Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 8/29/25: Adam Friedland TEARS INTO Ritchie Torres, Dark Money Funds Dem Influencers, Gaza Doctor Returns w/ Shocking Photos

Episode Date: August 29, 2025

Ryan, Emily, and Griffin discuss the interview between Adam Friedland and Ritchie Torres, then we look at the Taylor Lorenz WIRED article on influencers being paid through an organization called Chorus. Then we speak with Dr. Mohammed Khaleel, a spine surgeon who just returned from his third trip to Gaza. To become a Breaking Points Premium Member and watch/listen to the show AD FREE, uncut and 1 hour early visit: www.breakingpoints.comMerch Store: https://shop.breakingpoints.com/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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We're seizing the means. of the breaking points here. What are we going to take a 10% staking? Ooh. Hmm. What is a, was it black rifle coffee? That was really big in the studio for a minute there.

That's pretty good. There was two months where we had a bunch of free black rifle coffee. It was out of control. Yeah. Saga would love that. Yeah. I don't know, consider keeping it. Actually, it would be Lucy, Lucy Gum, something like that.

Lucy, yeah. Lucy, I like Lucy, but Lucy doesn't ship to California for some reason. They're tightening down here in Gavin Newskums, California. All right, we got a lot to talk about. We've got Adam Friedland versus Richie Torres, the matchup everyone has been waiting for. We've got an interview with Gaza doctor, Dr. Muhammad Khalil. We've got a Taylor the Wrens article and much, much more. But why don't we get right into it here?

the Adam Friedland show. He is a podcast comedian and he recently had Congressman Richie Torres on to discuss many topics including Israel Gaza. Let's take a listen. The understanding in our community

is that we have to defend Israel. But it's, I lived there and I went to a settlement at the end of my year there. And I looked down the hill at a Palestinian village and I saw how they lived I turned back and I looked at this element and saw how they lived,

and people live in a world where they're demeaned and dehumanized and surveilled constantly by people in, and this isn't in Gaza, by people in swap team outfits with semi-automatic weapons, and that's what the world is seeing. And you keep telling me that the problem is someone's getting yelled at at a restaurant. I'm sorry. You're complaining two different issues. Please, just, please. me saying this to you right now

will hurt people in my own family okay because this is a very important thing to us and the fact that I still fucking care about being Jewish is embarrassing I should just be a guy but this feels like a stain on our history

and it feels like it's changed what being Jewish is because what being Jewish is isn't Israel Judaism has existed for 4,000 years. This is a country for 75 years. I feel like I'm here to be lectured. Not. Shut up. That's not nice. You can't talk that way.

Why are one set of Jews but more poor than the others? No one's saying any your... What happened? You went to the beach in Israel? What? You went to a restaurant or something? Yeah. A nice restaurant?

Like, listen. Never been to the television private rate, so... This is the year 2025. Yeah. the world is seeing something that looks terrible and it's being done in my name and i don't know what to do but the war began on october sept no it did it yes it's yes when hamas systematically murdered all right that was clip number one uh what are we to make of that well the whole conversation uh is is raw and i think just worth worth watching as uh

It's like cinema almost as Adam is sitting there kind of begging Richie Torres to reach him on a human level, to meet him on a human level, and Richie Torres just flatly refusing throughout it. Like Richie just kind of sticks to Wikipedia level talking points, Hebron Massacre in the 1920s. And so this juxtaposition, this point-counterpoint of, like, raw emotion being met with talking points, creates this just disturbing scene. And there's also been a lot of criticism you've seen from the kind of more ultra-left saying that why are we, because this has gotten so much attention, why are we, quote-unquote, centering Jewish feelings? And to me, that's, to me, that's completely unfair criticism because on the one hand, you have heard a repeated criticism of the American Jewish community that they haven't spoken up enough to criticize and to separate themselves from Netanyahu's and Israel's genocide, which is being waged according to Israel on behalf of the Jewish community writ large with a flag that has a star of David. it on it like that is their claim that they stand for the jewish people so if jewish people who do not agree with that are silent that is affirming that is that is used as affirmation that in fact the Israeli government does indeed speak for them so the criticism has been they're not speaking up

enough so he speaks up and now saying well why are you centering Jewish feelings like that to me is utterly inconsistent and unfair like in fact if a country is waging a genocide and saying that they are doing it in your name, it's not just appropriate for you to speak up about it. It's morally imperative for you to speak up about it, because if you don't, then it's a silent acknowledgement that that's true. They are doing that. And meanwhile, like Richie Torres kind of jokingly adopted George Santos' claim in this interview

that he's Jewish. Yep. He was kind of serious. Two Latino New Yorkers, two gay Latino New Yorkers. Who were both Jewish. So the questions of identity are kind of shot through this.

Like, two, and yeah, we can, if you want to put up this next, this capo tweet, like to some defenders of Israel, Ritchie Torres really is the more Jewish.

