Judging Freedom - Larry Johnson: Will Israel Invade Lebanon?

Episode Date: February 19, 2024

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Thank you. Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Monday, February 19th, 2024. Larry Johnson joins us now. Larry, thanks very much, as always. Before we get into the Israelis and Lebanon and Ukraine and the fall of Abedinca, I just want to ask you a question or two about Alexis Navalny. Do you believe that he was an asset of Western intelligence? Yes. He was at least, whether witting or unwitting,

he was clearly a tool used by the West. In fact, you know, the fact his death coincides with his wife showing up at this major meeting, the Munich Security Council meeting, I believe. And, you know, that's not a coincidence. They just didn't get lucky. I could not rule out the possibility that the West paid somebody off to do a Jeffrey Epstein on the guy. You know, have him die at this time that would be inconvenient for Putin.

Because the West is pushing this nonsense. Oh, Putin had him murdered. And Putin could have killed him years ago. Didn't. And it would be one thing if this guy was a leading philosophical thinker and talking about, you know, pick your topic, freedom, rights to vote, free speech. He wasn't. In fact, there's video of him out there saying, you know, some very racist things and talking about,

you know, talking about Muslims as cockroaches that need to be exterminated. So this guy was just a useful tool. And he had very, very, very little political support. This would be like saying that Joe Biden was going to whack Marianne Williamson, one of the third-party candidates that's running. She's an interesting lady, but certainly doesn't have any kind of political base or support that would make her worthy of somebody killing her. I was just going to say, this whole Navalny affair is just a reminder of the staggering hypocrisy that grips the world. The United States, we were founded on this document that said, we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. But when it comes to this, no, no,

Navalny's more equal than Gonzalo Lira. Navalny's more equal than Julian Assange. Navalny's more equal than Ashley Babbitt, who was murdered in the Capitol by an element of the U.S. government. And oh yes, Navalny is definitely worth more than 8,000 Palestinian children who are dead. So, I mean, when I watch politicians like Lindsey Graham and others get up on their moral high horse to denounce, oh, we got to deal with Russia, go deal with Netanyahu first. He's the one murdering civilians, women, and children. But it shows we just don't care.

You beat me to it. I was going to ask you about the radical, in a good way, I was going to ask you about the radical differences in the West's treatment of the death of Gonzalo O'Leary in prison. Of course, an American citizen, as opposed to, about which you see no official government reaction. Cut number four, Chris. Here's President Biden, I think on Friday being asked about the death of Alexei Navalny and Biden's relationship to Vladimir Putin. You warned Vladimir Putin when you were in Geneva of devastating consequences if Navalny died in Russian custody. What consequences should he and Russia face? That was three years ago. In the meantime, they faced a hell of a lot of consequences. They've lost and or had wounded over 350,000 Russian soldiers. They've made them to a position where they've been subjected to

great sanctions across the board, and we're contemplating what else could be done. But what we were talking about at the time, there were no actions being taken against Russia. And look at all that's transpired since then. Well, we know what his sanctions have done. They've made Russia financially independent and actually more prosperous. Those numbers are measurable and not disputed. Right, right. But any opportunity to blame Putin that he can. The other thing I want to mention to you

before we get into the news of the day is that tomorrow is either the final hearing or the revelation of the final ruling on Julian Assange's efforts to avoid extradition to the United States. Am I right that the British judiciary will just be poodles to what the U.S. wants? There was a time when they had the most fiercely independent judiciary in history would stand up to the king and the parliament, but no longer. Yeah, no, they're so thoroughly politicized.

The only new development in this is the government of Australia under a new conservative prime minister has spoken out and spoken out strongly about the need to release Assange. So they are at least asserting the rights. They're stepping up and doing something for Assange that the Biden administration did not do for, say, Gonzalo Lira. So I think that may be the wild card in this that could, in fact, influence the decision. Yesterday, the Israeli cabinet voted unanimously, so that includes what few self-characterized moderates there are in the cabinet, to reject the concept of a two-state solution, to reject any freedom for or governmental recognition of the Palestinians. So where is this going to go to?

Is this going to result in some sort of a bloody confrontation, or is Netanyahu going to get his country from the river to the sea? Well, it's already a bloody confrontation, but Israel is going to invade Lebanon. I heard from one of my buddies, a retired CIA officer who has been in touch with somebody who knows, and he said with no doubt Israel's made the decision they're going to invade southern Lebanon. You know, the rational part of me says, I hope to God they don't do that because it will lead to the destruction

of Israel. But I understand how people, there are some people out there that feel, wait, if Israel does this, it will end up destroying them. Great, let them do it. Because Israel is this combination of arrogance and hubris. And it's born out of insecurity.

