The Jordan Harbinger Show - 927: Miko Peled | Journey of an Israeli in Palestine

Episode Date: November 28, 2023

What's an anti-Zionist Israeli's take on current events? Miko Peled, author of The General's Son: Journey of an Israeli in Palestine, is here to share. What We Discuss with Miko Peled: How the patriotic son of a renowned Israeli general came to change his mind about the forces at play in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The ongoing role of the US and the West in this conflict. A detailed analysis of the October 7th incident from a pro-Palestinian pro-Palestinian (note: not pro-Hamas) point of view.  Debunking conspiracy theories and addressing bigotry. What a peaceful future for the people of the region might look like. And much more... Full show notes and resources can be found here: jordanharbinger.com/927  This Episode Is Brought To You By Our Fine Sponsors: jordanharbinger.com/deals  Sign up for Six-Minute Networking — our free networking and relationship development mini course — at jordanharbinger.com/course!  Like this show? Please leave us a review here — even one sentence helps! Consider including your Twitter handle so we can thank you personally!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Coming up next on the Jordan Harbinger Show. From the rivers to the sea means freedom over all of historic Palestine, freedom from apartheid, freedom from checkpoints, freedom from violence, freedom from racism, where, like I said earlier, the possibility of Israelis and Palestinians living together in peace becomes a reality. That's how you make it a reality. It's the only way that you can make it a reality. Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the story as secrets and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice

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get a taste of everything we do here on this show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today's guest is the son of a prominent Israeli general who is now firmly pro-Palestine and one might say anti-Israel. He's one of the leading voices in the Israeli left, many would even say, the radical left. We'll cover Miko's history growing up in a patriotic Israeli military family, joining the IDF, having a crisis of conscience, so to speak, and coming to the conclusion that the state of Israel, as it currently stands, simply cannot be allowed to continue on the path that it's on. This episode is a counterpoint to the Mossab Hassan Yusuf episodes that we've had recently on the show,

and I think you'll enjoy this conversation, even if you think you might disagree with Miko or his perspectives here. He did argue in good faith, at least in my current assessment, and I really actually enjoyed this conversation, even though we were not on the same page on a few things. This is one of those episodes where any pushback I give to the guest is both way too much and not nearly enough, depending on what side of the conflict that you are on or which side you've chosen to be on. This is going to be a lose-lose situation for me, just like when I had Maba on the show, I think, or plastics or people's weight or gender, or anything that gets people riled up in any way whatsoever, which seems to be

pretty much everything. I will say I've been pleasantly surprised so far by the amount of grace that I have from many of you and both shocked as well as disappointed by the amount of apologists for atrocities on both sides of this conflict. FYI, there's a fact check on some of the things we discussed in this episode in the show close. So be sure to stay tuned for that. Before you freak out about how much I pushed back or didn't push back or sending me angry emails, definitely listen to the show close because I, well, I give my own thoughts and

I check some of the stuff that we discussed as I usually do. All right. Here we go with Miko Pellit. As you might expect, I'm probably going to push back on some things you might say. I don't know what you're going to say. I've just, you know, prep the interview. And sometimes people get a bit upset about this, either the guest or the listener. And I'm not totally sure why.

I think conversations like that, they hold people to intellectual honesty. It gets more out of the conversation. So you'll find in me a friendly audience generally. But of course, I'm still planning to take you to task on some of your ideas, possibly, just as I do with most guests on this show, especially with a divisive topic like this. So I'm telling you this, because I think sometimes people think I'm just pushing their buttons because I'm some kind of a hole, and that's not really my aim, even though I also happen to be maybe a little bit of an a hole. But you're Israeli. You should be used to opinionated loudmouths by now.

Not a problem. So tell me how you grew up. I know you grew up, well, very Israeli, very patriotic Israeli. Yes, I mean, I grew up. I mean, when it's you, too, you think it's perfectly normal. Right. You grew up as a kid. You go to school, you know, whatever. My father carried a huge legacy. He was part of this generation of officers who were young officers in 1948 when the state of

Israel was established, and they're considered gods. And then he was a general. He remained in the military. He had a career in the military. He stayed in the Armenian. And that he was one of the generals of the 1967 war, which, again, is one of these epic moments in the history of the region. And again, as an Israeli kid, particularly as a kid, but for Israelis, that generation of generals, again, are gods of the Olympus.

So I grew up with that. Plus, I had a great uncle who was the president. I had a grandfather who signed the Declaration of Independence. I had all these people around in my extended family who were all from the fathers of the state, so to speak, and then held important positions once Israel was established. And so certainly I was a patriot and I lived in this reality that I thought was a reality. I didn't realize there was another reality because Israeli, We live in a bubble. And that was my upbringing. That was until maybe when I was in high school or something like that, when things began to change a little bit. How did things start to change?

Was it your parents who started to change? I know you moved to L.A. as a kid. Was that the beginning of this? No, not at all. I moved to L.A. My father retired from the military in 68, and then we moved to L.A. for a few years, for this Ph.D. at UCLA, so that I was a kid. But another thing that my father did after he retired, he began.

and talk about this idea of a Palestinian state. And this whole thing that there is such a thing as Palestinians, because we just call them Arabs. And he started talking about the PLO, and he started talking about the need to negotiate, and they need to give them their own rights, granted on a small parcel of what was historically Palestine. And that was huge. People started attacking me, attacking him.

He was a traitor. Suddenly, he went from this national hero, a huge figure, to suddenly becoming kind of a pariah and all that kind of stuff. So then I was in high school, and that's kind of what I began to realize. There's something going on here that maybe, you know, it's not all as rosy and wonderful and patriotic as I thought. And there was a story that I mentioned in my book in the General Sun that my mother told me many times, which is when she was 22 years old in 1948, and the Zionist militia,

which later on became the Israeli army, took Jerusalem. They kicked out, you know, the Palestinian population. I mean, the ethnic cleansing was absolute. A single Palestinian were remained in West Jerusalem. And their homes were made available to Israelis. She was offered a home. And these are gorgeous homes. They call Arab homes, the Palestinian homes in West Jerusalem.

The neighborhoods are still there. A really beautiful homes. She was living in a small apartment with her mother, and she was already a mother herself, and she was offered this wonderful home. And she refused. She said, how could I possibly live in a home of somebody who was thrown out, kicked out?

And then she talked about how they lived. looted and stole the Israelis looted and stole things. And as a kid growing up, that story didn't make sense because it was contrary to the narrative. It was contrary to the history and the story of the heroism that I was led to believe was true. It wasn't as a later or much later on in her life, but I went to talk to her again about that story and had the full picture. But you know, so there were cracks in that wall gradually moving on going up. Then I was in the military and Israel invaded Lebanon, that was another big crack, not a very serious crack in the wall of faith in our righteousness. Tell me a little bit about that. So you joined the IDF because everybody in Israel has to join the

IDF, well, pretty much, unless you're like, what, super religious or disabled, I guess? Are those the rules? Yeah, those are pretty much the, yeah, unless you're somehow disabled or you can prove that you're ultra-Orthodox. Why don't ultra-Orthodox Jews have to serve? I never quite understood that, because I'm like, okay, you're able-bodied, and it's not like you have a pacifist of because a lot of those same people are like Likud party sort of, not all, but like right-wingy kind of folks in Israel. So it's not like, they're not like peacnick. So I don't get that.

No, they are peace-nicks. That community, they are peace-nics. They are. First of all, they're forbidden. Jews are forbidden from carrying weapons. And then number two, they are a deeply religious community. The army is completely secular. Men and women mix.

The food is not kosher. I mean, you dream of sending their kids. Separation of men and women is absolute in that community. and the army has no such thing. And so there was an agreement very early on when Israel was established. They don't want the army. The army really doesn't want them. I mean, who wants a group of ultra-religious, you know, it was a pain.