Like, your ideas around your approach israel your your thoughts as it relates to this genocide determine whether or not you are jewish in the eyes of some people i just want to say very quickly i can't read this you want to read that griffin i just want to say i'll go for it well i just very quickly that is the exact argument conservatives detest when it is applied to clarence thomas or uh or whomever else right that this idea that is you are not you know people will use the the Uncle Tom slur, but it's this idea that your identity isn't true, even though it's literally true, it isn't true unless you have the ideology baked into it. So anyway, that's what you're seeing

in this tweet that Griffin just put up on the screen about Richard. It's a senior editor from the free press here. Yeah. The role Friedland is playing is that of the capo, the Jew articulating and or acting out the wishes conscious or unconscious of the Gentile majority. This is literally the world's oldest or second oldest profession. Okay, literally it is not. I don't even understand what remotely the guy's talking about there. And in the post right before that, he used a bunch of fancy words to call himself hating as well. Yeah, because what Adam says in that clip, I guess, is he's like, oh, I shouldn't even have to care about.

this and I think he's he should just be a guy not a Jewish person and he I think is speaking to like that as a comedian like identity politics and all that stuff is typically something that you try to steer away from that it's typically construed as lame to like lead with your identity when speaking on a subject but when it comes to this subject specifically like they're doing it in people like Adam's name and Adam kind of crashed out in the interview and I don't mean that in the bad way. It was obviously like, no, truly, that's where some people on the right are, who don't know Adam Friedland, are watching this and saying, this was such a win for Richie Torres. Richie Torres probably thinks it was a win for him too. He looks like he was calmly sitting there

while he got badgered and pestered by a mentally unstable comedian. But if you follow Adam Friedland's work and you know Richie Torres from other appearances. It was a really I think it was a really important clash for someone who's Jewish to relay a lot of Jewish

people's feelings about the conflict. I remember Ryan when the campus, when the encampments were happening, you set up an interview for us with somebody I think she was a senior at Columbia. They were doing Shabbat in their tent.

at the encampment. And it's just so absurd. Were there some anti-Semitic hangers on? Of course. But it's so easy to dismiss people with those labels. And it just falls into the exact same territory that has the left, I think, dismissing black conservatives, female conservatives, you're anti-woman, you're not a real woman, you're self-loathing. It's the same thing. And I'm saying that just in the of, we're using an example from the free press, that would editorialize against all of those uses, all of those applications of identity litmus tests. So in this next clip, you know, we also get, I think this is a clip where Adam kind of is able to totally break the sort of pro-Zionist talking point facade with some just really simple, straightforward rebuttals that you don't typically see on. any mainstream news or in many of these conversations with Zionists. Let's take a listen. What we're seeing right now is that members of the Israeli government are talking about clearing that shit out. And Trump, our president, is talking about putting a fucking jet ski museum there. And you're, that's the reality right now. That's the far right. That's a

view that I reject. What the far right? I'm talking about the government and the generals that are that are in charge of Israel. The Bengavirs, the smeltschages of the world, that's a view that I reject. They're the cabinet. Yes, and I reject them. That's what Hamas is saying they want to do to Israel. I'm sorry?

I mean, Hamas murdered thousands of people, so there's no... So what does that mean? That Hamas is a terrorist organization for murdering innocent children and civilians. How many civilians have been killed in this war? The war is a tragedy, but... Ninety percent of them have been... Ninety percent of them have been civilians.

They're suggesting... They've killed journalists. They've killed journalists. People have been killed in a war. It's been a tragedy. They've killed people waiting for aid. But you're suggesting that it is the policy of the Israeli government to murder civilians, and that is a notion that I reject.

You've got to, like, listen, man, you've got to be like a human being about this. people who are dying in the war, which to me is a tragedy, because war is a tragedy. Do you feel in your heart that this is what you're doing, what you're saying is, right? If Hamas, if you remove Hamas, you don't actually think that. I told you what I believe. Don't tell me what I believe. I've told you what I believe. Why would you believe that? Because I, because there are people who see the world differently. I know it's a shock to you. Why would you believe that? Yeah, I feel like Adams almost success, but simultaneously fatal mistake is assuming Richie Torres is a human and trying to

relate to him on a human level when that was just never going to work out. But maybe that contrast and that attempt. But that's the tragedy too. Richie Torres is a human. Netanyahu is. Humans are capable of horrific evil. And we

that's something we always have to remember. Because if we forget that, then we'll set back and be a little bit too comfortable and all of a sudden these humans are doing these all too human things like we're I think we're a little bit too kind to our idea of humanity humanity is capable of deep evil totally yeah

but Friedland is a unique figure in the way that he engages with with guests and like a let's let's pregnant pauses sit says things bluntly male Zeeway you heard here first. Is that what it is? No.

No, we need and we've argued about this off air. Zway's thing was all Zeeway's thing was all just about being awkward and usually awkward with like her friends and like she rarely did like contentious stuff with with you know strangers. George Santos was pretty good

but yeah but the whole that new exchange thing go ahead go ahead. Well no I was just going to say I mean you this maybe 20 years ago you would have seen something uncomfortable like this on the daily show, maybe, or in a print interview and like a zine. But this is really new that we see confrontations like this, I think playing out, which is a good thing. I mean, I'm glad that we

are able to watch Friedland v. Torres. I think it was actually instructive. And the whole thing is just completely crazy because anybody watching it is like watching him define what a terrorist organization is as somebody who has quote unquote murdered thousands of people um but which again whatever uh and then the obvious i think the entire audience is like wait a minute that's your definition of a terrorist organization somebody who's killed thousands of people by the way hamas on october 7th killed hundreds of civilians anybody would call that terrorism to kill hundreds of civilians terrorism But what is it then to kill tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of civilians and to displace two million and to send suicide robots through Gaza City to blow up entire populated blocks?

