Judging Freedom - Scott Ritter : How Isolated Is Israel?

Episode Date: May 14, 2024

Scott Ritter : How Isolated Is Israel?See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Resolve to earn your degree in the new year in the Bay with WGU. With courses available online 24-7 and monthly start dates, WGU offers maximum flexibility so you can focus on your future. Learn more at wgu.edu. Hi, everyone. Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Tuesday, May 14th, 2024. Scott Ritter joins us now. Scott, a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank you, as always, for your time and for your insight. How isolated is the state of Israel as we speak?

It's about as isolated as it has been at any time in its history. Israel has always had a very effective public relations capability. They've sold a narrative about the necessity of Israel born out of the Holocaust and embattled Israel dating back to 1948, sidestepping the reality of the Nachba or the catastrophe to the Palestinian people, instead focusing on how this small band of brothers resisted overwhelming opponents to survive as a nation state. The miracle of 1967, ignoring the attack on the USS Liberty, focusing instead on their ability to defeat three Arab nations at once. You know, the comeback in the 1973 Yom Kippur War, the disaster, the horror of the Munich Olympic massacre, which made Israel more of a victim, the heroism of Ent. Indeed, when I was in Israel back in the 1990s, every major holiday, the Israelis would fly an Israeli flag out of one window, an American flag out of the other. They considered themselves to be the 51st state. We are America, they would tell me over and over again. And indeed, you know, this, the sycophancy paid off with absolute American support in the United Nations and on the international scene. And it was, again, as of October 6th, this was playing very well.

If people recall, on October 6th, Israel was on the cusp of closing a deal with Saudi Arabia to normalize relations that would set in motion the potential for implementation of this India Middle East economic corridor that Joe Biden had sold at the G20 summit in the summer of 2023. Now Benjamin Netanyahu touted it in September before the United Nations. This was going to be the economic miracle that would keep Israel alive geopolitically, economically. And then October 7th came. And again, ostensibly one would think that when you are attacked by a terrorist organization like Hamas, which many nations view as a terrorist organization, that the world would be sympathetic to you. But Israel didn't know how to respond properly. This is one of the genius

moves of Hamas by letting Israel be Israel. You see, Israel had sold itself to be one thing, but anybody who had studied Israel would realize that it was something completely different. I mean, after all, we knew that the Dahua doctrine, the mowing the grass, the disproportional response to civilians, holding the civilians accountable, dated back to 2006 and had its roots even prior to that. Israel has a tendency to massacre people. We've seen the Sabra Shatila massacre in the refugee camps in Lebanon. We've seen Israel slaughtering Egyptian prisoners of war during the night, you know, during the Sinai campaign. This was a murderous nation, and it's only gotten more

murderous. And what's happened now, because of their genocidal policies towards the Palestinian people, is that the, you know, the shroud that made Israel look like a nice fuzzy little rabbit to be hugged has been removed, and Israel's been exposed as the demonic nation that it is. And it's lost the support of the world, it's losing the support of Europe, and it's losing the support of the world, it's losing the support of Europe, and it's losing the support of the American people themselves. Our students have picked up the baton and are running with it. These are the torchbearers of everything that America's supposed to stand for, and they're holding Israel to account, even though our government won't. But

Israel's never been in such a precarious situation as it is today. How will any of this, particularly the announcement by President Erdogan of Turkey over the weekend, affect Israel economically? Actually, let me restate it. Please tell me how Israel's ferocious genocidal attack on the Palestinians has affected Israel economically, and then how decisions like Turkey not to trade with Israel will further exacerbate their economic woes? You know, Israel has consistently been fighting any effort to sanction it, any effort to promote divestment, you know, getting the United States Congress to even considering laws that would prevent anybody from talking about sanctioning Israel, because they understand how precarious their economic situation is. They are totally dependent upon the largesse of the United States. And because of their linkage with America, they have access to global

markets. But what's happening now is that the world is turning its back on Israel. First of all, we have to understand the horrific economic cost of this conflict to Israel. It's not just the billions of dollars in weapons that they're spending or the salaries of the reservists who have been pulled away from the economy. It's the fact that hundreds of thousands of Israelis have been displaced from their homes in northern Israel, in southern Israel, and now live as internally displaced persons inside Israel. This is very expensive. They are not contributing to the economy. They're not paying taxes. They're literally sucking the life out of the economy at a time when Israel's trade is not being, you know, conducted in a normal fashion.