So there was the status quo. Everybody agreed that that was going to be a thing. About 20 years ago, a group of politicians that entered the stage, the Israeli stage of politics, the political world, used it as a wedge issue. And they said, these are parasites. They're not carrying the way. Our young men and women serve while they sit around and do nothing, reading the stupid Torah, that kind of thing.

Well, to them, reading the Torah and studying the Talmud is not stupid. That's what a Jew does. They are deeply faithful religious community. Now, there are settlers, and the Kudniks, like you described, the dress like the same as those guys. So it's easy to confuse these right-wing settlers with this very righteous and, you know, really quite holy community of ultra-Orthodox Jews.

who have a real reason, and many of them don't even recognize a state because the idea of a Jewish state is contrary to Jewish law. So, you know, there are all these different issues that are thrown into this thing. Wow, that's confusing because they have Israeli passports and they live in Israel, but they're like, well. They didn't want those passports. They asked not to be citizens. The state of Israel was established that community. That community precedes the state of Israel. I see. You know, because there's a religious community interest on going back a very long time. And when the state of Israel was established, they begged the United Nations to give them some kind of a special status, they did not want to be citizens of that state.

Huh. But nobody listened to them. Wow. So it's not like they're enjoying the benefits and they don't want to serve. They don't want the benefits. They don't want anything to do with this secular entity that to them, like I said, is sacrilegious and contrary to Jewish law. That's interesting.

I never knew that. Because, yes, you're right. You said those guys dress alike. That's pretty much where I'm going, right? I'm thinking like Hasidic Jews, or especially like with the curls and the Russian hat version especially, I'm like, I can't tell between what. one that lives in the West Bank in a house that they maybe threw some Palestinians out of two weeks ago. And then the people that live in Oak Park, Michigan, where I grew up, who I'm like,

I can't imagine these super, you know, people who walk everywhere. It's a very different kind of thing. They just happen to have the same uniform. And it sounds so ignorant saying that out loud, but I'm just going to wear that on my sleeve for this episode because it's hard to tell the difference. A lot of people are confused by it. What's particularly funny is like the big communities in New York, for example, when politicians run for office, they come to them, they're a very large community, they're a very large voting block, and they tell them how much they love Israel,

and they go, okay, in this community, that is not a plus. That is not something you want to show, talk to us about we, Israel is not our thing at all. We care about other issues, but we don't start with Israel. That's funny.

It's like, well, come out, I came here to kiss ass, and you got to give me, throw me a bone here, tell me which string I'm supposed to kiss here, which cheek. That's confusing for it. I'm glad I'm not the only one

who's had that go over his head, because I consider myself a reasonably well-informed on some of this, and it's just, it's very hard to tell. There's so many different factions inside and outside Israel, inside Arab communities, Middle East communities, Jewish communities. This has got to be one of the more confusing conflicts. And I'm talking about even when you look at things like the genesis of ISIS and other also complex Middle Eastern stuff, this just seems to be extra, there's just layers upon layers upon. It's like, Jerusalem's like a metaphor, right? You dig three feet down and there's a whole another layer of stuff you got to spend 10 years studying before you can dig in

deeper. Have you ever been there? Yeah, I used to live in East Jerusalem in Harchatsafim, but only for a short time. And I wasn't going to tell the story, but I was just so ignorant. I went there because I was like, oh, study abroad. I'll go to Israel. They have something going. It'll be kind of cool to live in the Middle East. I couldn't probably live in Saudi Arabia, so I'll check out the Middle East. I only went there knowing that Israel was a democracy in the Middle East and I read in Jewish. That was it. It wasn't like, I'm going to go live in the Holy Land. I had no, I didn't care about that at all. I just went there and I lived in the dorms in the French Hill, and there was a house behind our dorm, and I was thinking about this

when I was reading your book, there's a house behind the dorms, and it was like weirdly out of place, right? Because there's all these nice houses, and then there's this house that's fenced in, and I thought, like, what's the deal with this house? Why doesn't the university move this or buy this or something? And then I started realizing that I kept hearing rocks hitting the ground near me when I walked by the house. And I was like, is someone throwing rocks at me every time I walk up to get falafel? And sure enough, there was a kid who would play outside and he would throw these rocks. And these were not little rocks. And so I went and I went through the fence and I knocked on the door and I was like, your son is throwing rocks. And she just yelled at me in Arabic and it was not a friendly

conversation. And I thought, oh, okay, she doesn't understand me. Maybe she just thinks I'm trespassing. So I was friends of these Palestinian guys, these Christian guys. And I was like, hey, can you help me? This kid throws rocks at me. And I just want to like tell his mom because then she'll knock him one and he'll stop. And they were like, oh, I don't know about that. But I kept asking, kept asking, they were like, fine. They go up to the door, and they were legit just screaming at each other in Arabic, and they were like, yeah, that kid's not going to stop throwing rocks at you. And I was like, why? And they're like, they think that you're a Zionist, and this is Palestinian family, this is probably all their land before, and that kid has been taught to hate everybody who walks by, and you

walk by here all the time, notice that there's nobody else who are taking this route ever. And I thought, like, oh, so this kid just thinks I'm an invader, and he kept throwing rocks in me. And the mom basically told him like, screw you, I'm not going to tell my kid to stop throwing rocks. You get off my land. That was basically the conversation. Right. Yeah, interesting. So I guess I kind of get it. I would be pissed off too. My grandpa had a farm and now it was a bunch of dorms with kids who are like giving me the finger out the window at night. I don't know. And you didn't get any compensation for it. The RV cam and took it. Right. Yeah. I don't know how it happened, but I assume that's how it happened. That's how it has to happen. That's how it happens. That's how it happens. That's how it happened.

So it was one of those many lessons I learned in Israel where I was like, oh, okay, this is not all sort of sunshine and roses. And there's people here who are on the losing side of this equation in a real bad way. Right. Did you want to be a general like your dad when you were a little? Because it seems like a complex situation, right? You're like, I want to be a general. I want to be pro-Israel. And then your dad's opinion starts shifting. And your opinion of your dad also in your political opinion starts shifting. And then it's like, maybe I don't want to be a general in the IDF. Well, when I was three and four, I did, but once I grew up, you know, and then certainly once I was old enough to actually serve, there was no way I was going to stay in the military one second, more than absolutely had to. What was your experience like in the IDF? Because it sounds like by that point, you were mid-transition from like Ra-R-R-R-I Israel, and then you said the invasion of Lebanon started to really change your mind. What happened? You know, when I started, you know, I started all rah-rah, and I was very excited to serve. Like, you know, I was a really kid, especially with a family like mine.

But, you know, step by step, the things you see, and I describe it in the book, there's a chapter called the Red Barrette. You know, every kid wants to get a red beret because that's the kind of a sign of that they're a real prestigious thing. It means you're, you know, you're legit. Certified badass? Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. I got the Red Barret, but in the process of getting it, I noticed that we were not doing anything that had anything to do with defending anybody.

We were trampling on people's land. We were patrolling people's cities that didn't want us. We were basically the enforcers of an occupation over a people that didn't want us. We were basically the enforcers of an occupation over a people that didn't want us to be there. And I couldn't understand why we were there. Orders to, you know, beat the brains out of anybody who looks at us. And they're giving us batons and handcuffs. And I'm going, we're supposed to be like a, you know, we're a connoissex unit.

What the hell are we doing policing? And then I was going to transfer from that unit. I was doing something else. And then the last year of my service, the 1982, the invasion of Lebanon happened. We were told, the public was told that this was a 40-kilometer incursion, get rid of some what they call terrorists, you know, Palestinian cells. Well, as they were telling us, it's a 40-kilometer incursions, our friends were telling us they're already in the outskirts of Beirut, which is much more on the outskirts of Beirut. What the hell are we doing in Beirut?