And so it just can't withstand the barest amount of scrutiny. And that's why we don't get a lot of Democrats to come on our show for that very thing right there. Well, I think it's actually more we don't try that much. Okay, Brian. I didn't think of it. You're on my inbox. Well, so. You try hard.

But this is so, the interviews are often so boring. The slucking one is good. If we can get more centrist, that'd be good. But like, I mean, we've tried Buttigieg,

Newsome. We've tried every single person that will go on Brian, Tyler Cohen, or Pod save, but we'll not come on here. Oh, they won't come on.

That's interesting. The very obvious reason why. Well, I think. We should start making that public and, like, shame them. This is the public side, baby. I don't think Richie Tor is expected to have that interview go, any other way, I think he's pretty happy with how it went. And because he's getting your support

from people that we just, like, I actually saw a lot of people on the right. It was sort of like an inkblot experience who definitely don't know the Friedland schick, jumping in and being like Richie Torres looked pretty good in this exchange or whatever, seeing it as an L for Friedland. And I think Torres is media savvy enough that he knows that. And there are a lot of Democrats who are media savvy enough that they know it's good to go back and forth with new media podcasts. Now, not a lot of Democrats. There's an

increasing number of Democrats who want that. You know, they know people disagree with them and they want it. So we'll see. We'll see. We'll see. We'll see. Imagine that you're on an airplane and all of a sudden you hear this.

Attention passengers. The pilot is having an emergency and we need someone anyone to land this plane. Think you could do it? It turns out that nearly 50% of men think that they could land the plane with the help of air traffic control.

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From a very rural background myself, my dad is a farmer and my mom is a cousin, so like it's not like... What do you get when a true crime producer walks into a comedy club? I know it sounds like the start of a bad joke, but that really was my reality nine years ago. I just normally do straight stand-up, but this is a bit different. On stage stood a comedian with a story that no one expected to hear. On 22nd of July 2015, a 23-year-old man had killed his family. family. And then he came to my house.

So what do you get when a true crime producer walks into a comedy club? A new podcast called Wisecrack, where stand-up comedy and murder takes center stage. Available now. Listen to Wisecrack on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Well, speaking of media. savvy Democrats. That leads us nicely to our next story here. From our friend from this

week, Taylor Lorenz, came out with an article in Wired. You know, she was really hiding the big story from us. You know, we were talking about cell phone bans earlier this week, but she came out with an article here in Wired. A dark money group is secretly

funding high-profile Democratic influencers. An initiative aimed at boosting Democrats online offers influencers up to $8,000 a month to push the party line. All they have to do is secret and agree to restrictions on their content.

And, you know, it goes through a list of people who are doing it. It's a real who's who. It's people like David Pacman, Brian Tyler Cohen, more youth DNC influencers like Olivia Giuliana.

And there's been a lot of pushback, a lot of response videos, and where are we right now in this drama rhyme. Well, now you're in the, as is common with a Taylor-Lorentz article, you're in your fourth or fifth phase. It's every single time.

So basically what a lot of the people involved say is Brian Tyler Cohen and some others, like, it's not secret. We've done videos about it. Chorus has a website. You can apply for a chorus. Basically, what this is, is Democratic adjacent, and I think the DNC actually took over chorus,

during the Kamala Harris campaign took over chorus during the presidential campaign. And there's now some actually internally, I've heard there's some struggle over it, like different party factions, like want to have the relationships with these different creators. And so there's a couple different things going on. One would be, you know, regular stipends to people to say certain things or to not say other things. The other would be stipends for training

to lift people up so that they can be independent content creators. What does that mean? Like, oh, here's how to make a thumbnail? Here's how to like... Yeah, no, no. But this is like, this is not dumb. Like this is what the right has done.

That it takes time to build up your audience and to build up the skills so that you're self-sustaining as an independent creator. like that anybody who's tried to do it from scratch will tell you that like you're not paying rent i mean i mean how you're gonna pay rent like on day one of with zero followers well you don't you you you have it it's a side job till it's a full job like it is with everyone else it that's creating independent right and so so what brian tyler cohen and others went and they basically went to these very rich people and said why don't you fund this network that will then see

need people and help get them off the ground. The people that are doing the funding, obviously then, are going to fund people that they think are going to be beneficial to what they want. So that, and that's where the corruption comes in. But go ahead. Well, no, I was going to, so I'll get to the right later, but if you could explain, so 1630 fund, how are they organized and how is course organized? Are we talking PACs? Are we talking C3s, C4s? What's going on? 1630 funds of dark money.

group um so you don't know like i mean you know some of the donors that who've been public in the past uh enormous enormous dark money organization that is linked directly to the democratic party uh and it but it does not have to disclose its payments because that's that's that's what a dark money group is and so 1630 fund is funding chorus and so that's where the dark money connection uh comes from. So the argument that some of these creators are making is this has all been public. We have said we

need to create a partisan network of creators like democratic partisans basically. Yeah, we got David Packman here. Let's take a listen to him for a sec. For years I've been saying the left needs to

organize independent media in the way that... All these words are insane. The left needs to fund independent creative the way that the right does. The right has won even arguably presidential elections because they're organized with regard to online and independent media. They're killing us. We've been so behind.