The actions of An-Srala, the Houthi, and blockading through, you know, through action, the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden, the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, has cost Israel billions of dollars in trade. And, you know, now we have Turkey launching its own sanctioning. We see Israel taking economic hits that it can't recover from. Even if this war ended today, Israel would face an uphill struggle that will only get worse because as pressure is put on Israel to create a Palestinian state and Israel resists this pressure, there will be more and more economic consequences for this. This is the death of Israel. When people think of how Israel ends, it's not going to be because enemies have surrounded it and are overrunning it. It's going to be because Israel has become economically unviable, that the people who

went to Israel, the land of milk and honey, the people who made Aliyah, the people who thought that this would be the place that they could hang their coat and call it home, they won't be able to afford there. And those people that have dual citizenship, which is the vast majority of Israelis, will find that the second passport they hold is far more valuable than the Israeli passport. That living in Israel will only lead to their economic ruin. And if we go back to the famous words of Bill Clinton's advisor in 1992, it's the economy, stupid. That holds true everywhere. For Israel, it's the economy, stupid. When people can't make a living, can't make ends meet, you'll see that Israel become depopulated, and that's the end of Israel. Is there any significance in your view, Scott,

to the threat by President Biden? I guess it's more than a threat. He's actually stopped this. I don't know if he slow walked it or stopped it permanently. The delivery of 2,000 pound and 2,500 pound bombs to Israel. I mean, stated differently, do they still have enough ammunition with which to continue their slaughter of the Palestinians in Gaza without whatever it is that President Biden is holding back. Absolutely. Look, this is an empty action by the president. Politically, it has significance because for the first time in a long time, the president has stopped armed shipments to Israel. It's the first time ever when Israel's in a state of war, especially one of an existential nature. But the fact of the matter is, if you listen to what the president said, he's only putting a stop on specific weapons and he's linking it to Rafah.

But he said, we will not. We will continue to support Israel's ability to defend itself against Hezbollah. Well, you know what you need to defend against Hezbollah? 2,000-pound bombs. So they're being poured in by the thousands. They said, well, help Israel defend itself against Iran. Well, you know what you need to defend against Iran? Yeah, you got it. 2,000-pound bombs. No, Israel's receiving thousands, tens of thousands of these weapons. This is a political gesture that once people see through what it is, realize it's empty. It's done purely for domestic political reasons. Here's the president's spokesperson, not Admiral Kirby, but Jake Sullivan on don't invade RAFA, cut number 11. We have paused the shipment of 2,000-pound bombs because we do not believe they should be dropped in densely populated cities.

We still believe it would be a mistake to launch a major military operation into the heart of Rafah that would put huge numbers of civilians at risk without a clear strategic gain. The president was clear that he would not supply certain offensive weapons for such an operation were it to occur. I think this is pabulum. Couldn't Joe Biden call up Netanyahu and say, supply certain offensive weapons for such an operation were it to occur. I think this is pabulum. Couldn't Joe Biden call up Netanyahu and say, don't go into Rafah, period? Absolutely. There's any number of things that the president of the United States could do. Pick up the phone, make that statement, have American aircraft appear over Gaza, create a no-fly zone over Gaza. There's any number of things that we can do if we were serious about this. But the bottom line is we're not serious about this. The president has a political problem here at home. We have an increasing number of Americans who are repelled, disgusted by what Israel is doing to the Palestinian people,

who have decided that they're going to take action on this political action. They are demonstrating, they're saying they're going to withhold their votes in the coming election in November. This puts Biden's reelection chances at serious risk. And so he's playing games, word games to appease this audience. But secretly inside, Joe Biden, the Joe Biden I know from the Iraq days, wants Israel to bomb Gaza, wants Israel to depopulate Gaza, wants Israel to solve this problem. Because Joe Biden knows what Jake Sullivan knows, what Tony Blinken knows, what everybody knows in the Biden administration. Hamas is not only winning this war, they've won this war. And the only way that you can make Hamas lose this war is to make Gaza disappear. And the only way you can make Gaza disappear is to depopulate it. something, trying to win back votes that Biden has lost. But secretly inside his heart, Jake Sullivan wants Gaza depopulated, because if he didn't want Gaza depopulated, there's other things that can be

done to ensure that Israel doesn't engage in operations designed to depopulate Gaza. Jake doesn't accept the fact and the finding of the International Court of Justice of the overwhelming evidence of genocide, cut number 12. We believe Israel can and must do more to ensure the protection and well-being of innocent civilians. We do not believe what is happening in Gaza is a genocide. We have been firmly on record rejecting that proposition. Again, political pap. And anybody listening to him should know that and should discount whatever the hell he says.

