Piers Morgan Uncensored - ‘We Should INVADE Israel!’ Trump To Sign Tehran Agreement | Middle East Debate

Episode Date: June 17, 2026

Just weeks after threatening Iran with devastating consequences, President Trump is preparing to sign a new agreement with Tehran - a dramatic shift that is raising questions across Washington, Jerusalem and the wider Middle East. The proposed deal would see US and Iranian officials continue negotiations over Tehran's nuclear programme, despite concerns from critics that many of the key issues which sparked the conflict remain unresolved. Meanwhile, tensions are growing between the White House and Israel, with reports that Israeli officials were not involved in the negotiations despite the agreement's potential implications for the conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon. Trump's increasingly critical rhetoric towards Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has only fuelled speculation about a widening rift between the two allies. As the agreement divides both Trump's supporters and his critics, scrutiny is mounting over whether the deal represents a diplomatic breakthrough - or a major concession to Iran. Piers Morgan is joined by General Mark Kimmitt, US Army veteran and Assistant Secretary of State, Lieutenant Colonel Chuck De Vore, former US Army intelligence officer, Hagar Chemali, foreign policy analyst and former Bush and Biden official, Cenk Uygur, founder and CEO of The Young Turks, and Brian Tyler-Cohen, host of No Lie to discuss. Piers Morgan Uncensored is proudly independent and sponsored by: Cozy Earth: Go to https://cozyearth.com/PIERS for up to 20% off. 00:00 Piers monologue on Iran latest 04:40 Cenk Uygur is “totally in favour” of Donald Trump's peace deal 07:10 Is Trump’s relationship with Benjamin Netanyahu on the brink? 10:03 AD: Cozy Earth: Go to https://cozyearth.com/PIERS for up to 20% off 12:50 Is Trump’s saber rattling still believable? 16:25 Why is America committing to invest in Iran as part of the deal? 21:00 The panel react to Mike Pence’s criticism of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) 23:37 Cenk Uygur accuses Ben Shapiro of being ‘team Israel’, not ‘team America’ 28:30 The panel discuss the weight of Lebanon in this deal 33:00 Does Trump regret entering this war? 38:10 Cenk goes OFF on nuclear double standard with Iran and Israel 45:05 Why can Israel have a nuclear weapon but not their neighbours? 50:39 Cenk goes off AGAIN over Israel’s nuclear domination in the Middle East 54:00 Brian Tyler Cohen: “Donald Trump is regretting criticism of Obama’s deal” 57:56 The panel debate the $300 billion US-Iran agreement Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's a memorandum of understanding, and if I don't like it, we'll go back to shooting at them, dropping bombs on their head. Of course they could start the military campaign up again. So by your logic, Iran should have a nuclear weapon to deter Israel from invading it. I mean, you just said it. I don't know what your relationship is with your country of birth, but you want to talk about genocide. Let's talk about Armenian. We're not responsible for Israel. Israel is not our daddies.

Israel might be your daddy, but Israel's not our daddy. Everybody says things they don't mean in the heat of the moment, but the soap opera love triangle between Tel Aviv, Tehran and Trump is a masterclass in mixed signals. When the US and Iran signed their memorandum in Geneva on Friday, if they sign it, Iran will be represented by their foreign minister and parliamentary speaker. Both of those men have been in government for years,

meaning they are very much a part of the same regime accused by the US of massacring 40,000 protesters and funding terrorism across the world. They were evil enough to warrant a threat of total eradication along with the entire Iranian civilization. But that was then. You talk about regime change. I never cared about regime change.

It's never a part, but I guess you have regime change because you know better than anybody. The first group, they're all dead. Dealing with people that I think are very rational people, and they were nice to deal with. They were strong people, smart people. I think actually they're smarter than that. the first and second group.

But they're not radicalized and they're, you know, looking to help their country. Well, President Trump is also losing interest in the so-called nuclear dust. Iran's uranium stockpile and its ability to quickly make a nuclear weapon became a central pretext for war. But the current agreement is only an agreement to carry on talking about it. Iran says it's only, quote, reiterating its previous position. And retrieving the nuclear dust, well, that might not be worth a hassle after all.

To go get it is a big deal because they say only China and us have the equipment where you can even get. The whole mountain is collapsed on time. We have cameras on it. You could make the case why are you even bothering because it's not really valuable. It's probably half a million dollars worth.

It's not very valuable. Meanwhile, the Israelis who launched and fought the Iran war alongside the US were not given access of this agreement at all. That's despite Iran's insistence that the deal includes Lebanon, where Israel is at war with Hezbollah. Benjamin Netanyahu, until recently praised as the heroic wartime leader, is now a difficult guy who should be thankful we're doing this. President Trump has a gift for making big points in plain English, and in his latest criticism with Netanyahu, he summed up what many people have been arguing for several years.

Israel is fighting Hezbollah too long, and too many people are being killed. And you don't have to knock down an apartment house every time you're looking for somebody because there are a lot of people in those apartment houses and they're not all Esbalah, that I can tell you. Well, the Iran War caused an enormous rift among Trump's supporters. Now, the agreement is doing the exact same thing in reverse. Mark Levine, held by Trump, as the true voice of Maga

is having what looks like a nervous breakdown. And most of the war's biggest supporters cannot stomach the idea that Iran is about to get $300 billion in financing while charging a toll on the Homoose Strait and effectively using Trump to rein in the IDF. The deal is absolutely terrible. There's no getting around it, said Will Chamberlain. The president should renege. A complete disaster, added Mark Tyson.

If nothing else, the Iran deal was supposed to draw a line under a saga. The president clearly regrets right now is failing even to do that. Well, joining me now is Cenk Yuga, the founder and CEO of the Young Turks. Mark Kimmett, the US Army veteran and assistant secretary of state, Lieutenant Colonel Chuck DeVore, who's the former US Army intelligence officer, and the foreign policy analyst and host of YouTube show on Oh My World, Hagar Hamali, and Brian Tyler Cohen, the host of No Lie, who's also with us. So welcome to all of you.

