughly 1991 when the Soviet
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Union collaps is until about 2017 when we morph into a multi-polar
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world but during the unipolar moment where the United States was incredibly powerful we
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pursued a liberal policy this is the policy that Piers was describing Pierce
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has the mentality that most people have in the west about what the United States should do in the world he thinks that we
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have a responsibility and we have a right to run around the world and interfere in
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the domestic politics of every country on the planet he believed that we should
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reshape the politics of countries that we don't think meet the criteria that
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we've established for a successful liberal democracy uh my view has long
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been and this is the view of almost all realists is that this is a prescription for disaster that the United States
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should not be interfering in the politics of other countries unless it's
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absolutely necessary and in fact when you do that it's going to backfire witness what happened to the Soviet when
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they were in Afghanistan witness what happened to us when we were in Afghanistan witness what happened to us
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in Vietnam and then later in Iraq you want to stay out of these places uh a
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realist like me says that what really matters are the other great powers in
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the system and what you want to concern yourself with is the balance of power
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between the great powers or among the great powers and you want your country to be as powerful as possible relative
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to all the other countries because that's the best way to survive so what you have um if you look
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at the historical record as a situation where virtually all the realists opposed
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the Vietnam War except for Henry Kissinger who's not really much of a or was not much of a realist and almost all
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the realists except for Henry Kissinger opposed the Iraq War in 2003 as well
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Steve Walt and I two card carrying realists led the charge against the Iraq
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War in 200 2003 so again this whole idea that we have a right and responsibility
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to interfere in the politics of other countries around the world is just not a smart way to do business so what
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explains returning to Kissinger how is he a realist who's also
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obviously a major interventionist how does one reconcile that well Henry Kissinger more than anything
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else was an opportunist okay and a lot depended on which way the wind was blowing and uh he he was a re I think
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that instinctively he was a realist but uh given that he wanted to have lots of influence not only in Washington but
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other places around the world he had a tendency to tell people what he thought they wanted to hear uh so he kind of
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blew at the wind and that's why he he was in favor of the Vietnam War he was a
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real Hawk on Vietnam uh and uh you want to remember that people like Hans morgantha Walter
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Litman George Kennan Ken Waltz all these you know big name realists were adamant
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opponents of the Vietnam War and again if we went to the 2003 uh Iraq war you'd
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see the same basic pattern uh but and very interestingly Kissinger who was so
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often identified as a realist uh was the one exception in both Wars right can you
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be a neocon and a realist at the same time or are those conflicts of interest no neocons are basically liberals I mean
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the argument that Piers was making is basically a neocon line of argument
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there's not a lot of difference between neoconservatives uh and liberal interventionists right I think one could
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argue that the neoconservatives have a slightly greater affinity for going to war more than the
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liberal internationalists do and I think the liberal internationalists tend to have a greater affinity for
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international institutions right than the neocons do the neocons really don't
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like institutions because they think that institutions or where the little pans tie down guler right but by and
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large there's just not a lot of difference uh between someone like mateline Albright who is a real liberal
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uh and Paul Wolowitz who was in Neo conservative they're basically birds of a feather but they're neither one of
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them are realist right so um where does a country by like Cuba fit into this
What is Cuba's vision?
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because maybe it's naive of me and certainly one can disagree with or disapprove of Cuba but it does seem like
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in terms of being uh politically realist
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and a rational actor they do have some kind of ethical or moral Vision that's
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not just about political survival or am I just being naive you you mean Cuba does Cuba yeah