Yeah, how far is that? It's like hundreds of miles. Isn't it or at least 100 miles? It's probably double that. Yeah, it's probably something like that. I mean, it's not hundreds and hundreds of miles, but it's not 40 kilometers for sure. And why are we in Beirut? Why is Israeli military even approaching an Arab capital? This is big stuff and they've absolutely no sense. And of course, later on, as the news became clear and the politics behind it became clear, it was obvious that the government had lied to everybody. And there were heavy, heavy casualties. Israeli military suffered very heavy casualties. And then there was resistance growing to this entire escapade. Even my father spoke at protests against the war, anti-war protests.

And this was the first time there was an anti-war protest while the war was taking place. And he was calling on Israeli soldiers to refuse to enter Lebanon, to refuse to serve. It was that divisive, it was that severe. But that was the breaking point for a lot of people of my generation that believed and then saw that this was, you know, and then, of course, there was the massacres in the refugee camps of Sabra and Chitila, which Israel had a carried important role. And so that was the beginning of the end. I went down that rabbit hole with Sabra and Chitela.

And if anybody wants a little more background on that, it's a very not fun sort of Wikipedia deep dive into something that will shock you. I remember looking that up because when I was in Israel, that was when Ariel Sharon, I was in Jerusalem, the old city with my Jordanian roommate friend. What years were you there? This is 2000. So Ariel Sharon went up to the temple mount to do something, I don't know, but it just resulted in me going from shopping for like a Nargila, hookah thing to running away. And we would run into Israeli soldiers. And I'd be like, Americans, and they'd be like, go that way.

and then if we ran into Arab dudes who looked like they maybe were looking for a problem, my Jordanian roommate would just yell in Arabic, we're Arabs, and they'd be like, get out of here. So we just barely made it out of there without getting beat up by somebody. It was just pure chaos. And we were breathing in like, I guess, tear gas, like not when you get gas, but when it's just in the air, it was a mess. That was one of the scariest, probably 40-minute, you know, runs of my young life at that point. So, yeah, that'll put a timestamp on it.

So the invasion of Lebanon thing and you being in the military at that time, were you just like, okay, I'm done, I'm waiting my service out, I'm pulling the plug, or was it like, were you able to get out early? Well, I got a few weeks early. So what happened was people of my generation that were the same cycle in terms of being enlisted and were supposed to be released. So the invasion began in June. And so a year later, people's service was extended.

They weren't releasing people. And I'm like, oh my God, if they extend my thing, I will, you know, lose it. Thankfully, I was supposed to be released the following January, and I was actually released in December. For some reason, they said they didn't need people anymore, and everybody was released. So I was released about Lidz, and I never served another day. So it worked out okay, but no, the last year I was done. I was checked out.

I mean, I had to do what I had to do. I mean, it had to function. But had I been asked to go to Lebanon, I would refuse for sure. I was asked. It was not something I had to do. But it was not easy. the morale was very, very low. Most of the people around me

in that particular place that where I served, we were like-minded. It was terrible. And then to see the officers who were actually, you know, responsible for this horrible invasion.

Of course, Sabra and Shatila was the highlight in terms of the cruelty, but Lebanese were killed. And, I mean, there was destruction and there were so many Lebanese refugees and not only Palestinians suffered from this, and thousands of Israeli casualties. And then to see that those are responsible,

not only they were not punished, but eventually they were actually promoted, both in the military and even Sharon, who was found responsible for the massacres and was not allowed to serve as Minister of Defense. He became Minister of Housing, and then he became Minister of Agriculture, which are two extremely important positions in a context of Palestinians, because it's all about land, water, and housing. And these are three issues in which discrimination against Palestinians is severe. and he put policies in place that was so draconian, probably worse than what he would have done

had he been continued to be minister of defense. And of course, 20 years later, when you were there, he was prime ministering him. Yeah, that was shocking because I was like, wait, how is this guy, you can't be the defense minister, but you can be the guy who tells the defense minister what his policy should be. Like, that didn't make sense to me.

And I remember that was another time when I was like, I don't understand the logic of this. And that was when I, of course, started learning about Likud and the right way. Israeli politics and meeting both left-wing and right-wing folks in Israel and Palestinians who were Christian and Palestinians who were Muslim. And it was just like, again, layers upon layers of stuff here. Did your parents at that time also agree with you? Were you sort of on the same level as your parents politically when you were thinking like, hey, I'm leaving the IDF.

This is BS. I'm doing stuff that doesn't make any sense. Oh, no, of course. Yeah, of course. Yeah, yeah. We were all the same page pretty much. Yes. I mean, you know, like, My father was a pretty smart guy, and so the rest of us kind of respected his opinions and his views. And he was 9.9 times out of 10 on these issues, he was brought out of money. But it wasn't that I was engaged politically at that point, as much as I have not, not certainly not. But I was engaged because I grew up in a family where this was, you know, like my daughter says, it's a family business. Were you studying martial arts at that time? Because I know that sort of has a, there's a nonviolence streak to most martial arts study as well.

Right. I studied martial arts. I started when I was in high school, then I had to stop while I was in the military, and then I couldn't wait to get back. That was my dream to end this thing and get back to training. And yes, of course, martial arts. You know, people sometimes like to compare military, the military experience to the martial arts experience. But like you say, martial arts are all about a deeper understanding and how not to use your abilities, how to prevent fighting. It is basically a pacifist. Martial arts are basically truly a pacifist philosophy. The matter of is you're supposed to, you know, sharpen and shine and sharpen and shine the sword, but if you use it, you defile it. And that's basically the martial arts are. So there are no similarities. There's no comparison. There's no place to compare the two at all. Are you considered left wing in terms of Israeli politics?

Where do you fall on the spectrum? I'll tell you a funny story, okay? Okay. I'm ready for it. So this is when my older kids were very young, and there were elections. We're sitting around the dinner table, and my younger son, asks my older son if we are right-wing, left-wing, or Democrats, Republicans, something like that. And my older son says, well, Republicans are here, Democrats are here, and dad is over there.

So, yes, of course, it's left-wing, Paul. I mean, you know, I think on this issue, on the issue of Palestine, I think the right-wing, left-wing thing is not accurate because, you know, right-wing, left-wing, there's a lot more that's involved. my politics are clearly left-bling politics, but, or some people say radical. But not because of this particular issue. I think this particular issue transcends right-left politics. It's a question of values. If you believe in human rights, if you believe in democracy, if you believe in humanity, if you believe that equality, if you believe in justice, which has nothing to do with right-left or Republican Democrat, then it's very clear which side you should be on in this particular conversation. You cannot support Israel if you believe in justice,

freedom and human rights, because there's a 75-year history that shows that Israel stands against all of that. You cannot oppose the Palestinians call for justice and humanity and equality, and it doesn't matter if you're right or left. If you believe in those values, then it makes perfect sense to support the Palestinian call for justice, equality, and freedom. So this goes beyond right-left politics, I think. Yeah, no, I completely understand that it's a values issue. I think it's well stated. You're listening to the Jordan Harbinger show with our guest, Miko Pellid. We'll be right back.

If you're wondering how I managed to book all these authors, thinkers, creators every week, it is because of the circle of people that I know like and trust, otherwise known as a network. I know that word is dirty now. I'm teaching you how to create that same circle for yourself for free over at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. The course is about improving your relationship building skills, inspiring other people to want to develop a relationship with you.