Cheng Yuga, I'm going to start with the extraordinary words I never thought I'd use, which is probably the biggest cheerleader for Trump's deal is Cheng Yuga. Yeah. So listen, I didn't want to go on the war in the first place. I thought it was a bad idea. You all know that, right? But our job right now is not to say, oh, Obama's deal was better. We could have that discussion. But the most important thing is, let's get out of the war. Let's go towards peace. So if Trump is going towards peace and towards American sovereignty, I'm 100% in favor. of it. And so what do we want this theoretically this war for? To end the any chance they have a nuclear weapon, well, this deal ends that. And then after the war started, we need to open up the Strait of Hormuz. It opens up the Strait of Hormuz. So American interests are completely covered. We're done. The only reason why we'd want to stay in Miriam's war is to appease the Israelis.

And I think that every single person on air right now saying we have to stay longer is saying we have to stay longer for Israel so that Israel could fight Hezbollah and Hamas better so they could take southern Lebanon so they could drag us into endless wars so they could destroy their regional opponents so they could have no one to defend Lebanon, Palestine, Syria, and every other place that Israel wants to expand to. Why? Why do we care what Israel wants at all? It's none of our business. Our business is covered. Trump made a deal. It's perfectly fine. Let's get the hell out of there. We have no business in there in the first place. zero American interests.

So as you see people betraying us and telling us that we have to stay in a war for Israel, make note of it. And let's also make no one more thing, peers. Marjorie Taylor Green, Tom Massey, were excommunicated. How dare they criticize Trump and want the Epstein files released? Now I see all sorts of Republicans, politicians, pundits, all daring to disagree with Donald Trump, saying he's wrong, attacking Donald Trump. Where are the consequences?

Are they going to be excommunicated? Or as usual, does Israel first get a special rule? They're allowed to bash Trump. They're allowed to criticize Trump. They're allowed to be for war. They always get special different rules. So no, they won't get excommunicated. And we're about to find out who runs the Republican Party and who runs this country.

So if Trump says Israel doesn't run it anymore and we're going to leave and go to peace, God bless. I'm totally in favor of that. Okay. Hey, Hegah Hamali, welcome to Unsensit. It seems pretty clear from the rhetoric coming out of Donald Trump that his steadfast support for Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel is at best teetering on the brink

and potentially something heading for a complete severance here. Is that your reading of this? And is it really because from the very start of this war, you've had two countries with competing agendas? and that Israel's agenda is just simply not the same as Donald Trump's and isn't susceptible to the same political and economic risk that Donald Trump, I think, is now getting out of his war to try and counteract. No, so there's a lot, there's not, there's a lot inaccurate there in that question

because you have to, first of all, being able to distinguish between the state of Israel and the U.S. relationship with the state of Israel and our mutual interests, and also we be Netanyahu. So let's start with that. The relationship with the United States in Israel is always strong. I worked in foreign policy for over 20 years. I continue to work in foreign policy. And we have to distinguish.

We have disagreements with world leaders all the time, including our closest friends. You know that. You're from the UK. We've had ups and downs. That doesn't mean our special relationship weathers. They have mutual beneficial interests. And I should add, by the way,

like I said, they worked in foreign policy, particularly in the Middle East, for a long time. for a long time, but specifically in counterterrorism. And it should be known that the relationship with Israel is not because it's out of some kind of charity. The derangement around Israel is really odd to me. And I personally don't deal in hyperbole, I have to tell you. I deal in fact only.

And a number of the terrorist plots here in the United States are thwarted thanks to our partnership with the Israelis, because when you look at nefarious actors like the Iranian regime and their terrorist proxies and other Islamist and fundamentalist extremist groups in the region, They're not trying to target the United States because our friendship with Israel. They're trying to target the West and our democracy and Israel is part of that. So I want to be very clear about that. But the fact is to answer your question about Trump and Beebe, sure, there's now disagreement. As we have with every world leader, I wouldn't overemphasize that or exaggerate it to view it as some kind of strain on the relations.

If there's any strain of the relations, I would see that if we have a Democrat president next because that's something that they've been talking about. the left and Democrats, they highlight that. That's a very heavy part of their campaign. But on the right or with the current framework, no, we're gonna have our disagreements, but Trump very much understands Israeli interests and how US national security interests are tied up in that. I wanna be very clear, having worked in this for a long time,

the US goes after its national security interests unapologetically. It doesn't operate, it doesn't think, oh, well, let me see how I can work and expend national treasure to benefit another country, even if it's an ally. That's not how US national securities functions. The welcome return of summer sunshine doesn't mean you need to be uncomfortable. Life is too short to be fidgeting all night the paltry breeze of a bedroom fan. The smart move is to switch to cozy earth.

They don't exaggerate. This is the most comfortable cooling and cozy bedding and loungeware available anywhere on earth. That's why you hear so much about them and why so many of their customers keep going back for more. There's a massive range of products covering everything from towels to pajamas and footwear. Head to cozy earth.com and use my code peers, P-I-E-R-S, for an exclusive 20% off. That's code peers for an exclusive 20% off. And if you see a post-purched survey, mention that you heard about Cozy Earth right here on Unsensored. General Mark Kimmy, let me bring in, welcome back to uncensored. Is there any real difference, substantive difference between

this reported 14-point agreement, which is due to be signed on Friday, and the one that Barack Obama signed all those years ago, which Donald Trump tore up and dismissed as the worst deal ever seen. Yeah, a couple of things. First of all, I think it's important to note that the JCPOA would be inactive at this point. So there was a time and had to be renegotiated anyways. The short answer is we don't know the answer to your question for two. reasons. One, we haven't seen the MOU. Number two, we haven't seen the negotiations start

for the final agreement. And number three, something that I'm always concerned about, which is inspection and verification. The fact remains is we really don't know the capacity of and capabilities of the Iranian nuclear program because they had control over when, where, and how the IAEA could come down and inspect and verify. It was a fact. fig leaf, we really had no idea, either as a country, as a world, what the Iranians were capable of. So to answer your question, if we have an agreement that says we have unfettered inspection and verification of the terms and conditions of the agreement, yes, I think it would be a better deal. I want to play you, General Kim, a clip.

