The Breakfast Club - INTERVIEW: Head Of ADL, Jonathan Greenblatt, Speaks On Israel-Hamas War + More (Recorded 10-13-23)

Episode Date: October 17, 2023

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Wake that ass up early in the morning. The Breakfast Club. Morning, everybody. It's DJ Envy, Charlamagne Tha Guy. We are The Breakfast Club. We got a special guest in the building. Yes, indeed. The director of the Anti-Defamation League, Jonathan Greenblatt.

Welcome back. Good morning, DJ. How you feeling this morning? You know, I'm glad I'm here. I'm glad I'm here. We've definitely got stuff to talk about. Man, what is going on in the world? For people that don't know, don't understand what going on in israel and gaza what is happening look it is uh these

are dark days these are dark dark days i would say that this last week has probably been the toughest week of my adult life so last friday night around 1 30 in the morning i got a call from the head of my israel office who lives in a town called modine who said you know when the phone rings at 1 30 in the morning you know i look at the phone and she said jonathan there are hundreds maybe thousands of rockets coming into israel she said i don't know exactly what's going on, but you need to know something's up. And so then I called my other staff in Israel and was basically up all night trying to figure out what was going on. And then I would say it was around six in the morning that we started to get word here of what had actually happened. So it turned out that those rockets that

were sent by Hamas into civilian targets in Israel were sort of a cover or a distraction for what was really happening, which was this terrorist infiltration and the massacres that took place up and down the Gaza border in all of these surrounding towns. And they were brutal. I mean, the stories that are still coming out, more than 1,300 civilians, not just killed, although they were. I mean, it was a slaughter. It was a slaughter.

What did he say, the largest number of Jewish people killed in one day since the Holocaust? Since the Holocaust. Jesus. This is, I think, the largest terrorist, act of terrorism since 9-11. I think it's one of the largest acts of terrorism since the Second World War. And these people weren't just killed. I mean, they were slaughtered. When I say slaughtered, they were raped. They were tortured. Babies were burned in their cribs. Children were executed in front of their parents. Parents were executed in front of their children. Elderly people were shot in the head at point-blank range.

And they didn't just kill Israeli Jews. Israeli Arabs were killed. Asian people who live and work in Israel, there were videos of Thai people being killed. I saw a video of one man being bloodied, he'd been brutalized, being beheaded with a shovel. Filipino workers were killed.

A lot of people died at this music festival. It was a music festival, a peace festival. And these men came in on mechanized hand gliders of some sort with automatic weapons and gunned down approximately 260 young people. These are boys and girls and teenagers. Shot them in the back. Some of the people who'd come in on land were dressed as Israeli medics. They were in like uniforms, you know, and they were in the parking lot apparently. They stationed themselves in the parking lot. These men flew in

and as I understand it, the concert goers who filmed it on their phones because these people were coming in, they thought it was part of the show. It was like a rave. They shot them, shot at them and the people ran and they ran to the parking lot and there were medics there who they thought came into hell they shot them, shot at them, and the people ran.

And they ran to the parking lot. And there were medics there who they thought came in to help. And then the medics took out their guns because there were actually these terrorists and killed them all. They burned people alive in their cars. And of course, the people that they didn't kill, that they didn't maim, that they didn't kill that they didn't maim that they didn't mutilate they raped a lot of the women before they killed them there were stories about women who were shot in the legs so they couldn't run and then raped some of them killed, but a number of them and others were then seized and brought

into Gaza. And so we know this because we have the footage. This is the thing. We have the footage of all of this because these people gleefully videoed it on their phones. There was a story that I heard about one girl who saw the video of her grandmother being killed because they came into her home. They had the grandmother give them her phone, open her phone. They videoed themselves killing the grandmother. Then they uploaded it to the YouTube chats, or sorry, the WhatsApp chats on her phone. So that's how the grandmother saw her grandmother die, in the family WhatsApp chat. The grandmother saw her grandmother die?

The granddaughter. Granddaughter. Sorry if I said it wrong. The granddaughter learned that her grandmother had been killed because these men uploaded the video into the family WhatsApp chat from the grandmother's phone. But they've seized a lot of these people and they brought them into Gaza.

And again, we have the footage of all this. We have the footage of the murders. We have the footage of the torture. We have the footage of the beheadings. We have footage of these people in Gaza. There's a number of videos. You may have seen them. There's one video of a young woman battered and bleeding,

forced out of a car, mocked by the crowd, and then lit on fire. Set on fire in front of all of these people. There's a video, another video I've seen of a young girl brought out of a car bleeding from the crotch. I mean, it's bloody. You know, and they're leading her through

and they're chanting and whooping and hollering like she's some kind of, bloody, you know, and they're leading her through and they're chanting and hooping and hollering like she's some kind of, I don't know, trophy or something. So, I mean, these things, these videos, like I can't get them out of my mind. Like, you know, we talk about what happened in Rwanda. We talk about what happened in Cambodia. We talk about what happened in the Holocaust. And these are like things over there, right? And I'm not minimizing them at all,

but oftentimes these are incidents for which we don't have the live footage. And it's hard for us to relate to them. You can see it. It's like when they put the pictures of the Vietnam War on the papers back in the day, you can see it. You can actually see what's going on. And like, these are, I mean, it's like live in color on your phone, real time.

