Pod Save the World - Will China arm Putin?

Episode Date: March 1, 2023

Tommy and Ben discuss changes to Mexico’s electoral system, the botched presidential election in Nigeria, Jill Biden’s trip to Africa, new intelligence about the covid lab leak theory, a Brexit breakthrough, more detail on China potentially selling arms to Russia and Europe’s pitch for a potential defense pact and peace deal, the World Bank, and Biden’s immigration policy. Then Tommy is joined by Israel’s Labor Party Leader Merav Michaeli to discuss recent violence the region, Netanyahu’s proposed judicial changes, and the fate of Israeli politics with Netanyahu at the helm.

Welcome back to Posit of the World. I'm Tommy Bitor. I'm Ben Rhodes. Ben, you've been reading a lot of Jean Lacareé lately? Yeah. Why do I say it was an accent? He's British. Yeah. Well, and it's a pen name. Yeah, I have a piece out in the Atlantic. I've read so many La Caree books, but then they put out this collection of his letters.

And so I just kind of used that as a hook to write. Who is he writing letters to? You know, it's actually kind of interesting because, like, you know, he has letters to, like, other writers, you know, like Graham Green and Philip Roth and people like that. But then he's got letters to, like, you know, everybody from the person that was the model for George Smiley. Like the iconic character. Oh, like the real person? Yeah, like the person he actually modeled a smiley on. And then like what I found most interesting is that he, for all these books, he found like some guide, right?

So like for the Russia house, he had somebody who like showed him around Russia or then he did something on arms dealers in Congo and he found somebody to show him around there. And so you see kind of how he like approached. And this is part of what the piece is about. he approached writing books like a spy, recruiting like subsources, who then like took him to a place and showed him stuff. And so it's all about how his like habits as a spy made him a better novelist. And his kind of novelist eye allowed him to write things much more interesting than intelligence products. No offense to the intelligence community. Not quite as good as like Tinker Taylor Soldier spy and the lab leak report.

Yeah, the lab leak report. We'll get into that later. Very cool. I will definitely check that out. We got a lot to talk about today. We are going to cover changes to the electoral system in Mexico, a long-inticipated election in Nigeria. The first lady took a trip to Africa, the aforementioned COVID-Lab leak theory in the story that will not ever die. Some big Brexit news, Ukraine, lots of Ukraine news.

And then the World Bank gets a new president's immigration policy in Russian propaganda. Find a home. And then Ben, you guys are going to hear my conversation with Merov Mekiley. She is the head of Israel's labor party. We talked this morning about Netanyahu's efforts to gut Israel's judicial system. We talked about the scary escalation of violence between Israelis and Palestinians and these, like, settler riots or some people are calling them pogroms over the weekend. So we covered a lot of ground. It was good to talk to her and hear how she plans to resuscitate the labor party in Israel, which has fallen on some tough times.

Yeah, a lot of work to be done to kind of bring back the Israeli left. We all have a huge interest in seeing that happen. Well, that was kind of her big message was basically like, hey, progressives, don't give up on us. Yeah. You know, there's like a lot of people in Israel who feel the exact same way you do about the things Bibi Netanyahu is doing and what the right wing of the government is doing and, like, just know that we're here and don't give up on us yet. Yeah, like she took some crap for basically kind of standing outside of like a broader

tent of people in the last election. But at the end of the day, like these efforts. to kind of move center right or join some coalition, always end up kind of neutering the left, you know? At some point, you have to draw a contrast and fight on it, you know. Yeah, yeah, fight it out. Ben, before we get to the news, just real quick reminder, the important work of politics and civic engagement doesn't happen only every two years. Votes of America's no-off years program is here to help you stay engaged throughout 2023. There's lots of really important elections starting with a must-win Supreme Court seat in Wisconsin. If you go to Votesave America,

Saveamerica.com. You can donate. You can figure out how to volunteer and you can help out ahead of Wisconsin's April election. And you can sign up for our no-offiers campaign, stay in the loop on what's happening and how you can get involved via remote and in-person volunteer opportunities, targeted donations and more. So go to vote saveamerica.com. Okay, well, let's start in Mexico because there have been some big changes there where lawmakers recently overhauled the country's electoral agency by cutting its staff in limiting its independence and capacity to punish candidates that break election laws. So President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador or Amlowe, for shorts, he's been pushing these changes very hard. He says it's because they will save money and they will make voting more efficient.

It's notable, though, that Amlo has long blamed the National Electoral Institute for his 2006 presidential election loss. He's complained that this is an organization that's controlled by elite. So he sort of had it out for them seemingly for a little bit. Historically, the electoral Institute has gotten a lot of credit for helping facilitate fair elections. And critics of these new changes say that election officials now won't be able to pay workers to organize the elections, they won't be able to put up polling stations on time maybe. And the Institute will not have the authority to punish candidates that break campaign finance laws. So that's all disconcerting. There have been big protests against these changes in cities across Mexico. The one in Mexico City

organizers say was attended by half a million people, so very big. In the coming months, Mexico Supreme court will hear challenges to the law. So, Ben, it's worrisome to hear critics of these changes say that they could basically weaken Mexico's democracy and make it difficult to carry out legitimate elections. The BBC says these reforms would save Mexico about $150 million a year. So not chump change, but not a lot of money for a country that's forecasting $231 billion in tax revenues in 2023. Amlo is not eligible for election, but his party is favored to win in the next election. The U.S. has not said much about these changes reportedly because they just don't want to piss

the guy off. I've got a lot of work to do with them. Yeah. What do you make of what's happening, the sort of claims on either side? And do you think the U.S. should be bringing public pressure to bear on this guy to make sure the sort of worst case doesn't happen? I mean, I think any time you got the election commission, it's kind of a red flag. Yeah.

I flagged that one, too. Yeah, it's kind of a warning sign. I mean, I take Amlo's point, right? that there is a kind of corrupt elite in Mexico. They did run things for a very long time. They certainly wanted to see him out of power as a leftist, kind of populist. But these arguments just don't really carry that much weight. Like, you don't really, like, neuter the election commission just to save money.

That's not like kind of heavy-handed. It's not where you find savings, you know? And it is, but you wonder what his play is exactly, though, because maybe this is just him having this grievance and finally acting on it, or maybe this is him. Like, he will clearly try to anointed successor and then kind of be the power behind the scenes in this political party that is mainly an extension of his politics. Reportedly, two of his candidates in 2021 got basically pushed out of a race by the election commission, and he thinks that was heavy. Yeah. And so, like, I mean, but if he wanted to reform the election commission, that might be a more credible

course of action than just kind of neutering it. I guess it's interesting. You mentioned, this after Israel because part of what I was thinking is that you saw these protests, but the Mexican opposition is also kind of a mess, right? The parties, the two parties that would kind of be contesting the next election. And it kind of reminds me like India, Israel and Mexico are all pretty different countries, obviously. And Amo is a left-wing populist, unlike Modi, a Hindu nationalist or BB, a kind of right-wing or far-right nationalist.