And this kind of support for creators is exactly what I've been advocating for. But what is the like, and keep going back to this question, what is the support? Because like I don't think that. $8,000 a month, I think. Yeah, no, no, I get the money. I get that part. But I'm talking about like, yeah, they had trainings.

Right, but the trainings. I'm like, I don't buy that some random Democrat company knows how to do a YouTube thumbnail or like knows how to like do. Well, they would hire other content creators. Well, to me it seems like more like about my guess is that the majority of the trainings that happen here are messaging are like here's what here's what we talk about. here's how we'd like to talk about it. We want to push democracy. We want to support the Democratic Party. We don't want to be divisive.

We don't want to create a circle, like firing squads, you know. I mean, I don't know. Like, as Shomsky always says, like, you don't need the genius of that, like, there's this famous interview that Glenn likes to play. Yeah. We played it for Don Lemon. Yeah, we played it for Don Lemon. Yeah.

where this hack is like telling Chomsky, you think that I have this job because I've agreed to say certain things and because I've been trained to say certain things and Chomsky says, no, of course not. But you have this job because they know you're going to say these things. And the things are obvious.

To me, you don't need to be trained in what, like, Democratic Party talking points are. So everybody knows him. Let's see if Olivia Giuliana has a response yet. I was going to say, I'm checking her Twitter feed, but go ahead. But Emily, you go first. I haven't literally pulled up.

But I mean, I always have I have a bookmarked, of course, Olivia Giuliana's Twitter feed. But it's in the wired story, the line is creators in the program are not allowed to use any funds or resources that they receive as part of the program to make content that supports or opposes any political candidate or campaign without express authorization from chorus in advance and in writing per the contract. So one of the functions here might be like a little catch-and-kill action. You're not going to get involved in a primary. You're not going to get involved with Mom Donnie. In fact, you actually might not be able to talk about Mom-Dani if you're on the streaming equipment that you bought with part of your $8,000 a month or you're using your stream yard subscription that you bought with part of your $8,000 a month

because even though everybody's talking about Zoro Mom Dani, you could run a foul of that. And Wired has a pretty hefty update correction on the article, as his customary point Ryan was making, but that is not among them. There's no, nothing has been corrected to that point yet. And so I think that's a sort of crucial bit of information. Yeah, exactly. It's not, like, they're not teaching you how to make YouTube thumbnails.

That's my whole point. They're teaching me. I mean, okay, maybe. But like, how much of that is, no. It seems like, A, they probably don't know how to do most of that. I work in a lot of media companies where corporations want to start a successful YouTube channel. They have no idea the space or the platform or the mechanics up in the way that someone who's just grinding on their own doing it every day analyzing the space. Same with TikTok as well. So yeah, it leads me to

believe that the majority of this is closer to what Emily, I just described. But the way that corruption generally works is it's much more subtle than that. That point is key. Like, okay, like, they're making it very clear. Like, if it wasn't clear already, we are the Democratic Party. You're going to get money from us. And you're going to do things that make the Democratic Party happy. Now, there's a couple creators in this list that they pointed to since who have been critical

of Gaza. But that just means that they accept some people to go through the training and then continue to be, you know, critical of Democratic. parties platform towards Gaza. Corruption doesn't mean that it influences every single person. Some people take APEC money and vote against APEC. Like it happens. But the idea is that you tilt the scales enough.

You know, some are going to get away. But so, and it's not just the $8,000 a month and it's not just the amount that you spend and what you can spend making videos. It's future that so much of corruption in America. is about the promise of future wealth too where they string you along and like that's how members of Congress are thoroughly corrupted

that they know that if they do the right thing while they're in office once they leave office they're going to be very very rich people there's a great documentary on HBO called The Swamp that it's actually like AOCs in it at the time the woman from California

oh I forget her name Okay, Katie Hill? Katie Hill, yep. Matt Gates and Thomas Massey, and Thomas Massey at one point walks out of the RNC, stands in the middle of First Street, and he's literally straddling Capitol Hill Club and RNC and RCC,

and he's like, this is how, this is the actual architecture, the physical construction of Washington, that when you walk out of the party headquarters, you are walking right past the fundraising, bar essentially and that is I feel like the proximity is so powerful

yeah I mean my last thought is when I see a lot of the creators on this list I've always thought man I hope they're getting paid for this totally right yes it's like so pathetic it's like you're doing the stanky leg at the DNC you're I hope you're getting paid for that like do you think chorus is telling Brian Tyler Cohen

to unbutton his shirt more and more Is that the training they're giving? Well, Brian, like, he, you know, he helped create chorus. Like, that's the weird part about this. He is a hardcore partisan Democrat, right? Yeah. Like, nobody needs to tell him to be a hardcore partisan Democrat. That's what he is.

