Judging Freedom - Alastair Crooke: Warning Signs - "Untenable Positions"

Episode Date: March 4, 2024

Alastair Crooke: Warning Signs - "Untenable Positions"See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Thank you. Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Monday, March 4th, 2024. Alistair Crook joins us now. Alistair, it's a pleasure. Thank you very much. We have so much to discuss, but I want to start with two local, relatively local elections in Israel and in Great Britain. Let's start in Israel. Are there some trends from these local elections that you're able to deduce about the mindset of the Israeli electorate? Yes. They've been quite shocking, at least shocking to the establishment in Israel because it was really the parties of Ben-Gavir, which translates because they usually put the Hebrew version, but which is Israeli Supremacy Party,

did very well, did well, and has been actually running in conjunction with Likud, suggesting a very sharp move to the right with Likud. But overall in these local elections, the parties of the right did disproportionately well and the old European liberal world, Ashkenazi world, did badly. It indicates that even after the 7th of October, where there was a huge shift to the right, we're just seeing another shift to the right. And interestingly, the sort of young people are moving right, even though I'm particularly the ones, if you like, that have served in Gaza. I mean, the army, the reservists are coming back and are mostly voting for the right. So it's a big change.

And was Ben Gavir, the fanatical rightist who's in the main cabinet but not in the war cabinet, who, with his friend Smotrich gave Prime Minister Netanyahu the votes he needed to have a majority in the Knesset. Was Mr. Ben-Gavir stripped of some authority over the weekend by the war cabinet? I mean, this goes on periodically. There's a sort of little tussle between Ben-Gavir. He's firmly in the cabinet. I mean, his party is the only one that is getting additional voters at the moment. I mean, he's on an upturn in his party.

He hails from a very extreme party originally. And yes, there are a tendency in the war cabinet to try and restrain him over what happens at Ramadan. I mean, he has been sort of pushed back a bit because he wanted to have no Arabs going on to Temple Mount Haram al-Sharif during Ramadan. And that would have caused an uproar in the Palestinian world, in the Islamic world. And so he's been getting a bit of pushback, but nothing. I mean, he's completely central. He's to Netanyahu.

He's not about to be pushed out of the cabinet in any way or restrained in his areas. I mean, he's actually very much a sort of trendsetter, the leader at the moment. More so, if anything, he is leading Netanyahu. It's very far from Netanyahu pushing him out. How dangerous is this? Norman Finkelstein says there's three parties in Israel, the right, the far right, and the ultra right. It almost seems like that's a fair analysis. It's not bad, yeah.

I mean, there's no left. There's no peace. There used to be, you know, Meretz and Labour were parties of peace, but they've gone. They have no political support. Overwhelmingly, Israeli support is behind, whether you call them Likud or the Right or far-right or whatever.

The labels don't matter, but Israel has moved to the right. There's no doubt about that. And it's wishful thinking that goes on in America and in Europe. They still dream of the sort of Israel they used to know in the Kibbutzim and they would go. sort of Israel they used to know in the kibbutz, and they would go, some of them, you know, the head of the European Union, Bar-El, worked in a kibbutz as a young man, and he married a kibbutz girl, a girl from who was either working part of the kibbutz. And so they have this romantic view of sort of liberal, Europeanized Israel.

And it's changed totally in this time. As I said, it changed enormously when suddenly we had the Mitzrayim. These are the sort of outcast members of society. These are the Jews that come from North Africa, from the Middle East, and have always been the poor class, you know, rather like you had in South Africa with some of the Africana elements in society. And then they took power and they are radical and they have a plan. And it's a plan which doesn't work very well for Mr. Biden or for the European Union but it looks to me as if Netanyahu is not going to get pushback

from Washington he's got eight months in other words to do what he plans to do before anything is likely to come down on him this next period there won't be I don't think any real pushback possible from uh uh from Washington we don't see it I pushback possible from Washington. We don't see it. I mean, Kamala Harris can stand up and say, cease fire now, please. But everyone ignores it in Israel. As we speak, Benny Gantz, the former general, the former chief of the IDF, and at least before October 7, Prime Minister Netanyahu's staunch adversary is in the U.S., much to the consternation of Netanyahu and the War Cabinet. What is that all about? We don't know exactly.

I've seen different reports. I mean, Netanyahu is furious because he broke all the rules, just to be clear. I mean, you're supposed to tell a prime minister as a minister when you go off on a foreign trip to see and talk to other leaders, particularly in Washington and London, which are his two ports of call. So he didn't tell anyone until it was all fixed up. And then he just told Netanyahu, I'm going. And Netanyahu rather tartly said to him, just remember this, there's only one prime minister in Israel at a time. And so it's seen as an attempt. I think actually what it's going to do is actually very much aggravate the relations between Israel and the United States in this period, particularly the White House, because they've invited him there.