This is Donald Trump talking about that if he doesn't like the final deal, this is what he will do. Is the tax the agreement now final or are you still? No, it's not final. It's a memorandum of understanding. And if I don't like it, we'll go back to shooting at them, dropping bombs on their head. What do you expect the word? If I don't like it, if they don't behave, we'll go right back to dropping bombs, right smack in the middle of their head. Now, we've had a lot of this kind of bellicose rhetoric from Donald Trump in the last 16 weeks of this war, much of which just has.

materialized, do threats like that have any significance anymore? Do you think the Iranians care when Trump saber rattles like that? And on a practical reality level, is it realistic to think that there could be, say, a pause of a month, two months, 60 days, whatever? And at the end of it, if Trump isn't happy, he starts the military attacks again, given what's been going on for the last 16 weeks? Well, the answer to your question, your last question is, of course, they could start the military campaign up again. Now, would it have any effect? I think we've got to understand that military success up to this point has not had a strategic effect. It really hasn't changed the behavior of the Iranian regime. And part of that is the resistance model that is being used,

which says they win by not losing. They win by outlasting their opponent. We've seen that with Hezbollah. We've seen that with Hamas. That is just the nature of resistance warfare. They win by not losing. In fact, if you think that they learned it from us, they taught it to us. In fact, they learned it from us.

That's how we beat the British in 1776. We were on the verge of military defeat repeatedly, but the kingdom of George got weary, said it's no longer worth it. We don't want to fight anymore. It's not in our strategic interest. And we could be here for another 100 years and those damn colonialists will not give up.

So let's get out of here. I mean, doesn't that kind of sound like Iraq, Afghanistan, and now Iran? Just wait them out. Yeah. And without that devastating reality, 250 years ago, you'd be speaking in a nice English accent, General Kimet. Well, thank God we don't.

Let me bring in Lieutenant Colonel Chuck DeVore. Welcome to Uncensored. We do know, broadly speaking, because it's been leaked to CNN and various other Al Jazeera, I think, as well, now. This 14-point agreement, I've read it. Now, a lot could change between now and Friday, particularly given the ferocious backlash it's already receiving from many people who've been very supportive to this point of Donald Trump's war in Iran. so it may be that they go back and change some of this. But so far, what it indicates is that there would be an immediate and permanent end to the war on all fronts, including Lebanon.

And both sides would undertake that from now on, Iran will not launch any hostile action against each other, neither would, and will refrain from a threat or use of force against each other. Each side refrains from interfering in each other's internal affairs. Each will negotiate and reach a final agreement within a maximum 60 days. Iran will open the Strait of all moves to international shipping, while the US will lift its naval blockade on Iranian ports within 30 days. And then this significant part, I think, here, the rehabilitation and economic development of the Islamic Republic of Iran, ensuring financing of at least $300 billion and the unfreezing of assets of $25 billion,

all sanctions currently facing the Islamic Republic of Iran to be lifted. And the Islamic Republic of Iran reiterates, in other words, repeat. that it will never produce nuclear weapons. The fate of enriched material, the fate of all mutually agreed nuclear-related issues, including Iran's nuclear needs, will be adequately addressed in a final agreement. And both sides agree, the final agreement

will be approved for a binding resolution of the UN Security Council. So, you know, I've read that, and I don't see much difference with the Obama deal, particularly on the crucial stuff, like the ability to enrich uranium, the nukes and stuff. nothing concrete there whatsoever, which take things, I think, any further than the Obama deal. And this idea, Lieutenant Colonel Chuck DeVore, if I'd said to you on day one of his war,

at the end of it, Iran would be the losers, apparently, but be given $300 billion, and another $25 billion of unfrozen assets returned to them, you'd have said I was nuts, wouldn't you? No loser ends up with that, do they? Well, first of all, great to be on your show. Secondly, I think it's important to understand that all of this information we're getting about this deal is being leaked likely from one side. Just a few minutes ago, I was listening to President Trump speak with India Prime Minister Modi, and he indicated that he wasn't entirely sure whether or not the deal would be to his liking on Friday. He was basically admitting that there are details that are being worked out.

But let's go and go ahead and compare the JCPOA with facts on the ground today. The general mentioned a few things that I think bear expanding upon, which is that the JCPOA did nothing to restrain the Iranian ballistic missile program, which you could argue was technologically behind their nuclear program. Nuclear weapons aren't all that good unless you have a reliable long-range platform that you can use to deliver those nuclear weapons. Well, that infrastructure has been largely obliterated as the result of this war. That specialty steel factory that made the alloy that was needed to make the missile bodies,

that has been destroyed. A lot of the missile scientists have similarly been killed as well. So that's number one. Number two, the JCPOA unlocked billions and billions of dollars up front to Iran in an attempt to buy them off. That money went directly to their proxy network, throughout the Middle East to Hezbollah in Lebanon, to Hamas. So why wouldn't this money do the same? I don't understand.

But why would this money? Here's why. Because so far as we know, right, again, the details are somewhat sketchy. But so far as we know, it's all conditions based. In other words, if you behave, you may start to get access to some of this money. If you don't behave, you won't get access to it, which was very different than the JCPOA, which front-loaded the money regardless of behavior. One last point.

I heard the president say that Israel had the right to defend itself against Hezbollah just this morning. But he asked that Netanyahu be circumspect about that retaliation or about the scale with which they fought back. So he acknowledged this morning that Israel has the right to defend itself. And one last point. Facts on the ground again have changed significantly. Iran doesn't have the stockpiles of munitions nor the cash.

descend to Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis, and if you haven't noticed, there's been a change of management in Syria, which makes it a lot more difficult to resupply Hezbollah overland or via air. It's not as easy as it was just last year. Okay. Brian Tyler Cohen, welcome back to Unsensatea. I want to start with you by playing a clip from Mike Pence, because I think this is quite a significant comment from somebody who was, of course, Donald Trump's vice president. It sounds like you think, from what we know so far, this is a mistake by the Trump administration.

