Judging Freedom - Aaron Maté : Regime Change In Venezuela.

Episode Date: November 6, 2025

Aaron Maté : Regime Change In Venezuela.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Today is Thursday, November 6, 2025. Aaron Mote, he joins us now. Aaron, it's a pleasure. Thank you for accommodating my schedule. I want to talk to you at some length on what appears to be the coming efforts by the United States to bring about regime change in Venezuela. But before we get there, what is your understanding of how this horrible, horrible state of affairs in Israel, where some prison guards filmed themselves raping a male Palestinian prisoner? and then the head lawyer of the IDF, who was being severely criticized for investigating the rape,

authorized the release of the tape that these creeps made of themselves committing the rape. And then Prime Minister Netanyahu says the problem is not the rape. The problem is a PR problem with the tape. All right, you get it. You know the fact's better than I. How badly is this playing in Israel? Well, I think most Israelis agree with Netanyahu that the problem is not the rape and torture of a Palestinian prisoner itself. It's the fact that it got out.

When you look at the protests around this incident, the biggest protests that I've seen in Israel has been in support of the accused soldiers who were filmed themselves and were filmed on video, seriously abusing this Palestinian prisoner. It's a reflection of how sadistic Israeli society has become and how. tolerant people are and supportive of violence, aggression against Palestinians. Also recall that there's been a massive campaign abetted by pretty much the entire corporate media in the U.S. to accuse Hamas of committing widespread sexual assault on October 7th. And as I've pointed out, Max Blumenthal has pointed out, our colleagues at the Electronic Intifada pointed out, there actually isn't evidence even two years later, even a single case of sexual assault on October 7th, let alone mass rape, as the New York Times and so many have alleged. But yet everybody

has taken it just on faith, because the Israeli government said it, that Hamas committed mass rape on October 7th. Kamala Harris says this every time she was trying to duck questions on her administration's support for a genocide in Gaza. She would always bring up Hamas rape, October 7th. This was in the vein of Iraq WMDs and babies being torn out of incubators in Kuwait, atrocity propaganda to manufacture consent for our atrocities. The atrocities committed by Israel in Gaza with our support. And you compare the contrast. You have documented rape by

Israeli soldiers. Where's the public, where's the international media outrage on this? Where's the attention? If you look at media headlines in the BBC New York Times, sometimes they don't even specify that these soldiers committed rape and torture on camera. They talk about alleged abuse. They water it down. So you can see here the contrast not only with Israeli society and how generally supportive inside Israel people are of, you know, abusing Palestinians, but also of ourselves as well across the world. Our media culture in supporting abuses, including documented rape

of Palestinians. Here's these creeps appearing on camera in Israel, on Israeli television, but, of course, with masks on their faces, and then we switch to Netanyahu saying, this is the worst PR problem in the history of the state of Israel. Not the worst criminal problem, but the worst PR problem. Chris, cut number seven. The IDF's international legitimacy efforts are greatly benefited by the aura, the protection with which the justice system provides it. Yesterday, the reservist charged with abuse appeared in public

and accused Tomer Yeru Shalmi of spoiling their case. You've done a field trial on us in front of the cameras, as if you've already decided who's guilty. We will continue to fight for justice for ourselves, for everyone who came out in uniform and defended our home. This weekend, Tomar Yer O'Shalmi briefly went missing, and police found her abandoned car with a note. Police later found her on a beach, safe but in distress. The incident in Stetsaman caused immense damage to the image of the state of Israel and the IDF, to our soldiers. This is perhaps the most severe public relations attack that the state of Israel has experienced since its establishment. Instead of prosecuting a series of events that are criminal everywhere on the planet,

they prosecute the woman that we saw at the beginning, who since has resigned, a former major general in the IDF who was the general counsel to the IDF, they prosecute her for releasing the tape. She says she released the tape because those creeps with the masks were trying to prevent an investigation of their own criminal behavior, and she wanted to come to the defense of her investigators. So I guess you're right. In Israel, the revelation of a horrible truth is worse than the commission of a horrible crime. three guys raping a helpless beaten male prisoner because he's Palestinian. Exactly right. And it's very telling in Nanyahu's language.

