Judging Freedom - Prof. Jeffrey Sachs : The Greater Israel Project Is Collapsing

Episode Date: June 29, 2026

Prof. Jeffrey Sachs : The Greater Israel Project Is CollapsingSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Undeclared wars are commonplace. Pragically, our government engages in preemptive war, otherwise known as aggression with no complaints from the American people. Sadly, we have become accustomed to living with the illegitimate use of force by government. To develop a truly free society, the issue of initiating force must be understood and rejected. What if sometimes to love your country you had to alter or abolish the government? Jefferson was right? What if that government is best which governs least? What if it is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong? What if it is better to perish fighting for freedom than to live

as a slave? What if freedom's greatest hour of danger is now? Everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for judging freedom. Today is Monday, June 29th, 2006. Professor Jeffrey Sachs joins us now. Professor Sachs, a pleasure, my dear friend. I know you're going to be outside of the world, literally, but thank you very much for accommodating our schedules here. I want to talk to you at some length about what appears to be the demise or the collapsing of the Greater Israel Project. But before we get there, a few questions about Russia,

why do you suppose President Putin last week very, very ostentatiously, addressed newly minted Russian military and law enforcement officers, all young men and women, and told them Russia is prepared to fight a war against Europe. We're in a spiral of escalatory rhetoric. The rhetoric on the European side is really red-hot. I think Germany is most responsible right now. Chancellor Merz is leading the remilitarization of Germany, or at least the attempted remilitarization of Germany. Not a happy prospect.

And the German leadership is talking openly about the coming war with Russia. In the meantime, Zelensky is acting as, ostentatiously provocative as possible, making flagrant threats. Of course, actual drone attacks heavily coordinated with the European powers, with Britain, with France, and with Germany, attacking Moscow and other sites inside Russia. Things are definitely heating up very badly. the G7 meeting that Trump attended added to all of this. Trump was utterly inconsistent, big surprise. But the upshot of the G7 meeting was to basically end all of the talk of a diplomatic

solution that Trump himself had championed in the meeting with President Putin in Anchorage. And Trump basically said, well, we should go on. Ukraine is doing well. And we support that. I'm only paraphrasing. But basically, the situation is quite dangerous, actually. I mean, is it realistic to think that Germany would attack Russia and for what?

For what legal, moral, or even political purpose would it do so? Well, of course, nobody's actually speaking diplomatically, so there's no meeting of the minds at all, not even a coherent debate or negotiation over peace. essentially the dominant media in Europe right now is saying that Ukraine is winning or has turned the tide, which is rather absurd, tragically absurd. It's no such thing. But what is happening is that there's just ongoing war and destruction. If anything, Russia's continuing. to take ground in an important way, but Ukraine is making as many attacks as possible with drones

inside Russia. Most military analysts don't believe that this is really in any way turning the tide. And Ukraine basically has lost most of its army and on the ground, while it's quite bloody, the Russians are advancing. But the rhetoric in Europe is now we're going to defeat Russia. It's mind-boggling. If it ever were really the case that Russia was somehow being defeated militarily, it will escalate to tactical nuclear weapons and have said so repeatedly. And the calls within Russia for actually unleashing nuclear war, at least threatening it, are rising.

People who are known personalities, who are senior analysts, who are close to power, maybe who are stating things that the Russian government wants them to state, are openly opining. about that kind of escalation if it comes to that. All of this is a kind of insanity. We are gripped by leaders in the West, in the UK. Well, Starmer was so horrible, he's gone. So we can talk about Macron and Merckes, who are also horrible. We can talk about Trump. They somehow think that.

