Judging Freedom - MATT HOH : Ukraine Military Near Collapse. + OCT-7 What We Know Now!

Episode Date: October 7, 2025

MATT HOH : Ukraine Military Near Collapse. + OCT-7 What We Know Now!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 Tuesday, October 7, 2025. Matt Ho, joins us now. Matt, it's a pleasure. Thank you very much for joining. us. I want to talk to you about both Israel and Ukraine, but before we get to what appears to be the collapsing Ukraine military, a little bit on October 7th, Prime Minister Netanyahu was still repeating lies about the events of October 7th, claiming that horrific events occurred and describing them in detail, events that have been totally debunked by Israeli media and in the West.

What is he hiding? Well, Judge, thanks for having me back on. You know, the need to lie. What occurred on October 7th, there were war crimes, there were massacres, there were murders, that occurred alongside, though, justified in legal attack

by the Palestinian resistance on Israeli military, military and security forces that were occupying the Palestinian people. So the reality, though, as we've seen it play out with the need to fabricate events that didn't occur, such as the beheading of 40 babies, the mass rape of women, the things are just absolutely horrific, hanging dead babies on clotheslines. things like that. You know, the need for the Israelis and the Americans to utilize such stories and falsehoods shows the paucity, you know, shows the shallowness, the emptiness of what they're

standing on here. You know, so when you're standing on an occupation, when you're standing on mass violations of international law, when you're standing upon decades of ethnic cleansing, and you are in, and you are carrying out a genocide, then you have to fabricate things. You have to make things up. You have to tell extremely lurid in horrific tales in order to try and maintain some semblance of moral, moral direction in all this, which, you know, of course, those of us watching this the last two years know there's none, but still quite amazing. among the American establishment, the American ruling class, the media, the politicians, et cetera, these lies, as we, you know, we're just describing, still hold some weight.

Do you think that Netanyahu and his regime knew about October 7th before it happened? Well, the Israeli military intelligence services were in possession of the plans for Al-Axia flood. you know, for the attack on October 7th, you know, there's, you know, reporting whether it was they actually had the actual physical copies of the plan through to the intelligence officers serving for, you know, serving Israel, you know, maintaining surveillance on the Palestinians in Gaza who were aware that something was happening. So, you know, whether or not there was an instance of the Israelis saying, hey, let's let this thing go forward because we can utilize it. This will be the provocation. This will be the excuse we need to launch this campaign of

ethnic cleansing in Gaza to pick up where we shouldn't have left off in 1967 and finish the job. Or it was just incompetence, a bureaucracy where the information just didn't get to need to go where it had to go. Or, you know, thirdly, you know, we have to recall that Hamas, I don't want to call it a project of Benjamin Netanyahu and many in Israel, because certainly it is the embodiment of the Palestinian resistance against occupation. But we have to recall that Benjamin Netanyahu and others in Israel saw Hamas as a way to ensure friction. to ensure war, to ensure that there would never be a two-state solution, that there would never be a Palestinian state, that if you could keep a monster like Hamas, this is how they would

describe it, as the viable and leading power in Gaza, they can always make the case that we can never talk to these people. We can't make peace with these people. The idea of a Palestinian state is impossible because look, who's ruling them, Hamas, while you are sending or allowing the Qataris to deliver them briefcases of money, millions of dollars, you know, every month or annually or however often that exchange occurred. Do you think there was a stand-down order once they realized what was happening? No, I don't think so. I think the Israelis have become complacent. I think that their military, much like their Mossad, you know, and other security services are their, their reputation is overblown.

I mean, this was an Israeli military that for decades, their only combat experience was primarily shooting teenagers who were throwing stones. So I think the Israelis were taken by surprise on October 7th. They were overwhelmed by a well-prepared, well-organized, well, you know, a just, justifiably motivated Palestinian resistance. And so I don't believe that there was a stand-down order, not have not seen anything to argue for that. There certainly was, of course, the extension of this conversation, I guess, is the Hannibal Directive, where, you know,

what occurred on October 7th in terms of how the Israeli military reacted to the attacks and the consequences of that was the mass slaughter of Israeli civilians, numbering in the dozens, maybe even in the hundreds. Is there any question, but that Hannibal directive was issued and complied with? No, there's no question at all. I mean, the Israelis themselves have stated this Israeli media has verified this. You've had great journalists, you know, like Max Blumenthal and Aramate, you know, who have documented this, there are, you know, just the bithora of evidence, whether it's eyewitness