Well, it's much bigger than a mistake. I think as ill-advised, we ought to keep the pressure on, keep the blockade on, and if need be, let our armed forces get back to work. I mean, worse than a mistake, you know, and I did say again, I don't want to play, you know, Monday morning clever dick, but I couldn't really understand why Donald Trump was doing this, all his pledges not to take America back into, as he put them, pointless Middle Eastern wars, and with the obvious impact on cost of living, which he'd also campaigned on reducing

the cost of inflation and so on. None of it really made much sense to me. And also, I couldn't see what the end game was going to be. And now we see the end game is at best a mess, and at worst, as Mike Pence, Trump's former number two, and normally pretty loyal. to him actually, saying, you know, worse than a mistake. And I did say this could end up being Trump's legacy, but it might also be something which could cost the Republicans, the House, and the Senate potentially in the midterm elections and maybe even the next general election. You know, these things have enormous consequences. Well, they have enormous consequences because everything that he's engaging in right now

is severely unpopular. And Trump himself knows that it's unpopular because these are the things, as you said, that he campaigned expressly against. It was him who came out and said he was not going to engage in any of these endless, pointless foreign wars in the Middle East. It was him who said that he was going to focus on making sure that gas prices are low. Well, gas prices are high as the result of this war. It was him who said, you know, who even today, you want to talk about cognitive dissonance, today Donald Trump said, and I'm going to quote this, the JCPOA done by Obama, he handed

them $1.7 billion in cash. They tried to bribe their way out of it, and you know what the Iranians did. They laughed at Obama, and they said he's a stupid son of a bitch. So that was Trump saying that today, as he is in the midst of negotiating a deal, where the Iranians would get not only $300 billion, but they would also have the ability to basically use the Strait of Hormuz as a toll route. And so on issue after issue, as it relates to this whole, you know, what does he call this, an excursion, issue after issue.

Donald Trump is undermining the very promises that he made. And yet, this is a small part of a larger hole. Everything that Trump said when he was campaigning has been undermined by his presidency, whether he said that he was going to keep costs low. And, of course, he launched a trade war that sent the cost of everything surging. He was going to keep gas prices low. Gas prices are high. He said he was going to protect health care.

Health care has been gutted for 17 million Americans who rely on Medicaid, 24 million Americans who rely on the ACA. Food assistance has been gutted. That's not going to help with cost of living. inflation is up, not down since he took office. And so, again, issue after issue, Trump is undermining the very promises that he exploited people's votes for now that he's got power, now that he's got what he needs. Check, Hugo, I want to play your clip from Ben Shapiro, who's furious about the prospect of this deal.

I'm noticing that Mohammed Khalibov, who will apparently on Friday be literally in a photo with the vice presidents of the United States. I cannot express to you how stomach turning that is. I don't care who the vice president is. I don't care who the president is. Leaders of the United States of America in a photo op with a mass murdering terrorist supporter like Muhammad Khalibov, shaking hands six months after he blew away 42,000 innocent people in the streets. I mean, there's something completely weird going on here, Chink, where Shapiro is ranting away against the Trump administration, having been the biggest supporter of the war in the first place. And there's you opening this show by broadly supporting what the president is doing,

albeit not from a deep abiding love of Donald Trump. But it seems that people like Ben Shapiro, Mark Levine and others, they put all their chips in the casino on the red of Trump charging into Iran and getting rid of the regime and so on. But the moment that he looks like he's not going to do Benjamin Nanyahu's bidding, they've turned on it like rattlesnakes. What do you make of this? Yeah, there is one small part that I agree with Ben on. So when our leaders shake hands with terrorist leaders who've slaughtered tens of thousands of civilians, like Benjamin Netanyahu, it is stomach churning. When our Congress gives him standing ovations when he's a genocidal maniac and probably the largest terrorist leader in the world, it is stomach churning.

But that's Netanyahu, not anyone else. They have a worse civilian kill ratio than Hamas or Hezbollah, and IDF has murdered 100 times the civilians of Hamas and Hezbollah. By any definition, they're a terrorist state. But it's interesting because, as you point out, Shapiro and Levin, oh, my God, we love Trump. Oh, he's not doing Israel's bidding anymore. Trump. Did you know that Miriam Adelson, and that's why I called it Miriam's War, because her family paid over $317 million to Trump's campaigns to make sure that they got a war like this and they got the war that they ordered. Now all of a sudden they say, oh, there's a problem

with the war we ordered. Well, that's kind of on you and not on us. So I'll get back to that in a second. But did you know that Miriam Adelson and Larry Ellison used to donate to Bill Clinton before they donated to Donald Trump? Because they don't care about Democrats or Republicans and neither those Shapiro or any of the Israel first pundits. They only care about their beloved Israel. And it's obvious. They don't change their position on taxes, on social security, on health care. They only change based on whether Trump is in favor of Israel's actions or against Israel's actions.

So what you're seeing playing out in American media and the government is Team America versus Team Israel. So if you're on Team America, hey, they're not going to have a nuclear weapon. That was our only concern. The straight of Hormuz is open. the economy is going to get, hopefully get a little bit better now, right, than at least in the middle of the war, right? If we continue in the war, the economy is definitely going to get worse, gas prices are going to go up, inflation is going to go up, and it endangers the entire global economy. So as far as American interests are concerned, we should absolutely leave. And honestly, there's really no question about that. So the argument that the team Israel makes now is, yeah, but what about Iran's proxies, Hamas and Hezbollah?

to which I say, so what? Why are we facing our entire, basing our entire foreign policy on the needs of a country whose population is the size of Papua New Guinea? Why do we care what Israel wants in terms of, oh, no, it has to wipe out everyone who might oppose their fascist empire

in the Middle East. It has to destroy Iraq and Iran and all seven of their neighbors and take more of Gaza, more of the West Bank. Now we owe them southern Lebanon? Why do we owe them southern Lebanon? And that's not defense, that's offense. They're stealing southern Lebanon.

And no, we don't have to finance that. We have no moral or strategic or military obligation to Israel at all, which is a force for darkness in this world. In fact, literally every nation on earth is opposed to this war, except one, Israel. And we're having a debate, and it's 50-50, on whether we should listen to Americans, we should listen to the entire world,

or if everyone should bow to Israel and do their demands of wiping out all their neighbors so they could take more territory. No, this is a no-brainer. If you're on Team America, you come home, you get to peace, you improve your economy. If you're on Team Israel, you'll always want war. You'll always want ethnic cleansing and land grabbing.

We don't have to serve their imperial empire. Okay. Okay. Hago, you said this week, Trump needs to tell the Iranians that Lebanon is off the table. They don't like it. We can make things more painful for them. And I want to play you a clip from J.D. Vance's interview with Megan Kelly on this subject. And then you get to the next stage.