But in each case, there's kind of these groundswell of popular opposition to what are perceived as power grabs. And there's not really a lot of like organized political leadership to the opposition. And that seems to be a common threat. I mean, you know, for the health of Mexican democracy, like hopefully this kind of popular movement leads to some more coherent, cohesive political opposition. So there's just like a choice put before the Mexican people. I think the U.S. you're right. I think we're constantly asking for so much help from Mexico on the border. and with cartels that successful administrations in this country and Mexico kind of avoid big direct

confrontations. I do hope that there's conversations happening, you know, about this, though, quietly. And that if we see things that the U.S. sees things that suggest an erosion of Mexican democracy, then, you know, there's more vocal commentary on it. But, you know, it's just something to watch because, you know, Mexico for all of its challenges over the years, you know, elections have gone off pretty smoothly there. So, you know, you'd hope that, I mean, the court, if the court rules, for instance, against Amlowe, then you would hope that he abides by that ruling. Right. That's kind of thing to watch. So there's some, this is another warning sign, a marker,

and we'll see what the court does, and then we'll see how things lead into the next election. Yeah. Stick with our elections theme here. So in last week's show, we said, We were excited to talk this week about the results of the Nigerian presidential election, which happened over the weekend. That election has huge stakes, obviously, for Nigeria, but also for the continent of Africa and for the world, because Nigeria is projected to overtake China as the second most populous country in the world by 2100. So, you know, big stakes here. Unfortunately, as of Tuesday, there's not a lot of clarity. So far, the ruling party candidate is in the lead with about 40% of the vote, according to BBC News. But three opposition parties, the People's Democratic Party, the Labor Party, and the African Democratic Congress Party say that the results have been manipulated and they're calling for a new election.

These opposition parties say there's evidence of vote rigging and that millions of Nigerians weren't able to vote on the correct day because election officials didn't turn up with the right equipment. There are also concerns about this new electronic system that was used to accredit voters and this sort of website or portal that was supposed to be releasing results. in real time doesn't seem to be working at all. So kind of Iowa caucus shadow out kind of vibe. Yeah. Where's Mayor Pete? As of this recording, the votes are still being counted and tabulated, but the European Union is criticizing poor planning.

To win, a candidate needs to get the most votes nationwide and then at least a quarter of the ballots cast in 25 of the 36 states plus the Buzha, the capital, where else there's a runoff. So, Ben, kind of the worst case outcome here, you know, like I hope they can sort this out and come to some accommodation, but very, very worrisome. It is very worrisome. I mean, it's pretty clear that things did not go off right in this election. You know, I mean, the concerns or charges of vote rigging will have to be, you know, obviously looked at and scrutinized. But even without that, it's clearly this was chaotic. Clearly stuff didn't work. It just didn't set up polling

locations. Yeah, people couldn't. I'm talking about the need for a good election commission, you know, to bring these two stories together. And so there's a cloud over this election. And I I would just hope that whatever process kind of adjudicates this, if it's just this ruling party, which, you know, has been fairly corrupt in the past. And there was, I think, a sense among a lot of people that some change would be an improvement here, kind of new generational change or a different kind of political party leadership. If this is an effort to just ram through a result that is deeply flawed without some process of adjudication and, you know, a runoff, I mean, it just feels like this could be combustible because, I mean, you're talking about Nigeria country that you've had civil

conflict, you've had political violence in recent years, particularly in the north with Boko Haram. I mean, they're real challenges inside Nigeria. And the success of Nigeria is so important to certainly that part of Africa where we've seen some democratic backsliding. We've talked about a bunch of coups in that part of Africa recently and just the continent generally. I mean, to again, link stories, you know, I've talked a bit about kind of swing states, the states, the countries you kind of watch for the help of democracy. We spend so much time kind of looking at the United States and Europe, but, you know, ultimately it's it's like the Mexico's, the Nigerias, the Indonesians, these very big, important countries that are kind of regional hubs of democracy

around the world. You hate to see, you know, well, both stories we've led with today, you know, a sense that kind of the fragility of democracy in these places on display. So I think the focus here should be on determining what went wrong, being very transparent about that, and having kind of an agreed upon process that allows everybody that, you know, participate in determining who the ruling party is going to. Yeah. It's really sad. I mean, I was listening to and reading a lot of coverage leading up the election. And, you know, there were sort of a lot of, you know, older candidates who had been around for a while. But you kept hearing all these young people who are so excited to vote, so excited about the future and making a change and participating in democracy.

And for this to be the current state of the outcome is terrible. Yeah. And that's part of the problem in Nigeria. I mean, you're talking about like one of the younger countries in the world, Africa, the youngest continent in the world. And you've got these leaders like Buhari. I mean, I think he spent like months and months like in Europe getting medical treatment. This guy was like old when he was elected, like, you know, and really old. And so you just have a sense.

If you look at a Nigeria, you have such a dynamic culture and civil society and popular culture and athletics and a huge like entrepreneurial business community. And it just doesn't seem to enter into politics at the national leadership level, you know. And so what you'd really like to see is that kind of generational change and that kind of energy that is, you know, making a lot of progress in other sectors of society come into politics. And thus far, this result does not showcase that. No. Speaking of Africa, First Lady Jill Biden recently took a five-day visit Africa. She spent a bunch of time in Kenya and spoke with women and families who really were on the brink of starvation because there have been five failed rainy seasons in Eastern Africa. And they're about to experience a sixth, which basically means there's

insufficient rainfall to grow crops or raise livestock. The UN says nearly 20, 23 million people in Kenya, Ethiopia, and Somalia are highly food insecure. That means they don't know where the next meal will come from. While in Kenya, the first lady called for more international aid to help with drought relief. She also faced lots of very annoying questions about whether her husband might run for president again. Jill Biden last visited Kenya in 2011. She was there to raise awareness about a previous famine. This one is supposedly worse.

She's been to Africa six times total. Darlene Superville at the AP had a lot of great coverage of the trip. if you want to read more. But Ben, I thought it was great to see Jill Biden in Kenya for this trip. I think she specifically said, you know, there's a lot of attention on Ukraine right now. Ukrainian refugees, the war, a lot of money going that direction. And she was trying to raise awareness and kind of help on the margins. So they can get some more attention on what's happening in Eastern Africa,

bring in some donor money, hopefully get some governments to kick in more cash, you know. Yeah, no, I think showing up is really important in Africa and something that the U.S. doesn't always do it at a high level, you know? So I think this is a good use of her time and her effort to spotlight issues. I will say, I noticed those interviews too. Like, you know, they clearly pitched like some interviews where she was going to talk about Africa. And, you know, it used to drive me crazy. We'd go to Africa and we do the same thing, you know, press briefings, interviews, and nobody ever asked about Africa. They just asked about, you know, whatever dumb political story was happening back home, which kind of sends its own message. You know, like, you can't ask

an administration to spotlight things like food insecurity in Africa, or she went to countries like Namibia where nobody ever shows up at that level of the U.S. government. And then when the media kind of acts like it's just, you know, totally irrelevant. And that is consumed in Africa, too, you know. And so I would hope to see a focus, not just from the U.S. government, but, you know, from the U.S. political media and others on this part of the world that is really central to, you know, climate change, migration, food security, China obviously plays heavily in these places, you know. And so I think the focus is good, but Lug needs to be sustained and needs to be beyond just official visits. It needs to be from all parts of American society, including our private sector,

our media, as well as our government. So speaking of stories that are getting lots of press attention, there's the COVID-Lab leak news cycle that will never end. So the latest sort of turn here is over the weekend, the Wall Street Journal ran a story with this headline. Lab leak, most likely origin of COVID-19 pandemic, Energy Department says. That led to a huge freakout on social media, especially Twitter. Not a particularly nuanced headline. No, and lots of claims that the issue is now settled, right? And you saw a lot of people dunking on each other. Let's just briefly explain why that's wrong. So again, the debate here is whether COVID jumped from infected animals to humans naturally or whether COVID spread because of a mistake at a laboratory that was doing