Right. And so he's trying to build a network of hardcore partisan Democrats and get Democrats to fund it. Right. Like, and it's happening out mostly in the open. It's cool that she got some of these contracts and stuff. I just have a final word. He calls it the left, which is, he calls it left and independent.

And in his mind, I think he believes that. But it's to us, we're like, I'm sorry, what? Yeah, you're not independent media. I wanted to have Emily this specific because he mentions, like, how the right succeeded so well in this. And I think there is like, you know, we've like seen Tim Poole or other people have gotten like, you know, those big fundings and stuff.

Daily, Daily Wire, like, with enormous funding Daily Wire for sure but like my senses of like the whole podcast thing with Trump was like you know a lot of this was like people who like made a platform on their own

and became were kind of culturally right like Rogan Theo Von Andrew Schultz like they weren't like bread in like a right wing chorus like think tank to get to their size right. Yes so I think this is this does drive

me a little bit insane because of course there are situations like the tenant media scandal. I think that was like five high profile creators, like Tim Poole, Benny Johnson, Lauren Chen, something like that. And they were just over the last couple of years after they were already big cashing out for just dumb sums of money that they didn't need to be famous. It was just like padding their bottom line. It was like ridiculous. But they were already prominent and famous. And the reason that the right has a podcast ecosystem that's booming. If you look at the podcast charts, this gets misunderstood a lot. You have the Daily, NPR, Atlantic, all of those guys are up there right alongside Megan Kelly,

Ben Shapiro, Michael Knowles, whomever else. It's because the right was forced. The right during the wave of cancel culture was forced out of those outlets and so was forced to create independent outlets. And sometimes those, quote, independent outlets are made by money from, like, rich Republicans, of course, in the same way that George Soros at one point, didn't he have, like, a controlling stake in the New York Times company, Ryan? Like, it was, it's not an insane comparison, even though it's on a much smaller

scale. But, yeah, partisan Republicans support, you know, like a Paul Singer funds the Washington free beacon. And partisan. I'm trying to think of a daily wire funder. A Brian Tyler Cohen, number 10. Yeah, yeah. But if you go to like, yeah, news podcasts. Beating Tucker Carlson. Mm-hmm.

Yeah, look at that. But anyway, so I just think that this is a classic example of partisan, centrist, Democrats missing. Like, look at, I've had it. That's an example of what they should be doing, not, or that's an example of, yeah, there we are. That's an example of. I'll take that, Travis Kelsey. Oh. Does that mean our marriage news did better than his?

Wow. But like Tim Poole and I've had it. Those are examples of podcasts that actually are going to be more powerful. I'm not saying that it's strategically dumb for Dems to fund this vast network, but what they actually are looking for is people like Kyle, for example, who's very successful. They just don't consider Kyle a dumb. for Democrats, and they shouldn't in the same way that they don't necessarily consider. I've had it a W for Democrats.

And the right has seen pool. Which is hilarious because both those podcasts, like all their advice is how the Democrats can win, how they can like get back up on their feet. I just, is this, and like Republicans just see Poole and Benny as are, or as as ours. Yes, as ours, but also as W's because they understand they're moving the needle. but these were people who were forced out of the quote mainstream for various reasons

some good some bad and that's what happened it wasn't this like puppet master there are puppet masters but that wasn't the fuel for what happened on the right gotcha okay interesting well

you know we always love to tip our caps to the Taylor Lorenz and willing to poke the beehives I saw her TikTok alive yesterday where she was getting sworn by the haters

so you know always got to tip my hat to that all right well up next I should bounce yeah Ryan's gonna bounce we have an interview we just did with Dr. Muhammad Khalil who was a doctor who just got back from his third trip in Gaza

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Listen to the new season of Grasas Has Come Again as part of My Cultura Podcast Network on the IHart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. All right, we are now joined by Dr. Mohamed Khalil. surgeon from Dallas, and he has just gotten back from his, correct me if I'm wrong, third trip to Gaza. Welcome to the show, Doctor. Thank you. Thank you for having me. Yeah. And so I guess, you know, you said a list of things that we could ask you about, but I guess we just first wanted to ask you, what was it like getting in and out of Gaza this most recent time? It's actually become increasingly difficult on the very first trip that I went to to Gaza in April of 24. We're

We went through the roughup border, so we were able to bring in a lot of equipment. When I went back in November, as well as this time, you're pretty restricted on what you can bring in. The instructions are to just bring one suitcase, one carry on, and it's limited to personal supplies. Logistically, it can be quite a challenge getting there just because you can get a seat from the WHO as far as getting on the UN convoy, but you don't know until the night before if you're cleared by Kogat, which is the arm of the Israel military that controls movement within Gaza.