Is it included? Is it included? Lebanon is a regional peace deal. It's going to include the Gulf. It's going to include Israel. It's going to include Lebanon. The idea is this is a true regional peace deal because, again, if Iranians comply. Sorry, forgive me for intraddle.

No, no, no. The idea is that if the Iranians comply, then we are going to have a true transformative deal for the Middle East. Now, there's a lot of ifs there, Hagar, but the bottom line is the Iranians have made it crystal clear that if Lebanon's not included in this deal, they're not interested in doing a deal at all. And if they want to, they can just go back and shut the Australia full moose and fire a few missiles off at the Gulf States, and we're back where we were before. They know they've got that now in their asymmetric war. arsenal and it's very effective. So I'm not quite sure how anyone's going to bully the Iranians into excluding Lebanon from all this when they've made it a pivotal part of the deal. Yes, that's right, peers. I mean, this is the thing I would say I'm most concerned with at the

moment. And so let's take it back a little bit because Iran, the Iranian regime is struggling generally, right? With the United States and Israel has associated 50 of its leaders. They don't have nuclear capabilities at the moment. They've lost a significant number of their ballistic missiles. They've no military, no Navy. They're practically bankrupt. And their currency is worth nothing. At the same time, the Iran regime has discovered all these new cards and bargaining chips they can play that are very effective and cheap, by the way. Playing in the Strait of Hormuz, of course, attacking the Gulf. They fashioned a new terrorist group called Ha'i, which has now launched at least 17 attacks across Europe, though very few people are talking about it. And then you have

playing the Lebanon card because Lebanon, the thing about Lebanon is that you can see where you've got this peace process. There have been peace talks since April 14th. And they're going generally well. There's a long way to go. I work on Lebanon's all peace. By the way, efforts, I have an organization to do that. And there's a lot of potential there and opportunity. But the last thing that the Iranian regime wants is, A, any kind of peace deal or normalization for any Arab country with Israel. And secondly, they definitely don't want Hezbollah to be undermined because It's their most important proxy. So the longer the military operations go in Lebanon, the weaker Hezbollah gets.

So the thing that to back up, you started off by saying that I had said that Trump should not sell Lebanon to Iran. And that when Iran insisted that Lebanon be included in these talks, my opinion is that Trump should have told the Iranian regime, no, Lebanon is not on the table. Come to me with something else. What is it else? What else do you want as part of this negotiation? And the reason is because we, the United States, lose on a very key national security interest for us. We want a peace deal between the Lebanese and Israelis. Right now you have Lebanese and Israeli partners that are working really well.

The only thing preventing them from a peace deal is Hezbollah. And so if you have a ceasefire, the way the Iranians want, and let's be very clear, the Iranian regime does not want stability for Lebanon. They couldn't care less about the Lebanese people. A ceasefire with zero terms is a gift to Hezbollah. It allows it to rebuild, rearm, re-strategize. Whereas, and I'm not trying to imply that war is always better, if you have a ceasefire that has specific terms stipulated.

For example, how will the disarmament of Hezbollah go? Who will do that disarmament? Who's going to monitor and verify that disarmament? How do you ensure they can't rebuild? What is the relationship between the Lebanese and Israeli militaries? What is the role of the U.S. military in that regard? These are all typical things you figure out in a ceasefire. However, if you indicate to the Iranian regime, you know what?

If you are the Iranian regime want a ceasefire in Lebanon, then you have the right to negotiate on behalf of the Lebanese government, something that the Lebanese leaders have been repeatedly begging not to confuse the two. Okay. General Kimmel, I want to play you a clip. This is Hillary Clinton yesterday saying that Netanyahu had been pushing hard for this war when she was in an administration. Let's take a look. When I was secretary, it was a constant, you know, theme by Netanyahu and his then government,

the then defense minister Ahud Barak, the former prime minister. It was relentless. It was a constant push. You know, I remember... What would he say to you? What? What would he say to you? He would basically say, we need to, you need to support us in attacking Iran.

And they would say things like, you know, our planes are on the tarmac. And I'd say, well, good luck. I mean, great. Why are you doing this? Where else would planes be other than in the air? But on the tarmac ready to take off. I see. This follows a theme, General Kim.

We've heard, you know, from other Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken and others. and from other people working in administrations. Administration after administration was put on a lot of heat by Netanyahu to try and engage America in a war with Israel against Iran. And it seems like in Donald Trump, they finally found a willing partner in this exercise. Now, as I said earlier, I don't for a moment think that ultimately the buck doesn't stop with Donald Trump. Of course it does. He's the President of the United States.

He's the commander-in-chief. He's the one that makes this decision. But I also think it's pretty clear from everything we've now gleaned about the build-up to all this, that he bought in to Netanyahu's view of what would happen. And that has simply not materialized. Do you think that if Trump had his time again, he would go into this war? Yeah, well, it's a good thing that Kier Starrmer is not our prime minister, having lost the war in 1776, because we know how that would turn out.

But look, let's be very clear. Well, actually, I agree with you about that. Let's pull back a second. It has been the policy of every president since the discovery of the illegal Iranian nuclear program and their illegal extended range missile program that America would not tolerate a nuclear weapon in Iran. And we've tried everything. We talk about the typical tools of American power, diplomacy, information, military, economic. Well, the fact remains is through every other administration, those tools haven't worked because the military was not part of that.

Now, we can talk about that, but it was inevitable that sooner or later the Americans would be going to war or the region would be going to war with Iran. Now, there's this false argument about it wasn't an imminent threat. But you know what an imminent threat is? If you have to wait until the 19 terrorists get on the airplanes, because that's your definite mission of imminency, I'm not sure I would want to go with it. But the fact remains is that it was inevitable that sooner or later, one of two things were going to happen. Either the Iranians were going to develop a nuclear weapon, which would then lead to the major

problem, which was proliferation of nuclear weapons in that region, as Saudi Arabia would get one, as UAE would get one, and certainly Turkey would get one. So the question I have is we can argue about how the war has been worked out, but I'm not sure that anybody has a better idea of how to disarm the Iranians from their nuclear aspirations and any suggestion that the JCPOA was the right answer? Well, the fact reminds if it was the right answer, why didn't Biden renew the agreement when he was president? So look, but we can talk about how the conduct of the war and whether it's going to achieve what we want, but sooner or later, it was inevitable. And let's just accept that let's do it now rather than later.