And again, like the applauding of it and the apparent, you know, grotesque, macabre fun of it for these people. It's just a kind of sadism that I mean look I know people who were killed we I just learned this morning driving in that my son's camp counselor my son goes to a Jewish overnight camp a lot of kids go to camp and they have some Israelis who come in and they're the counselors. The counselor from his bunk had been missing since all this happened. Meaning people knew he was down there and couldn't find him. And I learned this morning that they identified his corpse overnight, I guess.

So I don't know if he was one of the people who was burned beyond recognition. I don't know if he was one of the people who was burned beyond recognition. I don't know if he was one of the people who was beheaded. And so they didn't have an easy way to know who he was. But they just figured it out, you know, six days later. Let me ask you a question. So asking friends and people tell me that the Israeli military is very strong. Yeah. And they also tell me there's a lot of military. They also said that they have this technology that I believe that only the Israeli military in the United States has,

where they can block missiles that come, and it's like a high percentage rate of them blocking. I think it's called the Iron— Iron Dome. The Iron Dome. Yeah. So what happened to those strategies? Was none of that into play? Well, I think, I don't know exactly, but here's what I think, Envy.

I think what happened was, look, this was, first of all, we think about Hamas. And I think clearly there were a lot of failures here. There were intelligence failures, a military failure, a technology failure, and a moral failure. And I'll talk about that in a bit. But just on the military technology failure, I think that, look, the Hamas is not some random group of guys, you know, showing up on Saturdays and doing like, you know, cosplay. It's a highly trained military force that's been groomed over decades by the Iranians. Armed, trained, all of that. And so I think what they did was they identified the Israeli like technology centers

like the antenna and the different posts where they had the means by which they could surveil or detect and they took them out. And I think that inhibited the Israeli response. I also think that the Israelis did not believe they had the capability of launching missiles like that. But what we now know, why? Because they filmed it.

That Hamas was, you know, there's been a big water crisis in Gaza for years. Just step back. Like, Gaza is an impoverished, very tough place. Like our hearts should break for the people of Gaza. Right. Live under a repressive Hamas regime who have suffered greatly. Like we should. There's a there's a there's a human dimension to this on that side that we you can't talk about this without talking about that. Who's fault is that? What's Hamas's fault? A fault a hundred percent now i'll give you a good example of it so the israelis didn't think that they had the technology and there's also been

this water crisis for years a lack of potable water a lack of drinking water terrible sewage problem so it turns out and now we know this because they filmed it, that Hamas has been taking the water pipes out of the ground, repurposing them in makeshift factories into missiles. So where did Hamas get thousands of missiles? They didn't, the Israelis would never prevent, you know, missile parts from going in, neither would the Egyptians. Where did they come from? They took the water pipes out of the ground, the water pipes that serve their population, that facilitate things like sewage and the passage of potable water, and they turned them into missiles. And again, you can see the footage of this. So we say, whose fault is it is it like it is reasonable to say that it would be

I mean Gaza does not need to be like this it does not need to be the most densely placed the most I don't know this exact the most densely but a highly densely highly impoverished pocket but the reason why it is that the reason why it is in such bad straits is because of the Hamas that runs it, that took over in a coup d'etat in 2005 or maybe 2007. The Hamas that has not had an election in 16 years. The Hamas that forces women to wear hijabs. The Hamas that hangs gay people or kills them. There are no gay people in Gaza,

at least open or out. The Hamas that doesn't allow the construction of churches or, you know, other kind of means of worship for other people. I mean, that's the reason why the situation is where it is. I'm not saying Israel is not, doesn't have its problems. I'm not saying Israel shouldn't do more. I mean, you know, I've been here before

and I've been an active, active, fierce, ferocious advocate for a two-state solution for years. And I've gotten a lot of criticism from some in my community, but I've always believed, I still believe as we sit here today, that you will never have a true and sustainable peace unless you have safety and security for Israelis and dignity and equality for Palestinians. That's what I believe. I don't think you can ever build walls that are high enough. I don't. However, like the war that is now being fought

wasn't started by the Israelis. And the way I would describe it is you know the IDF the Israeli army they are there they use the army to protect their citizens Hamas uses their citizens to protect themselves they were saying they put missile launchers in hospitals they put missile launchers in schools they put guns and arms in mosques. They dig holes like for the tunnels inside people's homes. So why do they do that? They do that because the Israelis abide by the conventions of the Geneva Convention and the rules of war. And you are not supposed to.