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well almost all countries have some ideology some have a very powerful ideology there's no question that for
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many years Cuba was a communist country uh especially in Fidel's early days uh
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and uh you know the Soviet Union at one point was heavily communist oriented
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country Nazi Germany was a fascist country the United States is a liberal democracy um with regard to Cuba let me
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say a few words first of all Cuba matters a lot to the United States from
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a realist point of view because it's physically located in the Western
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Hemisphere and uh it's America's backyard and the United States is going
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to care more about the Western Hemisphere than any other region of the
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world simply because it's our backyard and Cuba is right next door to us and
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that means we're going to pay a lot of attention to Cuba but our attitude
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towards Cuba during the Cold War when the real trouble started was not simply
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based on geopolitics it was also based on the fact that Cuba was a communist
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country uh and as you well know during the Cold War and this was true even
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before and after the Cold War any country in Latin America America has leftist
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leanings is likely to end up in America's gun sites and we're likely to try to topple that regime uh it doesn't
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even have to be a Communist Regime all it has to do is be left leaning and we'll do Terrible Things Republic or
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Guatemala yeah Guatemala is a very good example 1954 Nicaragua we could go on
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and on Chile 1973 these are just all examples and if we go back earlier in the century you'll see uh evidence of
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that sort of anti-left wi tendencies in American foreign policy when it comes to dealing with Latin America from a
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realist point of view I think this doesn't make much sense right because in a realist story ideology doesn't matter
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that much uh in my view you can live with a communist country we could have lived with Cuba uh the problem with Cuba
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was that once it became an enemy of the United States Cuba went to the Soviet
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Union for help and once Cuba went to the Soviet Union for help uh then it became
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an important geopolitical issue and of course the first manifestation of this
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was the Cuban Missile Crisis and then later after the Cuban Missile Crisis I remember very well uh the Soviets were
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talking about building a naval base at Cen fuos in Cuba and the Americans told
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them in no uncertain terms that that is not happening and that's geopolitical logic at play but again I don't want to
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argue that there was no ideological Dimension to this because there was a powerful ideological Dimension and
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actually I think if you look at our relationship with Cuba today it's really quite remarkable that we can't get over
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the fact that we had this crisis with Cuba during the Cold War I mean Cuba is not a communist country in
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any meaningful sense it's not a threat to the United States in an ideological
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way a lot of people AR during the Cold War that ideology really mattered and communism anywhere was a real problem I
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didn't believe that but I could see where people made that argument but how can you make that argument today but we
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cannot get over the fact that Cuba crossed us during the Cold War the fact
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that Fidel formed a close relationship with the Soviets which led to them placing missiles in Cuba is something
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that we've never gotten over and and go go ahead no no you you you finish what
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you're were saying sorry I was just going to say to my amazement we still have gun sites on Cuba even when we have
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a Democratic president like Joe Biden there is also I mean you obviously
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wrote this amazing book on the Israel lobby but there is a Cuba Lobby is there not absolutely and Cuba's not so Cuba
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Florida excuse me is not so much as a foran well given what I'm now gonna say
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you'll see why I made that mistake uh Florida used to be a real swing state remember the 2000 election and uh in a
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swing state where there are a significant number of Cuban Americans you want to make sure that you don't
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alienate those Cuban Americans uh and those Cuban Americans
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by and large in Florida are profoundly
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anti-castro anti- Cuba so it is or it has been very difficult for us to have
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good Rel relations with Cuba because of the Cuba Lobby so there's no question
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that you're on the money when you raise the issue of the Cuba Lobby there's also an interesting parallel I found between