I mean, my issue with what you've said is that if we go back to a year ago, last summer, there was the 12-day war, which looked brutally simple, short and effective, and we were told by the President of the United States, this had put back the nuclear capability and aspirations of Iran by decades. And I believed him. I thought, great. And I applauded that action. It was 12 days. It seemed very surgical. It seemed very precise. They'd taken out all the nuclear bases. They've taken out the nuclear scientists. It seemed very specific, a bit like when Trump took out Soleimani. But there we were, General Kim, only eight months later, where far from putting it back decades, it turned out we hadn't even put it back eight months. And we're supposed to believe then the threat was so it required an immediate attack to stop Iran developing these nuclear weapons within weeks. And so I'm scratching my head going, well, how can both those things be true?

Which one are we supposed to believe? Are we supposed to believe what was said last year? Or are we supposed to believe what we heard in February? I see the failure coming out of people like Chuck DeVore. He's a military intelligence officer. The BDA assessment that was done by our intelligence services was pretty loud. I think Chuck would have to agree with that as well, because it turns out we really didn't obliterate it. But the fact remains that we have not begun to scratch the surface of a strategic bombing campaign.

Britain knows what a strategic bombing campaign looks like. It was called the Battle of Britain. Now, I'm not suggesting or advocating for significant amounts of attacks against civilian infrastructure, But sometimes it has to be done if the option is better we have a significantly damaged Iran in every sense of the word than an Iranian regime that has a nuclear weapon. And let's talk about this world of Iran. So you are advocating for it. I'm advocating. You are advocating for it.

May I finish, Chink? Now, what I'm saying is, if it is clear, that this agreement does not stop Iran's permanent path to a nuclear weapon, then we have to continue the war in order to extract that agreement out of them. But how do we know? So we're done. Well, hang on one second. Hang on a second, Jay.

I mean, General Kim, my response to be, you know, you've repeatedly said you wouldn't trust the Iranian regime as far as you could throw them. According to this leaked agreement, they're going to get $300 billion. dollars, if at $325 billion. I wouldn't trust them to spend that how we'd like them to, would you? Why would they not just do exactly what Hamas did when they were given billions funneled through and encouraged by Netanyahu? The first thing I did say, my first answer was this agreement better have an intrusive

inspection and verification process. otherwise you're right. We can't trust them. And if we don't get that, then I will tell you, I don't agree with this agreement. Okay, let me bring in Attorney Colonel. Can we have the same process for Israel? Shank, you know, can we have the same inspection process for Israel? Chank, you know, you're talking about.

I mean, there is a country that has weapons of mass destruction, right? There's a country in the Middle East that's super dangerous, has attacked seven of its name, and already has weapons of mass destruction and weapons that they stole from us. Are they stole the nuclear technology? They stole the uranium. They stole the nuclear triggers. That's Israel.

So why are you not concerned about the out of control rogue state that already has a nuclear weapon and threatens all of their neighbors? And you're concerned with someone who doesn't have that and is now promising to never have that. So by your standard, we should invade Israel. Okay, two things, three things I'd say. Look, I don't know how, what you're saying?

your relationship is with your country of birth. But you want to talk about genocide. Let's talk about Armenia. And if you want to talk about not being able to go. Oh, nice distraction. Yeah, I can talk about it. And then the next issue is if you talk about not going into Lebanon, in fact, Turkey over the last few years has established, just like the Israelis have in Lebanon, a foothold in the first 30 kilometers of Syria because they're afraid of the terrorism coming from the PKK. And then the third, I mean, just like Iran, Iran feels this right. It's logical for them to want a nuclear weapon. You know why it's logical for, when an Egyptian general told me, we're not worried about Iran

if they get a nuclear weapon. We're friends with them. You need to worry about Iran, about Israel having a nuclear weapon. And I said, look, if I had been invaded by every one of my neighbors repeatedly, maybe I'd have a nuclear weapon to protect me as well. It's pretty good deterrence. Well, that's what's happening to Iran right now. So by your logic, Iran should have a nuclear weapon to deter Israel from invading it. I mean, you just said it.

You said if you get invaded by your neighbors, like Iran is getting invaded by Israel right now, you would logically want to have a weapon of mass destruction. Now, I want to answer the questions you said. I didn't know I was coming on the sanctions show. Yeah, okay, well, that's your problem for saying things that are incorrect and having me to correct you. So now you made it seem like I care what the Turkish government's doing. I don't care at all. I'm an American. So I think that Turkey being in northern Syria is wrong. And I know a lot about the Armenian genocide because I grew up with Turkish propaganda.

And so I, like a lot of the Israelis now, I believe the same things. Oh, it's not a genocide. They were hiding behind human shields. We were doing self-defense. We had to move them for their own benefit. So I know exactly what genocide denial propaganda sounds like, and it's exactly what the Israelis are doing. Now it's exactly what team Israel in America,

which you sound like you're on, is doing right now to justify all of Israel's wars and genocide and make it seem in some bizarreo, Alice in Wonderland type of situation that Israel is defending itself. What part of Israel is in southern Lebanon? No, they're aggressively taking land. land. Netanyahu bragged that they already have 60% of Gaza and they're going to take 70% of Gaza. What happened to self-defense? It was about land theft. Oh, no, I'm just speaking against Israel.

Oh, Team Israel wants me to hurry up. Don't say things. Remember, the boogeyman is Muslim. And this Kimit is talking about how, oh my God, what if Turkey has a nuclear weapon? Turkey's a NATO ally. So you have a problem with a NATO ally being stronger, but you don't have a problem with a deeply hostile state like Israel had it has attacked seven of its neighbors that has taken their land, having a weapon of mass destruction that they stole from us and lording it over the Middle East. They call this Team America, brother. We got no interest in Israel stealing southern Lebanon. Let's get the hell out of there. We have no interest in murdering Iranians on behalf of Israel. Let's get the hell out of there. Is anybody talking about gas prices? The food.

food prices, affordability. Nobody cares about American citizens. You're all obsessed with Israel. Chank, you've talked about a lot of things, so let me just go to some of the other guests. Lieutenant Colonel DeVore, I want to take you back to, I think, a sidewinder missile

which came your way from General Kimet. Unless I misheard him, I think he called you lousy. I see American intelligence is lousy. That's what we do with all of our intelligence officers. We beat them up repeatedly because they're not This is true. This is true.

