Julian Dorey Podcast - 🤯 [VIDEO] - INSIDE Israel-Hamas War | Israeli IDF Trainer, Mark Turner • 161

Starting point is 00:00:00 What's up, guys? If you're on Spotify right now, please follow the show so that you don't miss any future episodes and leave a five-star review. Thank you. On early Saturday morning, Hamas terrorists crossed the border from the Gaza Strip into Israel. They captured civilians, executed them brutally, and waved around their remains on video for the entire world to see. Now, a war is brewing. In what can only be described as an eerie coincidence, as we all woke up to the news here in America, I had Mark Turner on a previously scheduled flight to come in here for a podcast. Over the past six months, Mark has been training and advising

Starting point is 00:00:36 Israeli IDF soldiers on the Gaza border as well as on the West Bank border in Israel. Because of our timing with this sit-down, I've decided to debut our new Hoboken Studio two episodes early in order to get this one out immediately for you guys. Mark went in-depth about what's going on on the ground, the history of the conflict, what's coming next, and much more. So please hit that subscribe button, smash that like button, and enjoy the show. Mark, you picked a hell of a day to be here, man. I know. Yeah, I know. Shit is wild out there right now. It's crazy. I've been distracted all morning and all night.

Starting point is 00:01:16 All night as well. So for a little bit of a, I guess, like time stamp here on it, this was not going to be the first episode in the studio. we actually had filmed a couple other ones and there was one where the studio wasn't done but because of the timing of this this may end up being the first one in the studio if not disregard what I just said but we are talking right as this potential war is breaking out between Israel and Palestine or if you really want to say like Hamas. And you, we're going to get to all the stuff you do today. I'm very excited to talk about this.

Starting point is 00:01:51 But you have been over in Israel training people for the past, what, how many months? Yeah, we've been in Israel. It's kind of a new project, new mission on our kind of set of things that we do with the foundation. And we've been over twice. The first time we went, I think, was, oh, geez, everything's blending together now on dates. I think the first time we went, it was springtime, so maybe May-ish. Yep. And then after that, I mean, the reason I didn't come before was because I had to bump you because I went back to

Starting point is 00:02:25 Israel right it was like July or something we were talking I think so yeah something like that July or August so yeah we've been there twice we were planning on going back actually last week um uh last week last 10 days but that was gonna get bumped to November we're in October right now and um it looks like I'll be leaving this week or something. Oh, shit. We're thinking. We're trying to put something together. And we're talking we're hours into this whole big war.

Starting point is 00:02:54 So everything's very up in the air. I'm having trouble contacting some people. And nobody really knows what's going on yet, right? So we're early in the morning here um in new jersey and this has been going on since late last night our time right um and so everything's up in the air it's nuts it's absolutely crazy for people out there who are trying to follow this i mean there's obviously all kinds of history here that we'll get to some of today but a lot of it you can't get to but what what happened what precipitated this and what specifically is going down so um there's been a lot of tensions building up um we're learning a

Starting point is 00:03:37 lot about what's going on there obviously there's the history like you said but we're learning a lot about what's going on currently there with the political climate in Israel, with some of the stuff with Netanyahu and government policy and all that, and how, you know, the terror groups like Hamas, obviously backed by Iran, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad has a huge presence now in Israel, that they're been building to take advantage of some of the instability of Israel. Since, you know, we have a bunch of contacts in Israel, a bunch of non-Israeli contacts in Israel that have really helped fill a lot of that backstory in for us. And, you know, it's been from our sources which you know i won't name every name i may mention some of these people here or there but um some of them your viewers know um you know this has been building and um we just gave a ton of money to ir, $6 billion last week it was. And what is that for again? That was in part to free a bunch of political prisoners that Iran had. I think it was five guys.

Starting point is 00:04:56 So $6 billion for five guys. Personally, I don't make U.S. policy. Truck Month is on at Chevrolet. Get 0% financing for up to 72 months On a 2025 Silverado 1500 Custom Blackout Or Custom Trail Boss With Custom Trail Bosses available Class Exclusive Duramax 3.0L Diesel Engine And Z71 Off-Road Package

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Starting point is 00:05:49 in as fast as 60 minutes. Plus, enjoy $0 delivery fees on your first three orders. Service fees, exclusions, and terms apply. Instacart, groceries that over-deliver. Plus, I don't think we should be giving any money to free our prisoners. I think our prisoners in a state like Iran should be freed or we should go free them. Do you think that's realistic, though? I think that at one point this country had enough clout and was strong enough to say, hey, free our people or else. And people didn't even want to explore what the what else could be and would comply. I don't think we kind of have that level of oomph right now just for a whole bunch of

Starting point is 00:06:32 different reasons, not just with what's going on in the White House, but just with the government in general. But we give that $6 billion and then next thing you know, less than a week later, on one of the biggest Jewish holidays on the calendar year, you know, the army kind of has, everyone takes their leave at that point. If you think of it in the West, it's like taking, everyone takes their leave and takes their vacation at the end of December kind of thing, right?

Starting point is 00:07:01 The holiday period. Same kind of thing right now going on in Israel. Yom Kippur? Yeah, Yom Kippur happened. This last week has been the last seven, eight days has been Sukkot, right? The Feast of Tabernacles. And it's like a big celebratory time. And if you've ever seen in Israel or even here, New York, New Jersey, or in Chicago, places that have a big Jewish community, around this time of year in the fall, they build those kind of little huts or shacks outside their houses, their sukkahs, right? Tabernacles.

Starting point is 00:07:36 And so it's a massive holiday. And this is like the last day. It's a big day to kind of close it all down and then that's when they kicked us off um with with these attacks um coming from everywhere coming from the north coming in central israel and the west bank and all this kind of stuff and then obviously the stuff that's happening down south on the gaza border and you know we were talking about earlier it's they're hand gliding in they're coming in by boat they're uh hamas islamic jihad um in the north coming in from lebanon there's been just from what we've seen this morning uh hezbollah operatives coming in on motorcycles and all this kind of stuff so they're they're

Starting point is 00:08:18 it's a mass infiltration kind of from all sides and kind of has caught Israel with their pants down a little bit, right? And they're just, it's kind of unprecedented for what they're doing. They're going in, they're kidnapping civilians, they're kidnapping and killing military in the streets. They're taking people from Israel into Gaza, back across the border into Gaza. It's crazy. I mean, I can imagine it's just chaos there right now, trying to figure out what's going on and where it's coming from. So you and I are obviously both very familiar with a lot of the layout over there, because

Starting point is 00:08:56 Israel is something that we both look at and study what's going on. But for many listeners right now, who just, they're aware of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, they know where this is in the world, they know the basics, but they hear all these names, these different terms, and it's all kind of like jello up there. I want to try to break this down a little bit so that we can follow it. talking about hamas how much hamas is not it's a it's a terror organization that is not supposed to be in charge of palestine but they wield a ton of i guess like they curry a lot of favor within some of those territories is that fair to say yeah so let this is we get we get controversial right off the bat so it's all good. That's what we do here. And yay, you can send me messages if you want. I'm going to say this, right? I don't really care.

Starting point is 00:09:50 This is how I see it. This is how I view it. There is no such place as Palestine, right? It's Israel. And that's what it is. Now, the Palestinian people also live in Israel. If you want to talk about Hamas specifically, they are a Palestinian. There are many things, right?

Starting point is 00:10:10 Hamas wears many hats. They're a political party. They are a military. They're a governing body. They are a terrorist organization and and they are in control of the entire gaza strip in southwest israel alessi can you pull that map up so that we can have that in the corner of the screen and the gaza strip is a very small piece of land i think it's maybe i want to say 20 to 30 miles long it's maybe, I want to say, 20 to 30 miles long. It's very small. It's the most densely populated piece of land on our planet,

Starting point is 00:10:54 you know, per capita for its size. So if you pull up, yeah, there we go. So if you can see that map there, down on the bottom left of that map, you see the border. So that's the border of Israel, Gaza, and then Egypt. If you see where the map scale is that's egypt northern egypt right and isis controls all of that area right now in egypt they control that where the where the sinai is yes really yes isis is controlling all right put a bookmark in that we'll come back to that yeah and our are the guys

Starting point is 00:11:21 that we are kind of working with and and and connected to in Israel, they are active in that area. And we've had some of those guys from those teams actually get killed and wounded with border operations that are going on in that area. So that's the Gaza Strip there. There's big issues between smuggling operations between the border of Gaza and Egypt, right? Some of these groups that support Gaza get stuff in and out through tunnels from Egypt. And then all along the eastern side of the Gaza border that we see there are these small little kibbutz and farming towns that are Israeli. And they are heavily, heavily affected by the rockets that come from Gaza.

Starting point is 00:12:12 Now, in Gaza, it's something, and let me see if I can get these numbers correct. I'm working on like 30 minutes of sleep. I started hearing that. And I got that on the flight on the way over here so thank god for that flight and just with everything that's been going on i was up all night you know in contact with all our guys but you've been with it all morning i gotta give it to you i'm trying my best i'm trying my best so 60 of the people in gaza eat because of un food drops every day if there wasn't that amount of food they gaza they're not feeding their own people um and 90 percent of the water in gaza is not drinkable

Starting point is 00:12:54 for humans yet we fund the people of gaza as as the u.s government with tens and hundreds of millions of dollars a year. Israel funds Gaza and gives Gaza the people, well, the government of Gaza, Hamas, money that's supposed to help build there and kind of support all their infrastructure and all this. But Hamas tends to take that money and use it for terror because it's not going to the people. They steal it um i don't know if they if stealing it is a good word to be fair they're probably just a better way to look at is that money's being given to that given to that governing body to distribute to its people as aid and it's not being used for that purpose like for instance

Starting point is 00:13:46 they had said this was many years ago that they wanted um to rebuild buildings and and housing and all this kind of stuff for people in gaza israel didn't want to give money for that they said look we don't want to give money that turns into They said, look, we don't want to give money. That turns into rockets. What we'll do is we'll give concrete and we will bring concrete into Gaza. There's, there's two entrances into Gaza. It's basically all completely sealed off. There's multiple borders. There's the real international border. There's an Israeli border and there's two kind of gateways to get in there. There's an international border you said yes that was put there um you know by the the divvy up of the land but israel has another border fence closer to them um and i can send you some pictures if you want to show this because i've been there yeah if we

Starting point is 00:14:36 get some afterwards they'll be in the corner and maybe at least you can find a map there that shows the two fences but um if you see what happened was they said, we want to rebuild. OK, well, you're not getting money. We'll actually send you the concrete. We'll send you the supplies. We'll send you the stuff that you need to build. And that turned into the very famous concrete terror tunnels that were built from Gaza into Israel and have been used for terror, they would pop out and have actually stood at the mouth of one of these tunnels.

Starting point is 00:15:09 There's a very famous video online where these Hamas operatives come out of the tunnel. They go to the IDF outpost, kill five to ten IDF soldiers that are in that outpost. Israel says five, Hamas says 10. The video's there, you can watch guys getting killed. And then they go right back down into the tunnel. So stuff like that, it's a terrible place. The people there are very poor. They have a really, really, really high illegal drug problem there with young people. I really feel for those people. We're working on some projects in Israel to help them. Obviously, I'm very biased towards Israel.

Starting point is 00:15:49 If you ask me to pick a side, it's Israel for a number of reasons. But we love the Palestinian people as well. There's a lot of peaceful Palestinian people that need help and need support. And, you know, one of the things we've noticed in our first mission to Israel was an Israeli man, an Israeli, basically a mayor of one of these little border towns that is going to get, he goes and he gets special permission

Starting point is 00:16:15 from the Israeli government to screen, properly screen, and hire Palestinians from inside Gaza. And he puts them to work in his field. Now, here's why. And they could just cross over to do it. So here's what happened. His little border town was getting absolutely, you know, every time something kicks off,

Starting point is 00:16:39 his border town gets it, right? Rockets, some of the stories will break your heart here. And, you know, they would send over balloons with incendiary devices. So imagine like a, you know, imagine a cluster of like 30 kids' balloons. And in the middle's an incendiary device. And they float this thing over.

Starting point is 00:16:57 And all the kids in the village, oh, look, look, look, the balloons. And when it lands, and I've seen the incendiary devices. I have a picture. You know, I mean, I can show you these things. And they also would burn the crops, right? They're sending these incendiary devices over to burn the crops. And so what he said was, he said, look, I'm going to go get permission to hire some of these people to work in my fields. Now, what he pays them is probably less than if he got an Israeli to work there. It is a kibbutz. So it's kind of like a little communist.

Starting point is 00:17:31 Yeah. Can you explain that to people who aren't? Yeah. So the kibbutz system in Israel, it's kind of a very interesting thing. It's if you think of it's kind of communism, people live in these little communities and they work in the community and everyone works for each other. And sometimes it's with grapes, sometimes it's with various crops, right? Right on the border, they have a ton of different crops there and they would send that stuff over and get, it would all be sent on fire. So he hires them at less money than what he could pay in Israeli. He doesn't pay anyone to work on his farm, obviously. So that's kind of irrelevant. But he pays them in one day what it would take them 30 days to make in Gaza,

Starting point is 00:18:13 doing anything else. So he's changing the lives of these Palestinian people. And I said to him, I said, this is fantastic. And we met him by chance. And it was, you know, we were there with the unit that we were there with and he kind of came down in a truck and the guys were like oh you want to talk to this guy i was like okay so he starts telling us a little bit history and he starts going into this story that i've been telling you and i was like well this sounds good but do they live here with you

Starting point is 00:18:39 in the community these people from gaza or do they go back home and he goes no no they go back home he goes if they're working in my field they they can see their neighborhood. Some of them like they can see, but he goes, we're neighbors. I mean, from that, from that little, that little town, it's 650, 700 meters to Gaza right there. They're that close. Right. Um, you're talking, we were, we were looking at your neighborhood around here from, from your window. I talking, we were looking at your neighborhood around here from your window. I mean, we were looking at places that are just as close. It's unbelievable. And I said, well, here's the deal. If you're sending them back with that much money, and they have permission to be in Israel, and they've been screened, however they do that process. I said, but if you're sending them back,

Starting point is 00:19:23 doesn't Hamas just take that money? Like, it's a lot of money for it. He said, but if you're sending them back, doesn't Hamas just take that money? Like, it's a lot of money for it. He said, well, we know they take a tax from these people because we don't always just pay them in cash. He goes, we know they need food, right? They need food. So we'll take them shopping on the Israeli side. And he goes, it's kind of funny sometimes to see them walking with all the bags, all they can carry and groceries and all this kind of stuff or clothes for their kids and all this kind of stuff, whatever it is they need. But he said, yeah, Hamas takes some of the money. I said, well, aren't you funding, you're basically funding your own terrorism because obviously if it's Hamas, that's kind of what they do. That's their business. They,

Starting point is 00:19:58 you know, they're sending those, right? He said, I don't really look at it like that. He goes, these people are our neighbors. We don't hate them. This is an Israeli man telling me this, right? We don't hate them. We live next to each other and we want to show them that there's a better life for them other than living under the rule of Hamas in Gaza. Guess what, everybody? It is that time of year again. Football season is officially upon us and you know what that means. It is time to place those bets. As a better, you demand perfection and MyBookie delivers. NFL,

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Starting point is 00:20:55 there's a link that will take you directly to my bookie's home page once you're there hit the big join now button in the top right corner and then use promo code dory, D-O-R-E-Y, on a deposit of $50 or more to get up to $200 injected instantly right into your account. Once again, click that link below and use the promo code DORY, D-O-R-E-Y, on your first $50 deposit or more and get cash quick. And that blew me away. And I said, okay, on the humanitarian side, that's something we can get behind. And that's kind of one of our objectives there is trying to raise money so that he,

Starting point is 00:21:35 we're going to use his little village and his idea to hire more of these people and then take the concept to other border towns in the Gaza area to try and broker some peace between the people. You're not getting peace with Hamas. It's not going to happen. Yeah. So what does that matter then? If you can't broker peace with Hamas, why? Yeah. I mean, I think the way they look at it is, I mean, it's kind of like anything else. If you have that, it's that bully mentality, right? You have this group that is very powerful, very commanding, you know, and the people vote them in, quote unquote, vote them in, right?