And clearly they're trying to groom him as a sort of opposition figure for Netanyahu. But realistically, does he have the power to do that, to take it on? He's usually come across as quite a weak personality. He's not been a weak personality. He's not been very strong personality. And in cabinet, he's gone along with everything that the right wanted. I mean, he, you know, there'd be minor complaints, but he hasn't, you know, there's been no great division. Now, the other story, and I don't know if it's true but the other story i was just told that actually one of the reasons he went there is because there israel is running short on smart bombs and they want a

resupply of um of logistics um before ramadan so i don't know but i mean it certainly will have put the cabinet on edge that he's gone off there at the invitation of the white house um to if you like be played against the cabin it doesn't it doesn't play well in israel it doesn't not at a time of war if you like it doesn't play very well when the cabinet is being sort of um played by foreign powers. Here's Vice President Harris. This is either yesterday or the day before. Cut number five, Chris. People in Gaza are starving.

The conditions are inhumane. And our common humanity compels us to act. As President Joe Biden said on Friday, the United States is committed to urgently get more life-saving assistance to innocent Palestinians in need. Yesterday, the Department of Defense carried out its first airdrop of humanitarian assistance, and the United States will continue these airdrops. And we will work on a new route by sea to deliver aid. And the Israeli government must do more to significantly increase the flow of aid. No excuses. I will repeat, the threat of Hamas poses to the people of Israel must be eliminated. And given

the immense scale of suffering in Gaza, there must be an immediate ceasefire. For at least the next six weeks, which is what is currently on the table. I don't know if it's personality or political background or what, but nobody really takes her seriously and is moved by what she says and and the whole argument you know will give you smart bombs with which to slaughter innocents but those few that managed to survive the slaughter please let us in there to give them humanitarian assistance this is uh incomprehensible that those two views could come out of the same administration.

There were two other electoral events that I wanted to ask you about. One, a parliamentary by-election in which a notorious character, a champion of the left and the working class, a real pain in the neck to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Labor leader Keir Starmer by the name of George Galloway was elected. I've been on George's podcast, George is a pip. And then there was also, within days or days before this event in Michigan, where the Democrats in Michigan who are opposed to the slaughter in Gaza predicted they would have 10,000 votes against President Joe Biden, and they exceeded that number tenfold. They had more than 100,000 votes against them. You see a pattern here. I do. I think it's a very interesting pattern because what you're seeing there, I mean, was this extraordinary reaction by the Prime Minister to George Galloway's overwhelming victory in Rochdale. This is, you know, a small town was a

Labour stronghold, mostly working class, blue collar type of constituency. But he won overwhelmingly. And then the Prime Minister stops everything, goes out onto the steps of Downing Street into the street to give this press conference, not something that happens all the time. The Prime Minister does a sort of press conference on the steps and says, democracy at risk. Extremism from both ends of the thing are taking us over.

We must react. We cannot do this. This is a real danger that we're facing. And so it was very strange. And then the reason really sort of filters out because someone commented very well and said, look, you know what's really going on here, what the danger is. He's taking a working class constituency

and meshing the Palestinian issue with the interests and with the concerns of ordinary British people and wow oh they get everyone is in a panic about this because you know like in America there is the same power structures that exist in Europe. A cabinet in Britain, Conservative or Labour, are typically a majority of the cabinet members belong to the Friends of Israel parliamentary party, parliamentary grouping. And so, you know, this is something that is really the shaking many of the power structures and the definitions. I mean, because what does it mean, left, right?

Because you've got people who are on the right who are supporting Palestine, people on the left. You look at the protests in Europe, they're huge everywhere. So it's really shaking and unnerving them, along with everything else that's going on, along with Ukraine, along with Gaza and Israel. Everything is making for really, I mean, you can see real signs of panic in Europe at this point. I know you're an ocean away, but do you see any signs of panic in the Democratic Party in the United States in light of what happened in Michigan? And the New York Times has a poll out this morning. I know we usually don't get into domestic politics, but we're so close to

right now. The New York Times has a poll out this morning saying that 70% of President Biden's supporters, 70% of his supporters say he's too old. Well, that's fairly obvious, but yes. And we do see that. I mean, it was extraordinary. I mean, they were aiming for 10,000 uncommitted votes in Michigan, and they got over 100,000. And that, I think, has sent a shock. I know that Michigan and a few of those swing states have probably a higher proportionality of Muslims living in them. But this was the point about Rochdale. It wasn't just Muslims that voted in George Galloway. It was ordinary people, not necessarily left, not necessarily hard right, but people that are horrified by what they've been seeing in Gaza and the stance of Europe,

