Piers Morgan Uncensored - Bassem Youssef Returns

Episode Date: October 23, 2024

Collectively, Bassem Youssef has garnered over 40 million views for the Piers Morgan Uncensored channel; a testament to his charisma and talent. His exile from his home country of Egypt shows the power of his disruptive satire, and how at home he feels on Uncensored. A passionate fighter for the cause of Palestine, Youssef challenges Piers' view that Hamas are the cause of the conflict, although he makes it clear he's no fan of the group. In his third 1-on-1 with Piers Morgan, expect a charming but vital conversation. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Oh my god, can I have a hug? Can I have a hug? How are you? How are you? You're good? How are you? How are you? I'm good.

You good? You good? Very nice to see. I'm so glad you came into that. Of course. I mean, I like, I want to always be in person. It's much nicer. It's great.

It's great. You've been critical of me saying, I only do what I do, because I'm after click. I never said that about it. You did? I know that you mean well, but you are trying to two-sided. You're too one-sided. We should believe that Hamas went in with AKAS, 47 and cause that kind of damage.

What's your argument that Israelis did all about themselves? A series of reports of women who were raped and abused by Hamas. You don't believe any of you. You think none of this happened? No, I don't believe. You're trying to put a little protective shield up to what Hamas did. And my response is, I don't know why you would do that. Hamas being an Islamic faction, I'm not a big fan,

but you should not punish our population because a militant group did some atrocities. What else would you accept? If you treat people like animals, they will behave like animals. All these cars were obviously blown up by Israel. Hamas didn't do that to any of them. Amas didn't rape or abuse any women. And it's all bullshit.

A year ago this week, I interviewed an exiled Egyptian comedian about the aftermath of October the 7th. It was a time of intense anger and passion. Basim Yusuf's jarring and satirical take became globally iconic. A month later, we met again face-to-face and his adopted home city of Los Angeles. And Basim has since become an unwitting global spokesman for the Palestinian cause.

and against the way it's been reported by Western media. More than a year in, the war rages on. There's a lot to catch up on. For the first time ever in the uncensored studio here in London, Bassam Yusuf rejoins me. Bassam, great to see you. Great to see you too. Finally in London, my home city, finally.

Extraordinary that it's been a year. When you think back to that first interview that we did, that 23 million people watched around the world, and I still get asked about it all the time, Just take me back to how you were feeling then. It was so in the immediate aftermath of October the 7th, Israel's response was coming very hard at the time. What was in your mind at the time when you did that interview and the way you conducted it? I was very scared.

I was advised by my managers and agents not to do the interview because I could lose my career. And I just took it because, and actually, as a matter of fact, your producers asked me a couple of times and I said no. because, yeah, and then I said, like, I have to do it. I want to play just for those who haven't seen it, there aren't many, but let's take a look at some of that first interview. Those Palestinians, they're very dramatic. Ah, Israel killing us. But they never die.

I mean, they always come back. You know, they're very difficult to kill, very difficult people to pill. I know, because I'm married to one. I tried many times. Couldn't kill her. I mean, there's a dark humor there, and I understand why. Oh, it's not dark human. I really, I try to get to her every time,

but she uses our kids as human shields. I can never take her out. I really applaud Israel for doing one thing that no military force in the world does. Because I heard Ben Shapiro, and I heard Ron DeSantis. And they said, they said, Israel is the only military force in the world that warn civilians before bombing them. I mean, how fucking cute.

That is so nice of them. Because with this logic, if Russian troops started warning Ukrainians before bombing their houses, We're cool with Putin, right? I mean, OK, Habibi, you have warned them, go invade. It's fine. You have done your job. It was a brilliantly devastating technique you used in that interview,

which took me a while to work out what you were doing and why you were doing it. They're very powerful. It resonated with many people very closely. Where do you think we are with this war now? And in fact, not just the war, obviously, in Gaza, but the wider war that's raging now in Lebanon, on the threats against Iran and so on, the whole thing.

I mean, Israel is defending itself, right? I mean, that's what the Western media is telling us. They would say they are. Yeah, and I want to buy into it. I'm trying to convince my friends. Can you buy into any of their logic that they believe they are defending themselves? Okay.

Do you believe them, that they believe that? Let's put that on the test. So if Israel is defending itself, it's defending itself against an imminent danger, like an existential threat. I don't understand if, for example, Macron would announce that he would impose an embargo in Israel's arms and then Israel goes and bombs the French oil facilities in Lebanon. How is that defending themselves?

I don't, there's like a group of American doctors who were in Gaza and came back, and they reported seeing tens of children with sniper shots in their heads and necks. How is that defending themselves? Just a couple of days ago, we saw a little kid be. being shot by a drone, his family came to for to offend, to help him, and then they were all killed. How is that defending itself? I mean, I hear it, but I just don't see it. But do you believe that fundamentally Israel believes it is acting in self-defense? Israel can believe whatever they want. I'll tell you a story that actually can tell you exactly

how Israel is. I'm from Egypt, you understand this. You don't know what it's right? April 1970, there was an attack over an Egyptian school in the middle of the Delta, 100 kilometers from where my parents were born. It's called Bahral Bar on that day, Israel bombed a school killing 30 students. Now what was so interesting going back in history, this is, this was the headline of the New York Times of the day. And it was, says 30 pupils in Egypt said to die in rape, said to die, the passive voice. Which rate? Who did the rate? We don't know. And then you read it. This is Mosheed Dayan. He was the defense minister of at the time, he said, the target had been a military structure that had been photographed

from air both before and after the raid. What could have happened here was irresponsibility of high orders from the Egyptians that they set aside a floor or some room for civilian purposes such as a school. Now, do you believe that? You don't, right? It's ridiculous. And the fact is that the New York Times then, same as New York Times there, covering for it. But there was one thing that caught my attention.

They said, no mention was made of the use of Napal in the attack. I said, why would we have such a disclaimer? It's because three months ago, Israel bombed a civilian metal plant killing 70 workers with Napal. So this, when I hear Israel defend itself, when I hear the idea of them, they're liars. And I'm sorry to say, but they are. Do you categorize what Hamas has been doing,

particularly on October the 7th, what Hezbollah did within hours of October the 7th and carried on for the next year what the Hooties have done, a lot of it orchestrated by, doubtless, the Iranian regime. Do you categorize that as resistance, as freedom fighting, or are the elements of all those groups who are genuinely terrorists in their thinking? Oh, you know, someone's terrorists, other ones here. Yeah, but how you categorize it. how I categorize it. I mean, like, I'm an American citizen.

Of course, I don't want to come back and find the FBI raiding my house. So, yes, of course, the terrorists. Did you believe that? Well, at the advice of my lawyer, I would say, that they're terrorists. I don't think you'd be banned from going back to America. You think they were terrible. You know what happened to Scott Ritter? He was the former UN inspector of nuclear weapon in Iraq.

He's a convicted paedophile. Yeah, but like, when he was raided a few months ago, it was because he was talking against Israel. Asa Wynne Stanley, he was a British journalist in London, and his house was raided just last week because he talked about Israel. And this is actually, Pierce, what I like about you is that you are a fierce warrior against cancel culture.

Right? Yeah. If you cancel people for their opinion, we're not living in a free word anywhere, right? I totally agree. So, for example, you have Robert Salah, who was the coach of the NFL jets. He was like a small Lebanese flag,

and he was, I mean, I don't know. It's interesting. I came to America and I was so happy that I can speak about anyone I want. And then suddenly it's like, oh, we can do whatever you want unless if it's like. It is, I mean, it's tangible to me when I go to America, far more than it is in the UK, for example. The support for Israel is pretty rock solid in terms of their political class, in terms of much of the media, if not all of the media.