You are not supposed to bomb hospitals or schools or mosques. Now, again, if you're launching missiles from it, it's a different story and you're then implicating it. But that's the idea and that's why they do it. So they don't leave the Israelis with much choice and using their own people as human shields, taking Israelis, hundreds of people as hostages, taking elderly people and children.

I can show, I will show you the videos. I think that's the saddest part, you know, looking at civilians in Israel, civilians in Palestine, dying and being casualties is something that seems like it's way bigger than them. Yeah. I mean, I think this will be called the Hamas war. I think that's what this will be referred to as we look back on it. Because again, it is tragic when civilians are killed. But the ones who killed the Israelis, again, the grandchildren and the disabled people were the Hamas terrorists. And the people who are now killing the Gazans are Hamas terrorists. Because if the Hamas terrorists put these hostages out, if they just gave them back, the Israelis would have no pretext to do.

It would be very difficult for the Israelis to do what they're doing. I mean, Israel is retaliating, though. I would say they're responding in a defensive measure. And I say that and I use that framing because again this wouldn't have happened had they not gone in and butchered all these people it just wouldn't have um and i think this is where you know envy you asked appropriately don't they have the iron dome and don't they have all this intelligence and they do and so i think there will be like forensics and after actions to try to understand how did this happen for years. But it's not just a military failure.

It's not just an intelligence failure. It's a moral failure. Because Hamas in its charter, which was written in 1987, it says its goal is not a two-state solution. It's to eradicate the Zionist entity. That's what it says. I actually brought it with me, you know, so I would have it so I could read it in. It says Israel will exist and continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it so if you read the charter right

i mean it's off the wall but i think the israelis came to believe that they could find like a like a modus vivendi like they could find some kind of status quo and live with them yes they hate us but they'll stay there and we'll stay here. And I think that was wrong. And I'll also tell you that I think all of us, like me and American policymakers and others who figured, you know what? How bad could it be? They'll stay on their side. They'll learn to work it out. We were wrong.

And when people tell you they want to kill you, you need to believe them. And when people tell you you're not a human being, you're a Zionist, and you are committing genocide and you don't deserve to live, we should know already. Listen to your enemies. Take them seriously. And I don't think we took it seriously enough. Do you think this will start another world war? I don't think we took it seriously enough. Do you think this will start another world war? I don't know.

I think America sent that big aircraft carrier over there as a warning to the Iranians. Look, again, Hamas is funded by Iran. The Hamas government, they don't trade with other countries. They don't build industry. 70% of their budget comes from Iran. So again, this is so how does it happen that they are at war with their own people, impoverishing them at their war with Israel? It's because they don't have any accountability. So America, and so they're a proxy, they're a militia. They're

like an extension of the Iranian revolutionary guard, their army. Okay. So if Israel goes into Gaza, as they will, is that going to prompt other countries to get involved? I think America moved its aircraft carrier over there as a sign to the Iranians, don't get involved. So I hope that that will deter the Iranians from doing anything. I mean, we've seen in the weeks since this happened, all the governments in Europe, almost all the governments in the world, I think,

have spoken out in support of Israel and condemned the massacre. They say Putin wants to take advantage of the Israel-Gazov war. I'm sure he does. A Hamas official even revealed the intent behind the assault on Russian television. Is that right? I didn't know that. I saw that on CNN yesterday. Look, it plays into Russia's hands. They want to distract the world from the savagery they're doing in Ukraine. Like, I get it. They want the West to fund, divert money to Israel and not to Ukraine. I get it. They want the UN to be focused on Israel, not Ukraine.

I get it. Like, it works for Russia. But look, if God forbid there's a world war, I mean, God forbid Iran gets involved and they shut down the Gulf and then oil can't move and then prices go up and like the whole thing could spiral really quickly, really quickly. What is the difference between Palestine, civilians in Palestine who might feel like,

who feel they're being oppressed by an Israeli government? What's the difference between them and Hamas? It's a super good question. So, let's step back, right? So basically in that part of the world where there have been indigenous Jews and indigenous Muslims living forever, for a long time, thousands of years, 1948, the United Nations, these people are skirmishing and fighting with each other. I want land. I want land. The British pull out. The United Nations says we're going to partition the land. One side for the Jews, one side for the Arabs. Now, one thing I'll just note here,

the Jews. So Jews are both a religion and an ethnicity, right? Jews are from the ancient tribes of Judea, right? You read it in the Bible. That's who the Jews are. Now you can certainly convert to Judaism and not be of that ethnic stock, but it's a little confusing because we are both an ethnicity and we are a religion. Okay. So that being said, so the Jews in the area and the Arabs in the area, the Jews say, the Jews want all the land, the Arabs want all the land. They partition it. The Jews say, okay, we'll take half. The Arabs say, we won't, we want it all. And so they go to war. They go to war against this little state and it's Jordan and Egypt and Syria and Lebanon and Iraq, I think. And the Israelis, this new little country, 1948, they survive. And so that becomes Israel.