the world's a video game, that when they attack, well, that's a flap. Sometimes Trump says a gentle slap. These are people who are killing people in large numbers and absolutely normalizing this as if it's some kind of tactical game over a game board. So I think many of us watching this find the behavior completely shocking and irresponsible. I have been focusing my unhappiness, if I could put it that way, on the German chancellor, because Germany is the most powerful state. It not only rather made a mess of the 20th century, I would say,

but has made a complete mess of German reunification vis-à-vis the Soviet Union and then Russia, because to achieve German reunification in 1990, Germany explicitly promised to the Soviet and the Russian leadership that NATO would not expand. They lied, they cheated, of course, together with the United States. But when Germany did it, it lied and cheated based on something that it had promised for Germany's own benefit, which was reunification. And so Germany has a special responsibility in all of this disaster alongside the United States. And Mertz is turning out to be absolutely terrible without any idea. or inkling or ability to enunciate any understanding of why we're in this mess.

And I have to say it's very sad and alarming, but I'm speaking to lots of international leaders right now. I've not heard really a good word about the German Chancellor. I'm sorry to say. Colonel McGregor says he's the most dangerous Chancellor Germany's had since Hitler. Well, I'll tell you, people are not overwhelmed with his intellect. They're not overwhelmed with his direction. They're not overwhelmed with his demeanor. Let me just put it that way. And it's really rather frightening.

And if something bad happens in Russia because Ukraine missile attack or drone attack or terrorist attack because they also delight in killing senior Russian military officials and others. If something very bad happens, we could really quickly spiral into something out of control. There are very few grownups around in politics in the Western world right now. And somehow they think that taunting a nuclear superpower is a smart idea. And the smaller the states, like the Baltic states, the more they're engaged in the taunting and saying it's all bluff. Don't worry about it until, of course, it's not a bluff. These people are reckless with our lives.

it's really, really quite despicable. Moving over to Israel. Another happy case. Is the memorandum of understanding unraveling? Well, it doesn't mean very much, let's say, anything that's written down. The U.S. in any event doesn't keep its word. everything is basically hidden from view or denied. Israel is doing everything to undermine any kind of understanding.

But the point is there's not going to be a peace with Iran made by the United States, but what there could be is some relative cessation of fire. And I do still think that that's likely to hold because every time, as in the last couple of days, that the shooting starts again and the oil prices go up. Trump's approval rating and the Republican Party approval rating go down. And with the midterm elections approaching, I don't think it's a happy scene for the Republicans or for Trump. And they're fully aware of that. So I don't think they want an open war. I don't think it matters what they negotiate.

My view of all of this was and remains just go home. Things will work out because Iran wants the straight to reopen so that oil shipments can go through. They just want the United States out of their neighborhood. What is the Iranian attitude? I mean, how can they negotiate with the United States when Trump is threatening them like a mafia boss? They're not really negotiating in the sense that they don't believe anything that Trump says. And it's not only that he negotiates like a gangster, but he lies every time he speaks. And they know that.

You know, they don't need any convincing about that. And so they don't put any credence into it about the words, but they do actually want the shooting to stop if possible. And I think so does the White House leadership, if possible. And that's what they're banking on. In other words, they're not on a trusting basis standing down or taking any kind of unilateral. actions that they'll come to regret. They're basically saying, fine, we have a ceasefire. If you shoot, we'll shoot back. Israel's supposed to stop its invasion of Lebanon. That's part of the agreement. And the United States sometimes says, yes, it is. And sometimes says, no, it isn't.

these are not serious words that we're hearing. And these are not, in this sense, serious people, unfortunately. We're not in a situation with Trump and his group in which words matter to them. And so all these agreements, all these statements, they're incoherent because our process is completely incoherent. this point. How bad off is Israel today and how desperate is Netanyahu? Well, I think Israel is in very bad shape, worse than it looks, because it's losing its one backer in the world. Trump said something true a couple of weeks ago. By accident, I have to catch myself. but he did say something true.