The course is, it's not cringy, it's very easy to do, it's not going to make you look like a jerk or the people that you are reaching out to look or feel like jerks. It's going to make you a better friend, a better peer, a better colleague, and it just takes a few minutes a day. Many of the guests on the show, subscribe and contribute to the course. Come join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course at jordanharbinger.com slash course. Now, back to Miko Pellad. Do you feel alienated by Israelis for your opinions on this, or Americans and Israelis for that matter? You know, I was looking for people who are counterpoints to other people I've had on the show and your name came up multiple times. And usually there's just huge

lists of people on each side. And it was like more than one person mentioned your name. And I thought, oh, okay, this guy must be really getting out there. But also, while a ton of people support the things that you do and say, it seems like in your very hometown, there might be a lot of people who are like, there goes Miko the traitor. Look at this guy. Do you feel alone or isolated at all by this? I'm not alone. I'm not isolated. But again, those people, Israelis, who are loyal to this state, to this apartheid and racism are not my people anyway.

It's not my community. I was supposed to go and visit, I don't call it country Israel, I call it Palestine. I was supposed to go visit. I was going to Jordan for a few days and I was going to cross the river and go to the other side.

And it was made very clear to me that if I crossed to the other side, it would be arrested. And who knows how long I'd have to deal with that. So I didn't go. And that was the first because I traveled there extensively.

Just you couldn't go at that time because they were like you particularly couldn't go or nobody can No, me particularly. This is after, this is post October 7. I see. And so I opted not to go and not to, you know, deal with that. So yes, of course, Israel, they see somebody like me, I mean, like all kinds of for traders or whatever. I mean, I think it's ridiculous to call somebody like me a traitor because I, to me, to me, my loyalty is to the values that my spouse. The fact that there happens to be a state that claims that I am part of it or it's part of my identity has got nothing to do with my values. If they don't share my values, then the There's no loyalty. There's no call for loyalty.

But again, I was telling people I won many more friends that I ever lost. You know, the community that I work within, the Palestinian community, the pro-justice community, you know, the pro-peace community is far larger. And the experiences I've had with people, both personally and, you know, at work, are profound. Can I ask about your niece in her passing? Yeah. Tell me about that. So September, 1997, on the 4th of September.

And this was a time, you know, that summer of 1997, this two years, 96, 97, I did, there was a lot of violence going on. On that particular day on September the 4th, there was a massive attack by Palestinians where three young Palestinians blew themselves up and killed a bunch of Israelis in Ben Yuda Street. And my sister's little girl, 13-year-old girl, was one of the victims. She was killed. I think the only reason that people ever changed dramatically in terms of their thinking, in terms of ideology, in terms of their beliefs, because sadly, Judis is a result of something terrible. Yeah. It shocks us to the core and forces us to look at things we never thought we needed to look at.

And this is precisely that kind of a thing. So I was there. I went back home, you know, sound like for a week or so. And then you come home and it was just lost. I mean, you need to talk to people and there's nobody. You know, the whole issue of Palestine is not something people are keen to talk about. And now particularly you have a story like this that people just don't know how to respond to. So it was called, but what I did, what happened is a result.

of this, my search to find somebody to talk to is that I came across the Palestinian community I was living in San Diego at the time. And this was a very generous and very active community of Palestinians who I began to get involved with and kind of adopted me in a way, in many ways, and mentored me. And so that was the experience. And I always say the first time I met Palestinians was actually in the United States in San Diego, you know, I was 40 years old. But having grown up in Jerusalem, which is supposedly a mixed city, I never met Palestinians. Because Israelis live in a bubble. Palestinians live outside of that bubble, and that's the end of it, as you saw when you were there.

I lived and met with tons of Palestinians, but I was in university. That's a different bubble, right? You're on campus. Yeah. You're on campus, yeah. So anyway, so that was my experience. And then through that encounter with these Palestinians, the conversation was flowing immediately, the memories of where we're from and so on and so forth.

And while other Jewish people and Israelis would come and go, because we had these little dialogue groups. They'd go, how can you sit with these people? They're anti-Semites, they're liars. I thought, for all, they're not in Semitic. They're very nice people. And they couldn't all be liars. I mean, couldn't have all sat together and made up the story, right? That was what catapulted me to meeting of Palestinians and learning about the Palestinian story, which then forced me into a life of activism and to really reevaluate everything I believe was true. I heard you speaking Arabic and one of the videos, do you speak fluent Arabic or pretty fluent? Pretty fluent, yeah. Did you just learn that through conversation with Palestinians? No, no, no, no, no. I studied for many years, yeah.

It seems like the only way to really learn something like Arabic. Well, you need to do both. You need a combination of both. You need to study and you also need to converse. You need to have to know how to talk, which is not always exactly the same as what you learn in the textbook. But yeah. And especially the reading, you hear about Arabic, like there's the different letters for the beginning of the word, the end of the word, in the middle of the word, and I'm like, oh, man. And that used to be so intimidating until I started learning Chinese, and now I would kill for any kind of alphabet at all, right? I don't care how many letters it is. Right, right, right, yeah. There's a lot of similarities to Hebrews. I mean from Hebrew, it's Arabic or Arabic's Hebrew, a lot of

similarities. Yeah, that's an advantage I hadn't thought of. I've heard you say, and I don't let me put words in your mouth, so I'm just asking you to clarify your position here. I heard you say Hamas isn't a terrorist group, or more specifically that October 7th wasn't a terror attack. And again, I'm not trying to put words in your mouth. Am I accurate with that, or did I misunderstand you. No, you didn't misunderstand me. That's exactly what I said. I don't believe the Palestinians are terrorists. I don't believe the Palestinian resistance is terrorism. I think it's wrong to categorize it as terrorism. It's simplistic, it's superficial, and it's not true. And as a result of that, I don't think what Palestinians do when they resist are acts of terrorism. I think that the state

of Israel has been engaged in terrorism since before it was even established, the Zionist movement in Palestine had brought terrorism to Palestine. There's no such thing that terrorism before. There's no such thing the terrorism before the Zionists came and started killing people. And so when people are governed by this ruthless regime, apartheid state, which, by the way, if anybody has a problem with the word apartheid, Amnesty International came out with a report last year that explains very well why the state of Israel was being accused of apartheid. And so when you have this very ruthless, I would say even savage apartheid regime that is cheating Palestinians in this particular way, and the Palestinians stand up, a nation that's never had military force,

they never had a tank or warplane. And they stand up and resist. That's resistance. That's not terrorism. Terrorism is what the state of Israel is doing. In the book, there's a part where you say, hey, harming civilians makes no sense. If you harm the military, then you're harming the state. Harming civilian, I think you said something like, what's the point of harming civilians?

I think this is in that actually not the book, the Vimeo trailer that you sent me. So then when we talk about the Hamas attack on October 7th, it seems like you have a different opinion. So has your opinion shifted since that was filmed, or do you consider all Israelis combatants or is there something else going on there? The passage you referring to is in the book, but it wasn't me saying it. It was Abu Ali Shaheen, who was a leader in the Palestinian resistance for many, many years, and he was captured and spent almost 20 years in solitary. And he was a very important, a very charismatic leader. And I met him. The book was already done. But then I met him, the book was already done.

but then I met him and I added the chapter about him because he was such an important figure. And he says that that as a commander of the Palestinian resistance, that was his perspective. Now, the problem is that Israel has been inflicting so much violence against Palestinian citizens because really all Palestinians are citizens. They've never had a military force. They've had the resistance cells. They've had guerrilla groups. They've never had a military.

So Palestinians are all civilians. And when Israel goes into Gaza and kills thousands, as they've been doing for many years. This is not the first time. Then they're killing civilians, which is a terrible thing either way. Now, the thing is this, if the power that initiates the violence

wants to end the violence, it has the power to do so. You can't come to the people who are on the receiving end and say, well, you don't have a right to do what we do. You don't have a right to kill civilians. We have a right to kill civilians, but you don't.