And so that clearance doesn't come in until about 10 or 11 p.m. the night before you're supposed to move at 6 in the morning. So we all go to Amman and we find out that night if we're getting in. Last time I went in November, one of my buddies was supposed to go with me and he got turned around and had to come back to Dallas. When you first got there,

you sent me a text that has kind of sat with me. since then, tell people what the doctor told you, see if you remember this, what the doctor who, as the Palestinian doctor told you about whether or not you're going to have an eventful shift or not. Like how did doctors know whether or not their shift is going to be? Oh, yeah. This time around, it's almost a direct correlation with the GHF aid distribution as well as when a truck would come through this cane border. So they would say, I mean, his words were

if you're lucky, there will be no aid distribution tonight. If you're unlucky, the ER is going to overflow. And I mean, he was 100% right. I mean, I think the, you know, when I had gone before in November, we were at the same hospital at Ali up north. And it was mostly blast injuries from drone strikes and airstrikes. This time it was a good mix of blast injuries as well as these gunshot wounds from these eight distribution sites. I think everyone knows that. I mean, they describe him as death traps and they tell people not to go, but there's such a dire need with the malnutrition and starvation that people are just, they're just taking their chances and going and seeing if they can retrieve something. Yeah, so I just want to sit some of that for one second. So, like, here in the United States, if it's Friday or Saturday or like New Year's Eve or something, you tell me, like, the ERs know to brace themselves.

Like, there are going to be more people in here. Or maybe it's like New Orleans for the Super Bowl or something. Like we're going to get, we're going to have, it's going to be a, it's probably going to be a busier night than a typical night. In Gaza now, if there is an aid distribution site open for a few hours, the ERs brace themselves every single time. And did that bear out? Like in your, in your case, if the aid distribution site was open, was his forecast correct? like did you did you then get a oh yeah yeah exactly that that happened every time and the thing is that they're already overwhelmed um uh because you know one example is shiffa hospital that was destroyed

uh when i was there on the prior visit in november and since then they've been able to get the er back up and running to some degree um and they they have you know 200 semi-functioning beds and when i say beds i mean these are stretchers with no mat on them like we actually after operating on a patient, would put them back on a hard, you know, plastic or metal stretcher with no mattress. And I mean, but in those beds, they had over 600 patients. So they're running at 250, 300 percent capacity. So when these ERs would fill up, I mean, these are patients laid on the floor, getting chest tubes put in, getting procedures done. And so, I mean, every time there was an aid distribution, you'd have just so many patients on the floor,

we would literally have to be walking over patients, walking through the ER. Emily, you're meeting. Go ahead. Having done multiple trips at this point, what difference did you notice when it comes to famine and hunger? Can you share your experience in treating patients and whether or not you saw an increase in people suffering from malnutrition and starvation? Yeah, certainly. You know, it takes a lot of calories to heal injuries and to heal wounds. And so this time around the amount of people that were just visibly malnourished with,

with, you know, very skinny arms and legs, like visible ribs, was very apparent. And you knew that a number of these injuries were going to end up infected, and they would end up infected very quickly. Like patients that we operated on at the beginning of the trip were coming back for washouts within a week or so, and it's just usually you don't see infections develop that quickly because the potty tries to fight off infection. So, I mean, there's a remarkable level of malnutrition, even among the people that we're working with.

I mean, this time around, like, I met a lot of the same doctors and hospital staff that I worked with before, and they've just lost even more weight. So, you know, when they come in for a hug, you can feel their spinaus processes at the back. You can feel their ribs. And a lot of people will, you know, show you what they look like before they lost all the weight. And, I mean, the weight loss is dramatic even among the staff. You know, I mean, it was like one of the last cases that we actually did, it's outside of orthopedics. It was actually one of the anesthesia texts, sweetest lady, always smiling the day before we left Ali Hospital, I went down to the OR and she was very somber and walked into the room and the neurosurgeon was operating on her husband who had been shot at an eight distribution site.

Like her husband was also an anesthesia tech at Kamala Duan Hospital, did not leave when a patient was in the OR was. kidnapped for seven months in Israeli prison. She didn't know where he was. And then he showed up one day. So she was happy to have him back. But then he went to an aid distribution and got shot in the head. So I mean, even the staff that we're working with, they're suffering the same starvation that the people are.

How did he die? How did he survive the gunshot? Miraculously, he survived. Like, we were getting updates from now. Like, so the neurosurgeon and one of our, orthopedic surgeons scrubbed into the case as well and they picked out shrapnel and you know he had exposed brain matter so they were taking out pieces of the skull from the brain and he ended up in you know in the ICU when we checked on him right before we left he

was still non-responsive but now he is responsive still not communicative but able to follow commands what about your own safety you know i mean we've been covering a lot this week the double tap strike at the alnessyre hospital um that took out you know you know, medics and journalists. Some reports are now saying it may have been a triple or even quadruple tap. BBC, BBC found a quadruple, two tanks. It just keeps going up. So how did you feel about your own safety?

And I guess sort of a part two of this question is, you know, you come on shows like ours after these experiences to share them. Do you feel like the Israeli government is starting to become aware of that? Are you worried that they may not let you back in? another time? I think the first question, yeah, there were definitely this time around we had more close calls than on prior trips. You know, when you go up north, you have to go between hospitals to get cases done. So like I did a few spine cases. I would have to go to another hospital called Sahaba. So they, you know, load you up into an ambulance and drive you over to do the cases. And so the last trip, I was a little bit more liberal in going around town. And, you know, there were a couple of close calls.

just due to that. But this time, you know, there were very, I mean, we're, we're in a privileged position being American and European teams. They take our safety as a, as a high priority, both on the U.N. side, as well as on the side of the other Palestinian teams and probably from the Israeli side as well, because there are drones overhead, not, like continuously. They always know, I think, where we are. And so, but there were a few times where there were strikes very close to us because we were in Gaza City. I think there was that the push to invade the city. So there were a couple of airstrikes in the building adjacent to us. I saw, you know, a drone strike happened in an apartment that was in the building adjacent to our dormitory.