It's more tangible in America than it is in most other countries. Yeah, including here. Yeah. A lot more criticism of Israel here than there is in America. Yeah, and yet you have Israel having a crazy control on the political apparatus, whether in America or in here, I mean, 13 out of 25 of the labor cabinet here are funded by Israel lobbies, 126 out of 355 MPs are funded by Israel. I mean, out of those 13 members of cabinet is the prime minister.

himself, his counselor, his deputy, the Home Secretary, the Foreign Secretary, and the Secretary of the Treasury, who oversees the arms shipments to Israel. So I don't understand why. I mean, I think we should talk about that more about anything, because that is actually what gives Israel the cover for what they're doing. The, I mean, my take on Israel's government is that Netanyahu, to get back into power, aligned himself with some very hard right-wing people who's spoken in a very genocidal language

about what they really want to do with Gaza and Palestinian people, and that he should go and they should go and there should be new leadership in Israel, but that there should also be no place in power or government going forward for a group like Hamas after what they did on October the 7th. Would you agree with me?

Well, I'm not a Palestinian, so I cannot really... What's your view? Well, what's my view? Yeah, I understand the view of, well, there's two things about it. First of all, when you say that Netanyahu and Smotrish and Bingafir should go, it's as if as the rest of the Israeli political scene is peaceful. As a matter of fact, more than 90% of Israelis in a poll said that they should do more in Gaza. Over 70% of Israelis said that they should actually stop the aid, the humanitarian aid in Gaza. But let's talk about how. Yeah, I understand the thing. Like, if you gave them a state, it would be rewarding terrorists, right?

And we understand, like, you know, I mean, I have to be fair. I know that a lot of Arabs would hate me for saying this. But, like, yeah, terrorism has been actually going in the Middle East for a very long time. I mean, do you remember the bombing of the King David Hotel? 92 British soldiers were killed. The bombing of the Cairo Haifa train over 200 soldiers, British soldiers killed.

The assassination of Falka Bernadote or Lord Moyen, all done by Israeli scientists, militias. They were the terrorists, and they were rewarded of having their own state. So I don't understand the double standard. As a matter of fact, one of the people who were in these terrorist attack was Isaac Shamir, and he was on a terrorist list, English terrorist system, he couldn't come to London until he became a prime minister. But to be fair, to be fair, the Israeli government at the time, 1949, have actually declared the Stern gang as a terrorist group, and they arrested two of them, and they gave them very, very, very, very severe sense.

It's this eight and five years, and then they were released after a month. Do you see any blame on your side for any of this going back to 1948? Yeah. Genuinely, I mean, after a satirical response. I mean, genuinely, when you look back at the history of his conflict, I mean, one of the most powerful pieces I read actually about all this. One that I just thought was very interesting, was a Jewish journalist called Jonathan Friedland at The Guardian.

And he wrote a column where he said he could make a very powerful argument, both for Israel and for the Palestinians, in which he could present a case that they were the more overriding victim of this whole conflict. I'm aware of Jonathan Freeland. What's your view of him? Well, everybody knows he's a liberal Zionist. He's one of the most outspoken people in defending Israel.

But my point was he said that he could construct a case for Palestinians to have a... genuine right to feel aggrieved. You know what else? Can you do the same the other way? You know what else he said? He said, Israel has a very difficult choice of they continue doing it in Gaza or not doing it in Gaza. All we can do is just acknowledge it and see it.

And this is very privileged because he can do it because he's on the stronger side. And this is the thing. It's like, oh, we can acknowledge it. We see it. It's so bad. We're killing civilians. But what we can do? And then we in the reason our hands at the end and so like, oh, that's, It's too bad. It's inevitable.

War is so bad. It's bad. But to your point, yeah, I think the Palestinians had done a grave mistake for not accepting the settlement that they were given by the UN partition. I mean, they were given 47 percent of their land. And, I mean, let's go back. The Belford Declaration was 1917 at the time. There was 60,000 Jewish people living in the 700,000 population, which means them 8%. That number jumped from 8% to 30% after the Second World War and the Holocaust. Now, imagine yourself being a Palestinian, you're having all of these refugees coming to you,

and then they're forming gangs and stealing Iran and killing you. And then the UN said, like, I know what we can do. I'm going to give the people who just arrived 30 years ago, 53 of the land, and I'm going to give the people who are already there who form 70%, 47%. So I would say to you, there are also hundreds of thousands of Jewish people who were displaced from their homes in Arab countries. So was that wrong? Well, I advise that you read Avish Lime,

who is Jewish Iraqi and I think he's also British. That's not the timeline. The timeline was... It is true, though. Yeah, but that's not the timeline. The timeline is important. The timeline was the Zionist gangs, they were killed, they raped, they stole land,

And then they basically evicted the people out of their land. And overnight, 750,000 Palestinians was displaced overnight. Over the few years, of course, now Israel is now the enemy. And there was a lot of rise of nationalism. And yes, in some countries, some countries, that happened. But was that wrong, is my point? Of course. But, like, it is not the whole thing.

What I'm trying to do, and I'm not trying to trap you. trick you. I'm just trying to get you to concede that in a period since 1948, there have been things on both sides. I'm not trying to equivocate either. I'm just trying to get you to, I understand completely everything you've said and are going to say about Israel, and you're very implacable about that, and you have every right to be, so I get that. But can you find criticism of your own side in this argument going back to 48, proper criticism, where if things have been done differently, perhaps we wouldn't be where we are. Okay, so if you are British and you had a million Ukrainian arriving to your home,

and then over 30 years, that number increased to 30% of the population, and then the UN gave you less than half of your country, wouldn't you fight? Wouldn't you resist? Or, or now it's our... That wasn't my question. What was your question? Whether you can find anything to criticize since 1940s? Give me something to criticize.

I mean, there's a lot to criticize. You know the history better than anybody. There is a lot to criticize. Of course. there's a lot of mistakes. I mean, the Middle East has been plagued by a lot of the military dictatorship, of course. I mean, but having mistakes should not, we should not be penalized by having our land taken away from us just because the other side is stronger, right? Because what are you telling your kids, if you're strong and you have enough arms and weapons, you can take whatever land

you want? That's not why the UN was formed. That's not why the Security Council was formed. When you heard that Sinwa, the Hamas leader had been killed, what were your feelings about that? Well, when I heard he was killed, of course, like, I mean, it was, uh, It was, this is something that was actually, I said, like, oh, wow, that's actually, he survived all that. But I think it was a huge mistake by the Israelis to release the footage, because now he's an icon, right? Is he? Well, I mean, again, someone's terrorist is someone else's hero, right? Right. But all he did was lob a piece of wood at them.

Yeah, well, I mean, he was also like he was lost an arm and he was there and it took them three tanks to bring down the house. I mean, hey, you can respect your enemy. But when you saw the footage, for example, of Simwa in one of the tunnels he'd helped create, spending the billions that have been given to... Billions? Well, they were given billions of dollars. And I would say Netanyahu was quite happy to do that because he wanted to create a split between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority.

So I'm not... So where are we blaming Hamas? Why are you blaming him? No, I'm just saying that Hamas had an option of how to spend that money. Yeah. They were the government in power. And they chose predominantly to spend it on a tunnel system and arming themselves. When you see Sima,

walking through that tunnel safely with his wife and his kids and so on. And there's a load of money next to him. A lot of money? It was a huge pile of cash next to where he was supposedly sleeping. When you see that, do you not think that he betrayed his own people? They weren't able to use these tunnels, the Palestinians. He knew when he activated October the 7th and ordered it, what the reaction was likely to be.

He was sentencing to death immediately, thousands of his... own people, none of whom were allowed apart from the Hamas elements to use the tunnel system. I mean, is that not a sickening betrayal of his people? Well, let's talk about the billions of dollars who were with that, what was actually used. I remember a report by Ben Shapiro, and he wrote like videos of Hamas digging up tubes, water pipe, but pipes. And then it's like, and they're using them as weapons. And they said, like, these are the money that was given to the money.

by the EU and they squandered, they took the money. But the thing is what bin Shapiro didn't say that he stole that report from Al Jazeera, he removed the narration. And what the narration was said that this was actually pipes that was installed by the Israelis in order to steal the money from Gaza.

So there's a lot of lying in the thing. I don't dispute this line, but what you can't dispute, Bassel, is that clearly, since 2005, Hamas has spent a fortune of money they could have spent differently with their people. They spent it on this sophisticated and extensive tunnel system. The tunnel system that is bigger than the New York subway system?