Then in 1967, Syria and Egypt and Jordan go to war again against Israel. They attack Israel and Israel wins. And when it wins, it pushes back on Jordan, which had a bunch of the land that the Arabs didn't want or the Palestinian Arabs didn't accept. And so that they occupy that and that is called the West Bank. And then the Israelis also occupy part of the land the Egyptians came up from and that's called Gaza. Okay. And the Israelis also occupy part of the land that Syria came in and attacked them from and that's called the Golan Heights. So now Israel, which was once this big, it bigger, and they also occupy the Sinai area that Egypt also came in from. 1973, the Arabs attack again.

Israel repels them again, but they have all this land. 1978, Israel makes peace with Egypt, and they give them back the Sinai. 1993, the Oslo Accords. The idea is Israel's going to make peace with the Palestinian Authority, which is, so let's step back. 1962, remember, as I explained, there's a partition. Israel, the Jews take half the land. The Arabs refuse. The Jews survive. The land that was going to go to the Arabs, Jordan takes it and Egypt takes it. So in 1967, Israel repels Jordan and occupies that land, that land we call the West Bank.

So in 1962, in parallel to this, the PLO was formed to represent the Palestinian people, the indigenous people who got, you know, who the Arabs who didn't accept the deal in the first place. In 1993, the Oslo Accords, Israel makes peace with the Palestinian, the PLO, and they become the Palestinian authority, the government in the West Bank. It's just, okay, you can have it. We'll work it out. And in Gaza too, and in Gaza too. And then in 2007, there are elections in Gaza. Hamas wins the elections in Gaza. We'll talk about Hamas in one sec. And the Palestinian Authority doesn't accept it.

They fight, and Hamas stages a coup d'etat and basically wins. They won in the election. The PA didn't accept it. So they killed the Palestinian Authority and they took over. That's in Gaza. Now, Hamas is called the Muslim Brotherhood. It's an Islamic movement. It's got branches in different places. Started in Egypt. The Muslim Brotherhood chapter, if if you will in Gaza is called Hamas Hamas is formed in 1987 Hamas like I said wins the election in 2007 when they don't get power they kill the palace they fight and they kill the

Palestinian Authority and they take over so it is and has been is recognized by the United States and the European Union, many governments, as a terrorist organization. It's a government. Why? Because as they say in their charter, it's called the Covenant of Hamas, they believe in violence and they don't believe in peace. This is literally what it says. Again, I can read it if you want. So they believe in the eradication of the Zionist entity. They don't refer to it as Israel typically.

They call it the Zionist entity because they don't want to recognize that Israel exists. So this terrorist group took over, and this terrorist group governs Gaza. This terrorist group, again, is a Muslim Brotherhood outfit, so they are a fairly oppressive regime, meaning that it's an Islamic state, meaning they don't allow other religions, they don't allow music, they don't allow dancing. It's a lot like the regime in Iran or what ISIS wanted to build in Syria. So these are not people who are like liberal Democrats and these are not people who I think all of us could very easily relate to or and they would certainly have no interest in relating to me.

So the ordinary Palestinian people, Charlemagne, are just living there. They are not necessarily members of Hamas. Most Palestinian people are not in the Hamas military units. They're just moms and dads going to the grocery store who probably want a two-state government I don't know what the polling says about what they want but I think they probably just want to raise their kids and take a vacation like most of us nonetheless I will say that Hamas and the Iranians so a lot of this is being pushed by Iran we can talk about that but Hamas again has brainwashed and tries to use

propaganda to tell their people that they're at war with the Jews not with Israel by the way with the Jews so here's where it gets a little confusing so Israel is a the Jewish state it is a Jewish state. It was founded by Jewish people as a homeland for the Jewish people in the ancient land where the Jewish people have always lived. Not all of us. Again, we were thrown out and we've lived all over. Now, there are Jews who don't live in the Jewish state like me and millions of other people. Nonetheless, it's a Jewish state. So when Hamas says that we want to kill the Zionists, and when Hamas says it's the obligation,

it says, again, I'm reading from their charter, Article 7, the day of judgment will not come until Moslems fight Jews and kill them. Then the Jews will hide behind rocks and trees, and the rocks and trees will cry out, oh Moslem, there is a Jew hiding behind me, come and kill them. Then the Jews will hide behind rocks and trees, and the rocks and trees will cry out, O Moslem, there is a Jew hiding behind me. Come and kill him. So as I read this, this is not about, again, Palestinian identity. This is not about dignity and equality of ordinary people. This is about killing Jews, which is why the head of Hamas, who, by the way, lives in Qatar. He doesn't live in Gaza.