And as a matter of fact, and in my other book in injustice, I mentioned this, when the founder of Hamas, Sheikh Ahmad Yassin, who was a paraplegic, an old paraplegic, he was in Israeli jail right around the 90s, why it was the period of violence that I was describing.

And at one point, the Israelis came to him and said, would you tell your people to stop targeting civilians? Because, you know, buses were being blown up and all this. And he said, I'm willing to sign an agreement right now where both sides promised to refrain from targeting civilians.

They never came back. Israelies never came back. Because if they're going to kill Palestinians, they have to kill civilians because there's no military. The reasoning behind Israel's, you know, massive attack against civilians is revenge, is punitive, is to try to teach him a lesson not to raise their heads, which, of course, all three have failed. And so it's not that I changed my mind about killing civilian. Killing anyone is terrible. Everybody has a mother and a father or a child. You imagine it. It's a horrifying thing. But we can't come and demand one thing from the victim and demand a different thing from the side, the perpetrate, all the, you know, this enormous amounts of violence. I mean, and think about it for the last 75 years.

The state of Israel was established after a massive, a massive assault against Palestinian civilians where almost a million people were forced out of their homes. We don't even know how many were massacred because the massacres are still being unraveled today and being revealed today of things that we didn't know. And there were countless massacres. And so to then say, yeah, well, we're going to not talk about that. But why are they killing civilians? That doesn't fly. That doesn't work. We should stop killing all civilians.

We should, by all means, allow the refugees to return. We need to dismantle the apartheid state, and we need to let Israelis and Palestinians live together in peace. Absolutely. So nobody gets killed anymore. That should be the goal. I think you covered this a little bit, but I'm going to ask it anyway because I'm trying to stave off the 10,000 emails I'm going to get from people saying, you let them say this, without pushing back. So what happened on October 7th in your view? Because it seems like in some ways,

and I'm not sure about this, because again, I think you covered it. Maybe I'm just misunderstanding, but it seems like some people are going to say, hey, he's dehumanizing or shrugging off Israeli casualties in the exact same way that he's accusing a lot of people of shrugging off Palestinian casualties. And I'm not sure that's what I'm hearing, but I think a lot of people are going to hear that. I'm sure you hear that all the time. So what we do know on October 7th is we know that Palestinian fighters came out of the Gazal Strip, one of the poorest that most oppressed places on Earth. They came by air, they came by sea, they came by land, and they managed to basically occupy half of historic Palestine, and the entire southern half of the country was taken by them,

including a massively important large military base, which is the base of the Gaza Brigade, you know, and I believe they captured the general in charge. So this is a massive humiliation for the Israeli military, which once again proved itself, when it's being challenged and surprised, it's useless. Now, there are many casualties as a result of that immediately Israeli casualties. We don't know for sure what happened. We do know this, and this is according to Israeli sources, according to witnesses. We know that Israeli tanks were shelling homes where hostages were held. So we know that many Israelis were killed by the military right there and then. We know that the very first hours, the very first response was from helicopters,

military helicopters that came. And we know now, because of in several, articles in the Israeli papers about this, that they could not differentiate between the Palestinians and the Israeli civilians. And so they killed both. So nobody knows who killed how many Israelis. We know that there's a large number of Israelis that were killed. We don't know what happened that is not yet investigated. So we don't know. The only thing we do know is that many were killed by Israeli fire. How many were killed by Palestinians, if at all, we don't know. That's not yet been revealed. That's not been told. We also know for sure that for a very long time, Israel has been massacring civilians, long before October 7th, in the Gaza Strip, in the

West Bank, in other parts of Palestine, in Lebanon, and so on, on a regular basis. We're talking about thousands of civilians being massacred or being killed. We do know, I did this debate yesterday with some former British minister, and they talk, you know, all these rumors about babies being burned and that sort of thing. Now, that's been refuted, so we know that's not true immediately. but although nobody wants to get to the gory details, when a one-ton bomb or a half-ton bomb falls on a city block full of civilians with children,

do we really want to get into the gory details of what happens to these little bodies of the children? Today, we know that there are thousands of children missing, and they're under the rubble. We don't know if they're alive or dead, which is even worse than thinking that they're dead. It's a safe assumption that they died horribly, I think, at this point. Exactly.

So if we want to get into the nitty gritty of the horrors of war, by all means, but I think the Israelis are going to lose this conversation, which takes me back to what I said earlier, let's end it. This is an opportunity to end it. October 7th was a major, a watershed moment, or it can be a watershed moment, to end this for good, to demand a political solution that will end this for good. The state of Israel is still paralyzed. It was paralyzed for a very long time. People, you know, nothing was working. Now they're gaining a little bit, but I was talking to a friend today, the state of Israel is paralyzed. And this is, again, from a small group of fighters that came out of one of the poorest, most depressed places on earth. And so this big democracy, this massive

military force that's supposed to be so capable, we're completely, you know, this is a moment in history that can be used in order to bring about something positive under this terrible sacrifice of all this suffering. The question is, is anybody sitting there at the table that has got that kind of vision? And I don't see that, unfortunately, not yet, at least. I have questions about that if we have time later in the show, because I agree. I'm like, who's doing this? It's not Netanyahu, who most likely has diverted so many resources from protecting Israel to push into settlements that this was allowed to happen in the first place. And then there's the conspiracy theory part of the spectrum where it's like they knew and they let it happen so that it was an excuse

to invade. I don't really know, I mean, nobody really can tell you whether or not that's accurate, but it's just such a mess. Like the fact that that's even being floated. It's not accurate. The only reason it's being floated. It's like those rumors about killing babies and raping women. The only reason it's being floated is to discredit the capabilities of the Palestinians. So if Palestinians do something, then it's a crazy mob that burns babies and rapes women. And if they succeeded in something, it's because Israel was pulling the strings. Because Palestinians are Arabs and Arabs are incapable of being successful in anything.

Oh, I see. Unless there's somebody like Israel who's pulling the string because they control everything. It's like bigotry of low expectations or whatever that's called. Exactly. Yeah. So this is a loaded question, but I'm going to do it anyway. Would you consider yourself pro-Hamas or more pro-Palestine and is there a meaningful difference here?

I don't think there's a meaningful difference. I don't care if these guys are Hamas or some other group. I don't think it matters. These are Palestinians who came out to fight for their people, to fight for their nation, to fight for their freedom. You think if there was no Hamas, there wouldn't be somebody else. That'd be somebody else. That's not the issue.

I don't care what affiliate, who they're affiliated with. I don't think it matters to any Palestinians who they're affiliated with. These are Palestinian fighters who came and are fighting for the liberation of the freedom of their people. That's the bottom line. And again, I think framing it as pro-Palestinian or not pro-Palestinian is a little misleading or very misleading. Because once again, supporting the cause, the Palestinian call for justice and freedom ultimately will lead to the possibility of peace and Tunis-Israelis and Palestinians. because at the end of the sentence is a free Palestine from the river to the sea with equal rights, free democratic state on all historic Palestine with equal rights,

where Israelis and Palestinians can live together. Supporting the other side, supporting Israel, it means supporting what we're seeing now, this state that has been accused by amnesty international of the crime of apartheid, which is a crime against humanity, and the kind of vicious violence that we're seeing now against civilian in Gaza. seeing really, Palestinians have been living a life of terror for 75 years every single day for 75 years since Israel was established. So this is the choice. It's not pro-Palestine, pro-Israel. It's pro-freedom, pro-equality, pro-justice, or pro-violence and racism. These are the choices.

This is the Jordan Harbinger Show with our guest, Miko Pellid. We'll be right back. Hey, if you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our sponsors. All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are at Jordan Harbinger.com slash deals. Thank you for supporting those who support the show even when you disagree with the guest. Now, for the rest of my conversation with Miko Pellad.