coronavirus research. The intelligence community is trying to figure it out. Joe Biden, when he came in, I think, directed them to, like, double down on your efforts to figure this out. Different components of the intelligence community have reached different conclusions. They're 18 agencies that make up the intelligence community. Eight of them are looking at the origins of COVID. I assume the other 10 just aren't relevant. Like, you're not going to have the satellite geospatial imagery guys. Yeah. They're figuring this out, right? They don't work. So of those eight- National reconnaissance agency. Yeah. Two agencies believe that COVID came from a lab leak. So it's the Department of Energy believes with us with this with

low confidence. The FBI believes it with moderate confidence. The National Intelligence Council and four other agencies disagree and they assess with low confidence that COVID came from natural transmission from an infected animal. Two agencies, including the CIA, are undecided. None of them think this was a bio-weapons program from China, which is like a big Steve-Van thing. So again, you know, I talked about this on PSA yesterday, Ben, but like low confidence are really the key words here. The intelligence community after the Iraq, WMD, debacle, tried to be. more specific about not only what they believe, but how strongly they believe it. I think that has gotten lost in the reporting about their work since the energy department is involved here

because they oversee the national laboratories in biological research and they got some new information apparently. The bottom line, just for people wondering, okay, well, what should I think about this? Where did COVID come from? Is the U.S. government does not know. They are split. Yeah. They are split and they're split four to two in favor of still thinking this was natural transmission. I don't know what the answer is. I've never known. I kind of just hope, though, that I don't know, the DNI or the, the Avril Haynes, the Director of National Intelligence, will be able to just release kind of everything they know publicly that is unclassified. I also kind of wonder still how much this matters three years later. Yeah. Well, that's the thing.

I mean, because you kind of walked up to the line of the, you know, the bio-weapons conspiracy theory type stuff. But it gets even word in that, right, too, because in the fever dreams on the right, it's also like Dr. Fauci somehow initiated this, right? Because he started doing some stuff in labs that then the Chinese did and there was funding from, you know, NIH with the Chinese and, and that's just crazy stuff. I mean, this is this is one of those issues where people are project, talk about projecting. I mean, COVID generally, you know, obviously much commented on. you guys have done good job in PSA about how, like, you know, mask wearing is a projection of your political views. I mean, this is an extreme version of that. Like, you know, this desire to kind

of want China to be responsible for this. We should say, first of all, nobody has suggested that China, like, intentionally created COVID, right? I mean, that's. That's like the Steve abandoned territory, right? Yeah. No, no credible, you know, analyst. And then, so then you get to this point of like, you know, what was it a lab leak? Now, that's important, I guess, insofar as you'd like there to not be future lab leaks, you know? Yeah, she maybe curtail to gain the function research, if that was what led to this. I think in any event, we should be trying to like, you know, button down the labs and make sure that whatever experiments are being done with coronaviruses like are secured. But the reality is we don't know. And we don't know for a bunch of reasons.

Like you talk about a low confidence assessment. You would not make major foreign policy decisions off of a low confidence assessment from a single intelligence agency. I mean, that is as, there's no knock to the good people of the Department of Energy, but that's about as weak as it gets in terms of, you know, because the confidence assessments, too, are based on the fact that they also only look at their sliver of the pie. They're not even looking at everything everybody else has. So that's not based on like NSA intercepts or human intelligence. Exactly.

Exactly. It's very notable to me, which means we have not found some, you know, Chinese assets. to say, actually, this was a lab leak. Or, and I'm not suggesting we have that great intelligence in China, but like, we have not picked up the Chinese saying to each other, like, oh, no, like, we leaked this from a lab, you know? Now, some of this is on China because they didn't open up, you know, part of the reason we'll never know, really, is it there was no real credible transparent investigation.

There was a black box in terms of what was happening in Wuhan in those early days. And look, this is an interesting conjecture and people will continue to pull this thread. but like we don't know anything more about what happened, I think, because of this assessment than we did before. And it doesn't mean it's not worth doing. It just means that like different people are going to have different theories and we should do whatever we can to act on the series. So if there's anything that DOE, the Department of Energy found that suggests how to increase like the safety and security at labs, okay, do that. It doesn't mean to draw some sweeping conclusion about the origins of COVID, you know. Yeah, it's just such a frustrating conversation because,

I agree with the people who say it was ridiculous for, say, tech platforms to ban discussion of the lab leak theory on their platforms at some point. I agree with the people who say that, you know, the WHO saying, you know, ruling out a lab leak at some point or so, like some people were too definitive and saying, no, that was not possible. All that said, like, the conversation has evolved so much over time that initially it sort of did start with this more nefarious. connotation that this was a bioweapon or that this was a purposeful thing by the Chinese government done to harm the United States of the world. And like the lack of logic there or the sort of anti-Asian sentiment and rhetoric and violent acts that happened in this country that seemed to be spawned from some of those debates were really troubling, right? And so it's just, I don't know, it's a very frustrating conversation on social media. Yeah. Well, and the other thing and this,

like I remember having this conversation with you, like two years ago when this came up. But like the people who wanted to be a lab leak, you know, kind of wanted to be a lab leak, right? I'm not suggesting it's not possible there was a lab leak. But there seems to be this suggestion that that would then embarrass the Chinese or be like a black market against him. What I never understood about this, Tommy, is like they're also not supposed to have wet markets with like live that, you know, like after SARS, you know, they passed some, you know,

they weren't supposed to have the kind of markets where this could happen either, right? So I never really understood the kind of gotcha piece of this. It's not like the Chinese going to come out and surrender, you know, because of the Department of Energy's low confidence assessment. The point should be we should learn as much as we can about this to prevent it from happening again. And look, I just, the one thing lesson we should also take from this is everybody at times made statements that were too categorical. Like the WHO, Fauci. But to Fauci's credit, But if you actually listen to him, he would always say, like, this is the best information we have at the time.

Nobody ever listened to that part of his statements. But I think we've all learned, you know, we're now all epidemiologists. And even the epidemiologists aren't like all knowing at any given time either. There's a new virus. Yeah. It's a novel coronavirus. Yeah, it's very frustrating. I would love to know the answer.

I don't know that we will. It might take years, if not decades. My guess is that spies won't figure it out that a bunch of scientists will. Yeah. And we're just going to wait. And what we don't know is whether the Chinese knows something that we don't know. You know, like, and that's the nature of their government. I mean, because that's what I'm most curious about is like, do they actually know the answer to something they're not telling us?

Or maybe they don't know. I mean, it's possible. Okay, we get some big Brexit news, Ben. So the latest is the UK and the European Union have cut a deal to end their dispute over trade rules for Northern Ireland. The agreement even has a cool name, I'm hearing, Ben, the Windsor framework. Very cool. I like that. So here's the problem and the proposed solution.

After Brexit, Ireland remained part of the U.S. European Union, but Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK, had to exit the EU. Ireland and Northern Ireland are the same landmass. They share a land border. No one wanted to create a barrier between those two countries or customs checks because of concerns. It could unravel the Good Friday Agreement and the fragile peace in Northern Ireland. So what this new agreement negotiated by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and the European Commission

does is say goods moving from Britain to Northern Ireland go through one process without customs checks. goods passing from the UK through Northern Ireland, then to Ireland go through a different process with more checks. The deal also reduces the role of the European Court of Justice in enforcing these rules. So it's very technical, very complicated, frankly, very, very boring. But it had huge implications because if Brexit undid the Good Friday Agreement, it would have been a disaster. So Ben, just stepping back, it does seem like this is a very rare win for Rishi Sunak, who's been struggling when you really need to one. And two, I read that Sunak said he was going to put this to a vote in parliament, even though some people don't think he needs to do so.