No, I'm all four panelists going after each other, but I've had a good old military two-way like this for a while. But to that point, though. A few big points that have been made that I really think need to be responded to. Okay, so first of all, about the urgency of this operation after Midnight Hammer, Iran was rapidly adding to their ballistic missile inventory with the help of the People's Republic of China. The fear was that they were very quickly going to reach the, point beyond which they would be able to saturate the anti-missile defenses of the region, Israel and the Gulf Arab allies as well as any U.S. anti-missile platforms in the region.

Once they got to that point with over 10,000 ballistic missiles, which they were rapidly approaching with China's help, the fear was that they would reach a point of invulnerability where any sort of effort to try to prevent the reassembling of that nuclear program would be met with mass casualties throughout the Middle East. Now, to the issue of nuclear weapons in the region, Israel has had nuclear weapons for probably going on 40-plus years. They have not used them on anyone. The Iranian regime chance death to America and death to death to, death to America and death of Israel constantly. Say again. Why don't they admit it? Why don't they admit it? Why don't they Well, because it's the typical thing of strategic ambiguity.

It's like the U.S. policy towards Taiwan. We might or we might not do something. So the point is that... But I really don't... Sorry, just to lay with that point. Hang on a second. I really do not understand why it is. And I've raised this point many times on this show.

I do not understand why Israel, which demands full transparency from countries like Iran, right down to exactly how much enrich uranium they've got, why it's generally agreed that they have a huge number of nuclear weapons themselves, but they get a pass. They're the only country in the world that doesn't have to even admit they've got nuclear weapons. And to General Kim's point, if Saudi Arabia did want one, or Qatar wanted one, or the UAE wanted one, I'm in a bit of a loss to understand why if Israel's allowed to have a lot of them,

why they shouldn't be allowed to say. It's really simple. General Kemet mentioned it. They've been invaded by all of their neighbors in recent history. The missile force that they have, the bombs that they have, roughly 30 or 40, are a deterrent against a second Holocaust. The big difference between them and the state of Iran is Iran is not a typical Westphalian state. They are like a death cult.

They believe they have a millinery belief that if they cause enough chaos, they can usher. That's what the Israelis believe. Of the 12th Imam, the Mahdi. And so when you have a group of people who actually want to use a nuclear weapon, then they're hard to deter because it's part of their eschatology. They are not a normal nation state.

But given, okay, but, yeah, but Lieutenant Colonel, given, wait, wait, wait. Hang on, hang on, hang on. Is it still my show just, I think. Hang on, still my show. What is called Cheng Yuga-Ugruncensit, and by the way, we should maybe have that conversation. conversation. But until it is, I conduct the thing here.

This is fine, but again, if you take the principle that if you come under attack, you should be allowed to have a nuclear weapon. Well, what about the Gulf states? They've all come under attack from Iran. The Americans believe that Iran is literally weeks away from developing nuclear weapons. That threat doesn't seem to have been diminished at all by any of this war mongering in the last 16 weeks from what I can see. So if you take that argument, if you extrapolate that out, if you're Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, whatever, given you've come under attack from your neighbor, Iran,

why should you not be allowed to have the same nuclear deterrent that Israel has? So here's the challenge, right? Israel has had nuclear weapons for probably 40 plus years. The Middle East, minus Iran, has shockingly been without nuclear weapons. weapons. So if the UAE, if Saudi Arabia, if Turkey were to suddenly want a nuclear weapon, now why is that? What's the proximate trigger? It certainly wasn't Israel having nuclear weapons. No, it's the Islamic Republic of Iran having nuclear weapons that is the trigger. Right. And it is longstanding U.S. policy to be opposed to nuclear proliferation. It makes

things progressively more difficult. Except Israel. More nations that are armed with nuclear weapons. Like as the United States, well, hang on, has the United States actively sought to stop Israel having more nuclear weapons in the last 20, 30 years? Or has it just allowed it to? I'm aware of no policy, one way or the other with regards to the U.S. and Israel. There may be some classified negotiations. But shockingly, prior to this conversation with Sank, you don't really hear a lot of concern about Israel's nuclear weapons program, because they haven't used it, nor do they threaten their neighbors with it constantly. They've used it to attack all their neighbors. They use the threat of it and they say,

well, you can't attack us back because we have nuclear weapons. And the one country that has nuclear weapons in the Middle East has launched wars against almost all of its neighbors. So they've got that as backup, they've got Iron Dome's back up, and it has emboldened them to take land in Gaza, to take land in Lebanon, which you guys are denying. Iran has taken no land.

Israel has taken land over and over again. You know that in 1948 only 6% of the land was Jewish? Now it's 78% is owned by Israel. How did the settler colony get from 6% to 78% to start? To a campaign of ethnic cleansing and genocide. I was in southern Lebanon in 1986 with the IDF, land that the IDF voluntarily left. Why were they there? They went up to try to kick out the PLO.

You know who rescued the PLO? President Reagan and the Americans rescued the Palestine Liberation Organization. Israel left Lebanon. They left Gaza. So they were attempting to trade land for peace. And then they came back in. Unfortunately, HesBelah didn't they come back in three times? And got into southern Lebanon. They keep wanting to take Lebanon. And you just told us you're with the idea. The United Nations was supposed to prevent Hesbollah from getting to be a murderous force. And they utterly failed. In fact, Hesbala built facilities quite underneath U.N. Outposts. Israel invaded Lebanon.

you're you're inverting reality you're making it sound like lebanon invaded is no israel is inside of lebanon right now do you condemn Israel for being in seven lebanon do you condemn them for taking 70 percent of gas imagine if america was taking missiles daily from tijuana mexico teawana would be well you're making an argument for hezbollah you're making the i can't believe you're making an pro hesbalah argument because what heswellah is saying is can you imagine if america was invaded and they took half of texas it they're doing right now, Israel invaded Lebanon and has taken southern Lebanon. Well, of course, we would fight back.