It would appear so. 450 miles? I don't know. Do you know how big it is? 450. I mean, nobody... I think if there's 450 miles underneath the tunnel, we have seen droves and droves of tunnels.

What we have seen is small rooms, very, very... So you don't believe that there is a big toll. No, I don't believe. Of course there are tunnels, but I don't believe that there are like 410. 15 months, because that's ridiculous. You want to understand, you tell me that Hamas under siege were able to build a subway system bigger than New York in less than 15 years? I don't think. Did they serve their people, though, with how they spent their life? I'm not sure. I'm not sure.

I don't know. The thing is, like, there's a lot of propaganda. I don't know how much they spend on themselves. I don't know how much they spend on the tons. I don't know how much you spend on the people. But the thing is, these are all side talks. The main talk is, is the daily killing that's happening all through it. Like, I mean, yeah, there could be bad people. They could be horrible people. They could be corrupt people. Could be or are? They are. They are horrible. They are vampires.

Do you believe that? Or are you just saying that for performative reasons? No, I'm saying that because, you know, again, I don't want to go and come and find the FBI at my door. But I'd rather you're honest. I mean, surely we're at the stage of this war now a year on, where I can find a lot to criticize with Netanyahu and his government. And I can find a lot to criticize with Hamas, with Hezbollah, with Iran, with Iran, I can find a lot to criticize all over the place. I think as part of the problem is it's just an extraordinary mess with a lot of people who've been behaving badly.

In my opinion, betraying their people and making it almost impossible to come together for peace. So basically, we punish the Palestinians for being betrayed by Hamas and we punish the Palestinians again by letting them get slaughter every day. You punish the Palestinians in the sense that you're exacting retaliation for a heinous terror attack on your people. That's what the Israelis say. Fine. Okay.

Should they not have responded? For Israel? Yeah. On October the 8, should their response have been to do nothing? Oh, it's the question of like, what would I have done, right? Which is like one of the craziest question of others. Like, what would I have done? What I have done if I magically got teleported into the body of a Syrian? What should they have done?

Again, this is asking after the fact, Pierce. But what do you think now, looking back, what would have been a better course of action? Their argument, Israel, is they went after Hamas. They've just taken out the leader of Hamas, who was literally amongst people in Rafa, which was a refugee camp area. That's where he was hiding, and they killed him there. They say that justifies them going into Rafa. It's an arguable point, obviously.

But you can't deny that Sinoa was hiding there. They also say that all of what they've been doing is a response to what happened to their people. and that they have to stop the group that did that from doing it again, which they're wedded to doing. So what is there a proportionate response? Well, that's been the question I've asked for a year. Yeah, but like, you know, that- I don't know the answer.

That question kind of lost is fidelity after one month of the war. Well, I think you say, for example, you've been critical of me saying, I only do what I do because I'm after clicks, I'm after- I never said that about you. You did? No. No, you did. When?

We found it. Where is it? Where is it? Where is it? Oh. No, I did- It's an interview, Hank. Where is it? Oh, okay.

Yeah, yeah. You said at the Arab Media Forum in June. I don't know why people care that Pears Morgan changes his opinion. Yes. He's a man who seeks trends in increasing viewership, it's true. As he hosts people and sits with them to raise viewers numbers, yes. His opinion is an important to talk, because he only cares about what is trending and what people will talk about. So it doesn't matter that he changed his opinion.

Peers is a man who has a media platform on which we appear to convey our ideas to his viewers, nothing more. And there's nothing wrong with that. By the way, that's your job. actually to get clicks and views. Because the question I was asked is, what do you think of fears? Does he be, does he change your mind? And I said, like, I don't care about him. I understand that.

Because that's your job. But the implication of what you were saying was that that's all I care about. And I don't actually care about what I genuinely care about, which is trying to work out what the world should think about this. What is the correct proportion of response from either side to any of the things that have happened? And I think it is morally complex. You find it morally more straightforward.

I find it complicated. And I've wrestled with how I should think about this. I've gone on a bit of a journey. Now, it doesn't mean that, for example, I would find common ground with you about the way the Palestinian people have been treated for many decades. I do think it's been a form of occupation.

A form of? Yeah. Not an occupation. Not a full-blown occupation. As I said to Israelis when they come on, I don't know how you can argue, but it's an occupation. I know you moved out in 2005,

but the reality is, Once this war started... They didn't move out. Well, once they formally moved down. You basically went out of the room and you locked the room and you basically controlled the perimeter of the room. I was about to say, after October the 8th, when they began to turn off the water supply, the food supply,

the power and so on. It was quite clear they still wield power. But that was going on since 2006. No, I understand. That never stopped. So I'm agreeing with it. You know, you know what... I'm agreeing with it.

Okay, okay. What I'm saying is, clearly, that is a form of occupation. Otherwise, it wouldn't have a power to do it. It's an occupation. Okay, yeah. I mean, look. It's like, say like it's a form of terrorism. Okay, I take that point. Let's call it an occupation and it has to end.

And in my view, I've always hoped and believed there should be a two-state solution. Do you believe that is even remotely achievable now? I don't know, because the thing is you created a mess. You completely destroyed all kinds of... What are you? No, no, no, not you, not you, not you, not you. I mean, I'm like you as... Don't look at me when you said that.

I'm not creating any mess. You created a mess as like you as the strong. part in the conflict. The thing is it is very, it's very disappointing to see, I know that you mean well, but you are trying to two-sided, two-sided. I found this is something, no, but one- There are two sides. Yes, but one side of- You're two one-sided. And understand why. Okay. You know, your wife has family in Yaza. I get it, right? You're going to be one-sided. That's why I've asked you at the start of the interview, when you look back over since 1948, do you find anything to criticize on your side and your inability to articulate any response to that,

I mean, makes me think you are two one-sided. Do you accept that? If I met Mike Tyson the streets and I kicked him and he responded by kicking me in the face, killing me. Yes, I did, but like he has a lethal weapon, his hands. Israel is a hundred, a thousand times stronger and they have the hold of the support, all of the money. But here's my analogy for you with the Mike Tyson thing. If you had taken thousands of people and you've gone to Mike Tyson's house and you committed atrocities on his extended family and friends,

raping them and killing them and saving people alive, I know you don't believe there was any sexual abuse. Well, there was sexual abuse. We can talk about that. Well, we will come to that, but I think it's inarguable. It's been investigated by the United Nations to establish. Have you read the report? Well, I've had journalists who I respect more than any in the world.

Have you read the report? There is indisputable evidence of sexual abuse. Okay, let's talk about that when it comes. We will. We'll agree to differ, I'm sure, but my point is, I believe it has been established. But putting aside that, you don't dispute people were killed. You don't dispute people were set on fire. You don't dispute any of the stuff that happened October 7th that we saw through Hamas's

own cameras, right? Yeah. You don't dispute what we saw with our own. I know what I've seen, and of course, like, and as a matter of fact, I've seen many of them. Yes, it's terrible. Okay. But my point is, if you did all that to Mike Tyson's family and then he... But I'm going to not going to be sure...

It's a one-to-one man. It's not a thousand to one. But if he did all that, and then he did all that, and then he did all that, he punished you in the face and killed you. Yeah. Would you feel that was justified? No, but the thing is... No?

Sir, sir, sir. You're trying to expect... You're trying to expect... You're trying to... Well, I'm throwing your analogy back at you. You're trying to know, that's not the wrong guy. I said like me and Mike Tyson man to man is much stronger than me. I'm not going to show up with like a thousand person.

So if you want to do the analogy, you need to modify the analogy again. And the thing is... I think it's like... We always ask what Israel should do, but we never ask what should do. But we never ask what should the Palestinians do. Because, I mean, I know that there is like really great examples. I mean, there are some peaceful examples. There's a beautiful boy called Meadow.

