Judging Freedom - Ray McGovern: Neocons and Wider Middle East War.

Episode Date: January 22, 2024

Ray McGovern: Neocons and Wider Middle East War.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, January 22nd, 2024. Ray McGovern joins us now. Ray, always a pleasure, my dear friend. It's hopeless to warmer where you are. It's in the single digits up here. A little bit warmer.

Northwest New Jersey with a foot of snow on the ground. What are you going to do? Why do the neocons want a wider war in the Middle East? Why do American neocons want that? Because the Israeli leaders want it. I mean, I've always said that one definition of a neocon is the inability to distinguish between the strategic interests of Israel on the one hand and the strategic interests of the United States on the other. The Israelis are in bad shape. They're trying to

mousetrap us into full-scale military help. My God, I hope they don't succeed. I hope the other powers in that area, including the Houthis and the Iranians and the others, keep a tit-for-tat thing and do not escalate to the point where Biden will say, oh, my God, Jake, you said the Middle East is OK and Gaza is passive. Maybe we we don't want World War Three, but we didn't want to put tanks in. Well, let's just do World War Three. I mean, hello. If I were a Kremlin leader, I would really worry about the balance

that will be applied to these decisions. What kind of a monster in the United States actually wants a war that will result in the deaths of innocents and no strategic or national security advantage to the U.S.? You've said it, Judge. A monster is a monster. Not only monstrous, but supremely confident, supremely arrogant. These are lesser people, these Palestinians. They don't look like us. Part of it is racial. Part of it is just the way people are brought up. Chris Hedges talks about the three blind mice, Blinken, Sullivan, and the president this morning. Well, you could add this

guy, Brett McGurk, who's the Middle East specialist, and you can add Averill Haynes. Five blind mice, blinded by their power, blinded by the notion that the U.S. can work its will wherever it damn well pleases. That's over. And I hope they don't learn that in a very violent way. Our friend Alistair Crooker was on with us a few hours ago, believes that Israel is attempting to trap the United States into engagement in a wider Middle East war. And he also thinks Israel is in danger of imploding. And he believes that Israel doesn't know this but everybody else does they they can't fight this wider war on their own they can only fight it uh with the United States uh here's um Netanyahu's latest this is earlier today number six uh Chris being his usual usual defiant self. We continue the war on all fronts. We do not provide immunity to any terrorists, not in Gaza, not in Lebanon, not in Syria, and not anywhere else. Whoever tries to hurt us, we hurt him.

Regarding our hostages, to date we have returned 110 of them back home, and we are committed to returning them all. This is one of the objectives of the war, and military pressure is a necessary condition for its completion. I work on this around the clock. But to be clear, I reject outright the terms of surrender of the monsters of Hamas. In exchange for the release of our hostages, Hamas demands the end of the war, the withdrawal of our forces from Gaza, the release of all the murderers and rapists of the Nuhba, and leaving Hamas intact. If we agree to this, our warriors fell in vain. If we agree to this, we will not be able to guarantee the security of our citizens. We will not be able to return the evacuees safely to their homes. And the next October 7th will only be a matter of time. What's your take on this? I mean, to me, well, I shouldn't have asked the question first. To me,

the murderers and rapists he's talking about are part of the 6,000 Palestinians who've been kidnapped off the streets and are now in Israeli jails for the crime of being a Palestinian, many of them women and children. Some of the children were born in those jails. I don't know what he's talking about when he says murderers and rapists, but that's the language that politicians use. He must know that when the war is over, he's finished. But what is his goal, Ray? Is his goal the release of the hostages, or is his goal the degrading of Hamas? Because if it's the latter, he's utterly failed at that already, has he not?

Well, it's the latter, and these kinds of speeches, of course, are meant for domestic consumption. The Israeli populace, sad to say, is out for vengeance, okay? The vast majority want to get Hamas and they want a strong leader, okay? Netanyahu knows that. He also knows that the Supreme Court in Israel has suspended the application of a law that says you can't dismiss a prime minister before an election, a connessant election. Well, that law was passed very recently for the precise reason that you can imagine, but the Supreme Court says, no, no, we're not going to implement that yet. Okay. So they can remove Netanyahu before the

next election for the Knesset. I dare say that there's a lot of rumblings right now in Tel Aviv and in West Jerusalem or whatever you call it, that this is in the cards. They're fed up with them as well, these people. They want even worse. So as Larry Johnson and others have warned, if you get rid of Netanyahu, don't expect much improvement. These people are even worse in some respects. There was quite a row recently when an Israeli retired major general, former chief of staff of the Israeli defense forces, went on Israeli television. This guy's a member of the war cabinet saying Netanyahu should go. We need new elections.

Our first goal should be peace. We can't possibly defeat these people. This is a retired Israeli major general. And just the way Israeli politics is, this dispute is now out in the open. I know your field is not, your expertise is not Israeli politics, but what do you think your colleagues in the intelligence community are telling Jake Sullivan?