He doesn't live in the West Bank. He lives in Qatar in a villa. That's where most of their leaders actually live. They don't live in Gaza, even though Hamas controls it, because they're afraid the Israelis will get them live in they live very posh lives driving mercedes-benzes in very nice digs in doha but he did a video earlier in the week and he called for a day of jihad today a day of jihad and said that again muslims should go and kill jews wherever they are which is why in new New York today there is a police presence in front of every synagogue and every school. Because what the Hamas charter tells us, what the Hamas leadership tells us, is that all the Jews are targets. And I mean, that's just the reality.

So Israelis do not say that all Palestinians are targets. Jewish people, they're not my synagogue talking about Muslims. Not only do I talk about that, like, if you remember, like, this organization, the one that I run, ADL, fights Islamophobia. I have criticized Israeli government for its policies toward Palestinians. I stood up in 2016 in November after the election when Donald Trump, not my cup of tea, did this. You know, he was talking about registering Muslims. Do you remember this? And I stood up in front of a crowd of people and said, you know, I'm the grandson of a Holocaust survivor.

Like my grandfather lost everything. All of his family was slaughtered and exterminated. And I said, you know, as a proud Jew, if you try to register Muslims, I'll be the first person to register myself as a Muslim. Because I think it was an atrocious idea. And I will fight anti-Muslim bias with every fiber of my being. But there aren't Jewish people saying kill all the Muslims. And there certainly isn't the Jewish government, if you want to call it that, in Israel is certainly not saying kill all Palestinians. And no one is saying that the appropriate response to what happened is to go to a Palestinian music concert and gun down their children and burn them in their cars. So the level of savagery here is just off the charts.

The idea that somehow our synagogue here in New York is a legitimate military target, like do I need to say how insane that is? But if they're considered a terrorist group, right, as what you said, when the world sees a terrorist group, we usually go and try to find or get that terrorist group. Right. How come that hasn't been the same for this case or has it been? That's a really good question, Envy. So yeah, Hamas is a foreign terrorist organization designated by the U.S. State Department and most other governments.

And yet, I would say that the Israelis don't assassinate, kidnap, arrest Hamas figures around the world. They don't do that. Maybe they should. They don't. Because they usually do that for other quote-unquote terrorist groups. The United States has. The United Kingdom has for sure.

The Israelis don't do that. Maybe they should. I mean, yeah, the Israeli, I mean, the Hamas, like, you know, that wall, the terrible wall that's built in much of the West Bank, it's a terrible thing. It's a terrible thing. The Israelis built it after Hamas did a wave of suicide bombings, if you remember this. They had people strap themselves with explosives and go into cafes and dance clubs and go on public buses and thousands of Israelis were killed in the 90s and that's why they did that. Sorry it was the early 2000s, not the 90s. But, you know, no, actually, I'm wrong. It was the mid-90s, and it was in response to the Oslo Accords.

It was in response to the push for a two-state solution. Hamas doesn't want a two-state solution. They don't. They say it. They have demonstrated it. And, again, when you butcher children, like when you behead babies, clearly you have reached a point where you do not think the other side are people when i mean you do not think that israelis whatever whether they call us israelis or

zionists or jews it's all the same you don't think they're people you think they're animals you think they're less than animals we don't burn animals alive we don't behead animals. We don't rape animals. We don't do that. And I think you can clearly see through their actions that they regard Jews as subhuman. And I think it's also hard for us, and it's probably hard for your audience. Like, look, it's the year 2023. Yeah, why is this still happening? Yeah. We got electric cars, artificial intelligence. We've cracked the genome code. We're trying to address climate change. I mean, you don't think, you don't expect

that there are people out there who are so brainwashed and are so suffused with hate. But you know, I wrote this book, I was on your show talking about my book, It Could Happen Here. And the point of the book, It Could Happen Here, was what happens when hate goes to the unthinkable and how can we stop it? And the whole point of the book was

when you use this hateful rhetoric, when you demonize people, when you dehumanize them, it creates the conditions in which genocide can happen. And so it's why we got to stop it, why we speak out against hate when we see it. Anti-Semitism, anti-black racism, anti-Hispanic xenophobia, you speak out against it. Because if you don't speak out against hateful comments it can you know a sort of like uh what would you call like evolve or can move up the chain from comments to actions to systemic systemic policies to violence to genocide and when i wrote that two years ago it was certainly based on things like

the holocaust it was based on things like rwanda It was based on what I thought the world had learned. And yet here we are, literally sifting through the rubble and counting the bodies, trying to identify the victims in a way which suggests we haven't learned the lessons at all. What would you say to people who say that, because you said you've criticized Israel's government before. Sure have. MSNBC, I saw something yesterday that said Israel's far-right government fueled tensions with Hamas. What would you say about that? Look, Hamas wrote their charter in