We did, you know, the day that we were leaving, our UN convoy was delayed. You know, you have to wait for a green light to move. So we got loaded up into the cars and then somebody came by and said this is going to be in a 30, 40 minutes. Why don't you wait outside? So me and one of my, one of my colleagues that came with us, walked around to the back of the convoy, just to talk, and one of our teammates was in, he stayed in the car because he was taking a nap, and there was a drone strike just a few hundred meters away that, like, rocked the cars. And somebody from the Ocha Center ran out and said that the convoy got hit. So we freaked out because we knew he stayed in the car. But luckily, it was a little bit away. But there were definitely

some close calls this time. I think, you know, we, again, we have this sense of security that because we're American and European, and I think for the hospitals, they also see it as some sense of security that when, you know, when we leave as a team, they're more nervous about being invaded. So whenever there was a strike, I think Al Jazeera had reported on one of the Sundays that there was a strike in front of the hospital, there was some talk of having us move back down south. But that's what we were saying, like, you know, if we can serve some protective purpose, then it's good for us to just finish out the mission and stay put where we were. I think speaking up is an interesting question. Like, you know, when you arrive, you get a brief from the, you know, the teams that

are coordinating your travel from the UNWHO. And they say specifically not to use certain buzzwords and not to assign blame to anything. But then when you do these interviews, people will last pretty directly. And so you're kind of stuck in a hard position where you're like, you're, you're the reporter. I mean, you know who's doing the shooting and stuff. But it's, it's kind of a unique situation to be in. But I think at this stage, you know, it's anybody who's following the conflict, I don't think there's too many questions as to the responsible parties. And when we are there, you know, a lot of the doctors that are there and staff that we work with are like, you know, one of the biggest purposes that you serve is going back out to the world and explain

what's going on here because it's not it's not right for anybody to to live under these conditions and they're very cognizant of what's going on around the world like um and so we feel compelled to to speak up and at least report what we saw like i mean one of one of the girls for example like it's it's actually pretty hopeful like she she's a general surgeon um you know great surgeon like very calm collected cool we were she wants to be a plastic surgeon we were like oh you can definitely do it like you know down the road like uh take your us mLE you can even get it you might be able to come out to America for training it. She's like, yeah, I know. My brother lives in California. These are these are normal people that are not like, you know, cut off from the rest of the world. They know what's

going on. And speaking of bringing back some of the disturbing stories, one of the things you shared with us, I wanted to get your, get you to elaborate on for us. Let me see if I can share this and if not, we could have some. We can put them in post, Ryan, but yeah. Actually, is this working? You guys can see this, right? Yep. Yeah. So this is, I would call these photos, uh, disturbing, but overly graphic. This is a this is an x-ray of a 16-year-old girl wounds from from what you said was a shooting at a GHF site, Ghazi Humanitarian Foundation site. You told us that you observed a pattern of victims coming in who were shot in the genitals suggestive of some type of depraved target practice.

So this is one, we can talk about this in a moment. This is a 12-year-old boy who is being operated on. Can you talk a little bit about what kind of injuries you were seeing this time from the GHF site? Yeah, so, I mean, a lot of the, you know, it's a mix of blast injuries and gunshot wounds. And I think for the gunshot wounds in particular, there is this, feeling that there there's a target practice being done because they'll be

they'll come in waves so in the course of two days we had three patients with gunshot wounds to the scrotum that had to have an orchectomy or a testicle route and so we were talking to the urologist and he was like it just happens periodically where you'll get a wave of these shots

right to the testicle there'll be waves of shots right to the head and you know I think there is that the suggestion is, is that these kids are being used for target practice. I think there is, uh, um, you know, there is some concept of just spraying into the crowd with, with gunshots. Um, and so that can be a little bit random. But when it comes in waves like that, um, the physicians there are, uh, they suspect that this is, this is targeted, um,

because these are sniper. Yeah. That's what I just showed there, right? Yeah. And the thing is, exactly. And these bullets are large caliber bullets. And so I mean, it's, you know, coming from a sniper rifle, like it does, uh, quite a bit. of damage. One of the spines that I operated on was like a sniper shot that, I mean, the bullet is huge and it just does an immense amount of damage. So this was an unstable spine where the poster elements were just completely blasted from a gunshot wound and you just have to kind of span it with screws and rods. But it's the nature of the injuries from these high-powered rifles is pretty remarkable. So it looked like sniper fire? Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think with the large

caliber bullet that's the suspicion is that it's coming from a sniper rifle and you also showed us this miraculous one here which i'll put up where you said this was shrapnel that came this was a spine surgeon before you did this when you said you described this one here exactly so one of the neurosurgeons at uh at the hospital like he had done this case um a few weeks prior actually and uh This was a piece of shrapnel that had entered the skull and traveled through the frame in Magnum and lodged itself in the cervical spine. So he first operated on the patient for a head bleep and then came back a couple days later and retrieved this piece of shrapnel from the cervical spine. And remarkably, the patient regained function. So he was able to kind of move with four out of five strength in his lower extremities in one arm and the other arm remained paralyzed.