Maybe that's in part because the Labor Party has suggested they'll support some sort of reasonable agreement, which is just another sign that like labor's position on Brexit is pretty firmly, we're going to live with it. We're not going to try to undo it. Like, what's done is done. Any thoughts on this? Yeah, no, this is a pretty big deal. And I mean, I'm actually, you know, we've been pretty hard on the toys. Like, this is like a pretty good win for Rishi Sunnah, you know. Yeah, it is.

It kind of closes one of the big open accounts from Brexit, assuming it implements well and it works. And it kind of plays to his strengths because it's kind of, it's very technocratic, right? He's down in the weeds of like customs controls and it showed the European Union also wanting to get past this too, right? So that's the first thing is it kind of here's this technocratic guy after Boris Johnson and Crazy Liz Trust, you know, just kind of getting down the weeds and negotiating this. Second point is it's, you remember we just talking about like a hard Brexit and a soft Brexit and this is like softer than what Boris Johnson wanted to do with Northern Ireland, right? And so one of the reasons why labor, I think, would support this is because it moves more in the direction of a softer Brexit in terms of the kinds of custom controls and the, the, the, the, prioritization of protecting the Good Friday Cords, which Boris Johnson didn't seem to care that much about. So that removes a potential irritant to with the United States, which is like deeply invested in

the Good Friday Accords. Right. Because Biden, I think, have been pushing hard on this. And they want the, the UK government wants Biden to visit around the anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement. Yeah. And so this opens the door to that. And that would be, you know, another good thing for, for the Rishi Sunak government. Third thing that's interesting to me about this is, is King Charles played like seemed to play some role. It was like, I mean, I don't think he was negotiating, but like, it's at Windsor. Like, that's his, you know, I think he's a Windsor, right? The House of Windsor, right?

He had tea with the EU negotiator after this is completed. He's getting some shit, actually, I think, in the UK from some people for being involved in in this in any way. But it does suggest, like, King Charles wanting to be a little bit more visible and active. And that's kind of interesting to me, too, because we've been talking a lot about what is post-Brexit UK? and I don't know, maybe it's like a more active monarch or something because that's something that makes them distinct, that they have this kind of weird monarchy and family that is there.

So that's notable and it'll be interesting to see how that shakes out. You also got a sense that like the hardline Brexit people didn't complain about this deal as much as like some people thought they would if the UK made some concessions on this, which suggests kind of overall just fatigue with these arguments. Yeah, I think the European Commission was probably fatigued too. Yeah, it's just like, fucking let's get over with. Now, it doesn't solve all the problems. I mean, like we've already already talked about. They're massive economic problems because of losing that market.

It doesn't solve that. They have a labor shortage because they're keeping people out of the UK. So they still have a bunch of problems from Brexit. This just kind of deals with one of them. We'll still have to see whether Northern Ireland, which has not had a government, whether the political parties there now can come together. The Democratic Unionist Party, that's the kind of pro-UK. party there versus the, you know, Sinn Féin, the IRA legacy party, you know, can now unlock and come

together. But look, it's, it doesn't change my overall opinion of the Brexit, the toy party, or Rishi Sunak, it solves one little problem. What it may also do is help kind of Rishi Sunak put Boris behind him, right? I was about to say that. Rishi Zunak, like Boris Johnson's been running around the world. He's been going to Ukraine. He's been acting like he's still the prime minister. List Trust has come to the United States, It's giving speeches stepping on all over Rishi Sunak. Like, they're trying to humiliate him over and over and over again. And this is finally a chance for him to assert himself a little bit and, like, actually look like the prime minister.

Yeah, and say, like, I just did something that Boris couldn't do, you know. And I think that may consolidate his position as leader of the conservatives heading into the next election. Yeah. Let's turn to Ukraine because there's been lots of news there. We are learning more, Ben, about the White House concerns about China potentially selling arms to Russia. So CNN reported that the specific concern is about the sale of drones and ammunition. And then CIA director Bill Burns went on CBS this weekend. And he said that the U.S. is confident that Chinese leadership is considering providing lethal aid,

but they haven't made a decision yet. For their part, the Chinese put forward a 12-point plan to end the war. This is apparently offered without any real consultation with Zelensky or the Ukrainian government. It is generally viewed as sort of a pro-Russia document because it calls for an end to sanctions against Russia and kind of blames obliquely other countries for the invasion, meaning like the West, not Russia. Let's pause there, though. Like, I'm curious what you make of this strategy to push China very hard, very publicly. I both understand it, and I will concede that the White House did some interesting things

in releasing classified information, declassified information sort of early on in the war. But I also worry here that in the wake of the balloon mess and everything else that you could see the Chinese getting their backs up and not wanting to look like they had been bullied by the United States out of an arm sale that they feel like there is their sovereign right. Look, first of all, when like Bill Burns, you know, we worked with him, I worked with him for, I know, almost seven years, the most deliberate man on the face of the earth. You know, like every word that guy says, has, he's thought about it. He doesn't do a lot publicly.

It doesn't do a lot of press. So, you know, we always call him the stash because he has, like, just a killer mustache. Like, when the stash comes out and says something like this, like, that is some serious shit. Sunday show stash. Like, just like, stop what you're doing. Pay attention to this guy. Like, this is the result of a process. This is not like a, you know, he's not saying something by accident.

Yeah, no. So just to underscore, like, they are clearly seeing things in the intelligence and make them believe that China is going to do this or is planning to do this or has some decision teed up to do this. Now, why blow the whistle on it? I would assume that they're thinking is that the Chinese would maybe like to do this. And let's just, you know, why would they like to do it? Well, you know, they want to bleed the U.S. and Europe and bog us down there. And they, by the way, all the weapons were sending into Ukraine, those are weapons that we can't send to Taiwan. We've talked about this as shortages of arms. And just generally, like, you know, they're on the autocracy side of this war. Now, they would probably like that to just happen. Like they just start doing it and then people like, oh, wow, shit, the Chinese are supplying the Russians and then everybody gets mad. Yeah, it wouldn't be a secret. It's already happening, right? And I think that their hope must be that by spotlighting this and calling all attention to it, the Chinese may have to like think twice about it.

I'm not sure that's true because if the Chinese give such a little shit about the Ukrainians that they're even willing to entertain this, they're probably willing to do it, you know? I hope that that's true. I hope it works because as we talked about, if China comes in like this, it's a huge game changer in U.S.-China relations, relations between the West and China, and it's a huge lifeline to Russia that needs all the help they can get. I, you know, you and I were talking before we came in, like Lukashenko, the dictator of Belarus and the kind of lackey of Putin, the guy who literally the last time he met with Putin was caught on a mic saying Putin's like, thank you for coming.

and he said, did I have any other choice about whether it's come? Yeah. Remember that. He's in Beijing today, right? Now, there is no reason, like, there's no bilateral relationship between Belarus and China. No, but not doing a lot. This is like a pretty poor dictatorial country in Eastern Europe. Like, China doesn't need to be, like, hosting a, it's a state visit for dictator of Belarus.