He talks about this being a public relations assault in Israel. So according to Nanyahu, just the release of footage showing a crime is not a crime in itself, but a public relations assault in Israel. And that's how Israel views ethics and basic standards of decency, not in the through the prism of you know what's ethical and what's legal but in terms of what they can get away with and and when they get caught that's all of a sudden now a disaster but israel enjoys impunity from its sponsor of the u.s and from the western media which has gone to such great lengths to manufacture atrocity claims against palestinians while whitewashing the countless atrocities of israel and goes far beyond rape and torture We're talking about the destruction of entire society. In Gaza, we're talking about, as we're recording this today, Israel has renewed its bombing campaign in Lebanon,

heavy bombing of the South, because, again, for Israel, ceasefires, agreements, international law. And none of this matters. They only see everything through the prism of what advances their hegemony in the region. And on that, they have the full backing of Washington. Our friend Ben Gavir, I use the word, friend sarcastically, of course, has said any action is permissible if it is done for the sake of national security. How on God's green earth can the rape of a prisoner be done for national

security? That's the guiding Israeli ethos from the start. Israel's founded on ethnic cleansing. In 1948, you have hundreds of thousands of Palestinians being expelled from their homes. and some of the tactics that Israeli soldiers used included rape back then. There are some Israeli veterans of that ethnic cleansing campaign who later gave interviews, sort of laughing about how they raped people and how they witnessed rape. So this goes back to Israel's roots. It's a fundamentally sick society that hasn't reckoned with its original sins.

It's actually just only doubled down on them and grown into something even far more grotesque, if you can imagine that, than how it began. Wow. Is Israel still preparing to attack or invade Iran with the purpose of fomenting some sort of chaotic regime change there like they tried last June? I think that's a fair assumption. I don't have the level of insight into their plans, but given how obsessed they are with global, with regional hegemony dominance and how Iran still is at a turn to that, and they didn't succeed in regime change the first time, the first round

back in June. Yeah, like you have to assume, I think, that they're still working on plans. And the Trump administration gave him a big boost back when they did it in June. Trump pretended to engage in diplomacy and then joined in Israel's assault on Iran. And you have to think that the neocons around Trump aren't satisfied with the first round. Now, their problem is Iran can fight back. And Iran showed that. Iran inflicted some damage on Israel when Israel launched its aggression against Iran. But look, We know that Netanyahu seized an opportunity because he attacked at a moment when Iran still hadn't fully rebuilt its air defenses. And that's the state that Iran still is in. And Israel did take out a lot of important people, although Iran is aware that Israel is pathologically obsessed with regime change.

So Iran is also prepared for moments like this. And that's why the chain of command, you had quick replacements, new people taking up the positions. But yes, in short, I think it's totally full. fair to assume that Israel is still thinking about its goal for regime change in Iran and is drawing up plans to execute. Wow. Do any serious commentators or analysts, no matter where they are on the ideological spectrum, accept Trump's argument that the reason for the preparations to invade Venezuela

are because Nicholas Maduro, I can't say this, a straight face. Is the head of a drunk cartel? I have not seen anyone who takes this seriously. It's basically confined to a small circle inside Trump's administration. I mean, even members of Trump's team don't even agree. I know that for a fact. But the problem is there's been sort of a purge internally where people with dissenting opinions in the intelligence community,

and sadly, Tulsi Gabbard has gone along with this, have been fired from their jobs. So we're seeing a very similar thing to the run-up to the Iraq. war where a hoax is manufactured, a propaganda claim is made to justify regime change is patently false, and people with dissenting opinions are conveniently excluded. And that's the pattern that Trump is following after promising to end endless wars. After tapping in to all the fatigue there is in the U.S. public with regime change wars, he's now instead listening to Marco Rubio and other regime change obsessives in coming up with this pretext about Maduro being,

the head of a drug cartel. Max Lomenthal has talked about this extensively. This drug cartel that Maduro supposedly heads doesn't even really exist. If the extent it does exist, they actually formally partnered with the CIA because the CIA wanted to use the cartel to infiltrate other cartels.

So it's just, it's such a transparent fraud. And politically, it's unfortunate because, you know, Trump is walking away from the thing that I think, attracted some reasonable people to his campaign. The people saw in Democrats this obsession with regime change, whether it's in Moscow or in Ukraine and elsewhere. And Trump was openly saying the era of regime change is over and endless war. And he's completely selling that up.