He said to Netanyahu, everyone hates you and everyone hates Israel. And he said, you're fucking crazy also. I'm only quoting the president in his lovely language. But it's true. Everyone hates Israel, including, by the way, one thing that's happening in the United States is not only has Israel lost its Jewish support, which is pretty damn amazing, by the way. But it's also losing its Christian fundamentalist support

or Christian evangelical support or Christian Zionist support, whatever you want to call it. Even that support is fracturing right now. So that's a fundamental way that Israel is, I told them, in the process of committing suicide. They have one backer in the world. That's the United States. And the U.S. is losing interest.

That's the truth. But it doesn't stop them from the wild behavior, the killing of Palestinians in Gaza. There is no ceasefire. There's just the continuing shooting spree in the West Bank. There's a torching of houses every day. people being injured, expelled, Palestinians being thrown out of their homes, their farmlands, and so forth. And this is a kind of madness that has engulfed Israeli society and Israeli politics.

But for a long time, it didn't really fundamentally threaten Israel because there was a staunch backer that would give these war criminals standing ovations in Congress. But you look at what's happening in our politics right now. In the New York primary elections last week, every candidate that ran against Israel or against American support for Israel won decisively in an absolutely remarkable primary election in Manhattan, two Jewish candidates faced off against each other, one of them saying, you're supporting Israel too much, and that's the one that won the election. He ran against Israel, a Jewish candidate in Manhattan running against the election.

This is, when you ask, what is Israel's situation, that's amazing, because I can tell you, other than the United States, there's no support institutionally, politically anywhere, except maybe Germany in its reflexive unthinking because of the Nazi Holocaust, Germany in its kind of absolutely bizarre politics thinks it has to support Israel no matter what, And two, including the point of another genocide, which it's supporting by Israel this time. Because the German leadership can't tell the difference. They don't know which side to be on exactly. But in any event, other than the United States and this peculiarity of Germany, basically what Trump said is right.

The rest of the world hates Israel right now. This is what the Pew Opinion survey showed. We talked about it. recently, these polls were really stunning. Country after country, region after region, Israel has lost the public support because people have watched this mass killing, this expulsion of the Palestinians,

this whole project of Israeli extreme domination over the Palestinians, which is the project called Greater Israel, meaning that Israel will not only have its own country, but will dominate the so-called occupied territories that were captured in the 1967 war and stay there permanently and stay in part of Lebanon permanently and stay in part of Syria permanently. That is what is completely unraveling. and the only country in the world that supports that the United States is really losing interest. I'm going to ask you in a minute if the greater Israel project is over,

but before you answer, here is the latest from Minister Smotrich, one of the extremists in Netanyahu's cabinet. Chris? Samaria is the mountain that geographically and topographically dominates all these areas. and if we are not there, God forbid, Hamas will end up taking over in a second. We saw how quickly they took over Gaza. In the end, when we established 103 settlements and 160 farms, pave roads, plan and regulate,

our goal is to bring a million settlers to Judea and Samaria so that there won't be pickup trucks later in Raanana, Kfar Saba, Petatigva, Tel Aviv, Be'er Sheva and Afula. And that's true, God forbid. So when he says our goal is to bring a million settlers to, Judea and Samaria. These are biblical terms. What's the real estate, the geography by modern nomenclature that he's referring to? Well, that's the occupied West Bank. And that will be

the state of Palestine sometime soon. And it may be one unified country sometime soon, but not under Israeli rule the way they think. This man is a self-declared fact. fascist. And he doesn't understand that in that fevered atmosphere inside Israel about all their big plans, they won't be able to do it because there won't be anyone supporting them to do it. And Israel, on its own, ain't going to make it very far. You and I were very critical of President Biden's abject support for the genocide in Gaza. Here's someone who was an architect of it. Now seems to regret it.