1987. 1987. Last year, the Israeli government was a coalition. It's a coalition government. They had Jews and Muslims in the government. They had gay and straight and conservative and liberal. This government is certainly more conservative, more right-wing than that one. But the fact of the matter is Hamas didn't change their charter when there were Palestinian Arabs in the Israeli government. So I don't think it matters who's in the Israeli government. Bibi Netanyahu in the government. To Hamas? I don't think so. Yeah, I can see that. Because Hamas is going to do what they do regardless. it matters who's in the israeli government bb netanyahu and the government i mean think about

it hamas i don't think so yeah i can see that so i do i'm not going to do what they do regardless hamas is going to do what they do regardless hamas charter hasn't changed so it's certainly true that like i have been someone who's been pushing the israeli government for years to negotiate with the Palestinian Authority, to try to find ways, try to explore, try to use their kind of political and moral imagination to find ways to bridge gaps. Because again, I meant what I said before about two-state solution, but when I see no public demonstrations in the Arab capitals, when I see no words from the Palestinian leadership, when I see them in fact celebrating and hooting and hollering and giving out candies, it feels like they don't want a two-state solution. They want a final solution.

And the final solution is the term that Hitler used to describe what he wanted for Europe, which was to exterminate all the Jews. And what we saw happen this weekend in Israel was an extermination of the Jews. And so for Jewish people like me who live just two generations from genocide, this isn't a book. This isn't some abstraction. This is reality is it true when they say that the far-right government in israel has escalated military occupations over palestinians in the name of jewish supremacy look so a couple things first there's gods in the west bank so let's let's break it down what the difference is so first you have have the West Bank. The West Bank is the area

that's controlled by the Palestinian Authority. There is a strong military presence there still in parts of it. There's areas, there are different areas, there are designated areas A, B, and C. There are parts of the West Bank that Israel doesn't go in at all. There are parts that are totally controlled by the PA. There are parts that are controlled by the Israelis. And it's true that the Netanyahu government has allowed for the building of settlements in parts of those areas that are infuriating to Palestinians

because they can't build the same way. And again, hopefully, when there is a two-state solution or there is some modicum of peace, that area is going to be controlled by the Palestinians so they can live with dignity and equality. So there's no question that policies of the current government in Israel have done nothing to strengthen the opportunity for peace in that part of the land. Then there's Gaza,

Gaza that Hamas controls. Gaza, the Israelis withdrew from in 2007. The Israelis used to have settlements there. There used to be IDF presence there. They're gone. Like when I say they're gone, there isn't a single Israeli in that strip of land. Not one. Zero.

That's part of why there was this intelligence failure because no Israelis there. The Israelis do control the borders into Gaza, as does Egypt. So Gaza is bordered by Israel and Egypt. So now it's true, again, the Israelis control the flow of things into Gaza, like cement and supplies. Why do they do that?

Because they're afraid that the Hamas will use cement and supplies to build arms. Turns out that's true, but they control that. So do the Egyptians. Again, it's not just the Israelis, it's the Egyptians too. But this far right government, the Bibi government, has continued to supply electricity, to allow supplies to flow, and they have allowed for permits for Palestinian workers to come into Israel. I don't know if you know this or not, but Palestinian workers come into Israel from Gaza every single day,

thousands of them, and they do this in order to allow these people to make money and have a decent living. They all say that the Bibi government, you know, they do home demolitions and violent explosions of people and mass killings and military raids on refugee camps. And I hear people trying to use that as a justification for what happened, which I think is insane. Yeah. So there is no justification for raping women, butchering children, period.

I agree. So what happens in the West Bank, they do do home demolitions of a home where someone who goes in and commits a terrorist act. They do that. They do that. They don't do mass killings that's just not true that isn't true at all now they may go into arrest and kill someone who is a terrorist who's committed an act against israeli civilians they do do that for sure but these things aren't true and they don't do anything in Gaza. So it's hard to, it feels like victim blaming. It feels like saying, you know, oh, it's the Jews.

I mean, I'm seeing this. People saying it's Israel's fault that their people were murdered. It's Israel's fault that their children were kidnapped. And I just think victim blaming is disgusting. It's despicable, especially while we're still burying the bodies. And especially with that history lesson about hamas like just read it like it's right here they're not hiding it like you know good for them good for them for not hiding it good for them for making sure we all understand but bad on us for not taking it more seriously you think the u.s

is doing enough no what do you think that i mean I will say, I think President Biden's words were strong and they were meaningful and they were important. And I think that the other European countries have been good. And I think, by the way, like in Congress, you know, I think I'm not always a fan of some of these politicians, but I think both on the right and the left, they've gotten it right. Bernie Sanders said he thinks Israel's seize on Gaza is a serious violation of international law. Well, look, I would say to Bernie, as soon as the, I mean, I don't know what Bernie said in response to the savagery that happened. I don't know.

I'm sure he, I haven't, I'm sure. I would think he criticized it. I would hope so. But I think there's a way to end this. What did he call it? He said it's a serious violation of internet. Israel's siege on Gaza. So I think, number one, Bernie Sanders should use, every time he talks about Israel, he should talk about Egypt.