I know you're not a military guy, but the military folks tell us that there's a huge amount of naval vessels and troops on them right there. would be counterintuitive if they're not there for a purpose, if they're not about to engage in some sort of an attack, both by, well, not both, by air, sea, and land. I mean, is that your understanding as well? I mean, that the Gerald Ford has 10,000 troops on it?

Yeah, yeah, no, I get it. I mean, if you're Trump, can you really send all, of that military force to the region and then not do anything with it or else you won't look like a tough guy, which is very, very important to him. I get that point. I guess the best case scenario from the point of view of not wanting a regime change war, another bloody regime change war, is Trump and his team are hoping that just deploying that level of military force will be enough to intimidate Venezuela and cause enough dissension that Maduro is ousted by Venezuelans or, you know, by someone in the military. They've tried to push this before. In fact,

the first coup against Hugo Chavez, backed by the U.S., that was waged by members of the military who ousted Chavez before a popular uprising reversed that coup. So I think they're hoping for something similar this time. And that's why also you not only have this deployment of U.S. military forces, but you also have Trump basically deliberately telling the media that he's authorized CIA covert warfare. The New York Times did a big story about this, and it was so obvious. this was not a story that was like coming from whistleblowers inside the administration. This was the administration deliberately telling the New York Times, hey, Trump assigned a finding

authorizing covert CIA action because he wanted Venezuela to know. He was hoping that that would intimidate Venezuela into crumbling from within so that U.S. forces don't have to go in. And same thing now with these leaks in the media about Trump is considering military strikes on Venezuelan military bases. It's part of a sci-op. So I guess the best case scenario from the point of view of not wanting a U.S. invasion is all of this is just part of a sciop to try to like get venezuela to collapse from within the

problem there is people have national pride and in venezuel there's a lot of division you know i saw it myself when i was there in 2019 uh right as trump was launching his first coup attempt in Venezuela it's a very divided country but i'm sorry you have people who actually don't want to become another appendage of the u.s and who actually believe in national sovereignty and don't just want to bend to u.s. orders no matter how much suffering the u.s. imposes on their country especially via these sanctions that have really hurt Venezuela. As I know, Francisco Rodriguez, a Venezuelan opposition economist, told you earlier this week.

He's done some of the best work on this. He's not a Maduro supporter at all, at all, but he has a sense of national pride, and he doesn't want to see his country decimated by crippling U.S. sanctions to change the government. So that has an effect on people. Some people just want to surrender. Other people actually want to stand up and fight. And in Venezuela, you have a lot of people motivated to defend their country from foreign

aggression. this just breaking on CNN. I don't know if this is true or not. I'm going to read the first paragraph literally, and I've just seen it myself while you were speaking. Trump administration officials told lawmakers on Wednesday, that's yesterday, that the United States is not currently planning to launch strikes inside Venezuela and does not have a legal justification that would support attacks against any land targets right now, according to sources familiar with the briefing, conducted by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hagseth, and an official from the White House's Office of Legal Counsel.

Lawmakers were told during the classified session, so that means the lawmakers can't tell other lawmakers or even their constituents what they learned, that the opinion produced by the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel to justify strikes against suspected drugboats first reported by CNN last month, does not permit strikes inside Venezuela itself or any other territories for sources said. Wow, that is a head scratcher to me. Listen, great if true, the problem there I have is, you know, the Trump administration also said that we're engaging in diplomacy with Iran,

and Iran has, you know, this certain deadline to make a deal, and then they turned around and let Israel break all that and launch a war. So it's possible that this leak from the Trump administration is a cover for another act of aggression against Iran. Anything is possible with these people. But at the same time, I do have a hard time. Although it's very easy for me to see the Trump administration lying to Iran and saying, yes, we're engaging in good faith diplomacy with you, while actually they're planning with Israel an act of aggression, it would be harder for them to lie to Congress, especially their allies in Congress. If this news is true, then great.

Perhaps there's a recognition that their hopes for regime change in Venezuela just can't be achieved via military force. But that doesn't mean they're not going to keep trying through other means. And they have a lot. Again, these sanctions imposed by the U.S. are effectively an act of war in itself. They've completely decimated Venezuela's economy, forced migrants to flee, as John Bolton has admitted, which is the point to cause enough suffering inside a country. country so that people turn on their government. And that's what they're still hoping. That's what the Trump administration is still hoping will happen in Venezuela.