Jake Sullivan, President Biden's National Security Advisor, speaking over the weekend. Chris, number 10. I've said publicly that we should have done more to put pressure on Israel. But what stopped you? Well, the big trap that I think that we fell into, is we kept thinking we were close to a ceasefire, and that if you take a dramatic step like cutting off aid to Israel,

it could actually set you back from getting a ceasefire and hostage deal because Hamas would react to that. And so we kept thinking, let's try to get to that ceasefire and hostage deal. It took us too long to do that, but we did achieve a ceasefire and hostage deal before we left office. The guns had gone silent before we left office, and President Trump allowed them to start up again the following year. So it took way too long, and yes, we should have put

more pressure on Israel earlier. Looking back in hindsight, we kept thinking we can get this done and that just took way too long and too many people suffered and died as a result of it. And that's something that I sit with and I wait with at night thinking about. Well, I hope he waits at night thinking about it because pretty stupid, terrible administration. My unhappiness is every administration, I say this is the worst, imaginable. And then it just keeps getting worse in our country. But Biden was awful. Jake Sullivan was awful, not just in Gaza, also in Ukraine. They could have avoided the war entirely. They could have helped to end the war within a few weeks in the spring of 2022. Jake Sullivan once told me, don't worry, there won't be a war. This guy got so

many things wrong, top to bottom. But one of the things he got wrong was the United States, not just standing by in the genocide in Gaza, but actively being complicit in it. So I hope he's rethinking some of this. We've already been thinking this all along. It wasn't so complicated, Jake. We understood this. Here's Prime Minister Netta. in Yahoo yesterday using that phrase, Professor Sacks, from the river to the sea. Chris. Much more. I think there are many principles.

I'll give you another example. Another principle of the government I intend, the broad national government I intend to lead. There is no place for two states. What, from the sea to the Jordan, there is no room for two states. Look, this is the whole point. this is the whole point of the last 30 years. That's not a statement from yesterday. This is, in fact, the whole point for the last 50 years.

Netanyahu heads a party called Lakud. Lekud's founding charter in 1977 says that from the river to the sea, there will only be Israeli sovereignty. So that chant from the river to the sea, which many people maliciously and ignorantly attribute as a Palestinian anti-Semitic chant, that's the formal program of the party that Netanyahu leads. And it's been its formal program since its founding charter, which is that there will never be a state of Palestine. And this is why we have been in endless wars and why the American government is so stupid over this period and so reckless of the interests of the American people, because the

United States has gone to war repeatedly for Israel to prevent a state of Palestine. And that is tragic because the Palestinians have the right to political self-determination because a two-state solution was available for decades because the Arab countries in their peace initiative have said two states, we normalize relations, we have peace with Israel. It's all there, not this fascism of Smotrich and this hatred and this desire to expel, to kill, to dominate through apartheid rule to Palestinian people, but the chance for peace. But Netanyahu has led the movement for 30 years for that not to happen.

And that's the whole point of what has happened for 30 years. Netanyahu spelled it out 30 years ago. And it's clearly in his speeches, in his political doctrines, in something called Clean Break, which dates back 30 years, where the neocons in the United States, together with Netanyahu, concocted this crazy idea. There will never be a Palestinian state. Israel will rule everything. As a result, there will be militancy because there will be resistance.

even armed resistance. They knew it. And so in order to stop the armed resistance, what are they going to do? They're going to topple all the governments of the Middle East that support the armed resistance of the Palestinian people. That's the whole point. No Palestinian state. Yes, there will be armed resistance. Then we will go to war against Iraq, against Syria, against Libya, against any country that supports the Palestinians. and the big prize of all is Iran. So this Greater Israel project dragged the United States into 30 years of this disaster. And the whole idea of Greater Israel is a total disaster. Why can't there be a state of Palestine for the 8 million Palestinian Arabs

who have the same number as the Israeli Jews? So either have one democratic state, that's fine, but Israel rejects that. They say, no, it will have to be apartheid or we'll have to expel these people, ethnically cleanse this place, or have two states, but not this greater Israel, which is a project that has turned into genocide, ethnic cleansing, and apartheid. And the United States has been a party to it. And it's over. It's done. We've seen the results. Here's the phrase to which you referred, Professor Sachs, in the Lukud Charter, translated into English, of course. Judea and Samaria will not be handed to any foreign administration. Between the C and the Jordan, there will only be Israeli sovereignty.