You've dealt with those people who are so insecure that they're always bragging about themselves. I can do that. And so here's Israel insisting, oh, we got the best military in the Middle East. No, they don't. They have probably the most brutal, undisciplined, unprincipled military in the Middle East, as has been demonstrated by their repeated killing of civilians, women, children, without any regard.

They routinely attack hospitals and members of the press. And they get away with labeling them, oh, they're terrorists. Everybody's a terrorist. As long as they're a terrorist, as long as you declare them an enemy of the state, which was exactly the habit of the Soviets back in the bad old days of the Soviet Union. As long as you hang the label of enemy of the state on somebody, then you can do whatever you want to them.

But, yeah, Israel is going to escalate this. And Hezbollah is in a position, they're an organized army. They've got very heavily defended defensive positions, almost equivalent to what the Russians built as we knew as the Suravikin lines in Southern Ukraine. And they have long range missiles that up to this point, they have not used or used routinely on cities that are far away from the border, the northern border, and they will use them. And all of a sudden, Israeli citizens, they went, oh, we're always under rocket attack, but they rarely cause casualties. Whatever casualties they cause are minimal. I think that will change. If Israel launches this invasion of southern Lebanon, they're going to be looking at mass casualties in Israel.

Have the IDF attacks, the pinprick attacks into southern Lebanon weakened Hezbollah at all? No, no. Just to the contrary. It's redoubled. You know, Hezbollah, I think, is now, they're more than ready for the fight. And sort of the political leader of Hezbollah, Nasrallah, made a speech last Friday. And, you know, very clear that they're now moving towards, it's escalating.

And it's going to continue to escalate. And they're going to use whatever weapons are at their disposal to make sure that the Israelis do not return to their settlements in the north. And if necessary, invade Israel and force the Israelis out. I mean, it's getting to that stage because Israel's brutality against civilians is, I mean, we haven't seen this level of brutality by a military force against unarmed civilians since the Nazis entered into Eastern Europe. What is Hezbollah's escalatory capability? since the Nazis entered into Eastern Europe. What is Hezbollah's escalatory capability? They have both anti-ship missiles that can be launched at U.S. ships offshore, and they have long-range ballistic missiles that can hit cities as far south as Tel Aviv.

I doubt that if they target Jerusalem, they'll only target parts of Jerusalem that not where the Dome of the Rock is, where the mosque, the Al-Aqsa sits. Are we talking about tribesmen and flip-flops? Are we talking about a sophisticated, armed, well-equipped and trained military? Yeah, we're talking about a well-equipped and trained military. Yeah, we're talking about a well-equipped, trained military.

They transitioned. And really that transition was underway more than almost 20 years ago. In 2006, Israel launched an invasion of southern Lebanon, thinking that they would easily roll up the Hezbollah forces, cleanse the area, create a buffer zone. The opposite happened. Hezbollah was fighting from entrenched positions, jumping out of spider holes, hitting them with RPGs, rocket-propelled grenades, and anti-tank guided missiles.

They caused significant casualties to the Israeli, both in terms of personnel and equipment. And Israel ultimately withdrew. They could not hang. They couldn't complete the operation. Now, Israel went back and said, oh, yeah, boy, we beat them. No, they didn't. And all I can say is in the intervening now 18 years, since 2006, Hezbollah has only gotten stronger with more military personnel, with more trained military personnel. And unlike the Israelis, who are largely a reserve army

that are very, very, very poorly trained, Hezbollah is not that The ones that are serving within Hezbollah are full-time They're not the part-time citizen-soldier Earlier today in the International Court of Justice The Palestinian Authority made a presentation to the court On what it says is Israel's illicit, immoral, under international law, unlawful acquisition of land that belongs to the Palestinians. I think we all know this argument, but I want to play it for you because this particular argument shows maps of the area of what was once Palestine and is now Israel.

And at the end of it, I'm going to ask you if this is an argument that resonates with the billion, with the B, Arabs. So here's cut number 13, Chris. Allow me now to show you five maps. The first one is historic Palestine. This is the territory over which the Palestinian people should have been able to exercise their right to self-determination. Instead, the General Assembly recommended the partition of Palestine, ignoring the will of our people as shown in the second قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت قتلت وثالثاً بلسطين أصبح إسرائيل كما يظهر في المسار الثالث هذا كان بداية النقبة. التوضيح والتحرك والتحرك من أجل أهلنا.