So tell us what from the river to the sea actually means because some people are like, oh, it just means everyone should live together democratically and live happily ever after. And other people are like, no, it means get rid of all the Jews. And I'm like, eh, so much bad faith online. it's like you don't even, what do you think, what does it mean? When you say it, what do you say it?

I know what it means when Palestinians say it, and when people that I work with say it, then I know what it means. It's very simple. From the river to the sea refers to all historic Palestine. So on the east, it's the River Jordan, and the west it's the Mediterranean. And the north, it's the borders with Lebanon and Syria. And the south, it's the Gulf of Akaba and the border with Egypt.

It's very clearly defined. You know, every single map you look at before 1948, that region is called Palestine, going back thousands of years. And so from the rivers to the sea means freedom over all of historic Palestine, freedom from apartheid, freedom from checkpoints, freedom from violence, freedom from racism, where like I said earlier, the possibility of Israelis and Palestinians living together in peace becomes a reality.

That's how you make it a reality. It's the only way that you can make it a reality. It's like white South Africans and black South Africans couldn't possibly live in peace under apartheid. Israelis and Palestinians can't possibly live in peace under a regime where I have privilege over my Palestinians friends. It's never going to happen. There's no possibility of it happening. I think people are afraid that Israel might start to look like South Africa after the fact

because it's not, the country is not in good shape right now. Now, the reasons for that are different than, oh, they integrated. Yeah, it's very different. Like, I want to be very clear. Well, I mean, South Africa had, what, 40, 50 million Africans who would ever have the opportunity to go to school. Right. were impoverished, you know, a vast majority, Israeli-Palestinian societies are highly educated

societies. Israeli-Palestinian societies can go to work. If tomorrow morning, the apartheid regime fell, you had elections and you had a free democratic state with equal rights, it would be a flourishing, functioning democracy immediately. You've got people waiting, you know, in Gaza. I was not why I talk about Gaza now. I just think of all the people I know that have been killed in their families. But, you know, Gaza has, I think, one of the largest PhD per capita in the world.

You know, we're talking about a very highly educated, very productive societies that can go to work the next day. We're not talking about just beginning to educate millions and millions of people. Right. Some people might say, hey, though, democracy in the Middle East, that's a fairy tale. No other state in the area has a democracy. Even Hamas and Fatah haven't had elections in a decade or more. What do you say to that? I say it's nonsense.

It's racism and it's nonsense. The state of Israel is certainly not a democracy. It's never been a democracy. It's been an apartheid state from the very beginning. It was a democracy for people like myself, but we are now less than half of the population, so that's not considered a democracy. But the reasons that so many other countries in the region don't have democracies is because there are greater powers that are preventing them.

There's more interest in arming dictators and keeping them in power so that their foreign policy would be aligned with the U.S. and the Europeans and so on. But, you know, Palestinians and Israelis actually have had traditions of democracy going back a very long time. Ever since their political lives were these political entities existed, there were democracies and there's no reason to expect it wouldn't be a democracy. And again, we're not talking about a country where you place a king and you say, okay, he's the ruler. We're going to arm him. We're going to send him a lot of money and we're going to make sure there's no democracy, which is what happened in a lot of countries in the region. You know, Palestine is

not like that. It's a completely different reality. It's a completely different character of the people, the character of the country. It always has been. What do you say to the Israelis who say, well, if we let them do this, they're just going to wipe out all the Jews and take our stuff, which is what, you know, happened to them earlier. A lot of people are afraid of that, right? They feel like, even if they agree with you, they're like, I still don't want to get exterminated by the Palestinians coming back to Jerusalem where I live now. I don't know what in the world makes them say that. I mean, there's no history to that. There's no reason to expect that. Why would anybody say?

I don't know why anybody would think that. The history of Jews in Arab countries is the history of coexistence, even in Toslav. And being expelled in pogroms. I mean, come on, we've got to be fair. Not in the Arab world. Not in the Arab world. Really?

The Arab world, not in the Arab world. This is the experience of Jews in Europe. This has never been the experience that I would, I highly recommend you read a book. Where is it? I have it here. I will. By Israeli historian. Avishlai, it's called Three Identities, the memoir of an Arab Jew. He is from Iraq, and he talks about

the Iraqi community and what it was like for them for Jews in Baghdad. This is not the experience of Jews in the Arab world. And if you listen to, you know, there were Jewish communities in Jerusalem, in Hebron, in the North, and the Bria, and Safad, and so on, and they lived in harmony. They've always lived in harmony. They always lived well together. They shared the same values. They babysat each other's children. I mean, the relations between Jews and Arabs, even in Palestine. It was very, very good until the Zionists came. And the same thing happened in Iraq. The same thing happened in Syria.

The same thing happened in all of North Africa. Jews lived very well in the Arab world. The Arab world welcomed Jews. And when Jews were escaping from Europe, the Arab world is where they came to find protection. But that was not the experience. And what the Zionists are doing now, what Israel is doing now, they're perpetuating this revisionist history that says that the Jews in the Arab world, there were pogroms and they were kicked out. None of this is true.

This is absolutely not true. This is absolutely not true. That's what I've been reading. is like, oh, well, all the Arabic Jews from Iraq and Morocco, et cetera, I had to leave because of... They didn't want to leave. They didn't want to leave. Well, right.

None of the ones to leave, and there are particular stories. We don't have time to get jen out. But the particular stories of each and every country and what happened and why they end up leaving, you know, are tragic stories and the people are regret leaving, you know, because they were there for generations. And the culture of Arab Jews was a very rich and distinct culture, and it was respected by the countries in which they live. again, including Dostin.

Yeah, that's interesting. Okay, that's definitely contrary to some of the things that I've been learning and reading about. I need you to send me that book title at some point because I just tried to Google it and I got a bunch of math books. Three identities is not specific enough, I guess.

Memoir of an Arab Jew. His name is Avi Shlime, A-V-I-S-H-L-A-I-M. Three Worlds Memoirs in an Arab... That's why, yeah, I was like... Sorry, yes. Just trying to show me order of operations and calculus and I got PTSD flashbacks. It's not only a very important story

and was written a lot about the Middle East, but his own family story as having left Iraq and what it was like for them in Baghdad and the entire Jewish community, the Thai story of Arab Jews in general, and what happened when they came to Israel, how they were treated by the community of Israelis that already existed by the Zionists.

It's a very important lesson. So in the time that we have left, I'd love to talk about how we find a solution here, one that works not only for Palestinians, but not just for Israelis, but for Palestinians as well. I guess you can say both in either order, but one seems more apropos of this conversation. What is the compromise, though?

And what do you see is the role of the U.S. slash the West in general in this conflict? Because I am seeing a lot of parallels between how the U.S. acted post-9-11 from Israel. I think many would agree that we overreacted, and that did not work well for us in the long term. And it seems like Israel's falling into the same trap. Even Joe Biden is warning Israel

against falling into this exact trap that it seems like they have fallen into. As he sends the more money and weapons. Well. So there are no secrets in how this ends. There are only two options. One is a short-sighted, short-lived option, which is the continuation of the apartheid state, the continuation of the oppression and the killing of Palestinians. That is short-lived and short-sighted. There are about 12 million, 12-and-a-half million people living between the river and the sea,

between the historic Palestine. Seven million of them or seven-and-a-half million are Palestinians. And they're going to be a bigger majority because traditionally they have more children anyway. So they're going to be a larger majority. The minority of racist society that is governing through an apartheid regime can only last so long. I think it's inevitable. It's going to collapse. It's short-sighted. It's racist.