Here you are. Exactly what you were referring to. You know, it can't be more clear. but because of the Zionist lobby in the United States, it has been hidden from view on the claim. Oh, there's no one to talk to. No one would make peace. Nothing to do except kill these people or expel them or rule over them by apartheid.

That's been the claim. And the Arabs have been saying for decades, make peace have a two-state solution. Almost every country in the world has said that. Even the United States government has lied its way by saying it while knowing that it is supporting the opposite project. And so we went to war in Iraq because Israel under Netanyahu begged for it. He came called Congress in October, I think it's October 2002, how wonderful it's going to be. And we went to war against Syria to overthrow a government.

It ended up 14 years of bloody warfare because we had to overthrow Assad because he supported the Palestinian cause because he was too close to Iran, which was supporting the opposition. Whereas the answer to all of this is make peace. don't demand every square centimeter of land and ruling over eight million Palestinian Arabs. But they can't think of that, can they? Mr. Smotrich obviously can't think of that. Mr. Ben-Gavir and Mr. Netanyahu, and there are all three of them with an arrest warrant by the International Criminal Court because of what they have pursued. that's the reality we're in.

And what's happening, they don't get it, is the United States is losing interest in this. Why should we have interest in this? It splintered the Jewish community. It splintered the Christian Zionist community, which is the only numerous backers, but that's falling to pieces too. and if you look at the American people as a whole, they're completely against this war in Iran. They're against what Israel's doing,

because who can be for slaughter, after all? They're strongly in favor of a Palestinian state. Israel doesn't get it. And that's why I've told them for years, you're just going to commit political suicide if you continue this way. If Israel wants to survive, It has to live, not by murdering Palestinians or ethnically cleansing them or expelling them or dominating them by apartheid.

It has to live by having a state of Palestine next door. And here's the truth of it, by the way. There was a Palestine under British mandatory rule, the British Empire. And Britain turned that over to the UN after making a huge. mess turned it over to the UN. And in the partition plan, which the Arabs rejected in 1947, they said, why should there be a partition? There should be one state. Why should there be a partition? But the partition plan gave 56% of the land to the Jews who were about 35% of the population then. Now, after the six-day war, and then there was the war in 1948, 49, and partial ethnic cleansing,

and Israel took 78% of the land. And then after 67, they claim, and the Lakou Charter says, we want 100% of the land. And what the Palestinian state would be would be something like 22%. But that's too much for these people. They don't want any compromise. They think they get everything. And not everything, not only everything of Palestine, they should get part of Lebanon if they want. They should get part of Syria if they want.

So this is the insanity that we're in right now. They can't even compromise on a small fraction of what was originally Palestine before all of this. And this is where we are. And it's so basic and common sense. Make peace and this slaughter. Allow the Palestinians to have their small part of this land. And let's get on with it and stop all this nonsense.

And that's what we should be doing. And the American people are understanding this very clearly. Our political class, which has been paid for decades by the military industrial complex and by the Israel lobby and all the rest is way behind the American people in all of this. And what was Beebe's plan all along, which was the Christian Zionist, because it's millions of people, they're losing interest too because they see, that's not Christianity, this kind of slaughter. That's not Christ's message. And so even they, or I shouldn't say even, they're losing interest too.

Yes. So it's where we are. Professor Sachs, thank you very much. Great analysis. As always, deeply appreciated. As you know, it'll be off for a couple weeks, but we'll look forward to seeing you in the middle of July. Thank you, Jeff.

Wonderful. See you then. Thank you. Bye-bye. If you're watching us live in 26 minutes at 3 o'clock on all of the and some very interesting observations about the pressures on President Putin, Ray McGovern. Judge the Paletano for judging freedom.