That tells me a lot. Like, that tells me that Chinese have made a decision, maybe not a decision to arm them leafly, but it's pretty clear whose side they're on in the war, you know? And I can only imagine what he's talking to Lukashenko about. And maybe what he's talking. I don't know whether they're going to route some of these arms through Belarus. I don't know what the hell the deal is. But to me, that is like a blinking red light of like, okay, this is the axis that is kind of coming together here.

And it's not a good development. No. The other arms sale development I saw was a white house said they're concerned. Russia may supply Iran with fighter jets. So everyone's arm in everyone these days. The Wall Street Journal, though, Ben, reported that. Germany, France, and Britain have floated a new defense pact of sorts with Ukraine. So the idea is to offer Ukraine access to more advanced military gear once the war ends as a way to encourage Ukraine to begin

peace talks with Russia now or later this year. The journal said that, you know, there's a lot of growing doubts among leaders in European capitals that Ukraine will ever be able to fully push Russia out of his territory and that French President Emmanuel Macron in particular have been trying to deliver kind of like a tough love message to Zelensky to say, you're going to have to cut a tough deal, like the Germans and the Russians negotiated end of World War II. You know, you're going to have to do this. It might include losing territory. This proposal does not mean NATO membership.

It does not mean NATO troops in Ukraine. Meanwhile, though, you've got former Russian president, Smitri Medvedev, suggesting that Russia's security might require pushing back Poland's borders. Medvedevideo, everything the guy says sounds like it came after about a bottle and a half of a bit. Yeah, yeah, at least. So that's, you know, war with NATO. So Tony Blinken, Secretary of State is in Kazakhstan urging them not to help Russia evade sanctions.

So a lot going on here. It is, though, notable, though, that, you know, according to this journal report, and really, you know, we've heard soundings of this publicly before. The conversation in European capitals is pretty different than the message Joe Biden was trying to send in Kiev last week about, like, enduring U.S. commitment to defend all of Ukraine, et cetera, et cetera. Okay, so first of all, we may need a segment on this podcast called World War Watch. We've talked about that at an uncomfortable amount of times this far, but if you have China, arming Russia and Russia arming Iran that is also arming Russia, like, you know, we talk about how the flashpoints are Ukraine, Iran, Taiwan, like, there's the other team, you know. Yeah. It's kind of the kickback for the Iranian drones. Well, exactly, right, but it does show this kind of evolving, these evolving blocks, right?

of the West and, you know, Japan and Australia and a couple other countries versus these other guys. So that's just flogging that. It's interesting to me, like, the debate is being waged with an unusual degree of ferocity on this question of what Ukraine should get. What that tells me is that in all these conversations, like the Munich Security Conference took place, which we, you know, you can kind of snicker at the Munich Security Conference is kind of like the security Davos. But it is like everybody goes to that thing. Right.

It's pretty clear to me that the debates and arguments were happening at this conference are spilling out now into the open, right? Because you have, on the one hand, I don't know how many articles I've read in the last few days from, you know, in the Atlantic or, you know, from the neocons or from the, you know, really intense Ukrainian supporters

like Mike McFaul, like there's clearly a coordinated effort among some people who are worried about what they're hearing. Yeah. Look, what I'm guessing is that the hardcore Ukraine supporters are like they don't like what they're picking up in places like Munich from the Europeans and others. And maybe even people in the Biden administration who are kind of like, where is this going? Like we need to start thinking about an end game. And that end game probably doesn't involve like taking Crimea back and every inch of Ukrainian territory. And so they're out there now at full decibel volume.

Give them everything. Give them everything they need. Do it now. do it now. The way to end the war is to give them more stuff faster. Fighter jets are only the beginning of this and everything. And some that may also be that if you set the bar really far to the right, like at least you get them some more stuff. And it seems like there's a quieter view that is concerned about this. And the Europeans are on the front end of this. And I think the U.S. administration probably has both of these views inside of it, the Biden administration. And so

everybody's trying to influence the Biden administration. That's kind of how I read what's going on. Look, I think that we've talked so much about, and we did on the special episode, but like, we'll know more in the next few months about do tanks make a big difference? Do the Ukrainians, is the Russian military buckling or the Ukrainian is going to take back significant territory? Is the momentum going to kind of propel them such that if we do keep pouring in weapons, they can make huge territorial gains, or is this feeling more and more like a stalemate? And I just think we have to be informed by that, you know, I think it's prudent to kind of make decisions based on what's happening on the ground here. Yeah. But it feels pretty pivotal to me right now. I mean,

like this question of like open up the full aperture of weapons versus try to land the plane, which by the way, both of those things probably won't work. You know, like I don't think just arming the Ukrainians and everything will like lead the ward end, nor do I think. think there's like some peace deal to be had. But I mean, you sense the opinion beginning to open up in terms of the different camps on this. Yeah. Switching gears here. So last week we talked about the World Bank, right after we recorded, or a day or two after we recorded, President Biden announced that a guy named Ajay Banga will be the next president of the World Bank. He is the former president and CEO of MasterCard. He's a long career in business. In this announcement, Biden highlighted

Bongo's ability to bring together public and private funding to tackle problems like climate change, as we talked about last week. The hope is to reshape the mission of the World Bank to focus on climate change in addition to poverty alleviation because they are inextricably linked. Banga is a naturalized U.S. citizen but was born in India. He went to school there. According to Washington Post, you have some activists who are disappointed by the choice in part because they hope Biden would name the first woman to leave the World Bank. others felt that Bongo was too closely aligned with Wall Street. I'll be honest, I do not know much about him, but it seems like then the White House had been prepared for this opening because they moved really fast to name someone once the previous Trump goon stepped down.

Well, yeah, they'd come under some pressure and some criticism for not shoving the Trump goon overboard. Yeah, yeah, climate denying Trump dune. Yeah, so look, anybody's a huge improvement over the Trump climate denying goon. And what's interesting to me also is like when we and the Obama administration fill the vacancy with Jim Kim, one of the things that, you know, the U.S. gets criticized for is that there's this kind of weird deal where the U.S. usually gets to pick the leader of the World Bank and the Europeans get to pick the leader of the IMF. Yep. Which has kind of weird, you know, colonial vibes, especially given that the World Bank and the IMF are usually operating in the developing world and, like, the formerly accomplished. colonized countries. And what's interesting me is Jim Kim was similarly an American born in another country in South Korea. So part of how this can be read is them trying to signal diversity in the

sense that, you know, this isn't just some, you know, white guy born in the U.S. This is somebody. Bob Zellick. Yeah. Yeah, exactly, right? This is somebody who was born in another country and has this kind of global business experience. So that's just kind of notable because it's interesting to watch how the U.S. and Europe are trying to evolve their approach to these institutions. Look, anybody that prioritizes climate and the linkages you talked about, climate and poverty, alleviation and migration, like the World Bank should be a better tool, much better tool than it has been to date in being a part of the climate finance solution. So like, this guy will get in there because that's usually what happens when the U.S. picks a candidate and let's hope that it works.

Yeah, I hope it works. Some big immigration news, Ben, the Biden administration proposed a series of new immigration regulations, including a rule that says, except for some narrow exceptions, that migrants are ineligible for asylum if they enter the U.S. unlawfully. The administration is also reportedly considering a new policy that would fast-track deportation of migrants who don't schedule an appointment at a U.S. border port of entry or request protection from another country while traveling to the U.S. These policies would take effect on May 11th. They're supposed to stay in place for two years.