التنفيذ بالحقوق والمساعدة التي تستمر إلى هذا اليوم. في 1967. إسرائيل ثم تتواجد المباركة من فلسطين، ومنذ يوم الأول من مباركتها، بدأت بإعادة وإعادة المدينة بأهمل تحرير إدارة نحونا كما يظهر في ماب 4. أراد إسرائيل جيوغرافيا من فلسطين ولكن ليس ديموغرافيا. لذا استمرت في تحرك أشخاصنا من خارج منزلهم من خارج منزلهم. هنا هو الماكهة الخامسة. كانت تظهرت من أجل مضة إسرائيل للعام الأخير في السبتمبر الأخير. تسمى هذا المدينة الأخيرة الجديدة. هذا لا يوجد

فلسطين على كل شيء على هذه المحطة. فقط إسرائيل تحتوي على كل المدينة من of all the land from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. This shows you what the prolonged continuous Israeli occupation of Palestine is intended to accomplish. The complete disappearance of Palestine and the destruction of the Palestinian people. The complete disappearance of Palestine and the destruction of the Palestinian people. I thought it was a very effective presentation, Larry. Is this argument one largely embraced by those now outraged by the slaughter in Gaza? Yes, I mean, it's intellectually correct, but it really doesn't change the dynamics on the ground.

Israel is intent on destroying the Palestinian people, and they don't care whether it's women or children or elderly. They don't care. They will, people with mental handicaps, they'll kill them too, just like Hitler killed Jews with mental handicaps. They'll kill them too. Just like Hitler killed Jews with mental handicaps. I can't emphasize enough, and I know that Netanyahu got very upset with Brazilian President Lula da Silva. But da Silva is absolutely correct.

What did da Silva say that upset Netanyahu? He likened what Israel's doing to what the Nazis did to the Jews. And I think I fully embrace that and endorse it. That's absolutely what's going on. This is not punishing those who carried out the attacks.

This is collective punishment. This is punishing them because they're Palestinian. And yet, if you lined up an Israeli, a native-born Israeli, with a native-born, quote, Palestinian, they're genetically the same. You can't tell them apart. But it's this kind of this hatred that's been engendered where these radical Zionists have decided that the only way for them to, quote, survive is to destroy the Palestinians. But it's sort of the Hegelian dialectic at work. That very act of trying to destroy the Palestinians is, in fact, I believe, going to end up destroying Israel. They will destroy themselves because they will have abandoned their moral foundation. Is there anybody to make that argument to Netanyahu,

or is his war cabinet and his government fully behind this? Surely there must be some IDF generals saying, you know, Mr. Prime Minister, this is crazy. Do you have any idea how strong these forces are that you want us to attack? Oh, no. In fact, it's just the opposite. Mariv, which is a polling outfit in Israel, conducted a poll the other day.

Almost three-fourths of the Israelis say, oh, yeah, we want to invade southern Lebanon. You've got General Halivi, who's the head of the Israeli army. He was talking about doing it. He announced that they were going to be invading back in January. No, no, judge, these people are not rational. They're not thinking with any kind of vision down the road. They are just obsessed with, we got, this is our one chance to eliminate the Palestinians.

They don't care whether they're Muslims or Christians. They lump them all as Hamas, even though there was a sizable minority of Palestinians who were Christian and had nothing to do with Hamas. The Israelis don't care. That's why they're engaged with this widespread murder. That's why they're preventing the arrival of humanitarian aid. That's why they're bombing hospitals and targeting ambulance drivers, medical personnel, and journalists. It is an outrage to humanity, but so far they're getting away with it. Do you think any Western countries will intervene with force in order to put a stop to this?

Are they just like Joe Biden and Rishi Sunak, going to send money and materiel and sit back and wring their hands but do nothing to stop it? Do nothing. They're going to, in fact, enable it. The United States in particular has the wherewithal to stop it. They'll do nothing. They're going to, in fact, enable it. They are doing... The United States in particular has the wherewithal to stop it, but the United States is bought and paid for by Israel through the American-Israeli Political

Action Committee. And so as long as the United States is behaving like a prostitute, it's been paid for services, and it's rendering said services. Switching gears back to Ukraine, over the weekend, more properly last week was the Munich conference. We talked about the coincidence of Navalny expiring while his wife was at the

conference, but there were members of the U.S. Congress there, hand-wringing and almost in tears, telling an anecdote about a Ukrainian soldier looking at his cell phone every hour to see, has the House of Representatives voted yet? Have they voted to send us the $61 billion yet? I think last Turner, the chair of the House Intelligence Committee, that they all went through and fawning over Mrs. Navalny and fawning over Vladimir Zelensky? Is all of this an act? Yeah.