Yeah, and I apologize for laughing, especially to you. No, no, no, but it's laughable that he would expect people to take him seriously when he says that. But you can't. Let's look at the statements that Jake Sullivan and the Biden administration made in regards to Russia and Russia's activities in Ukraine early on, where Russia was accused of killing hundreds of Ukrainians, hundreds. In fact, many of them died because the Ukrainians dug in next to civilian positions. But it was called genocidal, where Russia was accused of denying food and water to the citizens of Mariupol during the siege.

Genocidal. Everything Russia did was genocidal, genocidal, genocidal, even though none of it was, but we called it genocidal. Now we have a situation where Israel is actually carrying out genocide, recognized as such by the International Court of Justice, a court that we respect their jurisdiction, and we're not willing to call a spade a spade, because this is all about domestic politics. This is not about real policy. How strong is the Israeli military in its efforts to beat Hamas? You say they've already lost, and if they're crazy enough, to take on Hezbollah. Let's never forget that the Israeli military at the end of the day is a conscript military,

and anybody who's served in a purely professional military like the United States Marine Corps, the United States Army, knows that a conscript military can't hold a candle to a professional military. So as good as we like to believe the Israelis are, they are primarily a conscript military with all of that entails. They have technological supremacy over Hamas. You know, these are very modern tanks, very modern armored vehicles, very modern aircraft. Their pilots are very good. But at the end of the day, this is a military that went up against a peer-level force. I'll just tell you right now, you put a company of Israelis up against a company of Marines, and it's over in about five minutes flat, and it ain't going to be

bad day for the Marine Corps. It'd be a bad day for the Israelis. They're just not that good. They're going up against Hamas on Hamas's home turf, where their technology doesn't amount to anything. They have to now reconquer. This was the nightmare that I predicted early on. I said, you're going to level the city, you know, the cities. Hamas is going underground. This is going to be like Stalingrad meets, you know, Iwo Jima meets the tunnels underground, and it's going to be hell on earth for the Israelis. That's exactly what it is right now. They can't win. They can't defeat the tunnel network. Hamas has freedom of action beneath the ground to pop up whenever they want, hit the Israelis when they least expect it. It's a death

by a thousand cuts. Hamas simply wins by surviving. People need to understand that. Israel has said that to win, they have to destroy Hamas. They're not even close to destroying Hamas. Does Israel recognize, they would never admit it publicly, does Prime Minister Netanyahu, do his senior military people recognize the truthfulness of what you just stated? I've heard this from Israeli officers, retired, and they're increasingly active duty. They've made these statements. But Netanyahu, remember, war is an extension of politics by their means. Netanyahu is not in this to beat Hamas. Netanyahu is in this to stay in power. This is a desperate bid to remain in power. In fact, winning, defeating, ending the war in

Gaza would be the worst thing for Netanyahu, because right now, if things calm down, he didn't have a war to fall back on, he would be removed from office that quick. So would his right-wing government. So he needs this perpetual conflict. So it doesn't matter what his military leaders tell him. He's going to do what he does to stay relevant politically. Here's Joe Biden on CNN warning Netanyahu about not going into Rafah.

Cut number five. When I went over immediately after that happened, I said to Bibi, don't make the same mistake we made in America. We want to get bin Laden and we'll help you get some more. But we went into Afghanistan

to, it made sense to go get bin Laden. It made no sense to try to unify Afghanistan. It made no sense, in my view, to engage in thinking that in Iraq they have a nuclear weapon. Don't make the same mistake. Focus on, and we'll help you focus on, getting the bad guys, and we've got to think through what is happening after Gaza, after this is over. Who's going to occupy Gaza? I've been working with the Arab states. I won't mention them because I don't want to get them in trouble, but five leaders in the Arab community who are prepared to help rebuild Gaza, prepared to help transition to a two-state solution. To govern it?