Starting point is 00:22:16 As their government. Yeah, I don't know that I believe that. I don't either. I'm not there, obviously, right? But, yeah, I mean, I don't believe it either. That's the government they have. And they're obviously not working for the people. The government's not working for the people.

Starting point is 00:22:34 And so I guess the hope is, and you'd have to, this is me speaking for them, the hope is that if they can see that there's something better than Hamas and they can see that there's people outside than Hamas and they can see that there's people outside that support them maybe they rise up and ask for change or try and make change I mean you could say that sounds very far-fetched but it happened in Egypt that happened all over yeah 79 that happened all over the Arab world right so um I guess those aren't right the thing

Starting point is 00:23:01 about those is they aren't right there and it's not over the land the other deals we're talking about right now egypt there's some of that there was there was some questions and i mean and look with the land israel gave gaza to the palestinian people there there were israel now here here's the deal you people have to remember this. There are millions of Arabs that live in Israel, right? Millions. There are Arabs in the IDF. There's really defense forces. and members of parliament in the Knesset. Arabs function in Israeli society all over the place. They can own businesses. They can do this. They can do that. There are no Jews in Gaza.

Starting point is 00:23:54 And if an Israeli went into Gaza, he would last maybe eight and a half seconds probably, right? Maybe less, right? Maybe a couple seconds more. It's, you're not allowed. And even when you're in the West Bank, there's many areas where you're driving and the West Bank's very broken up into kind of little towns and communities separated by a bunch of mountains and nothing. And then another community. And there's signs saying, if you're Israeli, do not come in here. You don't see that on the israel side it's just not there you don't see any of that on the israel side there's no signs running around where it says arabs cannot come here what about all the settlements i mean those are some of that doesn't look good when you when you see to give a little context there for people there's parts

Starting point is 00:24:43 of the west bank so you have we've been talking about Gaza, which is on the west side of Israel with our direction looking here. And then we have the West Bank, which is actually on the east. It's kind of like the east and central. So those are like the Palestinian territories. And by the way, we'll come back to your comment about Palestine, there not being a thing. I didn't want people thinking we forgot that. I just want to – I don't want to jump around too much. But there are settlements that happen where Israelis with the backing of the government come in and settle kibbutzes and communities within the areas that are supposed to be Palestinian territory.

Starting point is 00:25:26 And I always recognize that in, especially in this conflict, everything you see from both sides, there is going to be some level of propaganda to it. So you have to be very careful with videos you see. And I have seen videos get this proven by a video with more context five seconds later after I saw it. And that's just how it is sometimes. But you have seen a lot of situations, and these videos are floating online, where people, Palestinians, on their land that was given to them, they're forced to be kicked out of it by new Israeli settlers who are coming in. So when you see stuff like that,

Starting point is 00:26:05 that's where I would push back and say, well, is there really no Israelis going on to some of these? Yeah. So there's been some of that. And a lot of that stuff has been kind of, I don't know if reprimanded is the correct word. Because look, I've been to the West Bank. There's plenty of places to live there. There's new communities, Arab and Israeli popping up all over the place. I mean, you want to say cats and dogs living together. There's a lot of mixed communities. There's communities where they butt up right next to each other and everything's fine, right? that you do see where it's um arabs being kicked out israel has this policy where okay let's say you are johnny shithead palestinian terrorist and you committed some terrorist act they still have that concept of not only are you going to be punished for it oh your whole family your whole family and and a lot in the middle East is like that. It's not just an Israeli thing. I mean, it's a Palestinian thing as

Starting point is 00:27:09 well. Right. They do it to their own and it's just a, it's their culture. And so part of what they do also is they destroy the house. So sometimes you see a video of a house being destroyed and you're like, those are Israelis destroying that Palestinian house. And like you said, there's no context. And you're like, yeah, that guy, that bomb-making operation in the West Bank or something, right? It's like, yeah, that's what they do. They knock the house down. And then that's pitched as a whole community is getting knocked down or this, that, or the next thing. So, yeah, you really do have to be careful what you're watching.

Starting point is 00:27:40 And neither side is perfect in this. Right. what you're watching and neither side is perfect in this right but you know my my adult life and my kind of career has been built around trying to be against terrorism and combatting terrorism and you know what hamas does cannot be looked at as anything other than terrorism what about what's the makeup there? And I don't know if we can pull that up a lessee if we can search What percentage of Hamas is comprised of native Palestinians? Like how how much of it is that versus you know, quote-unquote?

Starting point is 00:28:17 Freedom fighters being sent in with money from other yeah, I think there is some of that, you know Obviously where there's a fight to be had we saw that in Iraq as well, right I mean, a lot of the guys that we were engaging with were not Iraqi. They were Syrian. They were Jordanian. We saw a lot of that. And then in Syria, too. That was crazy. a lot of that happening um you know i think they kind of stopped sending in straight like iranian hezbollah type people because then it's pretty obvious if you're gaza's trying to say that israel is terrorizing you and killing civilians and all this you can't be running around with people right off the iranian boat kicking around in your city right right um so i think they've kind of quelled some of that stuff um ethnically if you if you do trace the palestinian people of gaza back they have a egyptian origin which that means a lot of different things right egypt kind of has a is a has many branches of

Starting point is 00:29:23 people right that's like the center of the world have originated from there but yeah so if you trace them back those people were not actually in the land of israel if you go back far enough they came from um egypt so yeah i mean i'm sure that i'm sure there are some people there stirring the pot and look at the same time too, if you're a government body that's legit on the world stage, if you are a government that's for your people, if you're a fair and just military, why are you building your command posts in children's elementary schools? Why are you putting your command posts in the basements of children's hospitals? You're talking about Hamas here? Yes. Yeah, but so Hamas, I wouldn't even i don't even think

Starting point is 00:30:05 that's an argument at this point like there that is clearly dirty money and there's a lot of people that would argue that they're freedom fighters right but well that's how they're supposed to the people who are arguing that are part of the ones kind of funding this problem right yeah but when you look at like the actual people who live there right the people who are born there the people who are not and then don't become a part of hamas right like a lot of people there a lot of palestinians they're not crazy about hamas at all no you're right yeah and again that's like in that in that border town that's kind of what's being those are the people that are you know and there's a lot of people look there's a lot of people in gaza you want to talk about poverty poverty, it's poverty to the highest degree.

Starting point is 00:30:47 Like I said, it's the most densely populated piece of land on this planet, right? And here's the thing. Gaza, a little bit different than the West Bank. Gaza technically, and this will raise eyebrows as well the verbiage i'm going to use but gaza technically is free hamas runs gaza so do what you want there right govern it how you want appropriate your resources how you see fit doesn't really seem like they're doing too good of a job there's yeah because they're what's the status of israeli forces are there any in the gaza strip right now um and look i'm not

Starting point is 00:31:31 saying this for fact i'm not saying that i know this or i know anyone in there there are there are no like israeli forces um over israeli forces in gaza okay there may be some intelligence service stuff there may be but again they don't do a lot of that because of how dangerous it is for you to be out there with basically your you know your deck in your hand running around Gaza as an Israeli but no there's no outpost there's no Israeli outposts there they have it right on the border on the israeli side of the fence there's outposts um but there's no israeli outposts kind of like uh opposed to the west bank where there's is israeli outposts basically wherever there's a a jewish community or an israeli community in the

Starting point is 00:32:19 west bank there is a outpost protecting that community out of necessity. Has this been the policy since Ariel Sharon put that through, I guess, like 15, 20 years ago? With the military units guarding the communities, you mean? With giving them autonomy over that region. Yeah, it was part of that whole land for peace stuff. And it was like, hey, because there was Israelis living in the Gaza Strip. There were Israelis. Yeah, yeah. And they pulled everyone out, right?

Starting point is 00:32:55 And so, you know, again, pulled them out. Those people were uprooted. Israel obviously took care of those people, gave them places to live, all that kind of stuff. But there are no Israelis in the Gaza Strip. Again, if you want to say that's a lie, well, yeah, there's the secret kind of intelligence operations that probably go on there. Yeah, they definitely happen for sure. We're talking about, I mean, Israel has the best intelligence services in the world. Like, of course that happens.

Starting point is 00:33:23 But that's happening everywhere. Like, this is what all the power players do there's no outposts there's no you know i mean there's no um israeli businesses in there there's no places where israelis live in there um but the west bank is different the west bank's different it's cats and dogs living together okay and there's new there's new communities i mean i was just there there's new communities popping up like i said on both sides um and you know they live relatively peacefully and there will be encouraged again you don't really see a lot of israeli citizens going into arab villages and stabbing someone or shooting someone, you see a lot coming from the other side.

Starting point is 00:34:10 And it's not Arab, the peaceful Palestinian Arab people doing this, it's these Islamic Jihad. It's various factions of different groups that operate in the West Bank that are doing this. It's the bastardization of what they actually want. Right, yeah. And I mean, there's that old saying that, you know, for Israel, you have to put yourself in that position where when this is going on in your own neighborhood, I mean, think of 9-11 that happened here.

Starting point is 00:34:38 You know, you can't just let that happen. Right. And it happened once here. It happens a lot there. Right. And it's happening all the time. It's happening across various different capacities of how it's occurring. You can't just allow that to happen. their militant side there'd be peace and if if israel gave up their uh military and their weapons there'd be no israel right i mean that kind of rings true when when hamas's charter is to wipe israel off the face of the earth and kill every jew we can't really negotiate if that's your if

Starting point is 00:35:17 that's your operating charter we can't set a table and talk Yeah, but I don't think there's ever been – I've never seen a really good argument for any negotiation with Hamas in particular, which then makes it hard when you're talking with like the PLO and everything. They do negotiate with Hamas, which is – again, it's not real negotiations at that point, right? On more things that don't amount to peace though. Right. You know what I mean? So any peace agreements, in air quotes there, that we've seen, say, over the past, with respect vis-a-vis Israel and Palestine, over the past 30 years or so, they seem to kind of be maybe slightly, with the exception of Sharon's in the mid-2000s, they seem to be something where it's more just symbolic rather than actually accomplishing anything i think a lot of it too has been a lot of pressure from the west just sit down we're gonna sit at this table we're locking the door and we're not leaving until we figure something out right and so then whatever gets figured out is kind of not it's made of

Starting point is 00:36:20 chocolate at that point you know i mean it's just we got that done we got something out of it they got something out of it we'll let the kind of this roll over and we can kick stuff up in another eight to ten years or something and that kind of seems to be how it is and look my opinions are my opinions i don't i'm not trying to convince anybody in anything i'm not saying it should be this way or it should be that way i think it's just this is the way it is and maybe I see it this way and maybe someone else can see it another way that's completely fine I actually think on the Israeli side I think they're just kind of and it's weird to say this but I think they're just kind of used to it like they're accepting of it like this is what's going to happen these people are gonna they are going to

Starting point is 00:37:01 be here they're constantly going to be trying to get rid of us and wipe our entire existence off the map and we just have to deal with it and we're gonna do the best we can with it because i think everything that's been tried on both sides hasn't really worked you know fair to say very fair to say but to to go back to the point you made towards the beginning of this conversation about your stance on there being no such thing as Palestine, why do you say that? Just, I mean, it goes way back. Obviously, people want to talk about the British mandate. That's fairly recent.

Starting point is 00:37:36 Very recent. In world history, right? you want to go you you can go all the way back to the time of the the second temple period where you know there were jewish people in the land and everything kind of got fractured and split up due to rome and all that kind of stuff to say i mean what years is that approximately uh you're talking well the temple was destroyed in 70 a.d by the So yeah, I mean, that's way, way back, right? And you want to argue, well, okay, if you go back to the time before Moses, there were no Jews in the land.

Starting point is 00:38:14 I mean, we could nickel and dime that all the way, but there's a huge Palestinian, and not just Palestinian, Middle Eastern outlook that there were never any Jews in that land. Yeah, see, that's wrong. Which is just completely wrong. Yes, it's like wrong on every level. On an archaeological level, on a history level,

Starting point is 00:38:35 I mean, we have different ancient Near Eastern people groups from that region, whether they be Canaanite or whatever, that have records of all different, you know, tribes or different types of Israeli people in that land. So it's just that that's just not a fact that can be disputed. And it's when people start at, well, yeah, the British mandate Palestine. OK, they just literally made that stuff up when they when they had it right i mean and that's very recent in history you're saying that yeah that mandate started world war one yeah and and so you're saying that's where you want that's your starting

Starting point is 00:39:13 point like that's where you want to start history okay it's going to be tough to have a conversation if you're starting history of that land at that point right this is where it gets a little weird for me though because i try to you know time is so long and and our spans that we think as long is actually very short obviously but the the history there like my belief first of all is that like israel's country has a complete right to exist they're an amazing ally of america, there's a lot of things I love about Israel. I understand some of the plight coming from not necessarily Hamas people, obviously, but from actual Palestinians who may also be worked up about the situation and who, you know, there are surviving people right now who were there when the British mandate ended officially in 1948. And there was obviously the whole clash of different Arab countries coming in and fighting with Israel.

Starting point is 00:40:09 But when you look at the history here, if the Israelis, the Jewish people were mostly kicked out of the land, I'm going to mess up the exact years here but we're gonna ballpark it somewhere you know like 700 AD something like that they were kind of removed from their land I mean it was it was theirs right yeah 1300 1200 years later they come back and the Palestinian people again as you pointed out this is like kind of a I I forget. There was like a Roman meaning to that name or something, but the British man died of Palestine. It was like a Western invention, right? Right. The Palestinian people, though, let's call them the Arabs who lived there, they had lived on this land for like whatever it was, 1,200 years, something like that. Not to say you can't find a way to split it up and have two countries

Starting point is 00:41:05 there because other people, very historical people, have a name to this land, in this case, the Jewish people. But I at least understand what that would feel like to be taken from what you have, and I would – this is not a perfect parallel at all but on somewhat of a parallel you know there are things that happened in let's even just focus on north america and where we sit right now five four or five hundred years ago where there were native americans living here right and i don't know about my ancestors i don't think i have anyone who was here but the ancestors of this country did kick them out so now imagine if even 400 years later right the native americans and obviously like i feel horrible for what happened

Starting point is 00:41:50 there but imagine if they suddenly came back and said get the fuck out to all of us there's a tiny little bit well i mean there's obviously a few differences definitely one thing though there always was jewish people in that land even during during the British mandate and all that kind of stuff. There was remnants of people that stayed and they functioned under whatever rule was in that land. And you can kind of look at it and say, well, governments and sometimes borders, right? Look at Africa, change all the time.