which is the same as that of America, which has been no ceasefire, no ceasefire. Now, that is, I mean, that is changing the whole, if you like, the definitions of politics. It's not left or right any longer. It is a sort of intersectional spectrum that is incorporating people from the right to the left against what they have seen in Israel and the handling of it, whether it be by Biden or by the European Union. Before we jump over to the problems with Ukraine, here's a clip of George Galloway. You've got to love this guy. Here he is last night celebrating. Cut number seven. this is for Gaza. You have paid, and you will pay a high price. I want to tell Mr. Starmer above all that the plates have shifted tonight.

And as Jacob Rees-Mogg just said on television, in talking of me as a parliamentary orator of note, that Keir Starmer's problems just got 100 times more serious. Labour is on notice that they have lost the confidence of millions of their voters who loyally and traditionally voted for them generation after generation. Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak are two cheeks of the same backside. And they both got well and truly spanked tonight here in Rochdale. That is

classic George Galloway, the last line. Absolutely. I mean, he has a way with language. There's no doubt about that. By the way, before we leave, if you like, Gaza, Israel,

and move on to your next topic, I just want to say to you that overnight something is going on. I don't know exactly what it means, but about just before midnight European time, Sunday night, there was an attempt by the Golani Brigade to infiltrate into Lebanon by their soldiers. And Hezbollah stopped it, attacking them with a large explosive device

and with artillery, causing casualties. And I don't know whether deaths were involved or not. And then half an hour later there was another attempt at infiltration near another settlement, Margallion, into Lebanon that was also stopped by Hezbollah. And this morning, there has been a further attempt of an intrusion into Lebanon. I don't know if it's Golani's or another group. But again, that has been stopped. So something, the armor is ready in Lebanon.

These are probably just probing measures. It's not a full-scale invasion or anything like this, and I think perhaps these troops were sent there to sort of test Hezbollah's reactions and to test their defenses more than to achieve some particular military objective. But, you know, it's a signal. This was the IDF. These are not several militias you're talking about. No. Golani is one of the most elite of the brigades. This is the elite

unit, sort of, not quite special forces. Well, effectively a special forces of the Israeli army. Absolutely. All of these were Israeli army incursions or attempted incursions because I don't think they actually got into Lebanon, but they were stopped at the border of Lebanon, if you like, by Hezbollah. So something is happening.

I don't know what. And I think perhaps it's just a probing exercise. Doesn't mean it's going to start tomorrow or anything like that. But we're on course for this, there's no doubt. Over the weekend, did French President Macron yet again hint or suggest that French special forces should be or already are on the ground in Ukraine? Well, it was actually the German Chancellor that made it explicit. And he said, yes, that there are French forces.

I mean, we're talking here about uniform. I mean, they may not be in uniform, but there are official French forces and there are official French forces and there are official British forces. And it was clear also from the telephone conversation between various German generals that the British and the French have teams on the ground that are preparing the missile attacks and helping with the targeting of these long-range missiles that are firing into Crimea, into Russia, and to helping with the choice of target and with the targeting process because they're quite complicated.

And this happened at this meeting at the Elysee. It started all coming out when Macron came up with this crazy plan, which is, I think we've discussed before about tripwires. Tripwire is where you put a vulnerable military group, which isn't capable of defending itself, like a sort of tethered goat out there saying if you hit the goat or if you kill the goat then all America's might is going to come down on you so this is a tripwire idea and Macron's thought was that Europe would put sort of scatter some tripwires of nato troops across ukraine and that would be a sort of strategic deterrence to russia russia would feel sort of hemmed in by these pockets of nato troops they

wouldn't be there to defeat russia just they would be the tripwires around which he'd have to maneuver like a sort of radar position he'd have to maneuver um to take forward the action and everyone everyone at the meeting went nuts and said you know what the hell do you think you're doing this is a this is a conveyor belt to world war three if you do this because russia is not going to just roll over and accept this, that they can put in little groups of NATO troops and that they are invulnerable and that they won't be touched. Of course, they will attack them. And then we will be on the pathway to a real NATO-Russian confrontation. So everyone said, you know, to him, go crazy. But you have to, if you can allow me just a couple of minutes,

because I just need to explain that all of this is something of a sham, because behind it are two things that are driving Europeans into this sort of panic. Of course, there's a real panic in Europe, because they're over-invested in Ukraine and in Zelensky, and they can see it all crumbling, and they have no solution. So there's real panic in that sense, panic about NATO. But what is behind what is going on is two things. One is that when the European Union was founded, there was a tacit agreement. France would be in charge of politics. France would dominate and set the agenda on defense and politics. Germany would set the agenda on economics and monetary issues.