It's violent. And it's going to be short-lived. The other option is, I believe, the preferred option and the option that anybody who has a conscience and a heart and values needs to espouse is the possibility of a free Palestine post-apartheid, the decision. dismantling of the apartheid state, just like it was done in South Africa, through a lot of pressure, through severe sanctions, through boycotts, severe divestment. You know, South Africa, people forget, controlled all of Southern Africa, all the way up to Angola. It had gold and uranium and a great deal of resources. There was a very rich country, and people in America did not want to end it. People in, you know, banks and corporations, the people who were doing business with apartheid

in the American administrations also did not want to fight it. But it fell. And so, you know, So I believe that through, again, sanctions and boycotts and whatever it takes, the apartheid regime in Palestine needs to be brought down to its knees. It needs to be dismantled and replaced with a real democracy, a free democratic Palestine, from over to the sea with equal rights. Now, that's base camp. Now we're starting to work. Now we're starting to figure out how we do this.

Now you've got to figure out how Israelis can function together in a single political entity, in a single new state that has never existed before. There's never been a state where Israelis and Palestinians. There's never been a situation, even a moment where Israelis and Palestinians live as equals or function as equals in Palestine. And so now we're starting to build this thing, and I don't think it's impossible to build because I think at the end of the day, even with all the animosity and the violence, the history of violence, and so on,

people want to move on. People want to get on with their life. They want to raise their kids. They want to go to work. And like I said earlier, this democracy would equal, rights, and again, these two highly educated communities, highly educated societies that are ready to go to work the next day, will be able to function as an excellent, very productive democracy the next day. Now, will there be people who will try to stop it? Will there be people who

pick up a gun and try to fight it? Of course, a minority. There will be a minority who will die trying. Well, that's the way it is. If they choose to pick up a gun and kill somebody, they'll have to pay the consequences. But hopefully the rule of law will prevail. as it usually does in the end. And we've seen dictatorships in Latin America fall and be turned into democracies. We saw... Can you give an example of Latin America?

I'm drawn a blank. All of Latin America. All of Latin America. Chi and Argentina, Pina She, all of these. I mean, eventually they sell it, turned it to democracies. And again, South Africa and others. There are other examples. So the possibility of replacing a totalitarian racist regime

into a democracy exists. Now, the role of the U.S. in this is extremely important because obviously the U.S. provides a lot of funding and a lot of weapons and diplomatic cover, which is maybe even more important. This is our problem as taxpayers, that our money is going to support violence and racism as opposed to using our money to build schools and provide clean water and provide all the things that people need here in this country. Why is our tax money going without us to be even being asked? And the responsibility that we have is to demand of our elected officials. And it starts at the level of people running for school board and city council and state

legislatures because it starts there. And we need to demand that they stop sending money. They stop going on junkets. They stop supporting and promoting themselves as Zionists. If we believe in zero tolerance to racism, Zionism should not have a room anywhere because it's a racist ideology. So we need to be consistent about that as voters and as consumers of the media. Because when Bill Maher or Jordan Peterson interview that's a now and give him a platform to spew these absurd lies, these absurd lies that justify his violence and his racism and don't challenge him at all. We as consumers of this media need to challenge him and say, what are you doing giving him a platform like that? They don't even ask him about his being indicted. I mean, yeah, we need to step up because we are complicit because

It's our money. It's funny. You mentioned the Netanyahu interviews because I think I saw a headline. I want to say it was like in Haarets or something in Israeli newspaper where the headline was, if Netanyahu gives you an interview, it's because he thinks you're an idiot. And it's because it's like he'll only go on a show where he can just unchecked, say whatever he wants, which is unfortunately true for a lot of politicians. But like Israel's moved quite far to the right compared to where it was when I was there. At the time, I think it was Ehud Barak who was in charge of things. And it seems like there's no credible path to peace with somebody like Netanyahu and the Lakud party so the Israeli right-wing party in power over there. That seems like that has to

change before we see any progress at all. No, I don't think so. Do you don't think so? No, because the entire Zionist project is the racist project. It doesn't matter whose prime minister is. Aud Barak was no less responsible for what we're seeing today than Netanyahu is. It is one building on the other, building on the other. It was the same policies that led to this. I don't think it matters who the prime minister is. I mean, the clerk who was the president of South Africa when apartheid collapsed was not a particularly tolerant person. He just happened to be the guy at the moment that it collapsed. And it could be Netanyahu when a part-time collapses. It doesn't really matter. It's not going to happen because Israeli society and Israeli politics go right or left. It's

going to happen because they are forced onto their knees. A racist society and a racist state will only cede power when they're absolutely forced to. South Africa had nowhere to go. The boycotts the sanctions were killing them. The divestment was killing them. They could not travel. They could not play sports. They could not participate in any sporting, academic, cultural, diplomatic, diplomatic, political events.

You would be penalized if you invited a South African team to a sporting event as an international body. It was that severe. That is what's going to bring about the change. It's not going to be a particularly Israeli prime minister. It's going to be the people of pressure from the outside. And sadly, even the Palestinians within Palestine were spitting blood and spilling blood. and doing everything they can, they are like prisoners in a maximum security prison.

Their ability to bring about change is very limited. We are the ones that can bring about a bright future to Israelis and Palestinians. If we pull our support from this idea of Israel to the idea of peace and justice and so forth. Well, it seems like big strides between Israel and Palestinians in terms of the peace process have actually always happened after big violent clashes. So maybe there's room for optimism here. Obama used to say we can't want peace more than they do, which sounds catchy, but I think is kind of wrong. I think once great powers are drawn into the conflict because it flares up like this,

this is actually the type of attention and dedication of resources that are going to be required to get anywhere. Because we do need Turkey, Egypt, the U.S., Jordan, China, the EU, and other powers, regional and global to actually focus on this, or we're just going to keep watching this movie over and over again for 200 more years. Do you agree with that assessment at all? Well, I think all of the parties that you mentioned need to join, need to kick out the Israeli ambassadors like some of them already have. They need to the South Africans have, some of the Latin American countries have, they need to pull back their ambassadors from Tel Aviv. They need to end all ties with the state of Israel, all trade, all diplomatic ties, all trade ties, any

ties that the state of Israel has to become a pariah. Without that happening, I agree, nothing's going to change. So the kind of intervention that we need to see both from the U.S., the Europeans, Turkey, the Arab world, and so on, is a total disconnect with the state of Israel so that it is forced to agree to have peace, the peace and justice that we're talking about. You know, I was in Turkey, and Turkey is very, you know, many times, but I was there on a speaking tour. And my book came out in Turkish. And so they say, what do you think about, you know, Erdogan?

He speaks about Palestine. He's made from Palestine. I said, yes, that's excellent. But Turkey is still doing business with Israel, trade with Israel, billions of dollars worth, It doesn't matter what the president says or doesn't say. What matters is what actually takes place in terms of trade, in terms of commerce, in terms of the diplomatic relations. When that ends, that's what we're going to see change.

Thank you for humoring this somewhat contentious bit of the conversation. I mean, look, there's stuff I don't agree with you on, but it is so nice to talk to somebody who I don't necessarily agree with who also argues in good faith. Man, it's so rare. So I want to take a second and express my appreciation for that because it seems like Pleasure. You can't have these conversations without somebody just making some ish up and pulling it out of thin air and then getting mad at you. It's just nice to not deal with that.

So thank you very much. It's been a pleasure. Thank you. Here's a glimpse of my interview with the son of a Hamas co-founder before a change of heart had him working undercover for Israeli intelligence against his former friends and family to thwart terrorist plots and save lives. Check it out. Hamas is an Islamic movement. My father is one of the founding members of Hamas. Hamas for us was everything,

to the point where it became an army. It's a monster. I agreed to work with Israel, with a hidden agenda, to be a double agent. The level of pressure that they had to go through, my heart stopped for approximately 30 seconds. Most of the human beings cannot make it back. I was tortured mentally and physically.