Netanyahu's on thin ice, or you can trust Netanyahu, he's going to be around for a while. I don't think they know any better than we do. As to what they're telling Sullivan, they report to Sullivan, okay? That's how they brief the president. Sullivan runs this thing. So you have Averill Haynes and her minions, and you have Bill Burns and his people. They all go through Sullivan. Now, Sullivan wrote five days before October 7th, the Hamas invasion of Israel. As far as the Middle East is concerned, the region is quieter than it has been for decades. And he added that, quote, serious frictions.

Well, we have de-escalated crises such as Gaza five days before October 7th. Now, I looked at the latest threat assessment, the authoritative thing by Act of Congress that the intelligence community has to do every year. There's no section on the Middle East for this year. Sullivan must have told them, hey, look, between Trump's sudden law and my dealings with the Saudis, man, we got this all taken care of. You don't even have to mention the Middle East. It's the first time in my experience that there's been no mention of the Middle East

in an annual threat assessment. Do you think that Netanyahu is setting some kind of a trap for Joe Biden in the U.S.? Oh, sure. That's been the case all along. How would it work? Well, the first thing you do is you try to mousetrap the Iranians into retaliating against Israel in such a way that Netanyahu and the other can come to the White House. Oh, look what's happening. Those Iranians. And besides, they're trying to get a nuclear weapon. Why? Okay. So that's what's happened. Now, Damascus, Saturday, five Iranian revolutionary God advisors to the Syrian government in the middle of the most

dignified section of Damascus were surgically killed by imploding a four-story house right in the middle of the diplomatic quarter, not far from the South African embassy, mind you, or diplomatic establishment. So what was that? That's the message. We can do what we want. Now, what are you going to do about it? Press TV asked me to come on Saturday night, an hour after that. And I tried my best not to give advice to the Iranians, but I said, you know, what they want to do is provoke you. If you keep cool, well, they may still mount a false flag attack and blame it on you. So keep your head straight. Don't be provoked.

If they want to provoke the United States, let them do a false flag. We'll call them on them. We'll call it a false flag, as we have done in the past. We veteran intelligence professionals for sanity, whether they'll listen to us or not. Maybe somebody will listen this time because things are getting really out of hand. follow Lindsey Graham's advice and attack Iran, or if the Israelis are foolish enough to do a false flag and make it look like Iran attacked Israel. If Iran reacts by attacking Israel, it will be catastrophic for Israel. Agreed? I believe, yeah, that's the case. I think we've said that before. Israel will be gone. I mean, the array of missile and other weaponry that not only Iran, but Hezbollah up size of Israel. They can hit every city that's there. And, you know, duly provoked, they will, despite what the U.S. might be inclined to do in the aftermath.

We're going to take a break for an advertisement from our friends at Lear Capital. When we come back, what's going on with the Houthis? Does Joe Biden even know what's going on with the Houthis? Does Joe Biden even know what's going on with the Houthis? But first this. Judge Napolitano here. Do you know that we the people have reached 34 trillion plus in debt? It's unsustainable and it's growing. Our government is addicted to printing money and it's not going to stop. And if you believe that, as I do, then you need to understand why gold prices will continue to rise along with

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and i encourage every one of you to call today and get your copy of this report there's no obligation of purchase it's a free report it's free education Call 800-511-4620 or go to learjudgenap.com. And when you talk to my friends at Lear, tell them the judge sent you. Why is the United States attacking the Houthis in Lebanon or excuse me, in Yemen. Well, again, I'm going to quote from Chris Hedges this morning. He describes these four blind mice, or in this case, three blind mice, Blinken, Sullivan, and this jerk McGurk. They have intellect, they have ambition, they have ruthlessness, and they are joined at the hip with all those neocons who cannot distinguish between the interests of Israel and the interests of the

United States of America. They're ruthless. They'll do this, and they'll do this without any help. Thank you very much from the intelligence community. Now, the intelligence community has every right to say, hey, look, we're going to do a national intelligence estimate. We're going to do it before you attack the Houthis, okay? We're going to go a month ahead and we'll say, well, what's going to happen if you attack the Houthis? Will you be able to find those missiles? Oh, they're mobile. Probably not.

You couldn't find the Scuds during the 91 War in Iraq. You probably can't find these other missiles, okay? What's going to happen? Well, there's no inkling that an estimate like that has been prepared. Instead, as I mentioned before, it's not the intelligence community informing policymakers like Sullivan. It's Sullivan saying, all quiet on the Southwest Asian front, okay? Don't bother me with the facts. So intelligence is playing zero role in this as far as I can see. That's not new. That started with Afghanistan, with Petraeus is just discarding,

let intelligence people be strap hangers on these meetings and that kind of thing. Disregarded. And I dare say, I don't know how much help Avril Haines or Bill Burns would be, even if asked. Is the CIA on the ground in Yemen? I imagine we have some Yemeni assets. If we don't, we're very remiss.