Starting point is 00:42:23 Governments, political setups, all this kind ofrica change all the time governments political setups all this kind of stuff change all the time no one in israel that i've ever heard of is saying that arabs can't live in that land no one's ever saying that i could probably find a few but but nobody nobody that's any kind of decision maker i mean you have radicals on every side of every thing we have them here in america yeah i mean we're not going to sit around and talk about the really crazy exceptions of opinions that are out there about anything, right? I mean, there'd be people saying they don't like that you're wearing a hat right now and you should never wear a hat. And you're like, what are you talking about? So there's no one in Israel who's ever clamoring for on any kind of viable way that Arabs should not live in that land. On the other side, there's huge governing bodies, huge influential people, leaders of other countries in the region that are saying no Jews should live in that land and so if one side is saying hey we can all just

Starting point is 00:43:28 kind of get along we can figure this out and and they're in the government like i said the arabs have their political parties you know they in the last kind of election when netanyahu came back the arab parties had a huge swing in in how that went because they have to the way they do their government's different there right we don't have to really get into it but you vote for different parties to lead and then you have to form a coalition government it's very different than what we do very different and you need to the whoever's in charge or going to be in charge or trying to be in charge has to make these deals with these other parties it kind of it's like the senate in star wars you have all these kind of, it's like the Senate in Star Wars.

Starting point is 00:44:05 You have all these different political parties. It's not a two party system. And it's not even like a three or four party system. It's a lot. They have a lot going on. And so you have to make this little cool. And the Arab parties were very influential in that. They have a big role in government, you know, and, and they can,

Starting point is 00:44:24 like I said, they can run businesses. They are police officers. They're in the military. They have, they have their own, um, kind of groups and divisions and all this in the military. And they're mixed with the Israelis as well. Um, no one's saying they can't function there. No one's saying they can, they can't live there and on the other side if you let them have their way it's nope everybody not only has to be out everybody needs to die right that's kind of crazy you know I mean we know we've never done anything like that in this country right where people have to die I mean we've done so there's been some bad stuff in this country happen obviously

Starting point is 00:45:03 you mentioned with the Native Americans and stuff but it wasn't like we have to kill every single one of them it was basically if anybody stands up against they're going to get that right sure um still atrocities happened but again if if you want to make peace or you want to have some kind of arrangement where both groups can function it can't be that we can't be talking apples and oranges like that, where it's like, hey, yeah, we can all live together and figure out we're kind of doing that now. Why don't you guys just get on board? And then the other side's like, no, you guys all have to get out and die. We're never going to get anywhere. Yeah, I think the other thing here, you mentioned it a little bit ago quickly, but you talk about like the Western influence with some of these talks and the way this stuff goes.

Starting point is 00:45:52 You also got to remember that that – the internal politics of Israel and the stances of politicians there, they also come into context with these western leaders and what i mean in english what i mean by that is for example you have netanyahu who we'll talk about who's basically been in charge for mostly a long time now in israel he is a very conservative right-wing guy he didn't get along with barack obama in the States, who's a more liberal left-wing guy. And so that affects, like, it's not just simple foreign policy of like, okay, here's the issue. There's also like political differences that then affect complete approach in the area. Because we always think of political differences as our bullshit,

Starting point is 00:46:39 like domestic fights and stuff. But like internationally, it's the same thing. It's like, what lens are you looking at it through as an american president when you look to say that conflict in israel totally different culture totally different thing what lens are you looking at it through are you looking at it through what's actually going on are you looking at it through your political differences with whoever's in charge then it's it's very dynamic and very very complex on how policy can change from one side to the other right i mean obviously you saw the big swing with um the the difference in politics looking at israel between president obama and, yeah. I mean, you can't get much. Light switch, yeah. You cannot get much different than that.

Starting point is 00:47:27 And it's, you know, again, you also have to look at it through the lens of this is an ally. How are we going to treat this ally as an ally? Yes. That's a whole other little kind of like sliver that you have to pie off and look at as at as well and it's just yeah it's it's a very complex situation you know it's it's it's probably the one of the more challenging situations whether you're there and part of it or you're outside looking in like say as an American politician or president or even a citizen or something that the world's ever seen I mean it's so there's so many different ways to look at that and and to try and cut it up

Starting point is 00:48:12 and try and parse it it's just it's almost impossible I'd say yeah I mean the thing I really empathize with about the Israelis big time is how quickly the world kind of moves on with stuff and forgets about some of the things that they deal with. You know, you had the Holocaust, which was the last camps were freed in 1945. So less than 80 years ago, which is a wild thing for me to think about that is not that long ago. and you know this was a situation where an entire race was attempted to be exterminated off the face of planet earth and yet 25 years later 27 years later the world gives munich germany the Olympics, okay, you want to prove that Germany's rebuilt themselves, the non-suffice, okay, all right, I can get with that. But, you know, for people who haven't heard

Starting point is 00:49:11 the very famous story, like, that was the Olympics where you had, in this case, Palestinian terrorists break into the Olympic Village, take hostage nine of the 11 israeli athletes two of them they killed right away there was a standoff for a few days and in this time because at this point you know we're post 1967 six-day war in israel israel has been around for 25 years they're respected as one of the better armies in the world their intelligence is already top tier if not the best and so they offer their help to Germany Germany tells them to fuck off the Olympics go on right the Olympics didn't stop yes literally all these countries around the world 27 years later we're like all right let's hope that figures itself out we're gonna keep

Starting point is 00:49:57 playing our little games here that's crazy and then for again for people who know the story all those athletes ended up being murdered. They were all gone. And to me, that's when Israel really snapped and realized like, wow, we're always going to have to have some sort of advantage diplomatically to be able to survive. And so when you hear the – I don't know if the term is like rhetoric i want to use here but we're going to get away with it for a second when you hear the rhetoric of israelis constantly talking about like they will blow us off the face of the earth talking about hamas talking about iran which definitely that one i i can see that they're not kidding and i

Starting point is 00:50:39 get the desperation yeah i mean how many times does somebody have to tell you that they're going to punch you in the face before you kind of start changing angles and maybe keeping your hands on you know i mean it's like you have to kind of believe somebody at that point and yeah i mean it's just it's it's just so but the problem is here look if you and i were having an argument i believe what i believe you believe what you believe and we could be very animated about that we could be coming to blows and all that but if alessi steps in he can kind of cooler hey you know cool down the heads he can look he's kind of wrong here you're kind of wrong there you're right there we can go back and forth and and we probably will just call each other

Starting point is 00:51:22 names and be done with it you can't get to that kind of conclusion we still don't like each other but you can't get to that kind of conclusion in this conflict because one side literally doesn't want the other side to exist so i guess i just don't know and if that is your stance is against is, what's your solution? I hear, I've heard a lot of people against Israel. I've heard a lot of people saying, using kind of one-off things here or one-off things there, or a situation that was really bad that is not occurring anymore, but did happen as proof for, hey, this is, they're the bad guys, let just say right for lack of better terms okay so what's your solution there's no solution coming from that side nobody wants to say well some people say israel shouldn't exist in that case right which is not a solution that that

Starting point is 00:52:17 would be the hamas kind of right side which right your average i mean look Your average, I mean, look, we can say it this way. I've seen all the groups. I've seen the homosexuals for Palestine and the transsexuals for Palestine. I've seen it. It's like you want to go to Gaza and tell them who you are and that you support them, you'll be hanging off a crane by then. Yeah, that stuff. It's the stupid stupidity and so again

Starting point is 00:52:46 again you're that kind of activist we can't have a conversation like i can't talk to you about this because if you're that off that you don't then you don't understand what's going on how can we have a conversation yeah well i can try and we can try and show you some stuff we can give you the google machine and maybe you can try and look some of this stuff up on your own and then come back and maybe we can have a talk. But you're not going to stand up there on your multicolored rainbowed soapbox and talk to me about this happening in this part of the world or that part of the world when you wouldn't last 10 minutes there because of what they would do to you, regardless of if you support them or not. So and that kind of stuff just becomes noise, right? And they're up there just running their sewers. Someone like me completely dismisses that

Starting point is 00:53:35 and nothing's gonna get done, right? So there's just, that's where that difficulty comes in. And I think that's where, I don't know this to be fact it's just an opinion to me from what I've seen and I talked to a lot of people there they just kind of are used to it it's just this is life you know this is life this is what we deal with this is how we live the kids go to school work continues we watch our sports we do. We do that. And this is just part of our life, which to us, I mean, you know, imagine we're very close to New York, New Jersey. The border there, right?

Starting point is 00:54:11 We're very close. It's right there. Hop on a bridge and you're there, right? Imagine, and we'll equate what's happening right now as we're sitting here talking. Imagine somebody hops on that bridge from New York, drives over and takes citizens, your neighbors out of their houses and in the streets, they're either throwing them in cars

Starting point is 00:54:35 and taking them back to New York or they're killing them right there in the streets. They're coming in and they're taking the mayor of these New Jersey towns and killing them or capturing them. I I mean it's madness it is man we can't get our heads around that and and you kind of you can dismiss an example like that because you're like well come on that's never gonna happen like it's New York New Jersey I mean it might happen in New York New Jersey I've heard some things but um no, I'm just kidding.

Starting point is 00:55:05 Please don't, don't at me, New York. I know you were kidding. I love you as all right. But there, there have been, that, that is a direct kind of thing that goes on and we just can't get our heads around that. And that happened this morning in that country. And if you don't believe we can pull up videos,

Starting point is 00:55:22 we can show you all this. It's the fact, you know, we have social media. We have these things right now. You can watch it live happening, you know. Yeah, Alessi, pull up some videos on there. We are definitely not going to be able to put a lot of these in the corner of the screen. And we're probably going to mosaic some of it on the screen on the third camera here. Just because, you know, the episode will get demonetized.

Starting point is 00:55:42 But, you know, what we're looking at, there's one video of, in this case, if you go down right there, the woman, the dead woman right there, Alessi. So there's a video right here. I guess that's a picture. It's a screenshot. But I did see the video earlier of an Israeli woman who her body was lifeless and limp in the back of a pickup truck. I guess she had been captured by the border or something like that i'm not entirely sure and they were parading her around and again like when we're watching all these and i've been seeing videos from from the different angles this morning

Starting point is 00:56:17 you know i'm always careful with context this one right here this is what was this one you were telling me about this one they were uh they kidnapped those women and they're taking them and and those people there and taking them to uh to gaza are these kibbutz workers uh they're probably on the border towns of gaza yeah i mean so they crossed the border and got these people yes yeah and they're knocking the fence down i mean there's videos all over the internet right now of them using all kinds of heavy machinery and stuff to and and you know it actually happened a couple of weeks ago they were um probing the fence lines and stuff right there's that video that famous video that showed the um the hamas operatives

Starting point is 00:56:58 trying to mess with the fence and they blew themselves up that happened a couple of weeks ago three four weeks ago so they've been this is and look that's something we haven't talked about yet there's always little incursions from Gaza into southern Israel there's always I mean we just saw a couple of months ago with the stuff in Jenin in the West Bank and and some of these little infiltrations that happen this is a massive massive massive thing that's going on this is huge amounts of people coming in from gaza and kidnapping people and killing them in the streets i mean they're in the streets in tel aviv where's where's the idf that's what i'm wondering so i always see that we're going to talk about some of the stuff you've been right on the border with but i always see

Starting point is 00:57:43 footage and imagery and this doesn't mean it's the definition of it obviously it's not but the imagery on the borders is that the idf always has people stationed like in the videos i've seen but obviously they weren't here yeah they've been getting they've been getting overrun so on the border there are they of of gaza there are various outposts and i'm not going to talk about exactly what kind of outposts i don't know of all of them i've been to a few of them i know the capabilities right not going to get into that um you know some of those are bigger than others some are more equipped than others and there's been reports that some of these outposts are being overrun. And, you know, they went in very early.

Starting point is 00:58:31 And, you know, yes, these guys should have watch. I don't know their entire setup. They should have a watch. But, again, if two of us are sleeping, there's three people in this room, two of us are sleeping and one's up on watch and we're completely racked out laying in our skivvies, dreaming about, you know, whatever. It's kind of hard to get. I mean, there's also videos of literally that. Guys with their kit on and their rifle in their underwear, you know, shooting back kind of thing.

Starting point is 00:59:00 So this was, you know, caught with your pants down, Pearl Harbor type thing. Again, at the end of this holiday, there was huge reports that during Yom Kippur, you mentioned it earlier, during Yom Kippur but there was a lot of reports coming out that various biblical archaeological sites in various places in Israel were under threat during this holiday period. I'm trying to be careful what I say. And so some attention was put to that for obvious reasons, right? The military is already on that kind of more relaxed posture for the holiday time, as it is, you know, every year and as it is here during our holiday times.

Starting point is 00:59:58 You know, you could argue if that's good policy or not. I've talked to a bunch of our guys about this, our operators and former operators, and it's like, you know what would happen with us? You'd just be told your leave's been canked and we need you at work kind of thing, right? You need to go to work, you need to be protected. So I don't know if those reports, they were legit reports, I've seen them.

Starting point is 01:00:20 I was kind of involved in some of that stuff. We were. I don't know if those reports were was kind of involved in some of that stuff we were um i don't know if those reports were just kind of misinformation or distraction but this is something that's been planned maybe if if all that's nothing happened during that time by the way nothing really happened during the the um rosh hashanah yom kippur type time so you think okay there was reports we're good seems like everything's okay and then right at the end of the the last day of sukkot that's like the final thing final big event big holiday this kicks off in a massive way it comes from the north it comes from the south it comes from the sea the It comes from the south. It comes from the sea, the air.

Starting point is 01:01:06 They're infiltrating by land. It's Hezbollah. It's Islamic Jihad. It's Hamas. It's kind of all these groups. Something's, this has been planned and coordinated. Wait, so Hezbollah is involved with this right now? Yeah, there's videos.

Starting point is 01:01:25 I don't know if you can find it. I have it. On a break, maybe I send it to you or point it out. Hezbollah operatives on motorcycles, like off-road motorcycles coming in from Lebanon. Can you explain to people who aren't familiar with Hezbollah just specifically who they are? Yeah, Hezbollah is a terrorist organization that's heavily backed by Iran. They're basically kind of like a proxy army for Iran. It's kind of like – That was why we murked that guy a few years ago, right?

Starting point is 01:02:04 Soleimani? Oh, yeah. Yeah, because he was like, he had shit to do with them. Yeah, and they've been involved. Obviously, people may be familiar with the Lebanon conflicts with Beirut and all that kind of stuff as well. They were heavily involved in all of that. What's going on there? Well, I mean, it's still going on there back from the 70s and 80s and all that kind of stuff but hezbollah obviously iran's been building the last

Starting point is 01:02:26 i don't know since since president obama was basically giving them all our lunch money right um the palace of cash type thing iran's been building itself up on its world stage for quite a while now right and obama that you're to you're referring to the nuclear deal, obviously. that was an example of obama's utopian outlook on some foreign policy because it just i i don't know why they would have stopped that like he helped stop them make nuclear weapons during his presidency and then still made that deal but that's the other thing too it kind of reminds me the iran nuclear deal and we're obviously going off on now this is good keep going but the um the iran nuclear deal kind of reminds me the Iran nuclear deal, and we're obviously going off on this. No, this is good. Keep going.

Starting point is 01:03:26 But the Iran nuclear deal kind of looks to me, it's very similar to the red line in Syria with Obama. Because that deal was made, and Iran didn't stop doing what they were doing. They just said, okay, the thing we're doing, we're not doing it for nuclear weapons anymore. But we're still doing it. Which, how does that make any sense? We're making nuclear weapons and here's how we're doing it. Okay, let's put a deal together so that you stop doing that. Like, stop making nuclear weapons.