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the Israel Lobby and the Cuba Lobby in that you have for obvious reasons older people who are much more um maybe
The connection between Israel and Cuba
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emotionally driven about the issue and extreme and very very vocal and then you
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have especially the younger generation which really doesn't have that kind of attachment to it and you're seeing a
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real demographic shift yeah I had a a student he was an undergrad here at
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Chicago probably about 10 years ago uh who wrote A BA thesis under my
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supervision on the Cuba Lobby and he made exactly that point and he had a lot
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of data to support it uh but as I recollect his argument was that the
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elders tend to select the more hawkish right individuals
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uh among the youth uh to replace them so there is this continuity in terms of a
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hawkish attitude uh towards Cuba so shifting gears a little bit um want to
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talk about of course something that you've talked about a lot you've also written about uh Israel and Palestine
Anthony Blinken blames Hamas for the ceasefire issues
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and wanted to start off by showing you a clip of uh Secretary of State Anthony
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blinkin being asked by Andrea Mitchell about the ceasefire
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you say that everyone but Hamas has agreed to this benjin Netanyahu has
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certainly said otherwise publicly and the hostage families are saying you
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should try everything if this fails and it's quite possible it will fail with him now toughening his position more
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likely uh with his right-wing Partners if this fails they want you to work
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through Gutter and deal with Hama to get the Americans home
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and we are reporting at NBC news that that is being discussed as a a backup
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plan if no other way to get a ceasefire doing it without Israel agreeing to a
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ceasefire can you tell us about that and also if the war
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continues won't the Palestinian death toll be
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unacceptable as the National Security adviser of Israel has said till the end of the year after such a horrific death
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toll in getting the hostages out militarily this weekend first let me be very clear Israel has accepted the
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proposal uh in fact uh they were critical in putting it forward so the only party no that's that is what that
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is what the official position of the Israeli government and the Prime Minister um so the only party that has
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not accepted the only party that's not said yes is Hamas that's who everyone's waiting on that's who the Palestinians
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in Gaza are waiting on it's who the Israelis are waiting on it's who the hostages and the hostage families are
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waiting on it's who the entire region and the entire world is waiting on and so we'll see does Hamas want to end this
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conflict end uh this war that it started or not we'll find out but it's clear
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that virtually the entire world has come together in support of the proposal and the only open question is will Hamas say
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yes a lot to unpack there but can you shed
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some light and insight into the deal which um Israel is claiming it's not
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accepting uh and the US is claiming Israel is accepting yeah I mean trying to figure
24:17
out what is going on here is uh almost impossible just before I describe the
24:25
deal he says that Israel has accepted the deal and as you know the
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Administration has a tendency to talk about the deal as if it was Israel's
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deal in other words they proposed it Israel we accept we accepted it uh we
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put it before the UN Security Council and now we have a un Security Council
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resolution backing Israel's deal so what we have to do now is just get Hamas to
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agree that's the story that Biden and the administration tend to tell but if
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you look at what's happened what both sides and here we're talking about Hamas and Israel were
25:09
required to do was respond with a formal report or formal letter to the UN
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Security Council resolution SL plan Hamas has responded with a formal
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letter Israel has not responded now the Israeli Press today is
25:34
reporting that even though uh Hamas responded if you look
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carefully at their response this is according to the Israelis uh Hamas
25:46
really doesn't accept the deal they want to change X Y and Z okay but they've at
25:52
least responded with a formal letter Israel has not responded and you listen
25:58
to what the Israelis are saying about the deal they're all over the map it all
26:03
depends who you're talking to and what day you're talking to that person so I
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don't know how blinkin can say that the only remaining party to declare its
26:16
agreement to the deal is Hamas because Hamas I'm not saying they've agreed
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because I haven't seen their letter but they at least submitted a formal letter the Israelis haven't even done that and