But, you know, what are they going to tell you? They're just going to tell you that the Yemenis are riding high. They couldn't be more enthusiastic about grabbing the highlight, the publicity that they're getting. And, you know, in a very real way, acting unselfishly as far as Yemenis are concerned, why do they care about the Palestinians? Well, they care a lot about the Palestinians, okay? And this is one thing that should have been predicted, for God's sake. You know, where is the U.S. vulnerable? Suppose, you know, suppose we get involved in a real pitch battle on behalf of Israel. Who else

could hurt us? I mean, it's not hard to say, well, they could close down the Bab al-Mandab Strait. Those hooties, they're just likely to do that. None of that. None of that was allowed, in my view. And Sullivan just knows. He knows. These guys know it all. I mean, Blinken, Sullivan, McGurk, they all went to the best schools, and they know all this stuff.

It's really getting pretty sickening because U.S. interests are really taking a hit on this whole mess. Here's Joe Biden last week being asked if the bombing of the Houthis is working. This is ridiculous. You can't believe what you're about to see and hear. Are the airstrikes in Yemen working? Well, when you say working, are they stopping the Houthis? No. Are they going to continue? Yes.

Are they stopping the Houthis? No. Are they going to continue? Yes. What rational basis could there be for that thinking? Well, I believe, Judge, that many people consider that to be the definition of insanity, doing the same thing and expecting different results. We have another clip for you. This is your cousin in the Irish Parliament. He's not literally your cousin, but he reminds me of you, Mick Wallace. I think you know him, referring to Prime Minister Netanyahu

as the butcher of Gaza. Now, we may need you to translate. It's in English, but there's a heavy Irish, shall we say, brogue. I vote against this resolution on Gaza. It calls for a ceasefire, but the Parliament has voted to make it conditional on the dismantling

of Hamas, the same pretext Netanyahu has for his genocide. In spirit, the resolution stands with Israel. It's a document whitewashing unjustified murder and oppression. The racism of the EU runs deep, but is bared for all to see here. The resolution minimises the genocidal actions and overt genocidal intent of the Israeli regime and demonizes those resisting at every turn. Even those alleged to be aiding the Palestinian resistance are to be sanctioned. Yet the endless ships and planes loaded and loads of military equipment being funneled into the genocide by the United States, the UK and Germany don't get a mention.

Netanyahu, the butcher of Gaza, said on Saturday that no oneweud y dydd yw nad yw un allai ddychrau'r aswlt ar Gaza, nid yw'r Hague neu unrhyw un arall. Yn fwy na 30,000 o'r ddau, mae 10,000 o'r plant yn cael eu llwyddo. Mae 1.9 miliwn wedi'u ddysgu, ac mae 1.8 miliwn o fwyd yn anodd. Mae plant yn parhau i ddod yn marw o hypothermiaid. Mae plant new malnourished mothers are only surviving a few days. And the EU is okay with this? What has become of us? What has become of us? I thought he was absolutely fabulous.

I'm sure the resolution passed. Do you know this fellow, by the way? I do. He owns a great bar in Dublin, and he's the partner of Claire Daly, who is equally outspoken in the European Parliament. She has been making a real din of the fact that the European Parliament or the EU as a body is sort of giving full support to Israel without really any consultation. Just these people decide, well, they need to support Israel. So, yeah, Mick and Claire make me proud.

You asked me to translate the brogue. Well, what was the word here? Justifying murder means just that, justifying murder. And of course, Mick and Claire and I come from three generations from where justifying murder was done by the English

against our ancestors. I like the way he looks. He makes Senator Fetterman look like John Kirby. Like a person. I like the way he looks. He makes Senator Fetterman look like John Kirby. We shouldn't laugh at this. We both believe and the people watching and listening to us now, I think the overwhelming majority believe that Mick Wallace spoke the truth. But he's shoveling against the tide in both Ireland and in the EU. Again, what conceivable strategic or national security benefit is there to Ireland

or the EU to support this genocide? The answer has got to be none. There's none for Ireland. As a matter of fact, Ireland is coming around now. Ireland has been very close to protecting and speaking for the Palestinians for obvious reasons, the same colonial experience. So Ireland is getting much better. It'll show its strength if it prohibits the delivery of arms through Shannon Airport. That's a very sticky wicket. My friends there in Ireland are trying to prevent that because that's the way the Iraq and Afghanistan wars were both supplied through an ostensibly neutral country, and lots of people are fighting against that, including my friends in Veterans for Peace slash Ireland. Ray McGovern, always a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank you for all this.

Thank you for letting me poke my elbow in the ribs about your lookalike cousin. We'll see you Friday for the Intelligence Roundtable with Larry. All the best. Have a good week, my friend. Thanks, Judge. You too. Thank you. Coming up, the aforestated Larry Johnson at 11 Eastern, Kyle Anzalone at 2 Eastern, and the great Professor John Mearsheim at 4 o'clock this afternoon, all times Eastern. Judge Napolitano for judging freedom. Thank you.