Starting point is 01:03:55 Okay, what are you guys doing over there? Same thing we were doing before. I know, but I thought we had a deal. Oh yeah, but we're not doing it to make nuclear weapons, though. Doesn't make sense. Doesn't make any sense, right? The Syria one is interesting, though. My friend Joby Warwick, who I had in here for episode 134.

Starting point is 01:04:11 The most fascinating terrorist figure I think I've ever come across. We're familiar with bin Laden. Bin Laden and Zawahiri, his number two guy, they were of a completely different type. These were people who were professionals. Bin Laden was an engineer his number two was a medical physician so they're educated uh sophisticated people they have sort of a strategic vision of this terrorist organization trying to create so khali was none of that he was just a street tough he just wrote a book about that within the last couple

Starting point is 01:04:43 years called redline all about that and some of the some of the context there but to me like the bait that one has a lot of different things going on and i'm bringing them back in and we're going to talk about that but to me the big you know it just never made sense right and so then iran used that and used kind of the the lift that that gave them and obviously they pull along hezbollah right along with them you know and they're they're based out of of lebanon and all that kind of stuff and so that's been building up as well and recently over the last six eight months the northern border of israel has seen a lot of issues with um hezbollah in lebanon and and i and i that's something that hasn't really been

Starting point is 01:05:27 talked about yeah let's let's talk about it what i mean like any towns and particularly cities uh i don't know off the top of my head um i'm sure the google machine if you put israel conflict with yeah let's see if you can look that up some stuff may pop up but um that's that's been a thing that's been escalating the last you know few months and and it's like all this stuff the signs have been there you know the signs have been there things have been bubbling but this this thing that's going on right now is a massive coordination of various groups now look you have to remember a lot of these groups when you're talking the palestinian authority you're talking islamic jihad and you're talking about hamas they don't get along they don't it's not like they all work together you could say they

Starting point is 01:06:21 have a common enemy but politically and kind of territorially they don't get along what were the three there again palestinian authority yep um islamic jihad which has a massive presence in israel right now especially in the west bank and hamas yeah okay i knew i knew the palestinian authority and hamas talking along but okay right and and and islamic jihad they're kind of trying uh they're newer to the space there and they're trying to they're really building they they they are have really had a lot of growth in the west bank particularly the northern areas of the west bank and they're more i would imagine like a bastardized religious fanatic yeah they're kind of it's probably not a great comparison but they're kind of isis-y kind of on that it's hard to do i know yeah yeah i know it's there that's a whole

Starting point is 01:07:14 other show those guys right but um but yeah so but they're there and so obviously they're trying to get more stake in the game and they're trying to build themselves up and but but they don't those three groups don't like each other but this is involving all of them and it's not like they all just woke up today and decided hey we're gonna do our thing today so they are no shit we're doing our thing today yeah we're gonna do ours today as well right and this has been a coordinating thing um so why do you think they're just because they're like enemy and my enemy is my friend yeah i mean i think you know you could have um well the other thing is money right if iran comes in and gets the three of them at the table and says hey here you go yes i have a plan but i need you guys to kind of put your differences aside we need to do this together maybe that's how that kicked off right um but they definitely there's no coincidence in this they obviously did it those

Starting point is 01:08:13 groups and there's probably other groups involved as well i mean we talked about hezbollah but obviously that's kind of a given when you have iran involved um there may be other little splinter groups that have connected in as well but this has been a big coordinated thing there's I was talking to someone this morning as well that who is big in this space and knows what he's talking about and is involved in here and in New York and in Israel. And his opinion initially was, you know, maybe this was something that was actually planned and set up outside of Gaza, outside of the West Bank, outside of Israel. Because, and here's why, because of the intelligence apparatus apparatus you know and israel does a fantastic job of just as any very good intelligence service does they do a fantastic job of being in places

Starting point is 01:09:14 and making the relationships that you need to make on an intelligence basis to get information yeah because this thing this morning it seems like this massive intelligence failure, which they got the best intelligence services in the world. It's Pearl Harbor, right? And in the West Bank, obviously the Gaza stuff, trying to get whether it's Shin Bet or some of these other organizations that Israel has involved in Gaza can be very difficult, right? But in the West Bank, they run rampant in there and they have tons of connections within the Palestinian Authority and all this kind of stuff, right? I mean, it's a fascinating kind of,

Starting point is 01:09:54 if you like that kind of stuff, dig into kind of Israel's comings and goings when it comes to intelligence in the West Bank. But how is this missed? And, you know, when he said that to me, and I was on the plane on the way over and we're going back and forth, when he said that to me, my first thought was kind of like, but even if that was planned somewhere else,

Starting point is 01:10:21 like let's say you grab all the leaders or you grab all the commanders or or whoever's going to actually be operational in this thing and let's just say you take them to iran or you take them to some third country you know where where you can plan this kind of thing right and i still think it would get out i still think somebody back in in the gaza strip somebody in the west Bank, somebody in Israel would hear that this was going on and it would get out. That was my first little tinfoil thought that popped in my head this morning just because I know how amazing Mossad, Amman, and then to an extent Schimpet are. I'm like, how the fuck couldn't they have known about this? Like that doesn't, to me,

Starting point is 01:11:09 it's possible, but it's like, you hear that and you're thinking, all the coordination, and you're even telling me about more coordination than I got to see, because this happened, like this was happening this morning,

Starting point is 01:11:19 right before he came in. So like I'm walking in here very like blank faced on that. Yeah, before I even got out of the car, we're talking about that. Holy shit. But like all that coordination, they don't know anything. Now, let me put on my strategy hat for a second and remove, you know, just thinking about every little thing that could happen on the way. But like there is a way you could use that, right? So if there's going to be some violence to start to kind of suck them into it and then – I'm just thinking military strategy right here.

Starting point is 01:11:51 And then you can obliterate them. That would be – some people wouldn't like that, of course, publicly. But that would be a military-type intelligence op. But I just think – and here's the thing and here's kind of the difference between, say, the government in the Gaza Strip and the government in Israel proper is, and I believe this as well, is really the only job of government is to protect the people. Yes. The government's terrible at doing pretty much everything. Everything. The government's terrible at doing it right they you tell me one thing that you want

Starting point is 01:12:25 the government to do and i could probably show you a hundred companies private companies that could do it better to facilitate that community or that whatever right the government's pretty terrible at everything but the government certainly in my opinion has a has a obligation to protect its people. Obviously, you don't see that in the Gaza Strip. Israel, I think if you asked most kind of, you just walked up to random people, you'd say Israel's government cares about the Israeli people. They work for the protection of the Israeli people, right?

Starting point is 01:13:07 The reason I don't think they would take the stance of of like you kind of suggested with the tinfoil i know it's not really your stance you're just kind of throwing it's not to be clear right yeah um that they're kind of dangling this out there to draw them in is if if i had previous knowledge that they were going to do stuff like this to civilians i mean they're going into houses and oh it's horrible and just taking women out and goodness knows what they're going to do stuff like this to civilians i mean they're going into houses and oh it's horrible and just taking women out and goodness knows what they're going to do with them when they get them back to wherever they're going god forbid but i don't think i would dangle my people out there like that as a carrot to lure the enemy and i think i mean if that was kind of the thing this is on the this is on the the kind of the the the game plan sheet here of what they're going to do when they come in.

Starting point is 01:13:47 Okay, we can't use that as a strategy. We can't lure them in so we can punch them in the face kind of strategy there because of what their game plan is. And maybe they knew some things and they didn't know it was going to be quite this bad. That's very possible. There's the other one on the screen there where they have that IDF. Oh, the woman. Yeah, the female IDF soldier. they're, you know, look. They got her in the trunk.

Starting point is 01:14:09 Yeah. How'd they get it? Do we know how that happened? How they got her? I think she was, she's an IDF soldier. I don't think, and just from looking at it, she's obviously not in uniform. And I don't know, right? I could be talking out on my backside.

Starting point is 01:14:24 But she probably was home for the holidays. And they snatched her from wherever they snatched her and she just happens to be an idea yeah lives right along the border something like that wow so what does this look like though like you you gave somewhat of an image of it like there's the sky the sea the the north border the east border the south border what when this started i guess like overnight our time but early this morning over there right did they i don't know how many details you know yet because you were literally checking with your boys like right as we're going on camera but did they start this like at dawn was there a set number of soldiers in certain places or was it all like kind of uh street warfare tactics like

Starting point is 01:15:05 i'm trying to think what time it was last night so um a friend of mine trey yankst he um you know if you're not following trey yankst follow him and he'd be great for you to get on the podcast he's the um fox news uh foreign war correspondent um he's an incredible guy, incredible journalist. He's flying up. You know, he's the best in the game right now. And I saw him putting out some stuff on Instagram late last night, Chicago time. So it was early morning in Israel. I'm trying to think what time that was

Starting point is 01:15:41 just so we get timeline straight. Say maybe 11, 11.30 Chicago time time so you're talking nine eight nine hours you know so you're talking very early in the morning and i mean the sun was up and and he was at his apartment he just went out on his balcony um and i know it was his apartment i know where he lives and he's getting you know i mean the rockets are going the iron dome's kicking off you know and and and yeah i mean i'm not giving away where he lives or anything like that but he lives in tel aviv and he's obviously tel aviv is near the site right um it's right there um where tel aviv for you guys if you don't know where it is um it's it's on the uh west side of israel right on the sea yeah can you just pull up

Starting point is 01:16:22 that map for people lessy so that they know know and um all that was happening kind of right there and you're hearing the explosions in the background and i mean he's you know he's kind of looking around as he's talking trying to get this report he's just doing on his iphone so it started obviously previous to that because i'd imagine he'd have to try and gather his head and try and get as much information as possible before he just runs out on his balcony and so i don't know you're talking yeah very early in the morning probably dawn-ish right right what does it look like like we've seen the videos that to me it looks like a lot of like urban warfare just yeah so they fired about well not that one yeah so let's talk about this one that is a brigadier general in the idf all right we'll put this in the corner of the screen and these hamas operatives have went in and captured him and this happened this morning i don't really know what has happened with this story again

Starting point is 01:17:16 since all last night i was following everything with our guys i really didn't sit in front of any coverage i think the coverage would be lagging at that point anyway. I'm talking to guys in Israel, you know, because I'm just now it's like, okay, I just have to wait. I left my house this morning at 2.30 a.m. to go to the airport to get here. And obviously I'm trying to follow as much as I can using kind of the channels we have and looking at social media. Then I'm on the plane. So I haven't sat down and been able to like hear any news reports not that i think they could be totally reliable and and our guys heads are spinning over there so i i don't have a ton of like i mean and we're sitting in here talking

Starting point is 01:17:56 now right we're not getting all of this right now well alessi can you see if there's an update on that idf general yeah and so they fired about now 5,000 rockets. It's probably more, but last I saw before we started the podcast, 5,000 rockets, it was around to give some context context. When I left my house at two 30, it was around 2000 rockets. So in the time it took me to get from my house to, to get to you 3000 more rockets, which that's a lot right and how much is the iron dome catching of that the iron dome the iron dome is fantastic we actually went to an iron dome battery and saw it and and got to talk to some of the soldiers that work on it and stuff yeah we've actually we've talked about this on the podcast but can you also just explain it to people who haven't heard

Starting point is 01:18:40 that before yeah the iron dome is basically um they use high mars it's it's a it's a missile and and more kind of intercepting um apparatus um and and it uses high mars but what's so incredible about it is the technology behind it as far as um the algorithms that it uses if a missile is launched from gaza it can pick up obviously the trajectory of that rocket, but it will know, it can do the calculation very, very quickly and it can know if that's going to land in a field, in which case they just leave it and let it land in the field, or if it's going to land in a populated area.

Starting point is 01:19:20 If it's calculated it's going to land in a populated area, they fire up a HIMAR and intercept it. And it's about, it's going to land in a populated area. They fire up a HIMAR and intercept it. And it's about 90% accurate. But again, you add the HIMAR missile system, and regardless of how many batteries you have, hold on, because there's some stuff. Yeah. Okay. So regardless of how many batteries you have or you think they may have on the other side,

Starting point is 01:19:45 on the terrorist side, you can do a calculation and say, okay, if it's 98% or if it's 90% accurate, how many missiles do I have to fire up to get a couple to land? Right. Right. And so you can do those calculations. 5,000 might do the trick. Yeah. So yeah, probably. So some are getting through. It's not like it used to be, obviously. Right.

Starting point is 01:20:06 And that's why now, and they never used to fire this many. This is the reason why they do fire this many. Back when all that was happening in March and April, back in Starot, when Starot got the most of the rockets and stuff, you know, they fired, I think, 8,048 hours or something like that. And it sounds terrifying, and it is, but the Iron Dome is able to get 90% of that, right? And then some of it, they're going to land in fields and all this. But, I mean, people got killed during that last kind of thing, and people are getting killed here with these rockets and stuff from Gaza.

Starting point is 01:20:43 Yeah, we'll stick that video right there in the corner. But yeah, the Iron Dome is an incredible thing. This is not telling any kind of secret or anything, but there is. And the other thing about the Iron Dome is it's mobile. They can move it anywhere. They have batteries that they can move anywhere. There is a semi-permanent battery um in the gaza region how how big is it again like how far can it stretch uh i don't know exactly i want to say

Starting point is 01:21:14 a couple of thousand i don't know you'd have to it's a high mar system so you'd have to look um up the specs for a high mar i was never an artillery guy or anything like that so i don't know. I love artillery. I think it's amazing. But I've never really been a, I know they're really dodgy on the specs. But at some point, they do use Heimars. And you can see it right there. Yeah, that's an ironed-on battery there.

Starting point is 01:21:38 Right. We'll put that picture in the corner. Whatever the specs are on a Heimer, please, you military people watching this that know the specs of a hammer don't kill me on this i just don't know i'm not a rocket guy or a missile all the military guys are so into their terms too i know someone fucks it up they're like i could never talk again i know i just don't know the but but look i've been to the battery and i guarantee you most of you have not right um? And I've kind of had the tour and got to spend time with some of the soldiers, the young soldiers that actually work in the Gaza region. They're defending with the Iron Dome.

Starting point is 01:22:14 We talked about it early on in this podcast a little bit with some details, but we've been jumping around so much on so many things flying around in this situation. It's not a normal podcast. It's not, but it's great. I love this. I just want to make sure people follow as well.

Starting point is 01:22:28 So you had discussed how six months around, six months ago, you first went to Israel and you talked about like some of the team members and stuff going there. But like what your latest times there, what have your specific missions been like the last one or two times you've been there? So when we went there here's how we got involved in israel when when the last um missile attacks happened back in march um of this year i was talking to a friend and said um man I'd love to get involved in something in Israel. Number one, you know, I believe in Israel, my faith is based in Israel. There's a huge humanitarian crisis

Starting point is 01:23:18 there with a lot of what goes on with the Palestinian people and the victims of terrorism that go on there. So it's perfect for what we do, right? There's the counterterrorism aspects, there's the humanitarian aspect. I'd love to get there. But to me, it was like impossible. Now, when we do what we do, whether it's going to Ukraine or going to Israel or some of these other places that we're looking at going and even going to hurricanes to some degree,

Starting point is 01:23:47 you need people in those locations to help kind of be your fixers to help you. It's great to have an idea. I'm going to go to Africa and save the whales or whatever it is that you're, you think you're going to do. Right. But how do you make that happen? You can come up and you need people in those locations. In Ukraine, it happened very organically because we didn't go there for that reason.