26:28
there's no evidence that the Israelis agree to this deal the way blinkin describes it so it's hard to know for
26:36
sure what's going on here but it does not sound like uh blinkin is uh telling
26:42
a true story right and it's worth noting also this is Andrea Mitchell questioning him she's not someone who's extremely
26:49
critical of the Biden Administration or of Israel um so they're kind of losing
26:57
their ual allies yeah let me give you my take if you don't mind course why I
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think it's hard to see how you get a ceas fire I mean I do hope you get a ceasefire and I hope it becomes
27:09
permanent for sure but uh the problem is that what Hamas wants for understandable
27:16
reasons is they want a permanent ceasefire uh but Israel doesn't want a
27:23
permanent ceasefire they want a temporary ceasefire and then they want to go back on the offensive because the
27:28
Israeli view is they have to finish the job remember Netanyahu is firmly
27:34
committed to decisively defeating Hamas and if you get a temporary or ceasefire
27:39
now he's not gonna have decisively defeated Hamas so he wants to be able to go back on the offensive and of course
27:48
Hamas wants to end this once and for all so that's one major point of
27:53
disagreement the second thing is Hamas wants Israel to withdraw all its forces
28:01
from Gaza they want every IDF Soldier out period and you can understand why
28:07
Hamas wants that but the Israelis of course don't want to do that because
28:12
they haven't finished off Hamas and they understand full well they're going to be
28:18
problems inside of Gaza in the foreseeable future so they want to remain I think they're probably as best
28:25
I can tell from news reports willing this is the Israelis willing to pull out of the populous areas willing to pull
28:32
out of the cities and the large towns but they want to remain in Gaza and of course unsurprisingly Hamas doesn't want
28:39
them to remain in Gaza now the question I would ask you is how do you square
28:45
those circles I just don't see how you do it uh the Americans probably think
28:50
they can finesse it but when you're dealing with hops and you're dealing with the Israelis it's very hard to
28:57
finesse any anything because these are you know two ruthless actors who are at each other's throats and they're looking
29:04
for opportunities to inflict massive pain on each other so how you you know
29:09
Square those two circles I don't know you refer to October 7th as a prison
29:16
break and not quote not terribly surprising can you elaborate on that
29:22
well I mean what was going on in Gaza is that up until 2005 let me go back a
29:28
little bit further the Israelis gained control of Gaza in 1967 as a result of
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the famous 67 War Israel got control of the West Bank and Gaza and from 1967
29:44
until 2005 the Israelis occupied Gaza they had settlers in Gaza and they had a
29:52
large contingent of military forces in Gaza but the place was a hornet snake
29:58
nest and they were more concerned the Israelis were more concerned about the West Bank about the occupation of the
30:04
West Bank which they wanted not only maintain but expand so what Ariel Chiron
30:09
did in 2005 is he pulled out of Gaza he
30:15
pulled all the settlers and the military out of Gaza now Israel's Defenders today
30:21
like to argue that what the Israelis were doing was presenting U the Palestinians in Gaza
30:29
with a wonderful opportunity to turn it into Dubai uh and on the Mediterranean and
30:36
live happily ever after nothing could be further from the truth the Israelis continued to control gaza's borders they
30:43
continued to control the uh the air above uh Gaza and they continued to
30:48
control its water supply and so forth and so on and then in 2007 remember the
30:55
Israelis pull out in 2005 in 2007 Hamas takes control in Gaza and the
31:02
Israelis really turn the screws on Hamas and over the course of the time
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from roughly 2005 up until uh now uh people have come to
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argue that Gaza is an open air prison that the uh the Palestinians who live in
31:26
Gaza are basically prison prisoners it's an absolutely horrible life and the Israelis go to Great Lengths to make it
31:33
that way so this is why when Palestinians and
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here we're talking about Hamas and a handful of other uh resistance groups in
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Gaza broke out on October 7th uh it was referred to as a prison break
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uh yeah and and just going back to that point you made about um the
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disengagement or pulling out of of Gaza which people like to point to as a sign of generosity on Israel's uh part and an
Debunking the myth that Palestinians can't 'Govern themselves'
32:06
example of why Palestinians can't rule themselves I wanted to just show this
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article um from the guardian and here we have Ariel chiron's
32:19
Chief Aid making some honest statements about what was really behind this he
32:25
said when you freeze that process you prevent the establishment of a
32:31
Palestinian State and you prevent a discussion on the refugees the borders and Jerusalem effectively this whole
32:37
package called the Palestinian state with all that it entails has been removed indefinitely from our agenda and
32:43
all this with authority and permission all with the presidential blessing and the ratification of both houses of
32:49
Congress and he calls the disengagement uh he says this disengagement is actually form Malahide IT Supplies the
32:56
amount of form Malahide that is necessary so that there will not be a political process with the
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Palestinians so I I remember it very well it was Dove wine glass and yeah he
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said that they were basically putting the Palestinians in from alahi yeah and I mean this is a lot like
33:15
the claims that Israel has wanted to give the Palestinians a state of their own and they've offered the Palestinians
33:22
a viable State on numerous occasions and the Palestinians have turned it down and turned to ter ER at at every turn this
33:30
is you know this is a story that can't be supported by the evidence period and
33:36
the same thing is true with regard to Gaza the Israelis had no interest in
33:41
turning Gaza into Dubai on the Mediterranean in fact what they wanted
33:46
to do was you know put the Palestinians in Gaza in a giant prison and inflict
33:52