He's 19 years old. He's an exchange student in Texas. And he was moved from one safe zone to the other, and he ended up into a safe zone. And he was farming. He had a beautiful, beautiful garden. And he was farming and he was blogging about it. His mom died because of lack of medicine,

but he continued to farm. And you know what happened to him? He was killed in an airstrike. You asked me about the Nelson And there's a home uncle Ahmed Aboudrema. He was inspired by the civil rights moves and the anti-apartheid move in the South Africa and he toured the churches and the schools

and the colleges in the United States. And he came back and Israel hit him in an airstrike, killing five of his family, including his son, and he was injured. If Palestinians march, they get killed. If they throw a stone at a tank, they get killed. If they sit at home quietly, someone will come in and take their home away

and they kill them. kill them. If someone just like picking up all of them, they would kill him. So what would that say? And I don't know like our, but it sounds to me not what you're doing. You're construct like I'm justifying October 7th. No, I'm going to put words in your mouth. But it sounds to me like you're saying what else did you expect? Yeah, what else do you accept? If you treat people like animals, they will behave like animals. So you accept they behave like animals? Yeah, some of them did. Yes. Some of them did. Some of them. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But, yeah. Entering a 13,000 different points. So 13,000. 3,000? 3, 3,000. 3, 3, 3,

Hamas, a 13 entry point. So for that you kill 50,000 people? Well, they killed 1,200 people. They kidnapped over 250. No, no, no, no. I said like Israelis for that they kill 50,000 people. Well, hang on, I'm about to give you the numbers as we now believe them. So 1,200 people were killed, of which 400 were believed to be military. Then you had nearly 7,000 more people who were wounded, many of them irrevocably badly. You had over 250 people kidnapped, including a baby who's never been returned, Holocaust. survivors, grandparents and so on. And my question is really, I'm not sure what you would have expected Israel to do, but more pertinently, what should they have done? Well, I don't know,

Pierce, because... But you've got to have some idea. You can't just say what you did is wrong. You've got to have a thing of, given what happened to them, given that huge blow to their country and to their people, given that Hamas said we're going to keep doing this to you, what should Israel have done? Right? I mean, that's like... They haven't mute Gaza. They could have done. They have dropped bombs.

It could have done. My argument to those who say it's genocide is if they'd wanted to, Israel has the ability to blow up the whole of Gaza now. They haven't done that. So... If you really are genocide, why wouldn't you do that? If people are still around, it's not a genocide. If monkeys are still alive, how there's no...

Well, you have two million people residing in Gaza, of which over 42,000 have been killed. Yes. Yeah, okay. So what's... Is that a genocide after a year? So what's the threshold? Well, that's all. If you're waging genocide, Israel has the capability to kill all two million people very quickly.

How about too much killing? Is that good? I think there has been too much killing. How about extreme determination of life? I don't think it's a genocide. I mean, if you don't like the G word, we can use other words. I don't think it's a genocide, is it? We're wasting our time in definition. What is, well, we're not because it's important because what is genocidal is what Hamas has said they want to do to Israel.

What did they say to do? They want to eradicate Israel. Is according to their charter? Yes. Which charter? Well, their original charter said that. And then what happened in 2017? Well, I'd rather go forward to what happened on...

No, no, but what happened? No, hang on. Like, you've been... I know they rewrote the charter. Yeah, but why don't you say that? Because it's overtaken by what happened on October the 7th. So it doesn't happen? No, because, Bastian, because...

I mean, you're telling people as if it's the status code. No, no, I'm not saying that. I'm saying their original charter stated eradication of Israel. And the Hamas spokesman said after October the 7th, we want to keep doing this again and again and again. He said it on camera. That is an existential threat to all Israelis. Well, there's a lot of horrible things that Israelis say on camera.

appears. But the only difference is that Israel acts on it and they have the power to do. But I've already told you that I believe that Benavir and Smodrich have used genocidal language. It's not just them. It's not just them. It's a whole apparatus. They're the two worst offenders in the government. But the rest of the government is terrible. Yeah. So my question is again, and I think it's an important one is I get that you don't think they should have done this the way they've done at Israel. But given they had to respond, how should they have responded? Israel. When they responded in a more precision way,

and we can come to you, I know you don't agree with me about this, but I think you criticise Bill Maher saying that what they did with Hezbollah was in a military success. Well, indisputably, from a military perspective, it was successful. They managed to be very precise

in targeting 3,000 members of Hezbollah at the same time through pages. As an active military strategy, it was very effective. It did kill a lot of civilians as well. Yeah. And that is obviously... It's too bad, of course.

No, no, it is too bad. All civilian death is too bad. But my point is, if they had done that strategy in Gaza, where they had gone after Hamas through pages or whatever, I still think you would have said it was wrong. Israel is the strongest part in this. And they have unlimited supply of money and power. And as you say, in superhero movies, with great power,

there's great responsibility. And the whole idea of, like, how could they respond? And then we sit there discussing this while Israel actually responding on daily basis. By the time we finished this interview, It's a valid question, isn't it? It's a valid question about how you think they should have done differently. Or you think they should have done nothing? No, I didn't say that they said nothing.

So if you assume they had to... Israel has the technology and the ability to do more surgical attacks on that is. But to disseminate a whole region, displacing 100% of the population, I don't think we have... I think it's wrong. Good. I agree with it. Good.

I do. Good. Now, it's not on me to decide to Israel what to do. Maybe Israel could check with itself and see what had led to that. Yes, what happened is terrible, but they need to discuss. But, like, you know, the thing is, there is a roadblock between us, peers, because it seems that we are far apart of actually what happened October 7th. And I know there's a lot of people here came and talked about what happened October 7th.

I would like to have a chance to tell you what, with my point of view, what me and my people think. And you can tell me. Tell me what you think happened. So there are three. big things that made the world accept what is happening now in Palestine and they talked like, what will happen now, what's like how we gather. Three things. The story of what they decapitated babies.

That was not true. Good. So why didn't it didn't the Western media refuted? Why didn't they... Well, it was refuted very quickly. Really? Yes. But how many times you say, how many times the Western media has used that media? Until today, Mike Johnson, the Speaker of the House, is still repeating it. Until now, Benjamin Netanyahu. I know. I know. But it was... But it has been discounted by the media. No, not really. It has.

Not really. Not really. And it didn't, and in the discounted and it was refuting, and I think when you have an apology or a retraction, it has to be. Yeah, but I was accused of saying it. I never said it. You said. No, I didn't say it. You said, you said it came to me as a revelation that I read about 40,

killed 40 murder babies, some of them are decapitated. Yeah, maybe in that, yeah. You said that. Which were early reports. With Joan Collins. Yeah. Right. Which were early reports.

I understand. Which turned out not to be true. I know, but like this, but you understand the shock, the initial shock that made the public turn a blind eye of what's happening. Like, I mean, if I was like a European, I was like, oh, my God. But I would throw it back at you best in this. I don't know if you've seen all the GoPro camera footage from Hamas that they broadcast to the world. But I have seen a lot of it now. I have them.

I've seen. So I think spitting hairs, which is what I would call it, over the nature of the depravity, given the way that they openly boasted and gleefully conducted so much depravity. I just think it's a bit pointless. What's the point? What you're trying to say is, yes, they were barbaric. Yes, they were disgusting. They may not have done this precise thing, so therefore I give them a pass.

But no, but that matters. I know what? Because if I came here on your show and I told you, five million children were slaughtered in Gaza, what would you tell me, Pierce? No, there's only 16,000 and 17,000 people. Because fact matter. Because here's the difference between...

But I told you, I agree with it. But here's the thing, the difference between killing children and decapitating babies, the image of decapitating a baby, that makes... But kidnapping a baby is okay. Never. But they kidnapped a baby. You see that you're coming down to, you're coming back to...

No, no, I'm saying, what's the difference? No, the difference is... You kidnap a baby and take it away from its family. Yeah, and you... But you decapitate 40 babies? That's terrible, right? I mean, the thing is, both of them are terrible. You're trying to...

If you don't might be saying, what you're trying to do is say, well, they weren't quite as medievaly barbaric as that, but they did do this and that's not as bad. And I'm saying to you, actually, it is as bad. Yeah, one person. One person killed, one person. And they did behead people.

Where? On October the 7th. When? Multiple reports of beheadings. Babies? I didn't say babies. I said they did behave people. Again, why would...

Is beheading an adult worse or better than the baby? Like, how many decapitated babies, philistines have you seen already on television? Way too many. Yes, yes. Yes. I can say both are disgusting. Can you? Yes.