Everybody in the city, knew that I'm a dead man. For more, including what it was like growing up in one of the first families of which many consider a terrorist group and why Masab considers it the greatest school of his life, check out episode 407 on the Jordan Harbinger show. Okay, so there's a lot here that I've got to address. First things first, great conversation, really enjoyed Miko coming in here. I think there was a lot of stuff that really opened my eyes, a lot of points that I had to Google

and be like, that's not right. A lot of rabbit holes I went down that turned out to be really shocking and surprising that moved my opinion a little bit. I will also say that regarding the IDF killing a bunch of people on October 7th, that's sort of this Hamas apologist argument. Look, let's assume that the IDF did kill

a bunch of Israeli civilians in the crossfire. Let's assume that that's true. We actually don't know yet whether that's true. We might never know. Let's assume, though, that it's true for the sake of steel manning this argument. That is extremely tragic,

and it is awful. Usually, though, let's say somebody attacks something here in the United States. Let's say a shooter goes into a school. If the cops accidentally kill some of the school kids when rescuing them, we are very angry at the police. But in the end, it is the person who went in and shot up and took hostages at a school that is to blame. What I'm saying here is what I'm getting at is if we're arguing that Hamas only wanted to take hostages, that's what people are saying, oh, they just wanted to take hostages. They didn't want to kill anyone. It was the IDF and the crossfire that ended up killing people. If they wanted to take hostages, but they ended up killing a bunch of people and the IDF then ended up killing a bunch of other people in the process, that is still

on Hamas. That is not on the people defending Israel, defending Israelis from being kidnapped by Hamas. You have to agree with me on that, folks. Come on. His greater point also stands, which is that there are way too many civilian deaths on both sides, and especially on the Palestinian side. So his point stands there about civilian deaths, but I really think it's a stretch to say, well, it's the IDF's fault that all those people died. Not really, not when you have armed groups. Plus, they filmed it. They live streamed themselves doing this.

We can't be like, oh, they didn't do that. They filmed themselves doing it. This was live streamed, for God's sake. Hamas is a jihadist, almost fascist-seeming entity, which rules by force. It crushes all political dissenters in Gaza by killing. maiming or torturing them, or by threatening their families to do the same thing to their families. Their rampage in Israel was only an extension of what they do to Palestinians every day. And I know this from talking to Hamas supporters inside Gaza and in the United States as well

and talking to people who know about this conflict on both sides. I spoke with people who were in Hamas about this in years past. And I went to the Gaza Strip and spoke to people who worked with the Palestinian Authority and with Hamas. And they told me this. This is what they told me in casual conversation, okay? Hamas is in no way equivalent to Israel's extreme right government, which is also gross, and that government has also totally discredited itself with the electorate.

Netanyahu has lost his majority coalition when the next elections are called. He is toast. He is politically dead. He will probably face trial for corruption. He will probably, hopefully, go to jail. He's a dog chasing a car pretending that he has scared that car away. That's Netanyahu right now. now. But my point is he will be held accountable. So, okay, when does Hamas get held accountable?

Again, not just for what they did to Israel, for what they're doing to Palestinians as well. I am waiting for somebody to tell me when Hamas will be held accountable. My guess is they can't be held accountable by anybody in Palestine, right? Israel, unfortunately, is in the position of having to do that. Why won't they be held accountable by Palestinians? Well, I have a couple of thoughts on that. By the way, Hamas could stop the war right now immediately. Why don't Palestinians insist they to do so? Jordan, that's unfair. How can you say that?

I'm with you. Hold on. It's because they're afraid of Hamas. Why are Palestinians afraid of Hamas? Because Hamas is a terrorist organization. They rule by force and they torture and kill people that disagree with them. Okay? I don't understand why I have to argue this point with people.

It really is shocking to me that I'm forced to make this argument. I know people are going to go, oh, you're just saying that everyone who's pro-Palestine is pro-Hamas. I'm not saying that. There are actually a ton of pro-Hamas people. They're in my inbox. They're in my Instagram DMs. These are not robots.

These are not people from the Middle East. These are people from the United States who run some crappy fitness studio in Minnesota or whatever. People, please realize these comments are not anti-Palestinian. They're anti-Hamas. There is a huge difference between those two things. I, for the record, 100% agree that Palestinians deserve, equal rights. But that cannot happen as long as a criminal slash terrorist slash fascist, whatever entity remains in power in Gaza. They have to be disemboweled. Their infrastructure has to be destroyed.

Their weapons have to be taken away. And their ability to harm civilians on either side of the fence has to be removed. Of course, I wish there was a way to do this without any collateral damage. But I think we've all seen enough war to know that this simply isn't within the realm of possibility. it's one of the greatest injustices and tragedies of our time. That much is certain. Note that any time that there's been any advancement towards peace, Hamas has intervened against it. I know there was some anecdote like, well, they asked this guy if he would sign an agreement right now.

No, Hamas has intervened against peace multiple times. It's not like Hamas actually wants peace. They don't want peace. That's why they did the October 7th thing in the first place. They knew Israel would respond and probably swing for the fences like they're doing now. Okay, I need to calm down. Another point, when I said that there was mistreatment of Jews in the Middle East in Muslim countries, Miko then said, not in Arab states, and I think he said it like four times, which means he really meant it, right?

That just turns out to not be the case. Now, maybe I misunderstood what he was trying to tell me. I did reach out for clarification on that. Many, many, many Jews that lived in other Middle Eastern countries were pushed out of those countries. It was about a million, maybe more, depending on how you and where you get your numbers. is 900,000, some might say they were pushed out because the state of Israel was established. But that sort of proves my point, I think, and not his, that Jews were mistreated in the Middle East by majority Muslim nations. If a Muslim country pops up in South America or whatever,

and other countries in the area or in other parts of the world respond by kicking all the Muslims out of the places where they live, that is not a justifiable response to Paraguay deciding that they were suddenly a Muslim country or whatever. You would not. never tolerate this excuse if the tables were turned. And that's why it doesn't sit right with me. Now, again, maybe I've missed a point. Maybe I've just misunderstood him somehow here. I do plan on picking up the book that he recommended for me because I think that stuff is interesting. And there's a lot to be said for, there's these Baghdad attacks where the Mossad actually planted bombs to scary Iraqi Jews and to go into Israel supposedly, allegedly, there's evidence of that. But okay,

let's assume that that's true. And we don't have proof. Let's assume that that's true. What about all the other countries where Jews were pushed out and fled. I mean, you just can't sort of cherry pick the evidence that supports your stuff here. And I don't think he's doing that. I think a lot of other people are doing that. Again, I think Miko argued and had a great conversation. Most slash all of it was in good faith. And I think the part that might even seem like it isn't, it might have just been because I've misunderstood something. And obviously, we don't agree on everything, but I think that's a kind of a cool quality of the show is that we can still have those conversations. And, you know, I think Miko is a really smart guy, even if I think some of his

perspectives might be a little off. But that's the beauty of conversations like this anyway, right? All things Miko Pellid will be in the show notes at Jordan Harbinger.com or just ask the AI chatbot on the website. Transcripts, of course, are on the show notes. Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show. All at Jordan Harbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show, even if you disagree with the guest. We've also got a newsletter every week. the team and I dig into an older episode of the show. We dissect the lessons from it. So if you're a fan of the show and you want to recap of important highlights and takeaways, or you just want to know what to listen to next, the newsletter is a great place to do that. Jordan Harbinger.com

news is where you can find it. I'm going to be doing some giveaways on there. I know. I sound like a broken record, but that's the truth. Don't forget six minute networking over at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. I would love to connect with you on Twitter. Well, I don't really use it, but I'm over there, Jordan Harbinger on Twitter. Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. That's an actual connection, by the way. This show is created an association with podcast one. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace, Sanderson, Robert Fogart, Millio Campo, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for this show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us

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