Starting point is 01:24:13 And that network now we've cultivated and we have these guys that are movers and shakers and can put us where we need to be and in front of people that we need to see and all this kind of stuff. But it's very hard to kind of cultivate that your own. You can't just show up in Tel Aviv or in Jerusalem and be like, Hey, we're these guys and we want to do this. People are, who are you going to talk to? And the IDF is obviously very insulated. Israel's very insulated for all kinds of reasons. It's,

Starting point is 01:24:40 you can't just go over there and knock on the door. And I didn't have anybody. I know a lot of people in Israel, but I didn't have anybody that could help with that kind of stuff and I was talking to this guy I said I'd love to do it I just I haven't I'd have to really figure this out and he goes actually I know a guy maybe he can help us so I was like okay go pull on that thread and we'll see didn't have too much hope you know and uh sure enough that was kind of our way in there to to get connected was this a government connected guy this was a military connected guy okay yeah yeah um and so we we got connected there with a special tactical vehicle unit and with the idf and we went there and on the first

Starting point is 01:25:25 on the first trip it was funny I you know I took um you know a medic a green beret and then um a a recon guy another recon marine and we went and the first day we arrive we're at the beach in tel aviv now if you've never been to tel aviv it's like miami right it's like miami it is no shit like miami and then i showed them the contrast between jerusalem which is obviously very very different right and there's a lot of ten jerusalem's one of the greatest places if you've never been to jerusalem go and i don't care what your religion is i don't care care what your views on Israel or anything. It's all the religions there. It's an incredible place to go and to see.

Starting point is 01:26:11 And the history there is obviously. And so you see the contrast there. So now we're going to go meet up with these guys. And it was at the Gaza border. And it was at night. So we were basically doing a night patrol on the gaza border with this unit and getting kind of the the layout of what's going on there we went up on remember i told you about that guy who does the farming down there yes so they have these two or multiple, but they have these ramps where when he would go out to basically just

Starting point is 01:26:47 plow his fields or to harvest his fields, he'd have to call the IDF. They would put two tanks up on these big ramps overlooking the fields and they'd put Israeli snipers all along the berm line because his workers were getting shot at from Gaza from the Hamas snipers yeah from the outpost and so he'd have to have that up there just to plow his freaking field that's nuts man now that's not happening everywhere else right like again you back to our previous conversation oh but but this but this but this, but this, but they did this, but they did that. That's not happening on the other side. That's not happening on the other side, right?

Starting point is 01:27:29 So we went and saw some of that. And by the way, just for context for people, I think, I'm sorry to cut you off. I just want to make sure for people that aren't following all your long credentials here. We're probably going to end up doing a separate podcast on Ukraine because we're going we're going to keep going this is great but your your foundation the overwatch foundation is something that you formed when the ukraine war broke out because you are an ex-recon marine for 12 years and we'll talk about later how you got involved over there but just as like just for people to have an idea, what's the general mission of the Overwatch Foundation?

Starting point is 01:28:11 Yeah, so we use former Special Operations guys, veterans, to basically conduct humanitarian missions in crisis areas. So we do a lot of stuff with natural disasters here in the States. And that's kind of what got us started before we were the overwatch foundation was the afghan pullout we were involved in that um and then we did hurricane relief and we do like zero hour hurricane relief we're there right when the shit hits the fan um and and try and get involved in in in really helping people during those really you know disaster times um then we went to ukraine and and it's just kind of you know we we have obviously israel is a big part of what we do now we're looking to do stuff with in africa we're looking at some stuff with the border we're

Starting point is 01:28:59 looking at south america as well um we're just anywhere where there's kind of crisis and people in need, we want to take groups of highly trained former special operators and put their skillset and experience back to work to help people. And that's kind of the layman's terms of kind of what we do.

Starting point is 01:29:21 If you want to read our official mission statement, it's on the website. Yeah, link in description. But that's what we do. If you want to read our official mission statement, it's on the website. Yeah, link in description. But that's what we do. And it was just something that I didn't have this idea. And we can talk about it later. I didn't have this idea. It just kind of happened.

Starting point is 01:29:35 It just kind of just fell into it. And then I really started to see what the guys could do and getting these little bands back together and just winding people up and letting them go do and what what you know getting getting these little bands back together and and you know just winding people up and letting them go and seeing what we could accomplish in a very small team you know and and it's working we've kind of proven the concept and we're just we're just looking to replicate it and and to do it more and more it's been really really amazing and so you know Israel was something that it happened very fast because of the contacts we could make there and or the contact that we that we had there and we've developed that.

Starting point is 01:30:11 And so, yeah, that first one, it was border operation, like patrol on the Gaza border. Are you, because again, we're going to talk about what you do in Ukraine. I'm much more familiar with that. But are you training official Israeli forces there? Or are you advising the civilians what they can do to counteract some of these dangers? What's the roles? So I can't say everything that we're doing in Israel right now, just for a bunch of reasons as you can imagine some of what we do it's not like we're doing anything illegal we're not doing anything gray um it's just kind of

Starting point is 01:30:51 opsec and safety and and obviously we have this connection to these groups that are really what we've done there you know here's when we went the first time i got a phone call with these guys and so i'm on this call and they're like, okay, so we know who you are, but what are you trying to do? And I kind of didn't have an answer yet. That's what the call was to determine. And I'm like, well, I don't know, but we can help you. And they're like, well, no one's ever done this before. And I was like, that's the point. Like, like that's the thing that's why we're going to be able to do something because it's never been done and i don't know what the it is yet but let's figure it out and israelis you know they do have that middle eastern mentality where you know

Starting point is 01:31:36 it's just a different culture right so i said look nothing's gonna get done on these zoom calls i'm just gonna hop on a plane grab some dudes and go over and get in front of these guys. And they'll see who we are and what we can do. And we'll go do some stuff within and we'll figure it out. It'll develop from there because it's not going to happen on a Zoom call. And so that's what we did. gear there to help various people, um, on a humanitarian side and, um, showed up and, and right away it just kind of all clicked. And, you know, we were not right now, as I sit here, we're not doing the same kind of training in Israel as we do in Ukraine. Right. Right. We are,

Starting point is 01:32:22 it's, it's an ongoing thing thing we're still building out the relationship we're still we're doing a lot of stuff there we've done a lot of stuff there um and we're we're it's new it's much the ukraine mission that we have is much more developed because we've been doing it more right and you're and you guys are obviously an independent foundation you're not any part of the united states government or something. And we're not on a contract with anybody. Everything we do, we're offering to certain groups. We're offering our experience, our skill set to help whoever it is we're helping in whatever way we can help. We don't have a contract with the Israeli government.

Starting point is 01:33:02 We don't have a contract with the Israeli government. We don't have a contract with the Ukrainian government. When we go to a hurricane, like say in Florida, we don't have any contract with FEMA or the state of Florida or anything like that. A lot of the times it's obviously we have some donors that help us. And a lot of times it's me trying to scrummage around in my bank account, trying to find money to make sure we can just go help people um and we are we are you know we've helped a lot of people we've saved we've saved lives in israel we've saved lives in in ukraine um have you saved lives lives in israel like from stuff coming in from the border there um so that one unit that we work with does counter-terrorism operations on all of the borders of Israel, the Jordanian border,

Starting point is 01:33:47 everywhere in Judea, Samaria, the West Bank, Gaza, and Egypt. And this is an official military? Yep. Okay. And so we've given them our experience and some gear, like some tier one level gear that has kind of plussed them up to, and they've, you know, used that. I mean, when we went on that first trip to where

Starting point is 01:34:15 we did the Gaza patrols, we left on a Tuesday and on Saturday, two of those guys in that unit got killed down in the Egypt border. Right. Terrorist was at the checkpoint and just started opening fire and you know they were there doing some counterterrorism stuff and got caught up in that exchange like a border checkpoint you're talking about yeah like uh the way they have like kind of multiple checkpoint kind of things going there um and yeah this person

Starting point is 01:34:42 was crossing to kill as many people as he could they obviously took care of him but um two of the guys got killed there as well so i mean it's and i mean yeah it's nuts i mean we were in those vehicles a few days before you know um so i mean it's real right i mean these guys are really experiencing it and it. And when we went to the tour of Gaza, the border there, we went to that location where the terror tunnel incident happened. We kind of saw in this one border town everything that had happened and all that. And so it's like, okay, we can help these people. We can help on the humanitarian side for sure, right? I mean, that's kind of the humanitarian stuff

Starting point is 01:35:26 in my opinion the easy stuff it's it's helping people at a very high level it's it's it's easy to get out of bed in the morning and do that right then we went back and when we went back the second time i took another recon guy and a grs guy he he um when he got done in recon he went to grs um he me and him went and we did um we went to gaza and we did a little bit different stuff down there we went to like the actual um command post for the idea for the all of the gaza region and um really got to see some under the table, behind the curtains kind of stuff that the IDF does in that region. And it was, that was impressive. That was very cool. We were very honored to, you know, to be there and to be a part of that and see that and have that connection with them. And it was like, geez, these guys really are interested in us kind of

Starting point is 01:36:25 thing like we can help them and they're really interested like they're up for it and then um the second half of that trip was when we went to the west bank and we did a couple of different patrols there one was with the idf um on the border fence of of the west bank which was you know we were in the area of sharif, which is a terrorist shithole. And I have no problem saying that on the internet or whatever. Yeah, can we show that on the map, Alessi? Sharif, S-H-A-R-E-F. It's S-U-R.

Starting point is 01:36:56 Fuck that up. S-U-R-I-F, I guess. Try that. Google Maps. West Bank. And, yeah. Sharif. Yeah. I guess try that Google Maps West Bank and yeah yeah so this is this is right along the border this town um this is in the West Bank so it's right along the border of the West Bank yeah yeah I don't we get it will put it in it was funny too because when we got there we we went there

Starting point is 01:37:20 that morning to that IDF outpost and the unit we were going to go out with was still sleeping because they had been out the night before on an op and there was a ton of engagements and all that. So they were like, hey, they need a couple, you know, can you guys hang out and go get breakfast or something? They need a little more sleep. They've been up all night, like, you know, running and gunning. So we were like, okay, so it gave us a chance to meet a bunch of more people and all that and then we went out with them um and and kind of saw

Starting point is 01:37:49 some of the border operations that they do there and and the infiltrations of that border with money and because because an israeli shekel in israel and an israeli shekel in the west bank have two completely different values because of the corruption and because of the the you know the the kind of politics of the of the west bank and all that kind of stuff um and we saw how they smuggle weapons and and people right they they have people in the west bank that are hey you can't leave and go into israel because you're a terrorist but then they'll sneak those people in how did they do that uh different ways of how they beat the fence um you know they do stuff where they'll throw big rocks over they'll cut the fence they'll sneak under it or over it

Starting point is 01:38:36 and i mean you look at and you're like how in the world do they get through this fence and the west bank is very mountainous it's very rugged it's not um easy terrain at all um and that's where that tactical vehicle unit that we work with really helps those idf kind of outposts be because they use bigger vehicles and that are cumbersome and can't get through that terrain where the tactical vehicle unit can is really nimble and agile and can the capability is unbelievable um and so they can help intercept some of that counter-terrorism stuff on these border areas you know and that's kind of primarily where they use those well the one thing i can't really wrap my head around with all this you're talking about vis-a-vis israel and what you're doing there is that like i understand you are an american you're an american veteran they're a huge ally and

Starting point is 01:39:31 everything but you're like a private organization you've been over there like six months now it's not that long and it seems to me like they're bringing they're entrusting you and bringing you in on some pretty high level type things that they're going to play close to the chest like what why are they doing that um surprising yeah i mean look it does kind of sound uh surprising we're obviously excited about it and grateful to to be working there because their assistance is going to help us on the humanitarian side in a massive way. The reason that it shouldn't sound so unique and so just kind of weird to the average civilian is you have to remember as military, we often train with

Starting point is 01:40:27 foreign militaries and work with foreign militaries on, on, on different stuff, a lot of different training trips and, and things like that. So I'm not saying that's what this is, but it can look and feel like that. And so it's not, it's not unique to them it's not unique to us once once we get rolling in in the connection and or the relationship it just kind of feels that way and it's not a foreign concept to be working with people from another military the other thing in the idf you have to remember the idf the israeli defense their military, has a lot of American influence through partnership, obviously one of our greatest allies. But a lot of Americans go and enlist in the IDF.

Starting point is 01:41:15 Jewish Americans go back and they do two years or longer. And, you know, they make, or people people maybe they make aliyah to to israel like they go and then they and they live in israel and they join the reserve units um and and they they so so there is a lot of influence there connected to america american military and all that kind of stuff um you know i it does kind of sound weird. It's kind of like when we first went to Ukraine and got asked if we would help and train those guys the first time. You know, Zach and I, another one of the recon sniper guys that we have on our team, we just kind of said, yes, we'll help you.

Starting point is 01:42:02 And then when we got back to where we were staying, we kind of looked at each other and said, is this even legal? Like, can we do this, you know? And we didn't know. And it's kind of the same in Israel. I mean, you know, I haven't had a knock on the door from anybody. Nobody's called me and said, hey, what are you doing over there or anything like that.

Starting point is 01:42:23 We're not doing anything nefarious over there. We're not directly involved in any combat or anything like that. I mean, and look, could we be? Oh, the guys we have now, and it's very funny. A lot of the guys we have now are better operators than they probably were when they were with their teams and and i i probably not on a physical level although if you if even if i think about myself i'm a much stronger individual than i was i'm probably not as fit as far as swimming and running right like i'm not like that but

Starting point is 01:43:00 smarter kind of more experienced still training using a lot more kind of modern it's not the right word but kind of new technology that's out there for whether it's weapons or gear or whatever and and you know a lot of our guys have their own training companies and and so they're they're developing their skill set more so than what they had when they were actually in a team and as opposed to say like the ukraine situation we'll talk about in a little bit on probably the next podcast but as opposed to that in israel the way i'm reading this correct me if i'm wrong it's more of like a adding riches to riches here like they they obviously have great systems unbelievable technology incredibly capable military.

Starting point is 01:43:45 They're just looking for any possible edge they could get. And you guys, with the American perspective, can give that. Yeah, and that's kind of, I don't want to say that's all it is on that side of it. But that is it. We're not over there. And look, even though, like I said, our guys are really still shit hot. And some of them have been out for a few years. Some have only been out a

Starting point is 01:44:05 couple years um you know and we have tier one guys right and on our teams we're not trying to get involved in combat it's the same in ukraine we're not trying to do that we've done all that and and um that's not what we're trying to do we're trying to help whoever needs help. If it's a foreign, you know, again, when we say foreign military, that's a thing, obviously. But to me, if I go to Ukraine, or I go to Israel, and I'm standing there with a Ukrainian soldier who two weeks ago was a baker or a car mechanic at that point in that war and or someone in the idf it's just another it's just a guy it's just a it's just a human being it's a man it's it's somebody who's somewhat like-minded to me somewhat like experience to me and we're just sharing knowledge and and ideas and we have a lot of similarities.