Well, to maintain the security and peace while they're working out a Palestinian authority that's real and not corrupt. Does he know what he's talking about, Scott? He's repeating soundbites, barely. I've never seen such a physically weak president, an intellectually weak president. You know, this isn't the Joe Biden of the past. This isn't the Joe Biden that I hooked and jabbed with in the United States Senate back in 1998. Even though I despised the man then and what he stood for, he was a vibrant individual. He was a man who was very active physically and intellectually. This is a shadow of that man. The problem when Joe Biden speaks is I don't know

what's the substances behind that. I think he's been well coached to say certain words, but if this was a real interview and she doubled down on questions and dug in, he couldn't answer these questions. And this is this is problematic because this means that Joe Biden is as superficial as the day is long. What options are he is he considering? Normally, when you brief a principal like him, you come in and you brief on the substance of the issues and then you give him him a range of options, and then you rank them one, two, and three. And then he's supposed to put that into his brain housing group, chew on it for a little bit and come out and say, I choose option one, or I choose option two, and this is why. Then articulate what goals and objectives are so that everybody else can take that back

to their respective agencies and turn it into actual policy. This Joe Biden that you just saw on TV can't do that. So somebody else is calling the shots for him. Somebody else is shaping policy for him. And this is extraordinarily problematic because maybe the best interests of the nation aren't being at play. Maybe it's the best interests of the individuals who are promoting certain policy courses of action. They're the same. Bibi wants the war to continue so he can stay in power. Joe Biden wants a little, I'm not punching too hard to the Muslim community in Michigan

and elsewhere in the United States, but he still wants Bibi to slaughter the Gazans. Here he is, this is cut number six, Chris, stating the reasons supposedly and the sincerity of his holding off on no weapons for RAFA. Civilians have been killed in Gaza as a consequence of those bombs and other ways in which they go after population centers. I made it clear that if they go into Rafah, I'm not supplying the weapons that have been used historically to deal with Rafah. Does that mean he's not going to supply everything? No, he's just going to fig leaf by holding back the 2,000-pound bombs until Rafah's over.

Am I right? Yeah, and again, I mean, let's just dig a little bit deeper into this. Civilians have been killed. Well, you know, what number did you suddenly wake up to that fact, Joe? Because when they, you know, when you first, when, when Hind Rajab, and we have talked about her on this program, Judge, Hind Rajab, that six-year-old girl, when she was in the car begging for help and the Israeli tanks rolled up and machine gunned her to death while they slaughtered the two paramedics that came in. Where were you, Joe? When the mother was holding the hands of her child who was waving the white flag as she crossed the street and the Israeli sniper killed her while her son was next to her. As another mother came across, they killed the mother and the child at the same time.

As the snipers shoot people, where were you, Joe? The problem isn't the numbers of Palestinians. This is the same time as the sniper shoot people. Where were you, Joe? The problem isn't the numbers of Palestinians. This is the biggest lie in the world. He doesn't care about the numbers. What he cares about is the political consequences of those numbers, how enraged certain constituencies are in Michigan, in Pennsylvania, in Wisconsin, in these critical battleground states who are now saying, we're done with Joe. And so now he has to come out and pretend that there's a moral fiber in his being. There is no moral fiber. And when he talks about holding up this shipment, he's not talking about holding up all the shipments.

I guarantee you, as we speak right now, USC-17s are landing in Israel with 2,000-pound bombs on it because the Israelis are saying, hey, if we go to war against Hezbollah tomorrow, we need these bombs. But once we give them to the Israelis, there is no American auditor sitting there going, oh, no, no, no, no, you can't load those up on that plane going to Gaza. This has zero impact on what Israel's doing. It's a political statement done. It's political farce. It's political theater. It has no impact on actually impeding Israel's genocidal actions against the Palestinians of Gaza. Here's one of Joe Biden's fiercest critics, but I won't even tell you who it is until you'll hear his voice and see his face in a moment, whose histrionics and understanding of history are so perverse, he makes Joe Biden seem irrational. The short version, Chris, of cut number 10. When you're telling the world you're going to restrict weapons delivery to the Jewish state who is fighting a three-front war for their

survival, it emboldens Iran. It emboldens Hamas. Senwar is probably juiced up on the idea there's daylight between the United States and Israel. The hostage deal is harder. This is the worst decision in the history of the U.S.-Israel relationship to deny weapons at a time the Jewish state could be destroyed. I mean, look, I despise the man. I think that he has, you know, his heart's been gouged out and replaced by a vacant black hole. His brain has been addled by years of warmongering. He is literally the antithesis of everything we stand for as the American people and the American nation. He's a disgrace as a senator. He's a disgrace as a human being. He's a disgrace as an American.