The Biden administration says they're putting these policies in place now in anticipation of a potential surge of migration at the southwest border when the pandemic era title 42 rule expires. That was a rule we've talked about many times that allowed the government to basically expel all migrants in the name of pandemic protection. Immigration activists are furious about this. They denounce the rule. They compared it to Trump era policies. Just stepping back, like I think clearly this speaks to how difficult the. problem is and how impossible it is to solve without some sort of action by Congress. And also, if we're being honest, how bad the White House think the politics are. Because these are pretty

draconian steps. These are people comparing these to sort of like Stephen Miller policies have a point. I am also struggling, I hate these changes, but I'm also struggling to figure out a better way to address the influx of migration because what the administration is pointing to is saying, look, we set up these special parole categories for countries like Venezuela and Cuba and two others. And illegal border crossings have dropped 97%. So they're trying to say that's now a new model they can use to try to fix, you know, these enormous backlog of asylum cases, et cetera, et cetera. I don't know that this is the right way to do it, but clearly this is sort of the path they're going down.

Yeah, I mean, it's not all the way to like the Trump policies, but it is fairly draconian. But like, when you have Title 42 going away and you have like the spring is actually also the time of year when you sometimes see an uptick, like it's not irrational to try to get ahead of that in some fashion. I think they're projecting maybe double the number per day arriving at the border from last year's peak. Yeah. So a huge influx. And, you know, like this is excruciating and you're always going to like, you know, they're always going to be fair critiques level that this. I mean, I think the challenge is they're trying to deter that migration, which is not an inhumane thing in the sense that it's also not safe if you have like huge floods of people trying to get to the border because Title IV2 goes away and because of the weather and a bunch of factors. So I also think that we should just expect that this is, as you said, they're read of the politics and that in the less than two years running up to a presidential election, like you're usually going to say.

see like a pretty enforcement heavy approach as the border, you know? Yeah. Last thing before the interview. So, Ben, remember, it feels like a million years ago now, that hilarious week or two when Elon Musk rolled out Twitter blue program and everyone started impersonating brands and people and we're all having a great time. Well, things have been going so poorly for Twitter since.

They've fired most of the staff, including some more layoffs recently. But the Washington Post reported that Twitter has finally found some willing and eager buyers for their Twitter blue verification program where you can just buy a little blue check, which is accounts that like to push around Russian propaganda. This is according to a research group called Reset. One of the accounts describes itself in English as a, quote, no woke, no BLM, no gender pronouns,

just anti-imperialism purporting to be based in San Francisco. It's this blonde woman in a like a Russian fur hat with a hammer and sickle badge. It feels like they're confusing some archetypes there. Yeah, he's like on there. It's not like a right-wing, left-wing. There's another account where just the blurb says, Doing My Part to Stop Western Support for the Ukrainian War Machine,

one taxpayer at a time. This regular tweets videos of Russians killing Ukrainian soldiers. So great news for free speech defender Elon Musk. You are doing yeoman's work when it comes to helping governments push around propaganda. First of all, I have not been using Twitter as much recently for a lot of reasons, including just just, generalize mental health in the central world of that that Rich Goober, like David Sacks,

plays over there. Yeah, I think it sucks. But like I'm looking at now, I still have a blue check mark. Yeah, I think it's going to go away soon. Is that because they haven't gotten to me yet? It's going to go away soon. They're going to take it from you. I mean, because this is so fucking dumb.

Like, I never even, I didn't even know how I got in the first place. I think when I left the White House. It just happened. It was a magic process. No, no. When I left the White House, the great Tanya Somenator. Oh, hooked you up. Hooked me up because she had all the ends of Twitter.

right but like I just don't like this it's interesting me that there's these people that are so fixated on this blue check mark as some well it's not just a blue check it prioritizes you in search it makes more people see your stuff so that's why this like propaganda piece like kind of matters but there's a bit an element did you read the sneaches and when you're a kid the dr. Seuss book uh probably where there's like the star belly sneezes and then there's snitches without the stars on their bellies okay and then some guy comes and he makes a machine to give this non star belly sneech's stars and then It all gets mixed up as to who's better than who. Yeah, it's ringing a bell. There's something to this. Like, this is basically, read the sneeches if you understand, like, this Elon Musk fixation on these blue check. I mean, I know he's trying to monetize it, too, but there's this kind of weird thing that this is actually, like, a status thing, too. Look, the point is the Russians and the Chinese and whomever are going to try to manipulate and take advantage of any one of these things. And, like, Elon Musk is not going to, like, outsmart them with his brain trust of tech, bro, crypto.

goobers over there and in HQ. Yeah, and also I just think we're like on the precipice of fake news being so much worse than it ever was before. Here's actually an expert on it talking about. Here's a clip. Yo, Ben, Tommy. It's Barack. Look, I just wanted to drop a note to say thank you again for helping me fake Osama bin Laden's

death. I still can't believe we pulled that shit off. It was almost as impressive as when Kennedy faked the moon landing because as you know, he wasn't actually assassinated. Hope to see you both at the Deep State Holiday Party later this year. And remember, don't boo, vote. Because ghosts are real.

And they will fucking kill you if you sass talk them. I can't stop making stupid AI generated Obama voices. They're so good though. That's particularly good. I had not heard that. To those of us, to the 7 billion people, not on our text chain,

you've missed several of these that you've said, but that's a pretty good one. That one, like, so it's really, this technology is like hinky. Like, you delete a period one place and it changes the inflection, you know, four sentences later. So you really just kind of like have to mess with it to get it, right? Like the one I did for PSA, like actually really sounded like the tones that like Joe Biden did. That was your best Biden too, because I've heard your other Joe Biden, some of which are

even funnier in the PSA one, but they didn't sound. That was different audio. It was a, that was a speech audio. But the bottom line is like, even something where the language, itself is like self evidently ridiculous and not real. Just hearing it sound that much like the person it's purported to be fooled a lot of people. I had a lot of folks being like, I can't believe that that clip. I thought it was real for a minute until I saw the comments, et cetera, et cetera. It's like, it just makes me realize that there is this like fake news nightmare coming down the tracks.

And over on Twitter, you got Elon Musk and this skeleton team of people that don't seem to really care about this stuff unless it's sort of like defending David Sachs or other right-wing voices and it's going to be a real problem. So I remember like back in the height of the Iran deal fight in 2015 or something, I was interviewed at something by friend of the pod, Jeff Goldberg. And, you know, somebody like one of his right wing like assholes tweeted like Ben Rhodes to Jeff Goldberg and he put in quotes, the kiss of the nuke deal will turn the Iranian frog into a prince. And he put that in quotes. And I've seen. he didn't say that or anything like it.

It doesn't sound like you now. And they wrote articles off it though. Like Breitbart had a headline like Ben Rhodes says the kiss of the nuke deal is a prince. And I'm in the fucking White House and I've no power to stop this. People are gullible. There are all these stories and Jeff Goldberg. I had to ask Jeff Goldberg to like tweet out like Ben Roads didn't say this. And the point is that like you said that that was self evidently crazy language.

But like people see something in quotes. They believe it. Like we are, we talked about the chat bot last. week. You know, like, we're heading into, like, some new terrain, like, like, that could make the last decade feel like the warm-up act, you know? When you take AI and chatbots and deepfakes and governments are now war with each other, right, China and Russia and the rest of us, like, we could be heading into, like, a deeply,

deeply strange time. This is totally unregulated. You could, you could use AI. I mean, I think about just, like, to go down. the AI rabbit hole real quick. Like when I was in Taiwan, I met with some disinformation people that showed me like fake speeches that they said were created by Manuel Macron, like saying that like the U.S. is declining and China's rising. Like AI could create an entire news ecosystem to validate a piece of disinformation, right? Of course. So instead of just having a fake

Macron speech, you could have news articles about the fake speech. And TV hosts and the U.S. Boys saying the speech and then TV and then Tommy, Vitor and Ben Rhodes on Pots of the World talking about this McCrone speech, AI could generate that instantaneously. There's no way we're going to be able, that people are going to have the time or wherewithal to figure out what's real and not. Yeah. Just going to give up. So what do you do about it? I don't know. It's really worrisome.