massive pain on them right you've called Israel an apartheid state which I
33:58
obviously have done too and I got fired for saying that but you've called Israel an apartheid state and you've said that
34:04
they're engaging in genocide and you actually called Netanyahu you said about Netanyahu that he was basically he
34:10
basically represents Jim Crow so can you expand on that well those are three
34:15
different issues uh let's just take them in turn uh with regard to whether or not
34:21
Israel is an apartheid state anybody who has any doubt about that should read the
34:26
human rights watch report the Amnesty International report and the Bellum
34:32
report on this very issue uh these are extensive reports thoroughly documented
34:41
done by you know extremely competent and honest and smart
34:46
individuals and I don't see how anybody could come away from Reading those reports without thinking that uh Israel
34:55
is an apartheid state I would say Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch are anti-semitic that's what some
35:00
people say it gets harder though when you throw in bet selum which I guess would be self-loathing according to there to the logic of people who call
35:07
those organizations anti-semitic well as you know the term anti-semitic is thrown around so Lo yeah
35:15
that right anybody who criticizes Israel as an anti-semite I know that you and I
35:20
are both well-known anti-semites right yes it's just you know it's kind of crazy where we are you can
35:28
keep well it just I the nice thing about bet selum is it makes it a little bit harder to to write off that that claim
35:35
as anti-semitic look I could give you a list of probably about eight Israeli
35:42
senior figures who have said Israel is an aparte state right this is an
35:48
argument that you hear in Israel quite often uh Bishop tutu right who of course
35:59
uh lived in apartheid South Africa came to Israel and said it was an apartheid
36:05
state he and others like Ronnie casril who was a very prominent South African
36:11
Jew who was a major force during the apartheid era in South Africa he and
36:17
Bishop tutu both said that what you saw in Israel what they saw in Israel was worse than apartheid in South Africa so
36:26
they just a whole slew of people uh outside of those three reports right who
36:32
back up uh uh what those three reports conclude now before I go to the whole
36:40
subject of genocide let's just talk about the Jim Crow charge what I was
36:45
talking about there was the claim that many Israelis and Israel support as many
36:52
of Israel's supporters make that we share values okay in other words the
36:58
United States of America and uh and Israel have the same values and the
37:04
point I was making is the only values that we share with the Israelis are old
37:10
values that are thankfully now gone which dominated mainly in the south
37:16
after the American Civil War and up to the Civil Rights Act of 64 and the Voting Rights Act of 65 and that's when
37:24
Jim Crow America was alive and well uh in the South and even to some extent
37:30
in the north to be honest but anyway uh Israel today is basically the equivalent
37:37
of the Jim Crow South that's certainly true in the West Bank and in Gaza we
37:43
could argue what it looks like inside Greenline Israel where it's not quite as bad as in those two other places but
37:50
anyway that's the context in which uh I brought up the Jim Crow analogy and
37:55
again I was talking about aarth right I think it's spot on by the way we we had
38:01
um Chaz freman Aaron mate and I interviewed Chaz freman and he's compared Israel to Israel's ideology to
38:07
the KKK ideology so it's you know it's amazing what's
38:13
happened to Israel I I find it very hard to believe I mean I was someone who you know I came of age uh in the 1950s and
38:21
my whole view of Israel was deeply informed by Leon uris's famous book
38:26
Exodus I had a very romantic view of Israel and I thought that the Israelis
38:31
were clearly the good guys and that the Palestinians or the Arabs as people called them at the time were the bad
38:37
guys and uh it's amazing the extent to which people like May and many other
38:45
people I've known have fundamentally changed their view of Israel and there
38:50
are a number of factors that explain that but what Israel has become and you see this manifested in
38:58
uh the war in Gaza is just it's just really hard to believe u but anyway
39:04
that's where we are let me say a few words about genocide yeah please uh I
39:10
think that um if you look at the South
39:16
African report that was submitted to the icj and I think 84 pages long thoroughly
39:24
documented a really wellone report on what the Israelis uh
39:32
were doing in Gaza as of late December 2023 you want to remember that they sent
39:38
uh their report to the icj in late 2023 and then it was in January
39:44
2024 that the icj based on that report and all sorts
39:50
of other pieces of information the icj said there was sufficient evidence to
39:57
make the case that uh there was a
40:03
plausible case to make a plausible case that Israel was committing
40:09
genocide uh and uh if you look at what Israel has done since January 2024 it is
40:17
in no way taken its foot off the accelerator it's continued to pound um uh Gaza and it's not surprising
40:26
that South in South Africa has intervened again with the icj because they were so disturbed by what's been
40:34
happening since the ruling but anyway I paid careful attention to the report the
40:39
South African report I listened to all the testimony and I've been studying the issue myself and I think when you look
40:46
at what is necessary uh to prove genocide and you
40:51
look at what the Israelis are doing I think it's hard not to conclude their
40:56
engag in genocide and uh and I think that eventually uh the icj when they resolve
41:04
it uh once and for all will reach the conclusion that is that this is
41:10
genocide it's interesting what you said I've heard a lot of people say this that you know they used to support Israel and
41:17
now they don't but how much of what Israel is doing now is a departure from the way they used to be versus how much
41:23
is it that we just see it on social media I mean because because was founded right
41:28
through even Benny Morris admits he doesn't use the word but ethnic
41:34
cleansing or transfer as he admits as he calls it um so I guess my question is
41:40
how much has Israel changed versus how much we've just seen
Has Israel always been this brutal?
41:46
it for what it is I understand what you're saying and I agree with you in good part but not
41:53
completely uh there's no question that from the beginning the zionists who came
41:59
to Palestine understood that there was going to have to be massive ethnic cleansing for purposes of creating
42:07