Starting point is 01:45:05 And I'm just trying to help that individual guy, right? It's not so much about my organization trying to help this other military. Like, we're not mercenaries. We're not none of that, right? It's more about the connection to that individual and how can I help him. It's very different than the humanitarian side, obviously. When you see somebody in need, you see somebody who you can help out, you know, you think of whatever, a hurricane, food, water, shelter, you know, that kind of stuff,

Starting point is 01:45:36 this program that we're trying to do in Israel, helping the Palestinian people in Gaza, that's easy. That's simple, right? it's very easy to see the line there and to see how you can help someone there but yeah it does kind of not shock a lot of people but a lot of people can't seem to get their head around yeah but you're helping these foreign militaries it's like well it's kind of not like that like if you were were to ask me, I don't think I would say it that way. If you asked me on a, like a, like put it on an index card, I wouldn't really say it that way. Cause it's more about that individual and,

Starting point is 01:46:14 and helping that individual because look, I've been there. I've done it. So of all the guys we've been in a vehicle, we've kicked the door down. We've been in that house where it's like, regardless of the politics of this, you know, where we, you know, we've been in a vehicle, we've kicked a door down, we've been in that house where it's like, regardless of the politics of this, regardless of what the president's doing,

Starting point is 01:46:32 what the military objective is, what the objective in this city is, I'm here tonight and there's the 12 of us here and we have to get home. And what are we going to do to help each other? How are we going to do our job? I'm here for you, you're here for me. And that's it. It does, at the end of the day, to the individual man, it does boil down to that.

Starting point is 01:46:52 And I mean, you've had guys on the podcast who have echoed that in various different ways. And many people can't understand that. It's kind of like, and this is a throwback to the extreme opposite end of you think of when many people returned from Vietnam, how they were just looked at. Like that individual that was doing that thing over there day in and day out. And he comes back and the community hates him because he wore a green uniform. Had nothing to do with any of the politics or the this or that. And like that's the opposite extreme of it, right? It's not about that.

Starting point is 01:47:27 It's about the individual man. And look, I've been lucky enough to be on some good teams and to have good teammates that are way better than me and been able to do some things that are, you know, very unique. And I hope that there's not a lot of humans that get to do those things because they're very heavy, right? But I've seen it and done it. And so then when you see someone

Starting point is 01:47:49 else who's involved in that job right now and involved in those kind of, you know, that's their life right now, I can relate to that. And I know how that feels and I know how difficult it is for myself and for my friends. And so if I can help that person just a wee bit to like, whatever, if it's give them some advice, if it's to, you know, give them a little tactical knowledge here or there, or just to encourage them or just to try and, you know, whatever it is, I think man to man that goes a long way in that line of work. Absolutely. You know, and so a lot of it is just that we see especially in Ukraine it's crazy because those guys are not soldiers they're average citizens who are being handed a rifle and in two weeks told that they're going

Starting point is 01:48:38 to go do this and war is not supposed to be like that no war is not supposed to be like that like i've said this multiple times multiple places you know war should be war is a terrible thing it's a very it's a very weird thing because it's absolutely terrible it's horrendous but it's very beautiful and there's a lot of honor in it as well right why do you say that just because of individual things that can happen in in say a firefight or in a four-day fight to take over a town or in an operation to go get some shithead terrorist there it's so vast of what can happen on something like that from something heroic right and and and you know I had a thing when I was in boot camp in the Marine Corps you know at the end of the three months where back when back when I

Starting point is 01:49:37 was in back in the day when I when I went to boot camp it's probably completely different now however than it's done you hear bits and pieces but it was the year 2000. And at the end, you did this event called the Crucible. And it's like a three-day kind of event. And you get little sleep, you get little food, and you have to do these obstacles and these kind of puzzles, you know, and various different things, kind of putting all your basic training together. And at the end, you climb this hill in Southern California,

Starting point is 01:50:04 and you're awarded your Eagle Globe and anchor and you become a united states marine and it really was a cool thing and then you come back down off the mountain and you eat steak and eggs for breakfast the warriors breakfast right and it's it's it's like a really cool rite of passage and and and all this kind of stuff and it kind of sets the tone for what for who you're going to be and and and what you're going to become these guys say in ukraine they don't have that they're handed a rifle and and it look when you come out of boot camp in the marine corps you come out of of school of infantry you don't know anything. You're basic. You haven't done anything yet, right? Same as if, you know, you've had stories with other,

Starting point is 01:50:49 like special operations guys on here. They get done with their training, whether it's Navy SEALs, recon guys, Army Rangers, or Green Berets, Delta, whatever. You've just done this thing. You get to where you're going, and you're the low man on the totem pole. You've done nothing yet right like and and there's a there's a progression to that to developing you to get you to a level with people around you to to get you to a certain level ukraine doesn't have that and to some extent in israel just because of how they do their military it's very young people I was so surprised to see

Starting point is 01:51:26 how young their military is well they were like you said earlier they require at least two years of service for everyone it was that age 18 they have to do it yeah 18 yeah and then I remember we so we rolled into this tank outpost and it was really funny and and like on the patreon I have a bunch of videos of this with me and Andy we rolled into this tank outpost and there was these young guys there these young tankers and they had kind of the Arba tanks which is our equivalent of the the Abrams tanks and they had whatever their vehicle is it's the equivalent of like the Bradley fighting vehicle and we're looking around just like these young guys like crazy young guys like they had to still be teenagers or like 20 21 years old at the max and so i'm like can i get a picture with a tank so we're getting a picture and i've never been

Starting point is 01:52:11 in a tank i've been in like fighting vehicles but i've never actually been in like a battle tank like that i mean i there's no reason for me to ever be in a battle tank but um and and and then i was like can we go in the tank and so they're like like, can we go in the tank? And so they're like, yeah. So, so we jump in the tank and we have, you know, we're messing around with everything. We're checking out all the comm systems where, you know, and I just kept asking questions like, where are the, you know, can you show us the breach for the main gun and all this? And it's on there. It's really funny. And then they're handing Andy these big tank rounds, like the main gun rounds.

Starting point is 01:52:43 And it's like, I don't know if this, like, you're just letting, you don't like i don't know if this like you're just letting you don't they don't know us we just rolled up to this i mean we were with guys they obviously vouch for us and then i'm asking like can i see the targeting computer can i do this can we turn the turret like and so they're just kind of giving us a tour of this tank and you're thinking like these guys are on patrol with this tank on the Gaza border three days a week. They do their patrols and you're like, they're in it. And they're so young. They're so young. Obviously in the Marine Corps, there's a lot of young guys, but it always seemed like your senior leadership was old and crusty and knew

Starting point is 01:53:20 what to do. And, and, and I just don't really see, I mean, obviously in Ukraine, it's a totally different thing but even in in israel everybody i was so impressed and so kind of almost shocked that everyone was so young and and look they're capable fantastic whatever but i don't care how well trained you are however there's something to be said for experience yeah and if you're that young you just don't have the experience but that's also anecdotally that's some of the stuff you're seeing right right and so when you when you see guys like that though and you know look these aren't guys hanging out at camp pendleton you know and then they go do a six-month deployment um you know in africa and yeah look it's dangerous

Starting point is 01:54:02 then that's great service and all this kind of stuff. I'm just, I'm drawing the parallel that it's very different to when you sign up in Israel. And all of a sudden you're 19, 20 years old and you're on the Gaza border in an Arba tank and you have to go patrol four times a week. And something like this can kick off at any moment. That's a totally different reality for someone so young with no experience, you know, and, and it breaks my heart

Starting point is 01:54:27 a little bit when you see some of this stuff. And I mean, I showed you some of these pictures from some of those telegram channels. You see these young IDF soldiers laying in the street in a pool of blood, you know, in their underwear, because they got woken up and grabbed their gear and tried to go out and do something. Someone'srunning their their outpost and it just it breaks your heart because you're like did that guy have a chance you know he doesn't have the experience and experience there is different than experience here sure you can be young and get a ton of experience in a place like israel because stuff's popping off all the time but that's just a very difficult situation you know to be that young and to be faced with that kind of combat with very little experience and you know and you see it all the

Starting point is 01:55:21 time as well you're like yeah but those guys look young. Or how are these, some people have this mystique about the IDF and all this kind of stuff. They are very good at what they do. They have to be. They're literally fighting for their survival. I've never fought for the survival of the United States. Well, do you, hold on a minute. On that note then, do you, you have quite the background, right? You're a Scottish-American Jew and you – on the third part of that, do you feel some of that connection like heavily for like that survival? You just said you don't necessarily say you did that for the United States because like again,'re so big here it's a different history but like do you feel that yeah i mean look if you

Starting point is 01:56:11 want to talk the jewish people in general you know and i'm not want to get into like say an ethnic jew who can trace themselves back to any of the 12 tribes or whatever, but I'm just saying like in general, you can crack open that book and you can see, you know, throughout history, that group of people have had to survive all kinds of different situations that were dire, right? The Assyrian captivity, then the Babylonian captivity. And you just keep going through and through and through. And obviously we talked about just a little bit earlier, Holocaust and all this kind of stuff.

Starting point is 01:56:54 And you just see a group of people that has literally had to fight for its survival, whether on an ethnic level or a religious level throughout its history. And it's a small, relatively small group of people. And so, you know, to me, I don't live there. I don't care about their politics. You know, I don't care about, say, how they do government.

Starting point is 01:57:24 The stuff that you and I might complain about taxes or this or this or that. I don't care about any of that in Israel, but I care about the land. I care about the people and I care about the history, right? You know, this is a, this is a, the people that live in that land had everything their language taken from them, right? Your language taken from you. That's a wild history too, how they reintegrated that not long ago. One man.

Starting point is 01:57:51 Unreal. One man and his family, right? Went to Israel and said, okay, we're getting off the boat and we're no longer going to speak. I think it was German. Jabotinsky, was it? Who did that? I can't remember exactly. I don't think it was Jabotinsky. No, it was not. Jabotinsky, was it, who did that? I can't remember exactly. I don't think it was Jabotinsky.

Starting point is 01:58:06 No, it was not. It was one of the... But said, and look, there was no modern Hebrew at that time. The only Hebrew they were speaking was biblical Hebrew. Right. Which, you know, many people in Israel can't speak biblical Hebrew. Or, you know, it's very different than modern Hebrew. And just the revival of that, and just the, the,

Starting point is 01:58:25 the revival of that language where they have committees that even recently they've had to sit down and create new words. Yeah. Yeah. There was like limited, I forget the number, but yeah. And, and, and even just based on how their language functions, we don't have it, but like how the different roots work together, it has to be a certain way and all this kind of stuff and so it's like we don't have a word for this we can't just make one up or adopt it from somewhere else like we like in english does is just we don't have a word for that adopt it how do the french say how you know i mean we just take the word where they kind of would recreate or create words for modern things that never existed in the language. And they did it through the proper function of the language. I mean, I don't think that, I'm sure some other country probably has had to do something like that,

Starting point is 01:59:14 but I can't think of it. I can't think of another example like that, not in modern history. And so when you look at this kind of stuff, and it doesn't really matter about being Jewish. It doesn't really matter about being observant. I mean, you could connect it to being a Christian, right? For all intents and purposes, you could look at it that way. There is something different about that country. I've been lucky enough.

Starting point is 01:59:39 I've been able to travel all over the world. I've seen amazing places, right? Like I said, Iraq. I've been to Iraq and probably Iraq's one of its worst times in history. It's an incredible country. The people are amazing in Iraq. The average person that I met was incredible.

Starting point is 01:59:58 Baghdad was, I wish I could have seen it, you know, 40 years ago. And I hope in the next 40 years before God takes me that I can go back there, like people go back to Normandy or whatever and just see how beautiful it is. Because it's an incredible place. And you could just see how beautiful it was

Starting point is 02:00:17 when you're in a place like Baghdad and the countryside of Iraq and everything. It's amazing. I've been all over, but there is something very different about Israel. Like, you know you're there, you know what I mean? And just the history that's there. And, I mean, even you go to Jerusalem and you look at the Temple Mount and you just, you know.

Starting point is 02:00:37 And for me, when I go to the Temple Mount and, you know, and I believe the temple should still be there right it was there before those other two buildings were there for sure you can't argue that um and I don't want to piss anybody off talking about that that's probably a very volatile situation I'm not saying we should knock those two buildings down and and do that I'm just saying right but you know you're there and you know you know what went on on that mountain and you know kind of you just there's a different feel to being in that land than there is any other country i've ever been to you know it's very and look i've taken people there on our teams

Starting point is 02:01:18 that are not religious at all in any way shape or form i've taken guys there that are very say texas christian let's say right um they have a weird kind of connection when you're there it's just and i mean you can look this up it sounds very woo but there is just a weird thing about that land and being there it's the most historical place in the world i mean you, you look at it, and there's different, there's obviously different time periods and different types of histories here, but you look at Israel, you look at Egypt way past human history. But it's a crazy thing to me. And I look at, I always look at other cultures and realize like I can never understand because I wasn't born into it, right? I don't know what it feels like to have that ingrained in me at 18 months old, you know, when I'm hearing my first words and stuff like that. But, you know when i'm hearing my first words and and stuff like that but you know we had hinted at it earlier a little bit but there is such an ingrained survival instinct within the jewish

Starting point is 02:02:31 people and within the israelis that that we see there today because of how close they've come over and over and over again to being wiped off the face of the earth well look at today, right? Imagine waking up today in Israel and you don't fight back. We were 10 hours into this. What would happen, right? What would happen if they couldn't fight back or if the country didn't fight back? Look at what they're doing, right? We just had the break. We're looking, more stuff's coming out we're trying to get pieces of it here and there but if nobody fought back nobody tried you know precision strikes back into gaza nobody's kicking down doors you know in these towns in the south or all this kind of stuff what happens there'd be no israel like their religion and and if and if we woke up this morning

Starting point is 02:03:26 and hamas and all these other groups didn't do this encouraging and didn't start this war it would just be another day in israel right yeah israel's not trying to go into gaza and destroy everybody and and you know do all all this and kidnap people from buildings and take them back into Israel or shoot them in the streets. And that's not happening, you know? And so when you want to talk about survival, that's an example.

Starting point is 02:03:55 Like that's what we're talking about. You know, and you're seeing it on real time, right? On Instagram. It's unbelievable, you know? and the same thing happened you could take this time and period it happened you could take that time and period it happened we're just getting to watch it now because we have because we have instagram you know so it's it's it's crazy it really it's hard to get your head around that why do you think you, it's such a strange thing about humanity around the world and how we have all these different groups of people, races, religions, creeds, whatever. It's a strange thing

Starting point is 02:04:33 to me that even today in our very globally interconnected world, there is still intensive tribalism that then leads to call it what it is. You know, there's some severe racism around the world. We have it here in America in some ways, in some places. You know, there's this thing where human beings look at another human being who's the same as them and just looks a little different on the outside or believes something different, and they have intensive hatred for it. And when you look at like the Jewish people around the world, it seems like anti-Semitism, the fervor of it and the consistency of it that exists even sometimes in small places everywhere never subsides. Why do you think that is? I don't know.

Starting point is 02:05:19 I think – and that's the funny thing as well is I don't understand that, right? Like I don't understand what your objective is. Right. If, you know, like you said, color, this or the next thing. So what do you want then? Like if you don't want those or you want everyone to be like you, like let's say there are some sects of Islam that says the convert or die thing. And we've seen that throughout history, right?

Starting point is 02:05:42 And you could say it didn't happen, whatever. It happened. And it's probably, it's still a thing. ISIS did that, right? The convert or die thing. And we've seen that throughout history, right? And you could say it didn't happen, whatever. It happened. And it's probably, it's still a thing. ISIS did that, right? The convert or die stuff. Yeah. So, but I don't understand that. Like, I don't understand why you would,

Starting point is 02:05:55 why if you are that convert or die person putting that out there, why do you need that to happen? Why do you want that to happen? Why can't I be different than you? Yeah. If I'm not trying to kill you for any kind of reason or get rid of you and you can live over there and I can live over here, what's with the convert or die thing? And I'm just using that as an example.