But, you know, he was in a – it's actually a really kind of a sweet story. Like he, you know, when we got done with cases, he went to, he said we had to go, I got to go do something. So him and the attending neurosurgeon and the attending orthopedic surgeon actually left us and then we saw him in the hospital courtyard because they had physically gone to take this patient out of his bed and put him in a wheelchair so his family could wheel him around. We were like, nowhere else in the world would see the attending surgeons like go physically mobilize a patient. That's what they were saying. Like these are our kids. It's, you know, we have to look beyond just a physical injury. And any 16-year-old just laying in bed shouldn't be – it's not good for his mental health.

So they forced the family to kind of get him out and pull them around in a wheelchair. But it's really a miraculous case. Like you wouldn't expect anyone to survive that type of an injury. You also sent this one. What's the – That's the same piece of shrapnel that traveled through the head. You can see the track that it took. It went into the frame in Magnum directly.

Got it. and doctor like you know if i got shot with a sniper bullet i'm sure it'd be a very long recovery post the operation you know with a lot of these people you're operating on they're getting sent once they're done operated on even if it's successful they're being thrust back out into a war zone with little food or water what's your sense of people's ability to survive after these wounds even if you do patch them up uh so yeah that's the thing it's like it's it's a long drawn-out recovery for a lot of these things. And unfortunately, they're going back into a situation where they're living in a tent without food. There are extended hospital stays for some patients who just

really need it. And they're trying right now in the healthcare system to develop a, you know, this Wafa hospital is a rehab hospital that they're trying to convert into more of a longer-term stay for people to recover. But it's not online yet. It was actually damaged in a strike before. And so they're trying to get it back online to be able to provide some long-term care. But a lot of these patients, they just go back out and they have to, you know, figure it out on their own. I mean, even some of the fractures that come in, like as fresh fractures, normally they would get admitted here in the U.S. or in the West, they're just getting a splint put on and

being sent back home to follow up again when we can fit them on the ORA schedule. But the inflow of traumatic injuries just makes it to where some of these patients are waiting for months with an injury that never gets treated. Well, Dr. Khalil, really appreciate, you know, the work you're doing and also appreciate you, you know, filling us in here. I hope your re-entry is as smooth as possible. Have you heard anything from your colleagues that are still there that they want to share as, like, a final word?

Yeah, I mean, I think, like, you know, that's, there's been a number of doctors. that have been denied. I think the denial rate is getting up to 50, 60% likely. And so, you know, I think... Like going in, like Israel telling them, no. And what are they getting denied for? Like, are they bringing Band-Aids

or what are they getting denied for? There's no explanation. So a lot of times, like, you get denied before you even get to the border. If you get denied at the border, it's because of, you know, bringing in something or they say, like, you have,

you know, something that might be dual-use, like an ultrasound to do fast exams in the ER or to check for bleeds in the ER. most of the time the denial to before you get to the border before you even get on the UN convoy and there's no explanation. So there is some suspicion

that some of it may be doing interviews and reporting on what was seen. I wish journalists like yourselves could enter Gaza. Like I think once you go there, like it's hard to describe in words the camaraderie that you get from the people that are working on the ground there,

these other healthcare professionals, but it's, you know, I think at this point, everyone is pretty committed to speaking up Because a lot of the doctors there kind of see it, the physicians, hospital staff, talking to them, they almost see it as an end game at this point. Like, they're like, you know, when we talked about Gaza City being invaded, directly asked some people, like, do you think it's going to get invaded? And one of the guys was like, it's unlikely because why would Israel accept more personnel losses to take over something that's already this destroyed? But, yeah, they seem to be doing it anyway.

Exactly, exactly. And for a lot of those docs, that's the, they're, they're, we always ask, like, what can we do when we go back? And it's always the same answer. Like, just don't forget us and tell the world what's happening here. All right. Okay. Well, thank you very much, Doctor, for your time here today. Your time in the past, telling our audience about this. And we wish you in the medical community luck as they try to do what they can out there. Thank you so much. Well, thanks everyone for joining us this Friday. We have a great second half of the show coming up. If you want to, to see that. It's breakingpoints.com to get a premium subscription. We love having those paywalled conversations with our premium subscribers on Friday because we get to do a lot of back and forth question and answers and cover more important stories. So, for example, today we'll be covering Jake Sullivan's interview with Tim Miller on the Bullwork podcast. We'll be covering an absolutely hilarious mega viral clip. Also from Podsave about just this is a perfect abundance discourse clip about a LA City Councilwoman and affordable housing. And Griffin, the last story we're going to cover, I'm having a Rick Perry moment and I'm trying to draw out

this outro until I remember what the last story is. Well, I'm going to, I'm going to force it, Gavin Coin. That's right, Gavin Coit. That's why I forgot it because it's so ridiculous. But no, truly, he's threatening to launch a meme coin. And speaking of investing, folks, invest in breaking point. So we don't have to take a big chorus deal. So you don't have to see. Emily at the DNC doing a TikTok dance, okay? We were at the DNC, thanks to our premium subs, but we did not do TikTok dances. We did not dance.

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