Jewish State there's no way that zionists coming out of Europe and landing in Palestine where there is a
42:14
large population of Palestinians can create a Jewish State without doing
42:21
significant ethnic cleansing and of course they cleansed uh or transferred
42:26
trans was the word back then uh they transferred about
42:32
750,000 Palestinians uh in 1948 many of whom by the way went to Gaza and many of
42:39
these people fighting today are descendants of those people who were pushed out in 1948 and then the second
42:46
big cleansing was mainly in the West Bank after the 1967 war uh and uh
42:54
there's no question that what the Israelis did especially in 48 was absolutely horrific
43:01
and there's also no question that we didn't know much about it uh in the west and furthermore uh the Israelis were
43:09
able to purvey this story that the Arab armies which went to war against Israel
43:16
shortly after it declared its independence this is I believe May 14th
43:21
1948 the Israelis declare their independence uh and Israel then ends up
43:26
in in a war with a number of U Arab armies and the story that we were told
43:34
when I was young was that the reason the Palestinians left was not because they
43:39
were cleansed but because these Arab armies told them to leave they were
43:46
going to come in they would kill all the Israelis or all the zionists or all the Jews and once they were done killing
43:52
them throwing them into the sea the Palestinians could come back to their house or to their
43:58
houses this story is completely false there's no evidence to support it the Israelis cleansed Gaza and what's
44:06
happened is we have figured all of this out with the passage of time just very
44:11
quickly if I can tell you sort of what I think is the series of events that change not only my thinking but all
44:18
sorts of people's thinking about Israel uh and undermine this Exodus story uh
44:26
that was so firm entrenched in people's minds uh a long time ago uh the first
44:31
big event is the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982 um that was heavily covered in the
44:39
media and here you see the importance of the media this gets back to the very important point you were making
44:45
especially about social media today but the media began to cover things in a big way in 1982 in ways that it didn't in
44:54
1948 and we saw what was happening and uh it was a terrible picture and of
45:00
course the massacres in Sabra and shatilla did enormous damage to Israel's
45:06
reputation then in the late 1980s the new historians came along you mentioned
45:11
Benny Morris's name but Elon Pape uh was another prominent figure AI schlim was
45:18
another prominent figure and there were a number of other people as well and they got access to the Israeli archives
45:25
and they told the story what really happened in 1948 they told you how
45:30
Israel was created and they not only told you what happened in 1948 they took
45:35
you back to the early 20th century and told you how people like Boran thought
45:41
about what was necessary to create a Jewish state in a sea of Arabs and
45:48
what's very important to understand here is that once you heard the explanation that people like moris and
45:55
people like schlime and Pape were uh providing you understood that it made
46:00
perfect sense right you you understood that the Israelis or zionists had to do
46:06
terrible things to create a Jewish state it was just unavoidable so from a logical point of
46:12
view and from an empirical point of view or from the historical record you began to see uh what was really going on uh in
46:21
terms of how Israel was created and third thing you want to keep in mind is you had the first in fought it in 1987
46:28
this is the first big public Uprising again this is when you have a lot of
46:34
news coverage and then in the 90s the situation began to move back in the
46:40
other direction because of the Oslo Peace process but that all failed and then you had the second inata and after
46:47
the second inata and more historical work being done on Israel especially by
46:55
Arab and Palestinian Scholars this is another very important part of the
47:02
change that took place since I was a young man if not young boy in those days
47:08
it was basically white people who you know Europeans and Americans who uh
47:15
created the discourse about Israel uh and most of those people were super
47:21
friendly to Israel they were pro-israel that world has gone away you now have lots of people like Rashid hiid
47:28
right who can tell a very different story and I want to be very clear here
47:34
it's not just rashed hii it's also the fact that you have lots of Israelis lots of American Jews lots of American
47:40
non-jews who are telling the same story that Rasheed H is telling right there
47:45
are different twists on all these stories that these people tell but the same basic story is being told and now
47:54
today we have alternative media and you and I talking here is a perfect example
48:00
of this you couldn't do this in 1982 you couldn't even do it in
48:05
2000h at the time of Camp David right when Bill Clinton and ahood Barack and Yas Arafat were at Camp David uh in late
48:13
2000 trying to negotiate a settlement you had no alternative media you had to
48:19
depend on the New York Times and CBS and NBC and of course what you got was very
48:25
slanted you didn't get a critical eye looking at what was going on now you
48:31
have you know people like uh you people like Aaron people like Max Blumenthal
48:37
just all sorts of people Chaz Freeman um uh me Steve Walt and so forth and so
48:44
we're all out there uh you know opining on these events and the discourse has
48:49
just changed drastically and it's very hard for Israel's Defenders uh to
48:57
uh deceive us and we're making it very hard for them to deceive you know Middle
49:05
America or middle Germany or middle France right
49:10
so the whole discourse has just changed in fundamental ways and it is not advantageous to Israel right although
49:18
what's frustrating is that we've seen public opinion shift but public policy
49:24
has not caught up with it no question right no I mean the lobby you know the the
49:32
lobby operates at two levels when Steve and I wrote our book this is one of the first things that we figured out the
49:40
lobby is deeply interested in controlling the discourse as much as it can because controlling the discourse is
49:46
related to public opinion what the people in the body politic think uh and
49:51
that's where they've lost out in recent years that's what we were just talking about but they care more about the elite
50:00
level right uh and there they continue to be wildly successful it's really
50:06
quite remarkable and we'll see this on display on uh June 24th when Benjamin
50:13
Netanyahu comes to talk to Congress I think the only interesting question is