Starting point is 02:06:16 There's tons of other examples, right? I'm just using that one. I'm not picking on anybody or any. No, I know exactly what you're saying. Yeah, but we're on the interwebs so that disclaimer they're always they're gonna pick apart some stuff every time but things like that i just don't understand and it's very funny in the marine corps obviously you have a lot of young guys coming together you know leaving their house for the first time when they enlist and they go

Starting point is 02:06:40 to basic training and all this you have all kinds of different races and and everything there right and you're kind of taught that there's no white marine there's no yellow marine there's no black marine there's no you know brown marine everybody's just green right and if you want you can say you're dark green or you can say you're light green or whatever but you're still you're still green and that's going to matter one day. And it does matter, right? Like when, when you're in combat, you don't care who's to the left or right of you about what they look like or what they believe or anything like that. You care about, can they do the job? Can he help me if I need it? And can I help him if he needs it? You really don't care about that stuff. And, and at the end of the day, you know, we should maybe look at this whole thing like that

Starting point is 02:07:27 right i mean we talked about israel not that big of a country size of new jersey in terms of of space of land i mean i've been there there's plenty of places that you could still build and you could still you know obviously they have their their little um kind of zoning and rules about where who can build where and when and all this permits and all this. But there's plenty of land still there. There's enough land for everybody that lives there to live there in peace, in my opinion. You know, and so why can't that happen? And there's been bad players on both sides of the conflict

Starting point is 02:08:06 throughout the conflict's history, I'd say. I mean, there has to be, right? It's been going on long enough. There's been bad players on both sides. There's been bad things that's happened on both sides. But at some point, you're kind of looking at it now, the scale's tipped a little bit where one side is probably, it's hard to argue against one

Starting point is 02:08:26 side's probably would lean to peace a lot more than the other side what do you say to some of the people and i'm not advocating the stance i'm just saying this this is out there what do you say as someone who's been on the ground there and sees what it looks like to some of the people we hear refer to israel as an apartheid state? Again, we've already said this. I've already kind of said this without mentioning the A word. How can it be an apartheid state when the oppressed people can join the military, own a business, be in the government, right?

Starting point is 02:09:06 Have government offices, you know, can go to school. You know, look at Afghanistan, right? People couldn't, women couldn't go to school, right? I mean, you name it, if you're an Arab in Israel, if you're a Palestinianestinian person in israel you can do anything an israeli can do so even with some of the things we already talked about i i think just looking at it from the outside i think that when people throw around you know that claim or whatever they're cherry picking a couple of the situations they're cherry picking maybe maybe a couple issues that happen in a specific place like jerusalem they're cherry picking things that happen with the settlements

Starting point is 02:09:49 in the west bank i don't personally you know if you've studied the apartheid history in south africa that's apartheid yes you know i don't see i've looked at this a bunch doesn't mean i'm right but like i don't see the evidence for anything even near an apartheid in Israel that's that's that's happening I think that's kind of crazy and I mean the other thing is they say well Gaza's a blockade right and you go well okay you again it's one of those fancy or or kind of light bulb words that people like to throw out there, like apartheid. And you go, well, a blockade. First of all, they wanted everybody out of there.

Starting point is 02:10:30 They don't want anybody else coming in there. So you're blockading yourself in. And then second of all, the Gaza Strip's major export is terrorism. It's 5,000 rockets in 10 hours it's you know i mean i mean it's incursions with terror tunnels and and all this kind of stuff and so you go i kind of see why you might want to make it difficult for just anybody to come out of that border for you know sure yeah yeah you know what i mean and so if so you can't use the word blockade, right? You can't use the word blockade. And furthermore, if it's a blockade, Israel sends, again, tens of millions of dollars, hundreds of millions of dollars a year in food and infrastructure type stuff into Gaza. So where's the blockade? The blockade would be if someone else was trying to get stuff into Gaza and Israel was stopping it.

Starting point is 02:11:31 To me, that's more of the definition of a blockade than having a border. A border is not a blockade. And it's a self-imposed border. Right, right. It's a little unique. I also think it doesn't do any favors to the situation just like the way the geography is if we can put that map in the corner of the screen one more time just of like israel they're like separate you know what i mean so

Starting point is 02:11:55 you have israel like kind of all over the map down the middle and then you have the gaza strips over here the west banks over there so it's of course it's going to be and it's on as you said earlier as well like it's on gaza's is bordering egypt as well so it's on an international border yeah but but the other thing there so like throughout history you see where ashkelon is there right ashkelon is a beautiful city if you ever go to israel that's a really cool place to go there little bit inland uh no no it's right on the it's right on the beach, and the beaches there are beautiful. I can show you some videos. Oh, so it's just-

Starting point is 02:12:27 And it has a very important history in the Mediterranean as well, right? Ashkelon does. But look at Gaza. Gaza's entire western border is on the Mediterranean Sea. Right. Why don't they use that? Amazing port. Now, you know, I'm a few credits shy of being any kind of government planning guru, infrastructure, this, international trade, that.

Starting point is 02:13:00 But I kind of think if my entire Western border is on the Mediterranean Sea, I'd be trying to offer somebody something to use me as a port. Iran even tries to do that over where they are. Exactly. Yeah. And I get it. You could say you might have a tough sell because, you know, if I'm bringing stuff into Gaza, how can I get it out of Gaza into Israel? Well, maybe that's when you sit down at the table and you try and figure something out. Right? Because what would that do? It would help your people. to Israel, well, maybe that's when you sit down at the table and you try and figure something out, right?

Starting point is 02:13:27 Because what would that do? It would help your people. Yeah. But you don't do that, right? And so it's like- Again, they're under that thumb of Hamas. It's going to be a non-starter. But exactly. And so that's the whole problem.

Starting point is 02:13:39 Everything, we could sit here and come up with a bunch of really probably, no offense to you, but really stupid ideas on how to fix this thing because that's no offense taken man yeah because that's not what we do right like our job is not to sit down and do international diplomacy between two separate countries or whatever but like even if we come up with a half decent idea like something like that it stops before it even gets started and And, you know, Israel could even broker that in like, hey, we can do this with them. Maybe we can stop some of the other stuff we have to do that's imposed on us by the international community

Starting point is 02:14:14 because we're working and we're doing. So it's like there's a bunch of things I think that can be done. But again, it stops with that charter, right? The charter says you can't exist and you can't even, like your country can't exist and you as an individual and as a group can't exist. So how can we even get anywhere? It's just nuts.

Starting point is 02:14:36 So yeah, it's a rough one. You had said this way earlier in the podcast. I just didn't want to bury it and not come back to it. I was just reminded looking at the map. The border that they share with Egypt. Yes. It's on the Sinai Peninsula right there. The Sinai is obviously a very historical part of land, but also in the modern warfare arena since Israel's formation has been very historical between the Six-Day War, the Yom Kippur War, and then, you know, like even I think after Yom Kippur, Israel like took a lot of it but then gave it back afterwards as like a peace agreement or something.

Starting point is 02:15:17 So it's a desert mountainous region. Egypt and Israel made a peace officially in 1979 even after the arab spring in 2011 that still remains intact and everything how the hell is isis controlling that area yeah so they're they're controlling that area um i don't know how they actually There are very few things that you can be certain of in life. But you can always be sure the sun will rise each morning. You can bet your bottom dollar that you'll always need air to breathe and water to drink. And, of course, you can rest assured that with Public Mobile's 5G subscription phone plans, you'll pay the same thing every month.

Starting point is 02:16:17 With all of the mysteries that life has to offer, a few certainties can really go a long way. Subscribe today for the peace of mind you've been searching for. Public Mobile. Different is calling. MasterCard to help you earn the most PC Optimum points everywhere you shop. The PC Insider's World's Elite MasterCard, the card for living unlimited. Conditions apply to all benefits. Visit pcfinancial.ca for details. On south near, you know, the Egypt border and the other one was on the north side of Gaza. Now, the one on the south has been closed, obviously, because ISIS is there. So they've turned that into like total black market right they're they're running all kinds of drugs in there they're running all kinds of weapons money

Starting point is 02:17:12 all that kind of stuff um through they built tunnels um and i think actually i think maybe vice has done a profile on that on the egypt um border they've done a couple of different stuff on gaza i think but how many original people like were living there though because this again this is a very desert mountainous region and on the egypt side yeah i don't know exactly but it's not like densely populated there no or am i fucked up on that i i don't i don't know so listen we were supposed to go um again last week to israel and and that trip kind of got bumped out it was supposed to be november and where we were going was that where we're supposed to go is the egypt border so i'll get

Starting point is 02:17:56 down there i'll kind of get that all reconned up and and get um a good look and see what's actually going on there i do know i've seen tons of videos from our guys and, and pictures obviously, but tons of videos and surveillance videos and everything of some of the border incursions into Israel from Egypt. And they use a lot of actual kind of the, the same kind of tactical kind of vehicles. They use a lot of those side-by-sides and

Starting point is 02:18:25 different Polaris type stuff to get through some of that did on the the the terrace side they're using a lot of those high-speed vehicles just because the land is so rugged and all that and they need to be quick to get stuff done but they're throwing stuff over the fence they're cutting the fence they're coming through and and then you can see if you pull the map up again, it's easy. It's hard to get people into Gaza. It's much easier to get people into the West Bank. And so get them into the West Bank from the east?

Starting point is 02:18:56 They'll get them into the West Bank from down south in Egypt. They'll go up kind of around. But there's a ton of Israeli land between there. Yeah, but there's a ton of israeli land between there yeah but there's a lot of um a lot of open space and there there is some like palestinian um kind of uh areas there like towns and stuff like that so it's like an underground railroad piggyback it all the way in uh through beersheva and then up into into the west bank so there's an ISIS presence in the West Bank right now? I don't know.

Starting point is 02:19:26 I don't know about ISIS. I don't think so. I think the Palestinian Authority and Islamic Jihad, don't quote me on Islamic Jihad, but I think the Palestinian Authority and ISIS don't get along on any level. You don't say. I think ISIS is pretty like... People don't like them. And I don't say i i think isis is pretty like people don't like them and i don't think they like anybody either right so so there's that kind of problem but again you

Starting point is 02:19:52 said that earlier money talks so if these groups in the west bank can use groups in the south coming through egypt to get stuff in that's what they do it's the same in jordan our guys i've never been to the the jordan border with our guys yet that's another they do. It's the same in Jordan. Our guys, I've never been to the Jordan border with our guys yet. That's another place we're going to... Jordan's a friend, though. Yeah, there's a lot of terrorism in Jordan, though. Right, right, right, right.

Starting point is 02:20:13 Obviously. But that border is another problematic area for Israel because they get stuff from Jordan right into the West Bank. You can see Jordan borders the west bank there i'm almost i'm a little surprised at that though because i'm gonna up the name of this but the mukabar i want to say yeah the i got that right kind of i know what you're talking about i know the guy you're talking about yeah the jordanian intelligence like you know the the king over there is yeah boys with america and israel and the jordanian intelligence like you know the the king over there is yeah boys with America

Starting point is 02:20:46 and Israel and the Jordanian intelligence is pretty damn good well I think I think you know the Jordanians have always kind of been very good at playing both sides right and then what they do is even today I think so hmm I mean look it wasn't that long ago with the holes our cowie stuff and all of that as well right like well they they were the ones trying to tell people whoops like we need to fix that yeah but i think what they do is they like the whole plausible deniability thing right i think i think there's and look if you're those kind of groups and you can get yourself connected into jordan so you can do things like in israel or you can you know spread your terror networks through jordan and you can do it under the guise of jordan's everybody's ally that's pretty good now i'm not saying that the

Starting point is 02:21:33 jordanian the jordanians proper are helping these organizations right i'm not saying that i'm just saying that because of that kind of structure I think that these organizations can sneak under the radar. I mentioned Joby Warwick earlier in respect to his latest book on Syria with the whole red line. His book before that won the Pulitzer, and it's what we did episode 134 on. It was called Black Flags, the Rise of ISIS, which speaking with a guy I know who's, let's say, stationed in the Middle East over there on the intelligence side of things in our military, he said that it's not a requirement, but every time new guys go out there, they read that book. It's that good. And Joby, I would push back on some of that Jordan point because one of his major sources in the book and a guy who actually has become on friendly terms with him is the king of Jordan. And to his credit, he takes blame for the fact that when he rose to power, which he never expected to be in power when his father died. He thought it was going to be the other son.

Starting point is 02:22:44 His whole life he had kind of like planned on being something else he made some sort of like agreement for like a political reset to free a long list of political quote-unquote prisoners and accidentally on that list they didn't check it well enough according to him and on that list was al-zakawi who ended up forming what would become Isis right so there are up like let's let's be clear but and look you have to kind of look again I'm not I I'm not an expert on you know the Jordanians and all that kind of stuff but there is a lot of issues with that border and I'm not saying that they're involved I'm not saying they're being involved. I'm not saying they're being negligent. I'm not saying they're not paying attention.

Starting point is 02:23:28 I'm just saying there's problems on that border. So I'm sure if they're being a good ally, they are trying to fix it, right? And they are the major kind of peacemaker in the Middle East. They have been for a a long time and that's that's great that's excellent but there's still problems on that border so for whatever reasons i you know i'm not claiming i know all the reasons i just know that our guys have a heavy presence on that border and a lot of its weapons on the jordanian side it's weapons

Starting point is 02:24:01 what do you mean smuggling of weapons into the West Bank um a lot of it comes through Jordan okay well the country that doesn't share a border here but that we've been talking about the whole time is Iran yeah like we've been talking about potential Solutions and or lack thereof with the whole Israeli-Palestinian conflict but is there a solution with Iran besides completing total regime change? I mean, again, I'm a few credits short of being able to come up with something concrete, but it doesn't look like it, right? Short answer, it doesn't look like it because there's just such a fundamental's just such a fundamental it's kind of like the

Starting point is 02:24:46 Hamas thing right they're kind of like it's not like they're junior Hamas it's like they're senior Hamas right in this whole thing so um and and their charter kind of says the same thing right or their constitution actually says the same thing says the same thing about us actually too yeah and Israel andica yeah and we seem to just not read that i guess maybe we're maybe our person isn't as good as it should be when you're reading that right but yeah again this is and then that that goes back to that obama days with the pallets of cash and all this in the middle of the night and and even more recently the six billion dollars pallets of cash in the middle of the night yeah when he sent the money over on the c-130 and it

Starting point is 02:25:29 was just pallets of cash for the iranian deal if i'm familiar with that i'm forgetting it but that was a part of that yes i'm sure you're familiar with that that was a up deal yeah but anyway um you know you can't really miss that if you're doing anything about Iran and you're scratching around and you know nothing. Someone lands here from Mars and, you know, is asking about Iran and you throw them to Wikipedia or you read their constitution and it says what it says in there about Israel and the United States. From our perspective, why are we giving them anything? Right. Right. And I get that if that's your enemy, you're trying to smooth stuff over,

Starting point is 02:26:07 you're trying to whatever, but they don't want that. Money's not going to appease them. You're telling me that money doesn't go to Hezbollah, that money doesn't go to this kind of stuff? I mean, they're the major state sponsor of terror,'d say in the world iran and now we got the issue with you know them finding potential as they continue working on some of these things actively and down the line you know sources of money vis-a-vis trade partnerships with the east russia china you know and they got money over in those places yes so then it flows in and

Starting point is 02:26:46 it's another thing that funds all this stuff but i mean and that's one thing i look i'm not a warmonger at all i don't think we should go to war with every enemy that we perceive that we have but i also don't want to be jumping in bed with a cobra either kind of thing right and and so you get to the point you mean by that well i mean if you how many nights can you sleep in a bed with a cobra before it bites you and kills you kind of thing right yeah but isn't that but if it's iran and we're constantly like well if we if we do this they'll become you know everything will calm down or if we give them that or if we try and do this or if we talk about, I think the other party has to want to be involved. Like we, we have to sit and say like, look, do you want like Julian, you want to be my friend?