Is Trump planning to invade Nigeria? It's a great question. I haven't followed that one closely. But he's claiming there that persecution of Christians might compel military action. And yeah, with this administration, like any administration, you can ever rule it out. I mean, this is a country, whether it's a Democrat or Republican in office, they're just pathologically addicted. to using aggression. So you never know who will be attacked next.

Here's President Trump at a Halloween party. He's not in custom. At Marilago, well, you'll hear what he has to say. Guns ablazing. Cut number one. If the Nigerian government continues to allow the killing of Christians, the USA will immediately stop all aid and assistance to Nigeria.

We're going to do things to Nigeria that Nigeria is not going to be happy about and may very well go into that now disgrace country, guns are blazing to completely wipe out the Islamic terrorists who are committing these horrible, horrible atrocities. I'm hereby instructing our Department of War to prepare for possible action. If we attack, it will be fast, vicious, and sweet,

just like the terrorist thugs attack our cherished Christians. These are cherished people. These are great people. Leave them alone. Warning, the Nigerian government better move fast before it's too late. If they don't, there's going to be held to pay. Institute Nigeria for Syria. It all makes sense. And he's about to embrace Al Jolani and the Oval Office on Monday.

That's a great point. That's a great point. So the former leader of Al-Qaeda is apparently said to come visit the U.S. and his group, Hayatari al-Sham, which now controls the Syrian government, they've actually attacked Christians. So when they controlled the province of Idlib, which they took over during the Syria dirty war about 10 years ago, the Christian population of Idlib drastically reduced because essentially they were kicked out.

And now the leader of al-Qaeda in Syria, turned Syrian president, Ahmed al-Shara, he's being welcomed in the Oval Office, which tells you a lot about Trump's sincerity here. But this thing in Nigeria, I haven't followed it too closely. What I do know is that he's basically reducing a very complex conflict to a simple matter of religious persecution, eliding the fact that a lot of the victims in Nigeria, groups like Boko Haram are actually Muslim as well. So it's not just Christians who are being attacked in Nigeria. It's also Muslims, which, of course, Trump doesn't care about. And this is a part of an evangelical Christian thing. There's this, you know, people who want to support colonialism will invoke the,

the plight of Christians in countries as part of a white savior narrative. And I suspect that's what's happening here with Trump. Just to go back to the tail end of Netanyahu's comment earlier, where he said that this is the worst public relations disaster in the history of the state of Israel. He has, of course, dispatched his acolytes in the United States to try and present Israel in a better light. Here's one of them falling flat in his face.

Cut number 13. Nanyahu the problem, the IDF, the problem. They're fighting their own damn war trying to survive. And we have our own war. It's not a shooting war. It's even more complicated. It's more daunting. The cooks on the left and the right,

they're stealing our culture. This little bastard Fuentes, he likes to say, well, I'm going to deport, live in. Try your little punk. Try it. Try a tough guy. you and me one-on-one why don't you try deporting me you got that fat slob banning going on with his next cause he's going to denaturalize mandami no he's not he's a pathological liar he's stolen enough money from you and has deceived enough of you you shall blow him off then there's carlson making tens of millions of dollars in bed with the wrong people pretending that he's america first there are numerous of these that chris has put together but we thought we'd run that one for you

you know judge the wrestling fan in me loves this whole saga it's so entertaining this uh this feud on the right between you know people like chuckle carlston who represent a certain faction of america first and people like mark levin who represent israel first um i don't follow this very closely you know max blumenthal does And my understanding from him is that, you know, Tucker did make a, I think a big error by bringing on and platforming a Nick Fuentes who... I agree with that. You know, the Francis people keep asking us to put them on and I don't want to. From what I understand, and again, I don't want to, I want to be fair because I don't follow him at all. I just, I don't pay attention.