Even if they allocated that money, so what would that money be used for? Well, probably the bulk of it would go to U.S. military industrial corporations. even if they allocated that money, so what would that money be used for? Well, probably the bulk of it would go to U.S. military industrial corporations that would be tasked with trying to produce more artillery shells, 155-millimeter artillery barrels for the artillery pieces themselves, HIMARS, maybe buy some more vehicles, upgrade some tanks. But who's going to use them? You've got just because you buy that equipment and assume that you can deploy it, it's not going to be deployed and available,

even if they pass the bill today and Biden signed it into law tomorrow. None of that equipment would be arriving within six months, and you still would not have trained, competent personnel. So that would then leave the NATO countries with only one other option. They put their own personnel in there to operate it, and there are now reports emerging that Western military personnel have been sheep-dipped, are being presented as mercenaries, but they're still really active-duty folks,

and they're the ones operating the artillery pieces and trying to operate their defense system. But they made a bad choice because Russia's killing them too. In fact, you could see in one of the videos showing the Ukrainian soldiers fleeing, retreating from Avdiivka. Guy wearing a U.S. flag on his helmet. That meant you had a U.S. soldier there. Wow.

What Chris ran before, I didn't realize what it was. Chris, run it again, please. The B-roll. So this is Rafah. Palestinians attempting to approach relief trucks. Israeli soldiers shooting at them. They're obviously unarmed. Shooting at them, killing them as they're trying to approach these trucks to get food, water, and medicine.

Sure. It's exactly what you just described to us, Larry. Yeah. This is, you know, this is reminiscent of that U.S. Army officer during the Indian Wars who referred to the Indians on the eve of the Wounded Knee Massacre as, knits make lice. So they saw, disparaged the Native American Aboriginal tribes as, again, subhuman. As long as you can, you know, it's a psychological thing with human beings.

As long as you can convince yourself that you're dealing with something that's not a someone, something that does not feel, that's not even worthy of consideration, it's easy to kill them. And that's exactly what Israel's doing. Do you agree that the resistance to Israel will eventually comprise more than just Hezbollah, because other either militia leaders or even state government leaders in the area will not be able to resist the pressure from the ferocious anger that the Arab peoples have to what's happening in Gaza to do something about it once the IDF and Hezbollah are engaged? The only way to reverse the trajectory of events right now is to have a diplomatic front open. Well, the United States has no credibility any longer for opening such a diplomatic front and instead has reverted to, you know, being like that three-year-old with a hammer. Everything looks like a nail, so they're just hammering everything. So we keep using military force and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin in December. Operation Guardian, Freedom, whatever it's called.

We're going to reopen the Red Sea. How's that working out? It's not. The Houthis continue to attack. There are reports that members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Command, the IRGC, are now on the ground acting as advisors to some of the Houthis. It wouldn't surprise me. Of course, we're going to be outraged about that. That is, that shouldn't happen. Meanwhile, we say nothing about our own military forces in countries illegally, without the permission of those host governments doing the same kind of thing. So we don't see the hypocrisy of it, but the rest of the world does.

And the rest of the world takes the attitude, at least the non-Western world, they take the attitude, hey, if they can do it, we can do it. And we're going to do it. There's an American State Department in all of this. I mean, Netanyahu's government would collapse because Smotrich and Ben-Gavir and their colleagues would leave the coalition if Netanyahu engaged in any significant diplomacy with Antony Blinken leading towards any type of relief, never mind recognition as a government, but any type of relief for the Palestinians.

It still would not alter Israel's policy of exterminating the Palestinians. Even the opposition leader, Benny Gantz, is not necessarily opposed to the Netanyahu policies. He's opposed to how they're implemented in some form or fashion. But the overall objective of securing Israel against any kind of Palestinian threat or attack is a top priority. You know, that's why the attack on October 7th came out of Gaza. It didn't come out of the West Bank. And yet in the West Bank, the Israelis are intent, excuse me, they're intent on destroying and killing and arresting Palestinians who had nothing to do with October 7th. So the principle that we once thought would undergird U.S. law,

that you only arrest and punish those who are responsible for a crime where you can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that they did it. You can't just say, yeah, they're guilty, and then use the power of the state to impose punishment without due process. But when it comes to the field of foreign affairs, that principle goes right out the window. That's what could make the United States a difference in the world. If the United States would uphold that concept of, hey, we're going to promote due process, we're going to promote only punishing those who are responsible, and we're going to promote due process. We're going to promote only punishing those who are responsible, and we're going to ensure that we're not punishing the innocent.

But the United States has abandoned that principle. Thank you very much, Larry. Tough stuff, but thanks very much for your analysis. We'll look forward to the roundtable with you and Ray towards the end of the week. Great. Thanks, Judge. end of the week. Great. Thanks, Judge. Have a great week. You too. Coming up at 3 o'clock this afternoon, Kyle Anzalone on Do You Believe This?

The IDF now says it doesn't think it can defeat Hamas. Just what Larry and Ray and Colonel McGregor and Scott Ritter and Matt Ho and the others have been telling us. Three o'clock today. Judge Napolitano for judging freedom. Thank you.