50:18
how many standing ovations will he get and what you see is that the lobby
50:25
continues to Main Ain tremendous influence on the legislative branch uh
50:31
and on the executive branch and uh and that hasn't changed and the interesting
50:37
question moving forward as I'm sure you recognize is whether or not all of this
50:42
change down below will have an impact up on top right and here's the book uh the
50:49
Israel Lobby and US foreign policy which U Professor Mir shimer co-wrote with Stephen Walt what has changed since you
What has changes since John wrote "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy."
50:56
wrote that book besides the public opinion I mean uh is it much easier for people to
51:04
criticize Israel than it was then yes and I think you you can now first of all
51:09
talk about the lobby itself uh in ways you couldn't back then uh you can talk
51:14
about the US Israeli relationship in ways you couldn't back then uh and you can talk about whether
51:22
or not the lobby is uh doing good things for Israel and for the United States or
51:29
not in ways that you couldn't back then so I think that Steve and I did have a
51:36
lot of influence U on the discourse and a good number of people in the lobby
51:41
have told me that over the years but their view is that we may have had
51:48
influence on the discourse but we're not having any influence on policy and as I said a few minutes ago that's true but I
51:56
think the two things that have changed that really matter the most for
52:01
the lobby and are not good for the lobby is that first of all it has to
52:08
work harder than ever to defend Israel uh and it's really working overtime
52:15
these days and that means it's out in the open and lobbies don't want to
52:23
operate out in the open you want to operate in very subtle uh and sophisticated
52:29
ways uh whether you're the National Rifle Association the Cuba Lobby the
52:34
China Lobby back in the day or the Israel lobby but they are out in the
52:40
open everybody can see evidence of the lobby at work and this is not good uh at
52:47
all the second thing is they're not able to operate in a subtle way anymore
52:55
they're basically now engaged in what I call Smashmouth politics and if you're
53:01
Lobby I don't care whether you're the NRA again or the Cuba Lobby or the Israel Lobby Smashmouth politics is not
53:07
the way you want to go because you're going to end up alienating lots of people so what you have you know the
53:15
bottom line here is that what you have is you have a Lobby that is much more
53:21
exposed today than it was in 2006 when Steve and I wrote the article in 2007
53:28
when we wrote the book much more exposed and is engaged in Smashmouth politics in
53:35
ways it certainly was not back then uh back then so this is a real problem for
53:41
the lobby and then you can marry that to our earlier discussion of the changes that are taking place down
53:48
below in the population certainly among younger people including many American
53:54
Jews right is as you know I like to make this point that it is a fundamental
54:00
mistake to make the argument that you know all Jews are in the lobby or all
54:06
Jews support Israel nothing could be further from the truth as was evidenced by the fact that in almost all of those
54:14
college and university protests in recent months large numbers of Jews were involved and were arrested right and is
54:23
Biden's decision to not curtail Israel is it rational or or is it
54:30
ideological in other words he always talks about what a Zionist he is but could he have said to Israel you're not
54:37
going to do this without losing the election okay thank you so much have a
54:43
great night you too goodbye Katie bye what a wonderful interview wow we he
54:51
was so generous we got so much time with him I'm very very happy and uh want to
54:56
thank everyone for tuning in we have two quick updates wanted to share um one is
55:02
that friend of show she's actually been on the show before um Claire d uh the um
55:09
European the member of European Parliament M member of European Parliament from Ireland she lost her
55:17
seat um but to honor her we wanted to play a few clips of her speaking in
55:23
Parliament because she's so great and of course many times people people who are on the right side of History they lose their seats but I know that whatever she
55:30
does next she'll do a great job so let's take a look at some of these clips of CLA da so far the EU and US response to
55:37
Israeli genocide has been straight from the abusers handbook darvo deny attack
55:43
reverse victim and offender and if that doesn't work should just change the subject so as the genocide and Gaza
55:50
continues you want to talk about everything but Gaza you refuse to put
55:55
the on an agenda an agenda stacked with every cliche imaginable from Venezuela
56:01
to Iran with pride of place given to the Old Reliable Russian interference so
56:07
across the pond special agent Nancy Pelosi gives the signal branding
56:13
Palestine protesters as Kremlin operatives and like clockwork the dark
56:18
insinuations begin in Europe everyone can see what you're doing it's tedious
56:23
it's predictable you've been doing it since 201 and it isn't going to work
56:28
anymore the mass movement is focused like a laser on genocide everyone knows
56:34
it's happening and Europe is I'm sorry this is debate with a title
56:44
and so you should stick to the issue thank you always a good sign when they have to
56:49
cut off your mic uh let's see what she is and let's listen to it let's watch another clip president I voted against
56:57
this motion after a week of horror in Gaza and the EU Dev diving in head first
57:03
draping our parliament in the Israeli flag aiding and betting in war crimes including the bombing of a hospital and
57:11
still we find it impossible to say that Palestinian lives matter we're still
57:17
privileging one category of victims over another we talk about the humanitarian
57:23
situation in Gaza but why is there humanitarian crisis is it a national
57:29
disaster who cut off the water fuel and electricity are we not sure who is
57:35
bombing Palestinian civilians do we not know do you think we could mention it
57:40
there is a crime unfolding in Gaza now such as we have not seen since the 1940s
57:46
and we are in it up to our nexts we're watching Israel murder Palestinian
57:52
civilians and preparing to drive millions of them into the Sinai dead are to Annex and colonize their land it's
57:59
another Ana it's a crime against humanity it's not a humanitarian crisis
58:04
the EU will never live down this shame Long Live Palestine Long Live
58:11
Gaza great speaker we have a couple more Clips I've been involved in politics for
58:18
40 years but I have never seen anything like what is being Unleashed in Gaza in