You're saying, and I agree. And that's what Hezbollah is saying. Well, of course we're going to fight back there in our land. They're literally stealing our homes. What do you want us to do? I surrender to the mighty Israelis. Hezbollah is a catch-off for Iran. Hezbollah is an Iranian proxy that Iran has spent billions of dollars training and equipping.

So what? You make it sound like our problem. priorities are Israel's priorities. Hezbollah and the Iranians are responsible for killing. So what? Hundreds of U.S. Marine Corps. Hundreds of Marines.

Israel might be your daddy. But Israel's not our daddy. Iran has been at war with us since 1979, sir. All right. Let me bring in Braun. Israel's been at war with us the entire time. Israel stole our technology. Israel stole $300 billion from us.

Israel made us fight seven wars for $8 trillion. Chang, Israel's actually our enemy. And you guys keep aiding and abetting our enemies. Chank, you keep aiding and abetting my failure to include other panelists. So we've all got across the bear. Let me bring in Brian. Brian, Donald Trump said this. Just remember, the Iranians never won a war, but never lost a negotiation.

Are those words coming back to haunt him, do you think? I would say so. I mean, if you just look at the details of this negotiation unto himself, I mean, he had said initially that the whole point of this thing was to prevent, to prevent the Iranians from enriching uranium. Now he's coming out in just the last 24 hours and says, you know, basically I don't care about enriched materials. Yeah. Then there's the point of the $300 billion that Iran's going to have access to, Iran's going to have access to $300 billion. There's the point of the Strait of Hormuz. being basically a toll route that Iran's going to be able to benefit from financially in perpetuity.

And so if you look at this, I don't see where the United States is better off. I mean, I guess you could have Donald Trump point to this idea that Iran's nuclear facilities were obliterated. But even he, again, came out and said that he doesn't care about enriched materials anymore. So I don't know how you look at this negotiation and think that we came out. The real problem, yeah, the real problem, it seems to me, is here's what I think may happen in the next 48 hours. The backlash against the leaks of this report have been so big and many from Trump's traditional support, really supportive base. He's going to get embarrassed and he's going to be on his own deal. Well, exactly my point.

But then he's going to try and change things to be more adverse to the Iranian regime. and the Iranian regime knows all it has to do is bang shut the straddlemoose again and toss some missiles over to the Gulf states. And we're right back where we were when they first worked out. That was going to be the most effective weapon in their arsenal. And I just don't understand how Trump gets out of that problem without in the end doing what I've been recommending he'd do for quite a while, which is claim some kind of Pyrrhic victory and get the hell out of this.

because the problem he's got, until that regime's gone, they now know what the most effective weapons they have are. And they're not nuclear. In fact, they're pretty cheap, and they can unleash them at any time they like. A few drones into the Gulf states and shut down a bit of water. That's all they have to do. And by doing that, they hold the world over an economic energy barrel.

And by the way, I think any person on this panel would have been able to say that Iran would be able to deploy, using the Strait of Hormuz as a weapon against the United States at any point in this entire process. But I think you're right. I think Donald Trump is going to see the extent to which this is being berated on both the left and right across the political spectrum, and he's going to renege. And the Iranians have something that the United States doesn't have, which is time. I mean, we have midterms coming up. And so political pressure exists in the United States. And as we get closer and closer to midterms, there is a sense that Donald Trump is going to have to at least make

an effort, a modicum of an effort to keep gas prices down. Well, that's not going to happen. And the Iranians know that. And they don't have the same political pressures that the United States has. I would argue that they do. The blockade is starving the Iranian regime. Every day that goes by, they miss out on some $500 million. But they don't care. The Iranian regime don't care if they're people. Yeah, but here's the problem. The Iranian regime don't care if their people are starving. They don't care. Well, they do care to make payroll for the besiege and for the IRC. And they do care to try to keep their proxies afloat. And if that money is scarce or absent, then the whole edifice becomes rotten and may collapse. So that prompts the question,

why on earth would you agree a deal where you give them $325 billion? Makes absolutely zero. That's not the deal. So that is in the deal. The $300 billion is not money the Iranian regime has access to. And the lieutenant colonel already said this. And peers, I have to tell you, you have three people here who are foreign policy experts who serve their country with distinction, and we know what we're talking about. The $300 billion. And look, I don't like this deal. And I don't like the, I didn't like the JCPOA. Forgive me.

Forgive me, Hagar, with all due respect, forgive me, if my confidence in the so-called experts in all this has taken a bit of a battering in the last 16 weeks. Because it was little old me. All we've faced is a peccal of a hand. Hang on. It was little old me. it was little old civilian non-expert peers who called all this from day one. And very sadly, everything I warned has happened. So, woe be it for me to challenge your expertise,

but it seems like my amateurish view turned out to be sadly the correct one. I wish Donald Trump listened to me and not the experts. Anyway, on that bombshell, we run out of time. But you keep saying they have access to $300 billion, and I'm trying to correct you on something that's false. They're not going to have access. Well, I'm only reading what I've read in the, all I'm doing is reading, I'm reading the 14-point memorandum.

And in that, it makes it clear, it makes it clear, hang on, it makes it clear, there will be financing. There are no liars. No, this is actually, no, this is actually the agreed memorandum. But unfortunately, Donald Trump now knows no one's going to buy it. So he's now trying to change it. Okay. Well, unfortunately, they are listening and they are reading.

Anyway, I've got to leave you there. I'm going to be very clear about this. Because like I said, I don't deal in hyperbole. I don't have time for it. I want to tell you the facts on this, because you keep repeating and it's a disservice to your viewers. I'm literally reading out a clause from the memorandum. The 300 billion is nothing more than a potential opportunity,

if things go according to plan, which, by the way, I don't think they will. I don't think the Iranians are going to give up their material. No, no. No, it's insured financing. It's insured financing. No, it's insured financing. It is insured financing. You can keep talking over me as much as you like,

but I will have the last word on this. In the current 14-point agreement, the rehabilitation and economic development of Islamic Republic of Iran insuring financing of at least $300 billion, also on freezing assets of $25 billion. If that is a good deal for America, given what supposed war aims were,

my name is Donald Trump. And last time I checked, it isn't. So thank you all very much. We're going to leave you there. I appreciate it. Pierce Morgan Unsensored is proudly independent. The only boss around here is me. You enjoy our show.

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