Well, you know, I love you very much, Scott, but I got to run this one past you. This is Graham at his worst. Number nine. Well, historians would say, why is it OK for Reagan to do it and not President Biden? But let me ask you about the big deal. Well, can I say this? Why is it okay for America to not to to drop two nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki to end their existential threat war? Why was it okay for us to do that? I thought it was okay to Israel. Do whatever you have to do to survive as a Jewish state. Again, military officials say technology has changed.

But let me ask you about how all of this could impact. Yeah, these military officials that you're talking about are full of crap. I think she finally got to him, Scott. He just exposed her. This is a man that's legitimizing nuclear conflict, and it should scare the hell out of everybody, because I can guarantee that if he feels that about, you know, Israel, you know, wanting to drop a bomb, a nuclear bomb on Gaza, what happens when he gets in a, you know, gets his tail in a crack over Ukraine? Because Russia's winning right now. I know we're not talking about that, but Russia's

on the cusp of decisive victory, the kind where the front line collapses, it's over kind of thing. Is Lindsey Graham going to get on TV and tell the American people, we got to drop a bomb on them. We got to nuke them because my God, I'm Lindsey stupid Graham. And I'm going to say this because I got to say something because I have no other ideas in my little adult brain. This man is sick. This man is a threat to humanity. This is a man who's a threat to the national security of the United States, who sits on the Armed Services Committee of the United States. Come on. The citizens of South Carolina, get him out of office. This is an existential threat to America. You just heard it. I don't have to sit there and talk about Lindsey. You heard it.

This is a man who is legitimizing nuclear war in the present day. Can't happen. Can't be allowed to happen. This is the attitude that politicians take. You know, as Justice Scalia used to say, there's only one reason they say anything and one reason they vote for anything. It's to get reelected. He must think that he's appealing to a lunatic base in South Carolina if he thinks they're in favor of nuclear war. I mean, there's no reason to go through the historical arguments about Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Truman's decision has been totally and inexorably discredited, that he should raise this now and say that the Israelis who want to own Gaza, Trump's son-in-law wants to build beachfront mansions in Gaza,

actually want to destroy it by nuclear weaponry first? Yeah, I'd remind the South Carolinians that, you know, back in the Cold War, a B-52 bomber dropped a, inadvertently dropped a hydrogen bomb on South Carolina. Had it gone off, that would have been the end of a whole big chunk of South Carolina. Maybe that should have happened because then you'd understand what kind of sick person you have as your senator. Maybe the people of South Carolina should have been subjected to that. Now, I'm glad it didn't happen. But my God, if you let this man stay in office, if you let this man articulate policies of this nature without consequence, maybe you deserve to have a nuclear

weapon dropped on you. Wow. All right, my man. Thank you very much. Sorry to raise your blood pressure, but he needs that kind of comeuppance. He's still the most frequent member of the Senate to appear at the place that employed me for 24 years, Fox News, but they obviously have an ax to grind as well. My dear friend, thank you very much for joining us. We'll see you next week. All the best. Thanks. Wow. Lindsey, Senator Graham, I hope you were watching. If not, I hope you see it or some of your folks will tell you to look for it. I'm just looking for our schedule for tomorrow so I can let you know.

Phil Giraldi at 3 o'clock. Excuse me. Professor Jeffrey Sachs at 1130 in the morning. Phil Giraldi at 3 o'clock in the afternoon. Judge Napolitano. I'm very happy and relaxed, Judge Napolitano. Thanks to Ritter for judging freedom. We'll see you next time. Start dates, you can earn your degree on your schedule. You may even be able to graduate sooner than you think by demonstrating mastery of the material you know. Make 2025 the year you focus on your future. Learn more at wgu.edu.