You do? Of course. So you accept people were beheaded? But again, media. Do you accept people were beheaded on October the second? I haven't seen anyone to beheaded. So no evidence of any... I've never seen it. What do you think happened then to all these people?

Oh, they were shot point blank. They were some of them. Not more beheaded. You don't believe those reports? I don't believe them, yeah. Come on. But like, even in one or two, it's terrible, of course. But like, okay, you go in.

I mean, I don't understand. My point is, Pierce, is that on October 7, there's a lot of very, very sensational reports. that made people turn a blind eye of what's going in Gaza. One of them is the beheaded babies, right? But that was discounted so quickly. No. It was, I remember. Well, so why is Mike Johnson is still doing it and saying it?

I've not seen him do that, but if he is, he's wrong. Yeah, but many of them still, that is actually the narrative. That's the narrative. That's how we show you. So there's one thing, this is the decapitive, but the second thing, the Hannibal directive, low-key sat here in my chair, and you talked to him and you said,

you read a piece of heart saying that investigation of the IDF ordered Hannibal directive to be used, adding that they didn't know how many soldiers were killed, but it was used. And then two minutes later, he said, like, there's a lot of documentation. And he said, like, I just read it to you. It's never happened. No, it happened, Pierce. Now, in the same report that you quoted. I did later in the interview tell him that I knew that there had been reports inherits that had happened. Yes. And there is another. But just to be clear, that it's not been admitted by the Israeli government.

Yeah, well, they're liars. Yeah, but I'm not saying it didn't happen. I'm just saying, I did say to Loki that there is reporting in Herets, which is one of the big Israeli media publications, that it happened in that order of being given. It has been unequivocally denied by Israel. That's my point. I know, I know, okay.

My point about what Hamas did is almost all of it is indisputable because they gleefully broadcast it to the world. These things are not up for debate. They went house-to-house annihilated. I never deny that and I'm not defending it. So trying to equivocate with... No, I'm not thinking of the scale of the barbarity. No, the scale is important.

The scale is important because if you came to interday, first of all, the original number was 1,400. It was down now to 1,200 and then down to 1,129. That is the final official number. One baby was killed, Milakuhayn, 10 months old. And one kidnap. One kidnap. Right. All right.

And 12 kids were killed between the age of 1 to 9 and 36 were killed. between nine. But you don't believe that any women were sexually abused. Okay, let's talk about that. Yeah. But like, but before that, like, I mean, I just want to just mention something about the, because that's important. This is the pictures.

You know this picture, right? Is this burnt out cars after October? Yes. This is the print. All right. And then we are, we should believe that Hamas went in with AK-47 and caused that kind of damage. Have you seen the footage of a match? going car by car doing that kind of thing.

Yeah, yeah, but they didn't. This is burning and destroyed. How do you know how many of they did? Does this look like 487, like AK-47 thing? Looks like a bunch of cars that have been set on fire, yeah. Yeah, set on fire. Okay, this, and then a few, like, I know... What's your argument that is ready to do about themselves?

This is pictures for something called the Highway of Death from Iraq. This is the same thing. This is Apaches. These are Apaches, right? So this is actually cars... Right, but have you seen the foot? of Hamas going car to car. Yeah, yeah, killing them with machines.

And setting fire to the cars. Yeah, but that is not the actual... That is exactly how they're doing. Yeah, that is like a car of an Apache. These are the passion. It's also the look of a car that's been set on fire. Yeah, but that doesn't cause the... You're just surmising, you're guessing.

No, I'm not guessing. Why are you trying to excuse what Hamas did? One of them is... I'm not excusing. I'm talking about facts. Well, these aren't facts. This is just you saying, look at these pictures, look at those, they look quite similar.

At least... At least... Have you seen many burned-out cars in your life? No. Because I have. Really? And I have two. In the revolution, I had many.

Yeah, but that's... And they didn't look like that? But this is Apaches. Or it's burnt-out cars? So many big cars were there. Yeah, there were a lot. They went car to car to car. Yeah.

They were literally stopping cars and killing people and burning them. Interesting, yes. Why wouldn't you believe it? They wanted us to believe that. They wanted to show the world that. Well, at least there is a shred of doubt that we call about. Well, there's not really... What you're trying to do, Bass.

And I understand it. But what you're trying to do is you're trying to put a little protective shield up to what Hamas did. And my response is, I don't know why you would do that because Hamas didn't want any protective shields of what they were doing. They were gleeful about it. They showed the world in live streaming exactly what they were doing. They were proud of their depravity. You don't need to defend it. I'm not defending it or downgraded or diminish it or reduce it. I'm not. I'm not talking about your claim that you don't think any way. women were sexually abused. Yes. Well, the Times of London, which is a right leaning newspaper,

talked about the UN report, and they said, Pramilla Patton, who confirmed Israeli authorities were unable to provide much of the evidence that political leaders had insisted existed in all the Hamas video footage Patton's team had watched and all the photographs they had seen. There were no depiction of rape. We hired the leading Israeli dark web researchers

to look for evidence of those images, including footage deleted from public sources. None could be found. And Patton said the first letter that I received from the government of Israel talked about hundreds of thousands of cases of brutal sexual violence perpetrated against men, women and children. I have not found anything of that. That is the UN report.

Well, the same UN Special Representative Pramila Patton reported in March 24 that there was, quote, clear and convincing information that Israeli hostages in Gaza experience sexual violence, including rape, sexualized torture, and cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment, that there are reasonable grounds to believe such abuses on guns. And there was also her quotes, reasonable grounds to believe that conflict-related sexual violence occurred during the 7th of October attacks in multiple locations across Gaza periphery,

including rape and gang rape, in at least three locations. The same motion said has refused to testimony obtained by journalists and the Israeli police. I mean, I'm reading the same report. It's the same woman. And I'm reading the same woman. March 2024. So my point is you're reading selectively from that report. And you're reading selectively too?

Well, no, I'm reading a point which actually crystal clear. that there was sexual abuse and violence both in October the 7th and indeed two hostages, which may be ongoing. No, I have read the whole report. And then what you said... Why haven't you read that? I've read that. I've read that.

But if you read that, you would include that, too. Yeah. Yeah. So the thing, you see what you're seeing here? That there is... Well, you're just not reading that out. Well, it appears. I have great respect for you, Bassett.

Yeah, and I also... If you're going to use a woman's quotes to prove your point, you've got to use the rest of the quotes where she actually proves the opposite. Yeah, but in the same... same report they said that all of this was not provided by the Israel any forensic evidence that proved that. It's mostly witnesses that was provided by the difference. Clear and convincing information. Reasonable grounds to believe. But there was no, it was written and there's nothing. I've also read people like Christina Lamb, one of the best war correspondents

in the world who writes for the Sunday Times, who has done some stunning journalism with victims of this abuse, female victims of the sexual abuse and rape. I mean, are you saying she's just made that up? Is she lying? She's an award-winning journalist. Why would she? Well, also, Gettelman, who's an award, Jeffrey Gettelman, who's award-winning journalist of the New York Times, who wrote the screams without voices or, yeah, screams without words. His article was completely panned by 60 journalists who said that that article was a shame. Are you saying that Christina Lamb just made her reporting out? I don't know who's Christina Lamb. You've never heard of her?

No. Literally one of the top war correspondents in the world, renowned for her utter impartiality. Yeah, but the thing is... From a series of reports of women who were raped and abused by Hamas and continued to be so, the hostages. And you don't believe any of it. You think none of this happened?

No, I don't believe. You see, I find that disheartening that you wouldn't believe that. No, I don't believe it. It makes me think, Bessim, that... And I listen, I'll say to you, I have great respect for you. But it makes me think you look at it through such a partisan... prison that you can't even when confronted with obvious I just confronted you with the same reports.

Well, yeah, but you said, I showed you had the Hannibal report. But your point you're trying to make is, well, all these cars were obviously blown up by Israel. Hamas didn't do that to any of them. Hamas didn't rape or abuse any women. And it's all bullshit. Of course they did. Really?

Yes. Okay. You know it. No. In your heart, you know. I don't think so. You don't want to concede an inch. No.