I mean, they're going to need some real technology solutions, but the problem is... Other than take ad bulls and make really funny speeches. Yeah, well, that part's just fun. But yeah, I mean, listen, if I can, you know, make a pretty realistic sounding Barack Obama voice with a $5, you know, website, like imagine what the Russians can do with the Chinese. Exactly. It's really bad. Anyway, on that light note, we're going to take a break. And when we come back, you'll hear from Mav Mekaiili, the leader of Israel's labor parties. Stick around for that. Our guest today is Mairav Mikhaili. She is the leader of Israel's

labor party. Mayerav, thank you so much for joining. Thank you for having me. And just let me, I want to ease your mind on this. Okay. my first acquaintance with the U.S. was in 1983 when I was on the Scouts delegation. And then nobody could pronounce Marav and they called me Mirage. So. Oh, God. Listen, I can't pronounce anything correctly. And I've grown up with people calling me Viter, Vietor, Tommy Vitor.

So, you know, I figure everyone just has a little grace on this stuff. There's so much I want to cover today. But I was hoping we could start with the changes to Israel's, judiciary that Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu is trying to ram through the Knesset, Israel's parliament as we speak. Can you just describe for listeners what Netanyahu in this super right-wing, super orthodox coalition is trying to do in what the impact would be? So they're bringing a package of legislations that are aimed at crushing, weakening dramatically, our judicial system, politicizing it,

and giving almost exclusive power to the government. Now, Nathaniel has been in power for 13 years in a row. He was prime minister. He never did anything regarding fixing what they're calling now. This is how they call it, to fix the judicial system. But now, and we can elaborate on that in a short while, Different interests are colliding. First and foremost is his interest to escape his own trial because he stands trial for three criminal charges and he wants out. So there's a huge, huge protest that's been taking place in Israel for eight weeks already.

People are taking to the streets in hundreds of thousands every week again and again and even more and more every week. And what we're also seeing is people and sectors who have never taken a stand on anything. Officials who were appointed by Netanyahu, the high-tech sector, nurses or social workers, or really people who never ever took a stand in the most senior economics and all of them. You cannot find one economic in Israel who will speak in favor of this so-called reform, the coup that they want to bring about. And you probably also heard the warnings from the president of the United States, Joe Biden and French president in the UN.

And today it's also the foreign minister of Germany. So really, everyone is telling Netanyahu to stop. The majority of Israelis, and we see this in. in polls do not want this so-called reform. And this is what's on the line now. Now they passed their first reading in a, you know, one of their right wing, now he's not in the parliament,

but he used to be once said that there needs to be a D9 going on over the Supreme Court in Israel. So there's a feeling of them coming with a D9 own the Knesset now and passing the first reading. So now we're repositioning ourselves to stop the second and third reading and to not allow this to pass. Yeah, I mean, I wanted to suss out what that would look like because you're right. I mean, I read that there were 160,000 people in the streets this weekend in Tel Aviv alone. You see people like former prime minister at Ehud Barack calling this changes the laws of dictatorship. The

former head of the Mossad said if these changes go through, members of the military should legitimately disobey orders because the government is now illegitimate? I mean, those are as stark criticisms of a legal changes I've ever heard in any country. But I guess my question is like, what avenues exist currently to potentially block these changes from happening? Or does Bibi just have the numbers in the Knesset and can kind of push it through if he decides? Well, I suppose that in principle he can push it through if he decides, but it is still a way. We do have still the parliamentarian tools in which we can delay, stall,

you know, make it more difficult for them. Secondly, you know, there's always the hope that the few decent people that are left only could will do the right thing and not give Nathaniel the fingers that he needs in order to be able to pass. ask this because even Likud people are saying there was no discussion within the party. And there was zero discussion within the government about this so dangerous initiative that they're pushing forward. And I know for a fact, and it's not a secret that some of them are very much against it.

So there's always the hope of people being decent people and doing the right thing. But not only that, I think it's the protest that is really grassroots and is really amazing. It's something that they did not see coming. If you came to the stage of the big, big, big rally outside of the Knesset two weeks ago, I think it was, you could see around the stage not only one, but many former prime ministers, I think all the living ones, and former members, heads of Mossad and Shabakh and really so many seniors, former officials that were there. It was unbelievable to see. But the most amazing thing is that the current officials dare to, you know,

stand up and say, this is very, very dangerous. It's going to crash not only Israeli democracy, which of course is the number one thing, but also the economy and also security. And we're already seeing, and this is no coincidence in the sense that it's not by chance that when they are pushing forward, this initiative that will really crush Israeli democracy, we are seeing the violent settlers acting out the way they didn't, and really doing this terror attack that they did the other night in Chawarra. It really is generating this insecurity in the country from every aspect you can think of. Yeah, I mean, I'm glad you raised this violence because it's very scary sort of to watch from the United States.

The cycle of violence seemed to pick up the most recent events where these two Israeli brothers were stuck in traffic. They were shot dead by a Palestinian gunman in response. These settler groups rampaged through a Palestinian town. I think they burned over a dozen homes, dozens of cars. I know that Israel has since deployed troops to the West Bank to try to keep the peace, but there are a lot of allegations, and you see this repeatedly, that IDS soldiers or border police were potentially providing protection for the settlers during the violence or didn't do enough to stop it.

What do we know about those allegations in this instance? I can't tell you that I am aware of the details of any research that I'm sure. is taking place and should be taking place very seriously. But again, it's not, this needs to be handled in the hardest and the severest possible way, of course. But what I'm saying is that it goes together. These are the destructive powers that exist and have been cultivated by Netanyahu for many, many years, that exist in Israeli society and Israeli politics.

and are being cultivated by him for many, many years. He is the one who brought them into the Knesset, and now he brought them onto the government. And it goes hand in hand. So it's imperative to understand that I think this attempt of his to alter the regime in Israel and to turn it into a non-democracy, into something totalitarian, almost totalitarian,

or totalitarian is a wake-up call for a lot of Israelis to understand that it goes hand in hand with those very, very dangerous forces, which he brought onto the government, but are doing the things that they've been doing in the West Bank. So to finish the answer to your previous question, Netanyahu does not have any legitimacy for what he's doing. This is not something that he's promised on his campaign during the campaign. He did not say, I'm going to alter the judicial system and change Israeli democracy. He talked about personal security. He talked about free education from the age of birth to the age of three.

He talked about things that are really bothering Israelis. And instead, what he brought is a coup that is good only for those who are currently in power in order to leave them in power forever. So there is a major, major backlash, and he knows that he does not have any legitimacy. And this is why they constantly speak about negotiation or agreement or coming together to sit down and talk, because the only people who can give him legitimization right now are the opposition. And this is why labor is standing up and saying there's no way we should give him this legitimization. We should not save Netanyahu from what he's brought on himself, on everyone.