58:24
full public View while the world watches it unfold 10
58:30
days of Relentless air strikes one in a thousand people murdered by the Israeli
58:35
government in a week open Declarations of Siege 24 hours of fuel electricity
58:42
and water left Collective punishment on innocent people all illegal all war
58:48
crimes and when the EU should have been arguing for a ceasefire for the upholding of international law for the
58:55
protection of of civilians Ursa V liion touches down in Tel Aviv to photo up the
59:02
preparation of a genocide and says Europe stands with Israel now and in the
59:08
days to come how dare she she has no Authority in foreign affairs matter she
59:14
does not speak for me she does not speak for Ireland and she does not speak for
59:20
the citizens of Europe We Stand For Peace we stand for justice for the people of Palestine and for the
59:26
upholding of international law it's long past the time that this woman exited the
59:31
stage it's time for her to go and for the international criminal court so the Deb so the debate is
59:39
closed and one more listening to the cheerleading in here safe and secure
59:47
thousands of miles away from the front lines I think it would be a useful exercise for us to remind ourselves
59:54
about what ordinary you ukrainians are experiencing the economists reports of
1:00:00
forced recruitment across the country draft EES with no experience or training
1:00:06
are being sent to the front in what a UK Minister calls first world war levels of
1:00:13
attrition casualty figures are secret but we know there estimates of about
1:00:19
120,000 Battalion commanders tell the Washington Post of recruits fleeing
1:00:24
positions on Mass political rep reports a Crackdown on deserters these are human
1:00:32
beings and there is a shameful lack of empathy for ordinary people in the war
1:00:38
rhetoric in here the debate is about keeping the weapons flowing to keep the
1:00:43
war going Ukraine is burning through a generation of men Sons husbands brothers
1:00:51
who can never be replaced this cannot go on indefinitely
1:00:56
and ye sickening war generals who sit in here and will these men to our debts you
1:01:02
make me sick we need peace we need dialogue however unpleasant that may
1:01:10
be and that was CLA Del who lost her seat in the European Parliament who was
1:01:15
smeared and attacked by the political establishment and by the media but uh the great thing is I know that whatever
1:01:22
she does next she's going to kick ass as you can tell she's an incredibly inspiring person politician organizer
1:01:29
and if you want you can watch our interview with her um we have another announcement
1:01:35
which is that most of you guys watching I'm sure uh know about this but uh
1:01:41
Brianna Joy gray was fired at the hill and uh Amy Goodman reported on this so
1:01:48
let's show a clip of Amy Goodman because it's really important to show the story but there's also a bonus treat at the
1:01:54
end media news the Washington Bas news Outlet the hill has fired Briana Joy
1:02:00
gray the co-host of rising the hills daily Morning Show Gray's been a vocal
1:02:05
critic of Israel's war on Gaza last year the hill also fired the political commentator Katie Halper after she
1:02:12
called Israel and apartate state so guys terrible that bro that Bri
1:02:19
got fired although like Claire who lost her seat uh I'm not worried about Bri
1:02:24
everyone should support her patreon and her show at uh patreon.com
1:02:29
bfaith um but yeah you this sometimes when you are on the right side of
1:02:35
History you get punished for it but luckily I'm sure Claire and Bri are going to be doing great things Bri
1:02:43
already has a show so we know what she's doing next and um I'm excited for her to have more energy on uh to spend on her
1:02:50
show not to have to be uh dividing her time between uh rising and her show
1:02:56
and what else anything else Brad that I need to mention no I guess that's it but
1:03:01
I am thankful to Amy Goodman for featuring bod she just took my Twitter photo which happens to have bod in it um
1:03:08
really quickly going to read the super chats and then we will wrap okay let's see what we got um wadeworth thank you
1:03:14
so much for that generous chat uh yesie Miller thank you for joining uh Ed liwi
1:03:21
it's quite simple every Israeli claim is exactly the opposite all their allegations are actually confession and projection yes uh Al alook gave me a
1:03:30
nice Super Chat super sticker from Alex thank you so much thank you for this
1:03:35
great report thank you um thanks Katie for all that you do from Verina
1:03:41
Frasier why do many realists think we should treat China Taiwan more aggressively than Russia Ukraine both
1:03:46
China and Russia are nuclear armed having have aging populations and want to influence the region I will ask him I
1:03:52
will ask Professor Mir shimer the next time he's on um The Rev hi rev haven't
1:03:58
seen you a while Professor Mir shimer and his work is a wonderful gift Southern Taiwan gam gamia gamia
1:04:05
gratitude Viva Katy put a picture of me shimer smiling
1:04:10
on a shirt with the caption the lobby is working overtime and I'll buy it instantly that's actually a good idea
1:04:16
didn't Biden handle Ukraine policy under the Obama Administration am I hallucinating that nukes are illegal under
1:04:22
international law as well as immoral we could turn to it's a mistake by Men
1:04:29
At Work for evidence Say It Isn't So Katie Say It Isn't So I don't understand
1:04:34
someone explain that to me who's the little guy with the wet nose with sweat glands Katie Ho was holding in the
1:04:39
picture oh bod is that what you mean it's a she's a girl
1:04:45
though um oh and then Brad can we just show the picture of um of Mir shimer
1:04:51
dressed up on his website do you know what I'm talking about
1:04:57
if not I can do it okay let me do it hold on I just want to show people um Mir sher's
1:05:06
uh Mir Shimmer's
1:05:12
website because it's pretty cool all right
1:05:27
and there he is dressed up as the prince as mavelli John J Mir shimer and there's
1:05:36
look they even have a quiz what do Al Capone Michael Jordan Milan Freeman and John me shimer all have in common they
1:05:42
were all born in Brooklyn and made their reputation in Chicago Cool website anyway well guys
1:05:48
thank you so much for watching we'll be back next week and um please oh some
1:05:54
because we were blessed with so much time with u Professor me shimer some of this will be patreon only so to see the full stream with um uh Professor me
1:06:03
shimer please become patreon supporters at patreon.com theat helpers show and that's patreon.com theat helpers show so
1:06:09
you can hear his thoughts on Russia Ukraine and World War bye everyone
1:06:14
thanks [Music]
1:06:23
brous okay I'm down down