And understand why? Because you think that actually the bigger picture is Israel's behavior like this for so along towards the Palestinians with their occupation, apartheid, as a matter of fact, we have raping Palestinians on camera. But you think it diminishes your argument if you give an inch to any of this stuff? My point to you, it would actually, I think it would strengthen you, not diminish you, if you were able to concede these things that happened, rather than try and defend it or try and excuse it or pretend it didn't happen.

This particular point, Pierce, has been debated by so many people on both sides. The woman you quoted, I've literally just read to you. And I've just written some for you. You didn't read out what she's actually about. And you didn't trade out mine. So that means that this is a very conflicting report at best. All right? And the thing is, many of those witnesses like Chris Cohen on shirry mendays,

they have changed her testimonies many times. And they made their way all the way to Tapper on his show. And he has been laundering the whole idea about the mastery day after day. every day. Even the New York Times, they were going to make a podcast the daily about that article and they withdrew because there's not enough evidence. Doesn't, okay, let's say I'm wrong. Let's say that all of the Israel. Isn't that at least a shred of doubt that we should investigate this further? Because in that report, Pamera Patton said that we sent five requests to the Israeli authorities and one request to the

Palestinian authorities and none of our requests in the Palestinian... But as I read to you, she then goes on to say there's clear and convincing information of hostages, Israeli hostages, having sexual violence, including rape, sexualized torture. And also the commission was also unable to verify reports with sexualized torture and gentle mutilation. Additionally, the commission found some specific allegation to be false, inaccurate, or contradictory,

with other evidence of statutes and discounted these from its assessment. But what is, the central point of your argument is that Hamas are not quite as bad as we thought on October. No, no, I don't care about Hamas. I care about the Palestinian people killed every day. How can you not care about Hamas? The thing, you know what? Hamas is terrible, man.

Is like, is there a horrible rapist, You know what? Hamas did everything. Hamas did all of that. Let me ask you. Let me ask you. Should Hamas retain any power coming out of this in Gaza? I don't know if any of them would be left. But should they retain power on principle?

It's up to the Palestinian people. What do you think? I don't know Hamas. By the way, I told you before, I'm not a big fan of Hamas. As a matter of fact, Hamas being an Islamic faction, I'm not big fan of the product. What about Hasbalah? Same. I'm not a big fan of them either.

But you should not punish a whole group of people, our population, because a militant group that is embedded within the population did some atrocities. Israel has the absolute ability to locate and kill people through their satellite. And there is no excuse for blowing up empty universities or mosques or churches or destroying 90% of the infrastructure of a place. No matter what they did because the people who did it, they're horrible, they are zombies, they're crazy, they're terrorists, you should not punish a whole people. That's collective punishment. Let me ask you, I don't disagree with some of what you just said. Okay. I do think there's been a

collective punishment. I think it's wrong. It's gone way too far. I think that Gaza has just been systematically destroyed. And I have no idea what the plan is for after this because the Israelis doesn't seem to have a plan. And it worries me enormously now the rhetoric about going after the Iranian regime and where that will lead because of the way that global politics is working in relation to Iran. These are, you know, big picture issues. We may get time for that. Let me ask you specifically about the Jerusalem Post. We've accused you repeatedly of anti-Semitism.

What do you say to that? Everybody's an anti-Semitism in the eyes of Israel. Do you think you are or not? What is anti-Semitism? Somebody who has a hatred of Jewish people because of their Jewish ethnicity? Good. Where did I show that kind of Jewish people? How do you feel about Jewish people?

I mean, should I go do the white man thinking? Like, most of my friends are Jewish. No, no. How do you feel about Jewish people? Like any other people? Like any other people? What are you talking about? You've been accused of...

So I've been accused of being a CIA... Yeah, I'm not saying you're guilty. I'm just saying you've been accused of so many things. You've been accused of so many things too, right? And it's annoying. Like, no, the thing is anti-Semitism. Anti-Semitism has turned into, if you criticize Israel, you're anti-Semitism. I agree.

Yeah, so it's... It's been used as a protective shield against criticism. It's a way to shut down conversation. But there are also lots of genuine anti-Semites. Yes. who do hate Jewish people and want to kill them And there is a lot of people

who hate Muslims And there's a lot of people who hate gays And there's a lot of people who hate white people Right Yeah What do we do about where we are With this situation now What's the solution?

Solution? Yeah, genuinely I mean, I'm not a political analyst But again And I'm sorry being one-sided But there is one side Who has all the power All the money

All of the weapons They have been controlled the political spectrum. This is how many people in the Congress. So how do we get to a solution? Do you believe in the idea of a... Or do you believe in a two-state solution, for example? I don't know.

I mean, it's not up to me. Could it work? Could you have a Palestinian state side-by-side with the Israeli state? How would it work with Israel is taking all of the West Bank and making it cut into small a Gaza? How could it work? Again, I told you a quote from a book by Obama, and I'm telling it again, the problem with the Palestinian

Israel conflict is that one side of them is very powerful, and the other side is very weak. Why would Israel concede? But if Israel has the power, as you say, and I'm not denying they have a lot of power, if they have the power, how should that best be wielded to try and find peace through out of the wars? I mean, I remember Norman Ireland, right? People said it was intractable. Loyalists and Republicans wanted to kill each other all the time, living side by side in utter enmity. And they did eventually get there. They had fresh leadership, and they got there. The terrorists became politicians.

They worked it out. They got peace. There is now peace in Northern Ireland, where many people for decades didn't think they would be. Do you see any parallels there? Because the stronger side, which is Britain at the time, they kind of like they were reasonable. They didn't go and assassinate the leaders of the IRA, right? Well, they tried. They tried, but they did.

They did kill a lot of IRA members, yeah. Yeah, but there's people, there's negotiators that you don't kill. What they didn't do was go and target and attack civilian areas with bombing to kill. IRA terrorists. That's good. Well, they didn't do what... So why didn't England do that? Why did they, they were like IRA ties? Why did they go in and just like destroy Belfast? Why didn't they do that? Because their own side were also living in those homes. Yeah. They all lived amongst each other. No, because... Well, you don't have in Gaza, you don't have Israelis living side by side. So wait, wait, wait a minute. So if there were Israelis living, you would protect those lives, but the Palestinians...

No, I'm saying, Israel is obviously is far more unlikely to... bomb a civilian population area, even if they think Hamas are lurking inside it, if Israeli people are also living there? Yes, because they don't care. So that's the difference between that and Norman Ireland, is my point. Yeah, because they don't care about the Palestinians lives. Well, it doesn't involve Israeli lives. The analogy with Northern Ireland would be, in that circumstance, it would.

I don't know how can we move forward with one side having all the power and it. I mean, like, if Israel is actually... sincere about it, they should end up the UK. I mean, they should do the mildest thing, which is like stop the settlement. I agree. They are not.

Somebody asked me, the Palestinian ambassador to the UK said to me, do you think what's been happening with the settlements, expansions in the last year on the West Bank? Is that terrorism? I said, yes, it is. To me, it's what's been happening. So basically, it's terrorism. So Israel is committing daily terrorism every single thing.

I agree. On the West Bank, I think, and there's a certain point, something had to give. And it's terrible, but something had to give. Again, if you treat people like animals, they behave as animals. So how do we get... I mean, I don't know. I mean, like, do we expect the Palestinian to sit down as well-behaved victims while they're being killed? Well, they should be slaughtered while not making noise. That's impossible.

But who should bring Palestine out of this? I don't know, because all of the Nelson Mandela's are either killed or in jail. Should it be other Arab countries? I don't know. Some people talk about a coalition of UAE or Saudi. I don't have a solution. I don't have a solution for you. Really? Have you not thought about it? I'm not having to because the solution is very difficult and complicated when Israel is doing what is doing and having all of the support of the Western media and the Western government.

What should America be doing? Get off the phone and said, stop as easy as it is. But they don't. It's terrible. Why haven't they done that, do you think? When did they ever do it? What has been President Biden and... Oh, yeah.

They would have like a slap on their hand every time and then and they stop and they pause the arms and then they will continue doing it again. No. I mean, they're doing it again. And they think it's like they're using the same exact thing. You know, it's like, do you remember the one that I saw you, that I showed you this one? Similar. This was like the kill between the Palestinians. Yeah. Remember that?