Because Egypt barricades, blockades that place too. By the way, why does Egypt do it? Because they don't want Hamas terrorists in Egypt either. But number two, Bernie Sanders should, instead of criticizing, he should propose, how do we end the siege in Gaza? Give all the hostages, let all the hostages out. Hamas announced they're ready for peace negotiations with Israel and ready to accept its existence. That would end this like that. But if they're not willing to do that, I don't know what he thinks the Israelis should do. Does he think that the Israelis, so if he doesn't think the Israelis should cut off the

supplies, what does he think they should do? Does he think they should go find a Palestinian concert and rape their children? Does he think that the Israelis should, the Palestinian terrorists, I shouldn't say Palestinian, the Hamas terrorists, the Hamas terrorists went into these towns and went house to house and murdered entire families. We have the videos. So you think you said the Israelis go house to house in Gaza and murder entire families? Of course not. Should the Israelis go in, find some Israelis, good luck finding a music concert in Gaza since they don't allow it, but should the Israelis go

murder teenagers? Of course not. So what the Israelis need to do is to create pressure to get Hamas to release the hostages and to realize they have to live with their Jewish neighbors. That's it. So you said the US should do more should do more. So what could the U.S. do? What could the U.S. do? So I would like right now to make sure if Hamas is a foreign terrorist organization, like you were asking, Envy, like we shouldn't allow people to provide supplies or support for Hamas. We should pressure Qatar, where these people are living, all the leadership, to extradite those people to Israel so they can stand trial for their crimes. We have a big military base in Qatar. They're, quote-unquote, an ally.

There are also Hamas leadership in Turkey. We should pressure our allies in Turkey to have those people stand trial. We should make sure that there's not a single cent from anywhere that goes to Hamas coffers. And finally, Iran. We need to be a lot tougher on Iran because Iran, if you cut off Iran and you cut off the flow of money, it would force Hamas to realize they have to work with their neighbors, you know, and can't try to mutilate and murder them. So I think I'd like to see our country do more to quell the flow of money and arms

and ideas from Iran to Hamas. I've got a couple more questions. You know, they've been putting this thing out on social media where it says 6,400 Palestinians and 300 Israelis have been killed, not counting the recent fatalities, have been killed since 2008. Who's responsible for that? Is that Hamas? Is that the Israeli government? Like, who's responsible for that? Well,mas is that the israeli government like who's

responsible for that well look it's hard for me to talk in the abstract but like this isn't a game this isn't like oh we're scoring points here right like i don't think we can think about this as if it's something we're watching on espn well who scored more points that's real i mean that just isn't a construct that applies here. It's not about the number of people who have been killed. Although, just so we're clear, the death of any innocent person is a tragedy. Like the death of any innocent person, any child, a child in Gaza, a child in, you know um steroid i mean these are tragedies but there is something qualitatively and just like obviously different than again a terrorist with a machine gun shooting at families right and uh again the the grandmother who was burned alive in her house because she was too weak to leave.

They burned her alive in her house because she was too difficult to kidnap. And they filmed it. So, like, again, I don't think it's about scoring points. I think it's about recognizing the dignity of every human life and approaching it on that base. How do you feel about some- I'm glad you said that because I'm sitting here trying to figure out why do you think, whether you're pro-Israel or pro-Palestine, why do you think people try to justify these attacks and people losing their lives?

Well, look, we should talk about that because there have been rallies here in the U.S. that are pro-Hamas. Like the BLM chapter in Chicago and in L.A., did you see? Yeah, I saw that. With the parachutes and the hangar? Yeah, like glorifying these people and saying all these things that, oh, the resistance and this and decolonization. If you think decolonization requires you to, like like sodomize the elderly, like there's a special place in hell for you.

So I like, and I'm someone who stood up and said Black Lives Matter, I said it on your show. Like I believe in these, I think, like why are we even talking about, these are basic principles that like, of course our lives are created equal, of course there is systemic discrimination against black Americans. And if you don't understand that you're not looking at the data and you're like

divorced from reality but pushing for equality and justice for black people pushing for you know reform of a criminal like an incarceration industrial complex pushing for you know the ability of every American have access to vote however they want has nothing to do no relationship whatsoever to again the savagery that we saw in Israel and the people who conflate the two who say well this is what decolonization looks like like again I'm sorry but the level of moral degeneracy there is off the fucking charts excuse my language and and so that's like i'm having a curse at the time yeah yeah so it's okay to curse at the time like this okay so i'm having a big problem with this maybe you guys can

help me like i can't i can't stand up there and say i support black lives matter when they support the genocide of jews like how do you guys deal with this? Well, I would tell you that was one chapter, Black Lives Matter Chicago. It doesn't speak for every black person. Of course not, of course not. I don't know if the whole, I don't know if Black Lives Matter National

has spoken out against that yet. I haven't, I don't know yet, but I definitely don't. I think that's just one chapter. You gotta look it up because like the movement for black lives, which I think is the kind of umbrella group has also talked about actually can you send that to me dan what did the movement for black lives say can you pull it up do you know jonathan has to leave soon oh yeah i just had a question too uh you know on social media i don't know if you're on social media as much but you see uh

some of the big conversations with celebrities not mentioning it i wanted to know what your thought about it when they mentioned Drake or they mentioned DJ Khaled, who's Khaled is Palestinian and Drake is Jewish as well. So when you see celebrities not talking about it, how do you feel about it? I feel sad. I feel alone.