statements, whether it's statements from the military, whether it's our understanding and knowledge of how the Israeli military operates, you know, the forensic evidence, the fact that Hamas simply didn't have the weaponry to destroy the buildings or the vehicles in the manner in which they were destroyed. They had to have been destroyed by, say, Israeli tanks or Israeli Apache helicopters. I mean, so the evidence is there. The question, I think, remains how many were killed? You know, are you talking dozens? Are you talking hundreds? And, you know, the injustice in this, of course. Of course, there's the propaganda value of it, right? The fuel for the narrative to hide this to keep this October 7th attack firmly, rooted in a narrative of just simply barbaric massacre, an unprovoked attack, the region was

at peace, et cetera, et cetera, all that, right, all that nonsense we've heard for two years now, but also, too, you know, to hide, you know, I guess the injustice, what I'm trying to say, the injustice of it is to the Israeli people themselves, the fact that their government will not own up, will not recognize, except through weeks and through investigative journalism, that many of their own people were killed by their own military. Can a moral argument be made that the events of October, that on October 7th, Amos was engaged in the execution of a military procedure designed to repel illegal occupiers who had suppressed and starved the people that elected them?

Absolutely, Judge. The Palestinians had every right under international law or under natural law to carry out these attacks. People have a right to resist violently occupation. There is no argument against that, and that is found, I believe, in both international law and natural law. So what the Palestinians carried out on October 7th was justified. Now, certainly the attacks on civilians was horrendous. Those were war crimes. That's reprehensible.

And it's also strategically counterproductive. But certainly the Israeli, I'm sorry, the Palestinian resistance attacks on Israeli military bases and on security posts. I believe the Palestinians attacked eight Israel military bases as well as the more localized or smaller garb posts and patrols. and patrol bases and vehicle checkpoints, those are entirely justified. And there's, there's, you know, I will make the argument that until the justification, the righteousness of the Palestinian people in their resistance is recognized, there can be no political solution to this conflict.

just as this deliberate misunderstanding or this incorrect and unjustifiable assertion that the Israelis are engaging in self-defense as they carry out occupation, as they carry out apartheid, as they carry out ethnic cleansing throughout Palestine, Gaza, East Jerusalem, the West Bank, that as long as as that, you know, that incorrect assertion is made, they're all, also cannot be a political solution found because those are the two things that are most foundational to understanding the relationship between occupier and occupied. And if they're reversed, if they're flipped, then how could you ever have a process moving forward that will always be dictated and determined by the Americans if that relationship of occupier and occupied, a right to resist, no right to self-defense. is not understood. Does Israeli society, whether politically elites or professional class, whatever,

recognize that Netanyahu doesn't want, no matter what he says, doesn't want and cannot afford an end of the war, that the consequences to him personally would be so catastrophic that he will do anything he can to continue the war i think judge that's the that's the pretty much uh you know acceptable or rational or reasonable understanding on that i mean if he leaves office he goes to jail uh you know let alone his own personal ambitions his his his desires to be the greatest among all the israeli leaders uh you know i have to believe that that this man uh who is is a narcissist of the first order. Maybe he is not as much a narcissist as our current president did,

but he's pretty, talking shades of difference that don't really matter here, right? You know, I mean, but, you know, I mean, for a man like him, do you tell me that Netanyahu doesn't go to bed at night envisioning himself as being hailed as the greatest of all Israeli leaders? The man who could get done what Bangiorian could not get done, right? you know i mean like that type of thing the man who fully realized greater israel so i think there certainly are is that cold uh calculated political aspect of it uh where i got to stay in power

else i'm going to the clink right as well as though this greater messianic uh vision of himself that dovetails with his very sincere beliefs about greater israel uh as well as his hatred for the Palestinians. So I think you put those together and you put together, you couple that with his understanding of Israel's relationship to the United States. And he believes that Israel can be a super sparta, that it can be fortress Israel, that it can be Israel against the world, and they will survive as long as that asterisk is included, that it's Israel and the United States against the world. And so Israel will survive. Wasn't the entire Zionist project, now we're back in 1947 and 48,

premised upon a total rejection of the idea of collective punishment based upon characteristics of birth, condemning the concept that a Holocaust would ever exist again, and now it's been perpetrated by the descendants of the very people that created this state, this Jewish state, supposedly to be free of the state. type of cancer. Yeah, I mean, what you have is you have an ethno-theocratic nation state. You have a state that is a state built upon the concepts of Jewish supremacy. This originates as a Zionist movement builds in the late 19th century.

It becomes more concrete as the 20th century develops. And then it's giving a moral backing, a more. moral justification by the horrors of the Holocaust. So that by the time 1947 rolls around, you not only have an understanding within the broader Jewish community that such an acquisition of land is not just necessary, but moral, but that also is extended throughout Western governments, and, you know, I should say throughout many governments. But there was no righteousness in it, of course. I mean, there was no justice in any of it. And so much of the early aspects of Western support, such as say the British Balfour Declaration

of 1917, which gives, you know, real momentum to this, gives a national and inertia pushed by nation states to achieving a Jewish homeland in Palestine, well, that's many ways motivated by anti-Semitism. You know, this twin thing of the Jews want their own home, and we want the Jews out, so let's have them get a place in Palestine, right? So all of this is just, you know, just sinister, it's corrupt. And, you know, you could have this understanding of the plight of the Jewish people throughout their existence.