Now, they go into Lebanon and they're doing the same thing. Look at that. These are the Lebanese. But they're also destroying Hezbollah. Yeah, but they're at what cost? And the thing is like, if you look at, If you look at that, remember when I gave you, like, what is the exchange rate? It seems that the best investment that you can do is Israeli souls

because they never depreciate Israeli souls. Invest in Israeli souls. It's an oxymoran, right? I don't know if they have one. Given that Hezbollah's response on October the 8th was to start unleashing rockets at Israel, which they carried on doing all year. At what point did they not expect... They didn't unleash rockets as Israel.

Mahdi Hassan already told you that they made it in Shabakh farm. No, he was spilling hairs. What? He was spilling heads. No. Okay, but it's land that Israel's claimed the disowns this 1967. Okay, so they say it's theirs. You know what's the difference?

But they knew what they were doing? You know what's the difference between Hezbollah and Israel? Al-Du'll, I'm not a big friend of Hezbollah. Hezbollah always targets military bases. That's not true. They've killed civilians. Yeah, how many? Not as many as Israel.

But they've killed civilians. They killed 42. But the idea, yeah, so the idea they're only targeting, they're only targeting military. And Israel killed a thousand, a thousand for 42. That's like a one to 20. But they've also targeted thousands of Hezbollah very precisely with these pages. And then they kill the thousand people.

Right. Yeah. So it's not really targeted. And when you go and vaporize a whole square or a whole block killing 200 people, I mean, the thing is we talk about terrorism, right? We talk about terrorism, terrorism, terrorism, right? But we never... Is killing terrorists, even if you kill civilians in the process,

is that in itself an act of terrorism to you? So what's the proportionality, right? You tell me? I know, I don't know, but it's not one to 1,000. But if you keep saying you don't know, it's a convenient get-out. You're a very smart guy. Will you do the same thing? I ask you, I ask you, what should the Palestinians say?

I don't know. Yeah, but your answer to whenever I say, what should Israel do? You don't have one for any of it. Stop what they're doing. That's actually what they know. I do. I'm not sure you do, because you don't like Amas, you don't like Isbola, you don't like terrorism. You know they've been waging terrorism against Israel.

I don't know what you expect Israel to do. What do I expect Israel to do? What do I expect the people that actually have received the occupation and the killing of Israel every day. I mean, like, you're killing them. I mean, should they just, like, stay silent? So they're all resistance, all freedom fighters? Yeah, for their people, yes.

In your mind, are they? If I was living, if I was living in Palestine, if I was in Lebanon, I would actually cheer on those people because basically they're the bigger bully with bigger guns that are killing me. So, yeah. I mean, a lot of people who live there don't agree,

but I don't know. A lot of people I know in the Lebanon do not agree with that at all. Yes, I understand. They think his bowler has been a very insidious influence on that country. Of course. But even those people who hate Hezbollah, they don't like what Israel is doing to them.

But what is it? About 30% of people in Lebanon support Hezbollah. 70% don't. I don't have these numbers. The two-thirds of the country don't support them. Yes. They don't represent the people. Oh, good. So they don't represent the people.

And yet you're killing people around Hezbollah, even if they don't represent them. So why? Well, they're killing, in their eyes, they're killing terrorists. Well, in their eyes, they're doing whatever. In their eyes, they were thinking that whatever school that they bombed in Egypt was inside the military base. Do you accept, as we've been talking, though, that it is complicated. It's not simple. No, it's not really complicated.

There is an occupation that should end. If the occupation didn't happen, all of that wouldn't have happened. This problem was... You believe it, if the occupation, as you put it... Yes. And I don't dispute the terminology. But if you believe if they just ended that tomorrow, any form of control over Palestine,

there would be no more attacks or ideology of wanting to attack Israel after that. See, I think it's very naive. There would be. These groups are wedded to the elimination of Israel. Houtis, Hezbollah, Hamas, the Iranian regime, they want Israel, done, gone. And there's a lot of countries in the world.

Surrendering any kind of control over Gaza, for example, is not going to stop that. So how do you... So how do you... Well, no, but how do you move to a place where you no longer do it? You don't expose your country, as they put it to chronic... As much as I don't like all of these groups that you have mentioned,

but those people have actually where... It's a kind of a cause and effect, right? Because again, and Mahdi Hassan told you, there was no Hezbollah in 1978. There was no Hezbollah in 1982. And there was no Hamas in 1970s. But the ideology existed. Really? Yeah, the groups weren't set up.

But the ideology existed. Where was the ideology in 1978? Well, you can't. Where were Hezbollah in 1878? Anyone in those places hated Israel in 1978? Israel doesn't need an excuse to go in and occupy and kill people. They're already talking to you about it. But they say they do.

But I think it's Pierce. You already have people in Israel talking openly about a greater Israel, about like a huge expansion of Israel. Tomorrow they will find a Hamas in the West Bank. They will find the Hal Hezbollah in Georgian. They will find a Houthi in Syria. What do you think they really want to achieve Israel? Expansion.

Expansion. To what end? I don't know. You should ask them because they have. I do ask them and they deny it. Of course. Well, how many times did they deny things? How many times did they deny killing UN workers?

How many times did they die? And the thing is, Pierce, We have, you can talk whatever you want about the Houthis and the Hezbollah and whatever, but you have liars. You have people who are patent. We have liars on both sides. Yes, but one of them has the power and one of them is taking my tax dollars and your tax dollars to be supported. Iran has power.

You would agree? Yeah. And Iran is funding and training Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis. So they are exercising and wielding their own power in a proxy manner. So is there much difference between Israel wielding its power as a state? against Iran wielding its mighty power through proxies. Okay. I remember when you went on triggerometry,

you talked about Benjamin Netanyahu being a great visualist, right? A great. Visualist. What do you mean? Like, he was like, he saw you, what was the word that he used? I don't know, like when he started. Oh, he sent me to him a map behind the desk, yeah. Right?

And he said, and he put like his hands around the country around and he turned against it. Which is a, it was a powerful optic. It's not really. It's actually, it's very deceiving. Why? Because most of the countries that he was measuring the hands like Egypt and Saudi Arabia are actually with either peace treaties, so they're almost normalized things. So basically, most of the huge, bad, big countries, they are not a threat to Israel. But shouldn't that be where the Middle East should go?

Shouldn't all the countries have normalized relations? May I just, may I just mention my point? The thing is, when you put it like that, you're basically giving the idea of like, oh, look at this small victim countries that they have no power. Now, so the first thing, most of these huge countries have peace treaties with them. The second thing, size is not everything, because with the same concept, England is very small compared to India and Pakistan. India is very small compared to all of their colonies. It's not really about the size, it's about the firepower. It doesn't matter if David has half the size of Goliath, if Goliath is armed with a sword and David is armed with a machine gun.

Israel, you can talk about the proxies and the hosties, but the repower, they're basically, they are supported by not just America at England and Germany and France. Do you not think that after the normalization of relations with, for example, UAE and Israel and so on, that it was clear that Saudi wanted to go down that same path, almost certainly still do, that Iran saw that as a massive threat to them and their power in the region. And that is why they helped orchestrate October the 7th to derail that process. I really don't know how did this happen? This is like a very inside information that I think political... It's not bad.

Many people have reported it. So, okay. It makes perfect sense, right? Maybe. And if that's true, what's your view of how that should play out? I mean, the thing is even... Wouldn't it be better if they all had normalized relations with Israel? I think...

All those Arab countries? Yes, I would love to have peace in the Middle East, but peace comes from justice. And the thing is, if you get peace just because you're subject, you get the people, that's not peace. Shouldn't Arab countries take charge then out of this of Gaza, of the Palestinian people, and shouldn't they lead the way? One of the arguments the Israelis say is, well, the Arab countries are nowhere anywhere to be seen

when this stuff blows up. It's always left to us to handle it. If Arab countries went in and took charge of Arab people in... What do you mean to take charge? What do you want them to do exactly? Well, help form sustainable, peaceful governments. And would Israel let out? Well, if they had normalized relations with Israel,

say it's UAE leading it, right? Or Saudi. And they said, look, we want to have normalized relations with Israel. So we're going to make sure there's no more of this stuff going on in Gaza, okay, leave it to us. And it was driven by Arab countries and Arab politicians. And they worked out a way to rebuild Gaza and to give the Palestinian people a genuine future, which didn't involve reliance on terror groups. And because of their relations with Israel, Israel could trust them to do that. Is that not, in the end, the only way this is going to happen? That's a very wishful thinking because Israel will not allow anybody to interfere.