Like celebrities didn't hesitate to say Black Lives Matter, and they should, like just so we're clear. After the death of George Floyd, of course they should. And, you know, celebrities ran to talk about and influencers and people like, I don't know exactly what Drake or DJ Khaled said. No, they didn't say anything. People were saying they would. But they never do though.

But they would never say. Yeah, so like, I don't want to pick on them in particular. But just celebrities in total, because their names came up recently. It's hard. I mean, as a Jewish person, when you see – look, I've stood for Black Lives Matter. I fought to stop Asian hate. We launched the Asian American Foundation, for goodness sakes. I co-chaired the 69th anniversary of the March on Washington with Reverend Al a few weeks ago.

And I have proudly stood and will continue to with the NAA and the Urban League and LDF and all these groups. These are my friends and their cause is just, and I'm not going to stop, but like the movement for black lives, the talk that justifies the genocide of Jews, that says Zionism is racism. Anti-Zionism isn't just anti-Semitism. I used to say that. I used to say anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism because dehumanizing Jews, right, or saying, I love the Jewish people. It's just a Jewish state that's illegitimate and needs to be destroyed. So I've said for years, anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism. But anti-Zionism is actually genocide. It's an argument to savagely rape and mutilate and murder people. Yeah, I'm not with that.

Yeah. Like, who can be? So I don't understand. I truly don't understand how you can say you're an anti-racist and an anti-Zionist in the same breath. Anti-Zionism is anti-humanism. And just so we're clear, Zionism is the idea that the Jewish people should have the right to self-determination in that piece of land. It does not exclude Palestinians in that. It doesn't say anything like the Hamas charter.

And that's how you get Arab Israelis and Israeli Muslims and Israeli Christians in the government, serving in the IDF. And that's how you get Ethiopian Israelis and Yemeni Israelis and people from all ethnicities and walks of life in the country treated as equals. Now, is there discrimination in Israel? Sure there is. Absolutely. And could Israel, does Israel have to work to make itself more perfect so that all people, regardless of their religion or their ethnic origin, are treated exactly the same, of course. And yet it's the only democracy in the region.

It's the only place where LGBTQ people feel safe. It's the only place where you can have these sort of interfaith families. Look, and while there have been and will continue to be, you know, Palestinian Muslims in the Israeli government, you think there are any Jewish people in the Iranian government? I mean, again, they're not democracies with coalitions, let's just acknowledge it. But do you think there's any Jewish minister

in the Algerian government? And I'm not saying that to make fun. I mean, there's a thousand-year history of Jews in Algeria. There's, I think, 3,,000 year history of Jews in Iran. But the rights that people are afforded in Israel is just qualitatively different. That's because Zionism is not an ethno-nationalist exclusive idea, but anti-Zionism that justifies, again, shooting teenagers in the back while they flee. I mean, that is barbaric, that is sadistic, and it's just plain wrong.

All right. There you have it. The director of the Anti-Defamation League, Jonathan Greenblatt. Thank you for joining us this morning. Thank you for coming in. Can I just say one other thing? Of course. Thank you, thank you, thank you for giving me the chance to talk about this. And it's hard. Like, you're Jewish. Like, this is the week when you should be reaching out to your Jewish friends, your Jewish colleagues. Like, all of us have family in Israel. All of us have friends in Israel. All of us have people over there. And even if you have someone who doesn't say, well, I don't know anyone in Israel.

If you're Jewish, you're a target today on the global day of jihad. So I would say this to everybody watching or listening. Like, this is a time to, like, reach out to people and say, hey, we got your back. We're there for you. Because, like, I can tell you, this Jew, I'm not going to stop speaking out

for the rights of my black brothers and sisters. I'm not going to stop speaking out against anti-black racism. I'm not going to stop speaking out for the rights of my black brothers and sisters. I'm not going to stop speaking out against anti-black racism. I'm not going to stop speaking out against other forms of hate. So you guys and your audience being there for your Jewish brothers and sisters, you guys being there and speaking out against anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism, like this is the day, this is the moment to do it because this is when it really matters. All right.

Absolutely. It's Jonathan Greenblatt. It's this is when it really matters. All right. Absolutely. It's Jonathan Greenblatt. It's The Breakfast Club. Good morning. Thank you, guys. Wake that ass up. In the morning. The Breakfast Club.