And now Germany is taking the, if you like, the lead on Ukraine, because Germany now with Poland in tow has moved itself right into the arms of the United States, into Washington as a new military axis, which is opposed to the sort of Gaullist ideas of Macron, which are simply, you know, about European sovereignty and autonomy. And he said, oh, no, we want to be as close as possible to Biden and to that arm of NATO. And we want to be Washington's NATO arm in Europe.

And the French don't like that. And then there's a second thing, because you've probably seen all these extraordinary stories about how Russia is going to attack Sweden, how it's going to attack Finland and everything. It's nothing to do with that. The Europeans know that Russia has got no plans. Just to be clear, that Putin has never suggested that they had any ambitions of that sort at all. There's no evidence for it. What is going on, and it's behind the scenes, is a scam that Europe doesn't have money. It hasn't got a treasury.

It's like America used to be years ago, you know, with each state, you know, issuing bonds and raising money for itself. It was long ago before you had a Federal Reserve and treasury bonds. That's what Europe is like now. There is no own money that belongs to the Commission or European Union. The states raise money with sovereign bonds around it, and then they give that money, according to a formula, to the European Union. But the European Union is not a sovereign state. It can't raise money by bonds. It has no taxation prerogative. It only taxes through the sovereign states, the member states only. So all you've been hearing about defense, we need a new defense. We've got this great danger

coming from Russia. It's so alarming we've got to build up our defenses, is all about what they want to do is to go and say to Europe, now we've got to have war bonds. It's already been raised. We need war bonds to finance our new industrial projects. And that means also that the European Union wants to tax us. So tax me as an Italian, but also as a resident in Italy, but also then to tax us from Brussels as well. Not very popular. And this is why we're getting all those fear and scare stories about Russia, because they did issue bonds during the pandemic, but they were issued by the sovereign states, the member states individually.

And what happened? They collapsed. They stand at 60% of 100. So they've lost all this money. And Europe has a real problem. It is underwater in its banks, in its central banks of Europe, because they are full of sovereign bonds that are deeply underwater. That is, they're far less valuable than they appear on their books. It's a real crisis that Europe is in. So let's make everybody frightened about the Russians,

and then we'll say war bonds. You don't have war bonds, don't you? Right. When all else fails, they take you to war. Before we finish for today, and you have an enormous audience watching you now, Alistair, it's a credit to you and your extraordinary knowledge of these things. In your mention of French and German troops on the ground in Ukraine, whether out of uniform or in uniform. I did not hear any reference to American troops. It would seem to me inconceivable that the French and Germans were

there and the Americans are not. The Americans are certainly there, but the key part of it is the technicians from CIA. The main effort, the main asset, the only reason that Ukraine has got as far as it has, even if that is now sort of going backwards, is because of this huge intelligence set work that was described a little bit in that New York Times

piece of these rows of technicians manning the radar, the intelligence, the intercept, the electronics, the planes overhead, the satellites. All of this is what really has made it possible for Ukraine to do what it is doing. Is there any question in your mind that NATO, US, French, German, is waging war on Russia? They're clearly doing that, because what they're doing is an act of war. They are targeting not just Crimea,

which some European states is not Russia, but I mean, like they have been targeting into what has been Russia before 91, all historic Russia, and Europeans have been facilitating that and providing the support for targeting. And for this elaborate, it would have never been possible without the support, because what they do is they manage to send the missiles to do a sort of slalom race through the radar, Russian radar. They track all the Russian radars for the Ukrainians

and then do a little slalom course through the Ukrainian missile, which they've set up anyway, if it's a storm shadow or if it were a Taurus or something they've set up, can do a little slalom around the radars and land into Moscow or into St. Petersburg or whatever the target is.

So, of course, it is. And really, I mean, quite strikingly, after this happened and the description that seemed to appear about Britain directly in being involved in the attack that brought down the Ilyushin 56 with the prisoners on board, they've suddenly given absolute immunity from prosecution to all the troops. Wow. I don't know how this ends, but I'm deeply grateful, as is our very large and gratifying audience. Very appreciative for all your time and efforts. And, of course, we'll be seeing each other soon. Thank you, Alistair. Look forward to it.

Very much. Of course. Coming up at the top of the hour, which is 9 o'clock in the morning Eastern here in the eastern east coast of the United States. Larry Johnson, judge the Paul Tano for judging freedom. Thanks for watching!