Maybe not. Yeah, Israel has... normalizing relations with a number of Arab countries. Yes, but they're normalizing with Saudi, UAE, Egypt. It doesn't matter. Doesn't it? The matter is the occupation. Again, I'm going to go back to the same thing.

I know I'm like a broken record. Sorry, just to be clear, that would also involve the end of any Israeli occupation of any kind. Yeah, okay, if you end the occupation, if the Palestinians accept the deal. Yes. You know, because the thing is that there's a lot of, I'm sorry to say, and I'm not meaning you, of course,

there's a lot of deception and lies about what actually happened because most of the urban myth is that the Palestinians have squandered their chance time as time. Ihood Barak was on your show last week and he told... Harofat did walk away from what would have been the best deal. That is not true. That is true. Bill Clinton taught me through the whole thing.

Okay. I don't think he's a liar about something. He is a liar. Do you know why? Really? Yeah, he is. Why would you lie? Because in 1998 during the negotiations, Netanyahu took him myself.

and he told him that we destroyed the tapes. And when he said the story to the tapes, you're talking about Monica Lewinsky tapes. This is actually like an article from the Times of Israel, when actually this was used by Netanyahu, these tapes as a leverage for, to him to release Jonathan Polo The spy. Sounds like a bonkers conspiracy theory.

Times of Israel. Okay, okay, but like, can I, can I feel? Okay, I mean, like, you know, sometimes... Netanyahu destroyed Molok-No, no, no, he didn't destroy it. No, no. He blackmailed the sitting president with sex tapes, with Do you believe that? Yes, I believe that.

I don't believe that. I'll tell you what happened. I tell you, by the way, I can give you that to read it. It's the Times of Israel, I'm not making this up. And there's actually like, I have multiple books about it. And then, you know, then Bill Clinton went to Georgetown to release Jonathan Pollard, who was a spy who stole the nuclear secrets of America. And then he was jailed and he was giving the Israeli citizenship in jail.

And then he went to Georgetown, Bill Clinton, it's like, release Jonathan Pollard. And it's like, I will resign if that happens. So I don't know. if I'm a president and I have sex tape against me by the prime minister of Israelis, I would lie. Because what happened... Who do you think would be the best... I just want to finish something about Taaba. Because what happened in Taaba, there is a very interesting video on YouTube between Jouz Korobe and Micah Brazinski.

And they were hosting Mr. Javini Brazinski, who's Michael's father. And Joe Scorrabo said the same exact thing. He said, like, yes, Raifat walked for the best year of heaven. And then Brzezinski, who was the security, he was the national security advisor. To Bill Clinton, he said, it is, your information are so bad, it's embarrassing to listen to you because what happened is that Arafat didn't walk away. He said, I need some time to take this deal to the Arab leaders because the deal was very controversial. And what happened is that Ihood Barack left Tabah, he went back to, and he lost the elections in Israel.

So it was terminated by Bahraq, by Ehud Barak leaving Taaba. That's not the way Clinton recalls it. Yeah, well, he's a lie. Or maybe they're all lying. Well, Bill Clinton is a very, I mean, he lied. He lied. He lied. He lied.

Who would be the better winner of the American presidential election in two weeks? A better? For getting this sorted in the Middle East. I don't know, because Trump or Harris? Trump and Harris, both of them are competing over who's Israel's favorite bitch? I mean, I don't understand. You wouldn't make any difference. I came to America.

I was so happy to vote in the United States. And I was like one of those people, blue no matter who. But then I see the Republicans and the Democrats, they fight tooth and nails about everything. They fight on health care, about abortion, about guns. And then when it comes to Israel, it's like, who's better serving Israel? It doesn't make any sense. I mean, when Netanyahu went in Congress, he was like received like a rock star.

It was. I was so surprised. And then I was watching it and I thought like, this is how Liberty dies to a thunderous applause. Well, it just shows that there is, from many American politicians, they will show blind support to Israel. Yeah, but that's not right. That is not right, but that's what it is.

That's terrible. I mean, that is not right. I mean, I don't know where that would take us. You've done a song which I wanted to end with because it just made me chuckle. What's the song called? It's about BB Striis. Mibi's charge, he's also facing corruption charges.

Just take a little look at this. All right, no need to stand up. It's the ICC in the house. Hey, you mother fuck. What's up? The sentence, no brainer. You'll see. My mind is made up and my verdict. He'll go straight up to jail, BB, your time's up.

And the case number, ah, wait, I don't even remember. Allow's count of all the innocent souls you daily murder. I sentence due to life in prison. That's only for starters. It's the fastest sentence I pass. He's not making my job harder. I mean, it may be chuckled, but the irony of this, course is that Netanyahu's never actually been popular as popular as he is today since the start

of all this on October the 7th. Yeah. Because the more he goes after Hamas and has bothered, the more Israeli people seem to support him. Yeah, I mean, he is a guy who have bragged many times about sabotaging the peace accords. He is the guy who went in front of Congress and told them that you should invent Iraq, like a war that you have opposed. Right. And again, it brings me back to the thing, I mean, the Gaza and the West Bank and all of that, I mean, it would happen again and again and again again. I came here for the promise that I can choose people who can really represent me, but I am basically seeing people who don't really care about their American citizens.

I've seen more tweets from American senators and congressmen standing with Israel, and I saw them standing with the victims of the hurricane in South Carolina, even like the Their senators will go there and support Israel. It doesn't make any sense. It doesn't make any sense, Pierce, and it's wrong. And the fact that you have a British journalist living in London and then he gets raided by the counter-terrorism police because he talked about Israel, that is very alarming, Pierce.

That is more dangerous than anything. Well, I believe, as you know, in free speech and it being protected. You should bring AESA on your show. Yeah. I'm not trying because this is a fellow journalist who have been talking about the Israeli crimes. And by the way, he can talk more better than like me about the Hannibal directive.

You should invite him when you're sure. I want to end with this, because you've just signed up to do Arabs Got Talent in Saudi Arabia. And I, of course, more's a talent in the show of charge. I know, I know. Britain and America's got talent. So finally we've reached a place of commonality.

Yes. Yes. But you're more veterans. Any advice for me? Well, do you think you only landed this very lucrative gig because of my health? Sir, sir. you have all the credit.

Are the words you're looking for? Thank you, Piers, Bassett. And I told you have all the credit. But again, thank you, Pierce. But hey, because of me, you started a YouTube channel. So how about thank you, Bessam? Very true. Thank you, Bessam. Thank you so much.

What I would say to you, the best advice, Simon Cowell said to me, when I did America's Got Talent, which was before the British one. And he said, you can be as mean and tough as it like in your judgments. You just have to be right 80% of the time. Oh, that's good.

Because if the public are watching and they don't agree with you and you're being mean, it doesn't work. Yeah, I'm not... But if they agree with you, the public are merciless when it comes to bad time. Well, you know, in 2014, you were chosen by mirror to be the most likely celebrity to be... For housewives to have a steam relationship with... That was not just come out. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. It's new. Sorry, yeah, it's new.

Most housewives in Britain preferred wanted to have an affair with me over Brad Pitt. Wow. How do you feel about that? You know what? I feel about it. That's a crazy visual. I feel bloody good about that. I cannot unsee this. I didn't think I still had it in me.

You've come all the way from LA for this interview. It's the third time we've met. I always enjoy our conversations. I think they're very stimulating. I think we have a good rapport. I'd like to keep you going. Come back again. Maybe I'll come and see you on Arab's Got Talent.

Yes, please. That'd be fun. Thank you so much. Nice to see you. Thank you. All the best. Thank you.