Starting point is 02:27:34 I mean, I think I'd like to, but it seems very difficult based on our whole history and all this. Yeah. But if you'd like to, that's a start. So let's work off of that. Right. I don't think you have that conversation with Iran. So where are you bringing in this? And where are you bringing in 6 billion? And where are you bringing in deals with this? How are you making a deal with somebody who fundamentally says they want to destroy you?

Starting point is 02:27:59 I think you at least need to get to the point where you go, I'd like to be a friend, I just don't ever see it happening. It's like, okay i i can respect that but the fact that you want that means we can start there and see where we can get and maybe we still won't ever be friends but at least we can try if i say do you want to be my friend you say no i want you dead like yesterday what are we going to do yeah this is it's another non-starter and i think that's where we're at and and i get it if if you know there's that and this happened with the israeli palestinian conflict for years as well all these western leaders particularly american leaders wanted

Starting point is 02:28:39 to be the one they got the photo up with the handshake right right and and they think they can solve the problem and they and that's great we're gonna make a great deal yeah i mean i'm the century ambition is great especially on peace right um and i'm sure that peace prize looks fantastic on your mantelpiece after a career in politics and everything else but at some point though you know if it walks like a duck quacks like it's at some point it's just a duck yeah you know and you can't turn it into a pigeon right it just is what it is and you just i don't see why i'm not saying don't try i'm just saying to try should be hey have you guys come around yet to even having a discussion nope okay i'll come back next year i guess knock on your window and see where you're at it's just it's hard to

Starting point is 02:29:30 come out with that and what do you what do they do do they sit around in a room and they say well maybe if we give them this right good luck it just doesn't seem to work right well you had said that you don't you i i'm paraphrasing here but you don't care as much about like internal israeli politics and everything it does still affect their stances on you know the survival of israel or how that's accomplished i should say they all want the survival of israel but like with a guy like netanyahu who over the past year or so, I remember after I had Joby in here actually, I really started to look closely at him because I had had some opinions and then I was like, can I really – should I really be saying that though? Like do I have enough evidence to say that without going into it? But he has been in power for a long time and he's very – he seems to be within the country very controversial and yet when i look

Starting point is 02:30:27 at not talking about his israeli palestine stances i'm just talking about like how he how he views israel and the future of israel it seems like his foreign policy is from the outsider's perspective more in line with having a strong israel so why is he so disliked by so many people there not to say he's not liked by a lot of people too but there are people who obviously hate him over there yeah i don't know exactly i think a lot of it has to do with some of that corruption stuff or the perceived corruption that was going on, I think, with him and some of his government, right? You know, I would say the way I tend to try and view a foreign leader is in their relationship with us, right? I mean, that's kind of the only thing that would affect me as an American, right?

Starting point is 02:31:22 Not that it even would affect me on a day to day or anything, but like if you wanna even talk about Netanyahu's, the big topic of the day, the judicial reform, right? That's never gonna affect me, it just isn't. And I shouldn't have a say on that, and neither should you, and it's never gonna affect you. But some of that international stuff and his policy there and his views there and his relationship to us through that, I mean, I think that affects our country, which in turn technically affects us as Americans. Yes.

Starting point is 02:31:59 So that's kind of how I tend to evaluate any foreign leader. And I mean, look, it's not the best way to do it because in that the guy could be a scumbag. The guy could be terrible to his own people. The guy could be great to his own people and terrible in foreign policy. You know, it could go either way. up and say anything about their domestic politics or the opposition right now in Israel or Netanyahu and his party or his coalition government, you know, sure, I can have an opinion on it. I kind of don't want to anyway, because it just doesn't matter. I'd rather put my attention and my efforts into other things and just kind of keep it at well how is this

Starting point is 02:32:45 looking in relation to America and I think the guy you know I think he's a tough guy number one like he's very very strong yes he loved it he loves his country he loves his people he I think he genuinely wants peace but he's a if you step on me I'll stomp on you kind of guy and he's and he's proven that and that does ruffle the international community's feathers yeah i can't say i don't i can't say i don't blame him for having that stance i think maybe every israel leader of israel from any party regardless of their politics should maybe have that kind of stance um just based on their situation which we've been talking about um but as an ally to the united states i think he's i think he's above average

Starting point is 02:33:34 i mean you can't really argue that he hasn't been i don't disagree with that yeah i mean it's look people are going to cut everything they they want to politically it's it's what it is he's a complex guy there's a lot He's a complex guy. There's a lot there. There's some stuff I was definitely wrong in my interpretations of him, and then there's some other stuff I was probably right about. But I don't think one man also has the power to determine – with a country with that kind of history you know what i mean and you mentioned earlier the way the government's set up he has to keep on reforming the government because all the parties like i think some of that could be a little overblown but i understand when people are like all right let's get some new blood in there but the argument is he's been able to do that

Starting point is 02:34:20 yes yeah yeah which he's been able to win elections which sounds kind of and not just win elections winning the elections only half the battle there right you still then then you still have to put that government together and you know i don't know kind of what deals i mean i know how our government tends to work is you're making deals and you're giving here and taking there and all that kind of stuff and i'm sure they're doing the same kind of thing to get that government formed but he's been able to do that yeah and so that says something absolutely um and like you said i mean he is a his terminology for it is he is a peace through power guy rather than power through peace i mean i'll tell you this he's he's led some very and and I won't say the word in the beginning for sake of giving away my point in the beginning. He's led some very strong military actions for his country during his time in power.

Starting point is 02:35:19 But you can't point to one and said he did it without any provocation. It's always because of a certain event or a certain course of events that has happened. Like not just talk, not just some kind of whatever, but actual military action against his country that he's turned around. And again, you step on me, I'll stomp on you. And so you can't really say he's an instigator yeah I'd have to look at all at all the things in the full history not knowing it off the top of my head but I mean some of the things that are popping in my mind you're right yeah and I mean look there there's that old saying as well where like you they say oh palestinian people will throw rocks and then uh the israelis come with a tank that's like okay well if you don't want me to come with a tank don't throw a rock

Starting point is 02:36:11 don't throw a rock yeah if you threw a rock would the tank be there the answer is no because it wasn't there yesterday when you weren't throwing rocks becomes the never-ending you know circle of life there you know i mean what do you want them to do get rid of the tank and bring a spear and then when you kill them they can complain right i mean right it's it just turns into why don't you just stop throwing the rock or whatever the case is right um you know it's just that those kind of arguments again i tend to try and stay away from those because those should be very obvious and and they're very silly right yeah it just comes down to people skinning the game on it with what they're going to argue.

Starting point is 02:36:50 One other thing I forgot about your – some of the work you've been doing over there, and like you said, there's stuff you can't talk about too, so stop me if this is there. But outside the military, have you had any contact with any of the three intelligence arms, be it Amman, which is military intelligence, Shembet, which is kind of like their FBI, or Mossad? I am not going to say about that side of anything. Yeah, I mean, Israel is a very interesting place, and they're very good at what they do.

Starting point is 02:37:27 And, you know, yeah, it's one of those things where, you know, we're actually lucky to be there and to do what we do there. And I don't want to mess any of that up. You know, obviously, still, we're looking to do more there god willing this thing ends by the time we're done with this podcast and we're not going to go there this week and we can wait and have a much better visit in november as planned um but we're going to keep going back there we're going to keep building things out and we're gonna um we're gonna just continue to help people there. I'll say in, just because I know you're asking,

Starting point is 02:38:09 I know you like this kind of stuff. In Ukraine, yes, we've had contact with intelligence agencies. Coming up very soon. Yeah. We'll talk about that. But yeah, in Israel, I just, there's a lot of stuff we can't talk about just because of, number one, them. And we're just very privileged to be there and to be a part of that and to to be allowed to have these missions there that we're trying to do for

Starting point is 02:38:31 regardless we can say it's for their people or we can say it's it's it's to help the better good of that country but they don't have to let us go there they don't have to give us access to what they have and i mean to be honest i'm still blown away that we are there and doing what we're doing there it's you know it's working and it's going well and they're great they really are great and and um you know i'm i'm proud of those guys it's i mean i've been on the phone you've seen me all day getting messages i mean it's i still have a guy i can't get a hold of and my messages aren't even getting through to him and And, and he's a guy that, you know, he's, he's an incredible warfighter with an incredible history. He's so, I'll explain this guy without saying his name or without saying where he lives or anything like that.

Starting point is 02:39:16 Just because I want to get this story out there is he's younger than me. I'm 41 years old. I think he's 37. Been in the military all of his adult life. And for many Israelis, where they live and where they serve are somewhere in the west bank okay but when you're done you can go home like you can go home at night sometimes right depending on what your job is depending on what you're doing you can go home at night where this guy lives is one of the hardest hit places by rockets from gaza so when he goes and serves he's in a shitty place because he's a he's an actual war fighter he's he's a savage guy he's seen a lot of because he's a he's an actual warfighter he's he's a savage guy he's seen a lot of combat he's seen a lot of you know horrible stuff to kids and women

Starting point is 02:40:11 and and all kinds of stuff but when he goes home he's still in the thick of it and i can't relate to that right every place that we've been as as americans whether it's any of my my friends that i served with or guys now that i know in other branches and all this kind of stuff in different units whenever we went and did anything we went away from america to do it you don't come home and you're still in it and this goes back to that yeah and he's had this for his entire life and he's the most gentle down to earth happy guy um you know but you can tell when you hear his story and you hear him you can tell there's there's heavy heavy heaviness there you know um i mean he has he has to live in a place where every building has a bomb shelter

Starting point is 02:40:59 you know every structure has a bomb shelter, including the kids' soccer field has bomb shelters. Every house has a bomb shelter. And, you know, again, we don't have to live with that. I've said this, quote, many times on the podcast, and I'm sure I'll say it many times moving forward. Sometimes in America, I look around at the things we make problems out of, and say we have not been invaded and it really fucking shows yeah i mean it really does but i mean i've thought about that since meeting him and since you know um being in contact with him and actually you know going on patrol with the guy and stuff and i just for someone say with my background i couldn't imagine that I couldn't imagine going and doing an operation and then

Starting point is 02:41:47 going home and being in a place that is that heavy with stuff happening there's no break right I mean the break is when they're not firing rockets at you I suppose but that could happen at any time and it and it has happened at just random times as well, like this random time, obviously. But to constantly have that is weighing over your head. And I know what that's like. I know what it's like to go and do an operation or to be in combat and whatever. To go home and have that and never get out of that mentality has to be difficult. And he's had entire you know he said that his entire adult life it's crazy it's wild man can't can't comprehend it yeah over here last question on on this issue

Starting point is 02:42:32 and then we'll get to ukraine with a new podcast how do you you know we've seen situations where in recent history because it always happens where this tension flares up we saw a big situation in I want to say like June 2021 where there were all the rockets coming in and now we've been looking at the videos all day with this it's fresh six months from now what what do you think this looks like do things change is there is the Gaza strip situation different what do you think no i think what will happen is um kind of what happened in um march which actually got us into you into israel and 2021 and all that stuff too israel is going to fight back as they're doing thank god and it's going to go until the armament on the we'll say palestinian side for lack of a well we'll say the hamas and friends side right because i don't want to just say palestinians um we'll say on the terrorism

Starting point is 02:43:35 side um it'll go until their armaments deplete to where they can't sustain it anymore and then you'll see someone like jordan or egypt step in help broker some kind of peace uh for this conflict yeah right all the all their kind of peace deals now are very isolated to that incident kind of peace so we'll see that and then it'll just be tick along until they can reload and revamp and do all over again and the merry ground goes around and and i mean i really we can come back and we can watch this but that's what happened in march and you know it's all summer being there and being connected to some of our non-israeli people there um that are there in various capacities um have said something really big has been brewing and i think the one in march lasted what was it five days six days sounds right to the yeah it was five or six days something like that and it was very isolated to

Starting point is 02:44:40 rockets from gaza into southern is. This seems like a lot more. Yeah, it was to Sderot. It was to Ashkelon. It was those kind of areas. And whatever, it was terrible. It was terrible. There wasn't a ton of incursions. But this is, yeah, this is like a fully, you know,

Starting point is 02:45:01 this is a big thing. This is actual, I mean, that's war too. But this is actual, this could's war too but this is actual this could turn into something yeah a little more prolonged um i think 2021 how long did that go on for with the tunnels that was that was a couple of months was it three four months i can't remember exactly i don't want to say or am i thinking or am i thinking 2017 was the other big one that lasted the one that i'm thinking of in 2021, if I'm correct here, correct me in the comments if I'm wrong, was when this was when the Iron Dome became like a big, like the world knew about it. Because Hamas was sending all kinds of rockets from Gaza and then Israel sent back.

Starting point is 02:45:41 And I guess Naftali Bennett at this point was the PM. So Biden was coming in saying they had a right to defend themselves you know what's funny what's funny about all this is so the one i'm thinking is the one previous but it's funny that there's so many of them that we confuse them i know it's crazy man it's fucking crazy i mean the fact that we you know we're going to end this israel portion on that just just takes care of everything that we've talked about, right? So, but I think it will be the same. I think it will just be, you know, they wait until they're depleted. They time it right.

Starting point is 02:46:13 They get, you know, the West gets those Middle Eastern power players, Egypt, Jordan, to help broker something. And it just goes to, you know, you'll probably see an uptake in some stuff going on in the west bank um they're talking about an incursion an israeli incursion into gaza which yeah that's that's massive that's a whole that's a whole other level because i i can't remember but but it's been years since they did that into gaza that's a whole other thing right because then you start getting other middle eastern players do they take possession of it now like it gets weird they it starts to get weird and and they

Starting point is 02:46:49 when they did it before they said no no this is just a in kick the doors in do what we have to do and get out and they did it right and and they they held to that but it still gets a bit squirrely when you're doing stuff like that but once the piece is brokered you know there'll be some stuff in there where it's like well you have to give us some lower level commanders and they'll they'll kind of like give them the 10 digit grids for where those dudes are and and then they'll be israel will be able to say we went and got these guys after the fact after the piece and there'll be some of that and then it'll just be we'll wait until we give maybe around another six billion and they can you know get pay for all the weapons and do

Starting point is 02:47:25 all that kind of stuff so crazy man well this has been great talk about israel and obviously we hope to see some sort of peaceful solution here if that's even possible yeah it's been crazy obviously we were not coming here to kind of talk about this this way and it just i've never done a podcast like this it's you know fresh i hope everybody likes it it's kind of all over the place and and definitely different but we're trying to keep up with stuff that's yeah it's it's live in real real time yeah you did great let's let's go get some get some food and then we'll come back and we'll do another podcast on ukraine perfect all right all right guys that's the end of episode one of our two episodes with Mark. That's right.

Starting point is 02:48:05 We have another one coming next week. If you haven't already subscribed to the channel, please subscribe, smash that like button, and let me know what you thought about this episode down in the comment section below. Mark and I will return on the next JDP episode where we'll be discussing all the defense work he's been doing around the world. So keep your eyes peeled for that one. You're not going to want to miss it. That said, you know what it is. Give it a thought.

Starting point is 02:48:27 Get back to me. Peace.

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