You can have a sympathy with them. You could have an understanding that, yes, they should have been giving their own land. But that should have been in Bavaria, you know, not in Palestine. Right. Let's switch gears and let me prevail upon your military expertise and analysis and observations. What kind of condition is the Ukrainian military in as we speak now in early October 2025? It's a, you know, facing the manpower challenges that we've been aware of for years now, essentially. It is facing shortages of weaponry, particularly air defense missiles, armor vehicles.

And, you know, it is being outmatched by superior Russian weapons, both in terms of quantitative. and quality. So two reports that came out recently that show not just where Ukraine is at, but the overall failure of the Americans and the Europeans was that last month in September, the Russians launched nearly 6,000 drones against Ukraine. Ukraine launched well less than 3,000 drones, about 2,500 drones. So three and a half years into this war, with all All the statements, Judge, right? All the beating of the chests, all the proclamations and assertions that the United States and the Europeans were going to arm the Ukrainians so that they could defeat the Russians. We see the results of that.

You know, the success of Russian industrial capacity versus the failure or weakness of American and European manufacturer and industrial capacity. The other thing is we report, I believe it was the Financial Times, had an article on how, whereas you had over the last couple of years, the Western missile interceptors that were provided to Ukraine had success rates of 30, 40, 50, maybe even 60 percent, pretty high success rates of engagements against Russian ballistic missiles. And now because the Russians have, just as you, in any war, the Russians have advanced, their weaponry, their ballistic missiles now, or excuse me to say that the Western Air Defense missiles only shoot down about 8% of the Russian ballistic missiles. So you have this reality where you have a Ukrainian state that is continually getting weaker, not just militarily, but also economically. The IMF just said Ukraine is in vast needs. tens of billions of dollars.

They have not just a manpower shortage in terms of personnel, but a manpower shortage in terms of their economy and their society. Does the West recognize this? The West people around Trump know this, or are they still whispering General Kellogg-style nonsense into his ears? They still are, they still are obedient to the neoconservative view of the world. They still are, you know, obedient to the idea of American primacy or hegemony. And that the ideas that were laid down by the George H.W. Bush administration and Bill Clinton administration, that anything that resembles any type of threat to our primacy must be destroyed.

And so you can say whatever you want about Russia, but as long as it is understood to be something that the United States cannot subjectate, that it will not become either a, a voluntary, involuntary vassal, then it must be destroyed. And the Europeans are wrapped in the madness of their own. You had last week, Ursula Vandale, and the head of the EU, come out and make a statement where she said the EU's priorities are building its armies, right, and winning the war in Ukraine. This as Europe across the continent is beset with energy. with regard on to energy, housing, wages and jobs, their industry is in decline. I mean, the migration problem, their politicians and governments are incredibly unpopular.

You know, so as this is besetting the Europeans, these nations are under this incredible strain. And as they continue to bear the results of not investing in themselves, not taking care of their own people, you have the head of the EU saying what we need to focus on is building our armies and winning the war in Ukraine. Both things, as we've just spoken about, are near impossible. Yeah. Oh, Matt, it's a pleasure to chat with you. Neither of these, of course, is a pleasant topic.

We all thought Ukraine would be over by now. None of us thought that Netanyahu would stop by now, unless we had an American president who would stop him that that doesn't seem like it's in the cards right and and the thing that's so both these things you either the genocide going forward i'm i'm a believer that whether or not this trump plan holds it's going to result in the same thing for the palestinians just different style of ethnic cleansing you know and then of course you're going to have the annexation of west bank and in ukraine if and when ukraine loses what does that mean do you have a failed state right you have a syria or an afghanistan in eastern europe what type of victory is that for the russians

let alone the loss then you know and not just in terms we lost one of our our our countries on the map we lost one of our our pieces on the chessboard but in terms of this is what we have wrought this is what we have brought to europe is a failed state adrift with warlords right bandarists whatever they call themselves. Matt, thank you very much, my dear friends. Great to have you back. We look forward to seeing you next week. All right, thanks, Judge.

Sure, all the best. Coming up at 3 o'clock on all of this, she has a fascinating piece on Judge Knapp called Coach B.B. leaves a mark. Gee, I wonder who the coach's student is. Well, you'll find out, Colonel Karen Kutkowski at 3 o'clock. Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom. Thank you.