We should just bring the protest and the resistance to a point where they just can't go through with this. Yeah. It was interesting to hear you call this settler violence a terrorist attack. A lot of people sort of were surprised when the U.S. State Department called the Palestinian gunmen's attack, a terrorist attack, and then refer to settler violence as settler violence, what it does seem like both instances are our terrorism, sort of the definition of terrorism, terrorizing a community. And it also just seems to me that in some ways what we've seen from these settler communities is the logical extension of collective punishment on Palestinian communities, right? It meets the official government policy to seal the family homes of Palestinian terrorists.

There has been discussion about rescinding social security benefits that go to the relatives of attackers. And I just wondered if you think, you know, these settlers and these communities are sort of taking direction from the top from senior members of BB's coalition. I don't know. I'm not sure. And I really don't care whether they give it or take it or give it back. I mean, really, I don't care how they split the jobs between them. What I care is that they are being handled and stopped. And what I care is that we realize that there is no way to solve this conflict without a peaceful political solution.

Now, it is difficult. It is complicated. There is also a problem on the Palestinian side. It's not like the Palestinians are reaching out to us constantly, far from it. And there's constant terror being executed by, of course, Hamas, or now we have new organizations that were revealed and acted against by the IDF. So the reality here is difficult. There is a lot of Palestinian terrorism.

We need to acknowledge that, even us who are really peace people and really believe. and are pushing towards a peaceful solution. We can't look away from the dangers and the challenges and terrorism. But the fact that this is the situation right now should never discourage us from looking for the peaceful solution, the political solution that needs to be found at the end of the day.

Because otherwise, what we're constantly seeing is the constant deterioration towards, you gave some examples, but there are plenty more. This is not where we should be heading, but on contrary the other way around. Find, even if it's a little solution in the beginning, little solutions. By the way, at the beginning of, I think, last week or this week or whatever,

who can remember, Netanyahu reached agreements with the Palestinian Authority. The amazing thing is that this burst out after they reached an agreement to strengthen the Palestinian authority, something that I strongly support. And the Palestinian Authority has committed to do its best to prevent terror as much as it possibly can. Problem is, since the Palestinian Authority was being weakened for so long that its ability has been, is now less than it used to be in the past and the two voices in which Netanyahu, what he does is on one hand, he speaks against the Palestinian authority. He speaks against the legitimacy of dealing with them. And on the other hand, he goes and deals with them. And unfortunately, also was dealing with Hamas for many,

many years. Yeah. So we've been talking today about all the ways Israel has changed, its new right-wing government, these judicial reforms. But despite all those changes, very little about U.S. policy towards Israel seems to have changed. President Biden basically doesn't seem to want to have any public disagreements with Netanyahu, whether it's on Iran, whether it's on a two-state solution or settlements. It's just sort of like the standard talking points. What would you and other members of the Labor Party or other progressives in Israel like to see from the United States when it comes to U.S. policy that might actually help, I don't know, push back on some of these right-wing parties or proposals?

Well, first and foremost, you know, as an Israeli, as an Israeli patriot, as an Israeli leader, the relationship, the special relationship with the U.S. are, of course, very dear to me emotionally and strategically just as much. And I wouldn't want to see it get hurt. But I hope we never get to the point where Israel changes its character from the democracy that it is, that in a way that may, God forbid, jeopardize these special relationship. There's also a difference between what officials and the administration can and should do, and friends of Israel and people who Israel is dear to them and understand the importance of its existence,

I would say, first and foremost, of course, to the Jewish people, but not only those people, that is maybe my most important message to them. To say for, you know, I'm a member of the opposition, the political opposition, I'm in politics for 10 years, but I've been saying this long before I was in formal politics. Israel is not Netanyahu. and our friends and allies and partners to the same values and to the genuine original Zionism, which is about self-governing

and not about dominating anyone else other than govern ourselves. And that it is about a home for the Jewish people but with complete and total equality for all of its citizens and with separation of state and religion and with striving towards a just society, and reaching out to agreements with our neighbors. Those allies of ours, those partners and friends,

we need you to not walk away from Israel. We need you to realize and to recognize that the majority of Israelis are not supporting what Netanyahu has been doing. He has been operating this huge industry of brainwashing, which you as American, as post-Trump Americans know all too well. So just imagine, just imagine living under this for so long. And you can be so effective in helping us, beating that, and taking Israel back to the Zionist vision, the thing that is needed in order to be able to finding a solution.

for the Israeli Palestinian conflict and to rebuilding Israel as it began, as it is supposed to be. That is my most important message, maybe. The administration is one thing. It's more complex, but there are so many people

in so many positions who care about Israel do not give up on us. There's really no reason why we shouldn't be able to build it back. The majority of Israelis are afraid of Arabs because they're being told morning, day and night, that they're against them. But they are not racist or not

chauvinists in a way. You know it from some people in America. It's a whole different culture, which is really much more pro-pluralism, much more pro-acceptance. And there's so much much to work with. This is what we need to do. Work with it and rebuild what needs to be rebuild in Israel. So hopefully the Labor Party will be a big part of that process. You recently said the Labor Party is stuck in the mud and I have the mission of rescuing and rebuilding it. How are you going to do that? Well, first of all, you know, a party we need to always remember is a tool in order to build the country back and the state of Israel. It's not a standalone. But when you look at Israeli parliament today, the only democratic Zionist party is labor. And this is why it's so

essential to not only keep it, but really to revive it and to rebuild it. So how am I going to do this? You know, just the long way of a lot of work to bring new forces on board, to do the grassroots work of going back to speaking to people all over the country, something that was not done in labor for many, many years, and to bring on board powerful partners who can help us bring and build the platforms that our side of the political map does not have, and therefore is in such an unequal position vis-à-vis the right-wing in Israel, which has huge platforms and so many of them. And again, not something that is strange to you. You are no strangers to this situation. And there's no reason why we can't build what we need to build and win. I believe that we can

win and I want to win. Our side of the political map has suffered so many losses and so many disappointments from its own leaders so many times that I think they gave up. Many people gave up on the concept of winning. Well, I haven't, and I'm telling you, it's achievable. So that's what I'm going to be doing, building this prospect. That's a great message, a great place to leave it on. Look, as a Democrat, I know what it's like to spend some time in the political wilderness, but we're back over here, and I believe you guys will be too. So thank you so much for doing the show. Thanks for helping us all understand what's going on. And best of luck. Thank you, Tommy. Have a great day.

Thanks again, Mara for joining the show. Thanks, Barack Obama for helping with conspiracy theories. I was going to put it in there that only keep this secret between you and me and Seymour Hirsch, but he wouldn't say the name right. Oh, you tried that? Yeah. It didn't come through. Well, actually, that's normal for Obama's like share some of our own pronunciation problems.

He does. Massachusetts. Yeah, or Aung Sang. Remember, he kept pronouncing Aung San Suu Kyi's name wrong. How dare you. The point being is it actually would have been authentic if the AI screwed up the pronunciation. Fair enough. But we'll come back to that story.

Yeah, we'll be making more. All right, talk to you guys next week. POTSave World is a crooked media production. Our executive producers are me, Tommy Vitor, Ben Rhodes, and Michael Martinez. Our producer is Haley Muse. Our associate producer is Ashley Mizzou. It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick, Kyle Segglin, Charlotte Landis, and Veseli Futopoulos are our sound engineers. Thanks for our digital team, Elijah Cohn, D.B. Bradford,

and Milo Kim, who upload our episodes and videos to YouTube every week and check out the Potsave the world's YouTube account. Thanks to Saul Rubin for production support.