But from what I think it's fair to actually say that Nick Fuentes is anti-Semitic and does hold abhorrent views, unlike some people who are, given those titles simply for criticizing Israel, I think he actually does fit the bill of an anti-Semite. Again, but I'm saying this without following any of his work. So they're always getting something wrong. So anyway, Tucker Carlson does bring him on a show, and people like Mark Levine sees on that to then try to basically call for Tucker Carlson and other people who represent the sort of backlash to our support for Israel

to ban Tucker Carlson from the conservative movement. And the Heritage Foundation is now embroiled in this because their president, Kevin Roberts, gave a statement saying that we're not going to cancel people. We're not going to cancel Tucker Carlson. And now he's had to apologize for saying that, that we don't engage in cancel culture. So look, some of this speaks to dynamics of the conservative movement that I don't really pay much attention to. I'm very interested in. But to the extent this touched on Israel, you're seeing, once again, the intolerance there is for supporters of Israel to have dissenters within their ranks.

one more before we end you'll know who this is in a heartbeat chris cut number five Tucker Carlson has turned himself into a conspiracist and a crank and a pathological liar Tucker excuses Vladimir Putin's murderous and barbarous reign he has even become one of his most ardent defenders Tucker Carlson has attacked President Trump as a cover-up artist for sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein on behalf of Israel and Mossad because of course Tucker's a coward Tucker Carlson has stated that President Trump has undermined America first and Maga by attacking Iran, giving into neo-con ghouls like Mark Levin. Tucker Carlson acts as an ideological launderer for other people's evils.

He's a master of gaslighting. Tucker Carlson will have on a Hitler-friendly pseudo-historian to minimize the Holocaust and blame Winston Churchill for World War II, and he will call him America's best and most honest historian. I thought Churchill was the chief villain of the Second World War. Tucker Carlson will have on over and over, a pro-Chinese, propagandist who used global warming to promote global socialism, all in order to criticize Israel and hug China.

Israel has run American foreign policy in the Middle East for 30 years. That's how it works. This is actually the truth if we drop our angst on big bad Russia, big bad China, which is also not going to invade the United States. They're not a threat to the United States, honestly, and Iran is not a threat. Tucker Carlson, of course, brings on pro-Hamas voices. Episode after episode after episode, the instances are almost limitless. America needs a robust conservative organization based on principle and ideas,

not personal loyalty to bad actors like Tucker Carlson. You know, Ben has become a caricature of himself. Another guy I don't really pay attention to, but I do find it encouraging that there is this riff now inside the, Maga movement. And I wish we had more of that on the left, on the Democratic side. I mean, Zaraamam Dani, he just won the mayor's race in New York City. He didn't make Palestine a center of his campaign, but his opponents did because he supports Palestinian rights. So Andrew Cuomo and others tried to attack him for it, but it backfired. And Chuck Schumer, the leader of the Democratic

Party in the Senate, he refused to vote for and endorse Zaraamam Dani. Because according to the New York Times, you know, Schumer says that he sees himself as the guardian of Israel. So Schumer was prioritizing his perception of the needs of Israel over his own party's nominee in Chuck Schumer's own city, New York City. So I hope these rifts caused by the bipartisan support for Israel keep growing in both spaces. And I'm not here to defend Tucker Carlson. You know, I've been in a show before and I appreciate some of the stances that he takes because, you know, he is willing to defy the bipartisan worst.

establishment. That doesn't mean I endorse all of his views and all of his guests. I don't. But it's funny there that Ben Shapiro chooses to single out Jeffrey Sachs, you know, and accuse him of using, what was the like using global warming? Climate control as a means of affecting foreign policy. I don't know what the hell he was talking about. I don't know what that means either. Jeff Sachs is one of the most intellectually honest, gifted and brilliant human beings I've ever met. And Ben doesn't even understand him. Yes. And Tucker's lucky that Jeffrey Sachs has been, you know, banned from so many corporate media outlets because that's where he should be appearing every

day if they had any sense. So Tucker's benefited from Jeffrey Sachs having more time than his very busy schedule to come on. Listen, I worked with Tucker for a number of years. We had our differences. I don't agree with everything he does, but he is intellectually honest, personally courageous. And I strongly endorse his views on the Zionist state and what it's been accomplishing. He can put Jeffrey Sachs on. every day of the week if he wants. You're here. Aaron, thank you very much.

We're going to be going through this again because our good buddy, your partner, Ben, excuse me, Max Blumenthal is on it for this afternoon. I'm looking forward to it already. This has been a warm up. But thank you, all the best, Aaron. You as well, Judge. Thank you. Thank you.

And coming up at 1 this afternoon, we have a lineup of Class A guests today, starting with Aaron at 11, at 1 this afternoon, Colonel Douglas McGregor, at two this afternoon, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, at three this afternoon, Professor John Mearsheimer at four this afternoon, Max Blumenthal. Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom. Thank you.