The President's Daily Brief - PDB Situation Report | August 1st, 2025: Raymond Ibrahim’s Warning About Islam & Pressure Mounts On Israel

Episode Date: August 2, 2025

In this episode of The PDB Situation Report: We step back from battlefield updates to examine the militant ideology driving groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Iranian regime. Author and Islamic scholar Raymond Ibrahim joins us to break down how theology and history shape their violent worldview. Later in the show, pressure grows on Israel as several Western governments announce plans to recognize a Palestinian state. Jonathan Schanzer from the Foundation for Defense of Democracies joins us to analyze this diplomatic shift and what it could mean for the war in Gaza. TriTails Premium Beef: Visit https://trybeef.com/pdb & get 2 Free Flat Iron steaks Birch Gold: Text PDB to 989898 and get your free info kit on gold American Financing: Call American Financing today to find out how customers are saving an avg of $800/mo. 866-885-1881 or visit https://www.AmericanFinancing.net/PDB - NMLS 182334, https://nmlsconsumeraccess.org --Guests-- Raymond IbrahimYouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@TheHolyWarChannelBooks: https://www.raymondibrahim.com/books/ Jonathan SchanzerX: https://x.com/JSchanzerFDD Morning Brief: https://www.fdd.org/fddmorningbrief Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Olivia Rodriguez, the unraveled tour, live across North America with special guests. Get tickets Thursday, May 7th at Olivia Rodrigo.com. Welcome to the PDB Situation Report. I'm Mike Baker, your eyes and ears on the world stage. All right, let's get briefed. First up, and what drives the violence of groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Iranian regime? Well, today, we're stepping back a bit from the headlines to look at the ideology behind the militancy with expert insight from Raymond Ibrahim. Later in the show, pressure is mounting

on Israel to bring the war in Gaza to an end as multiple Western nations are now saying that they're planning to formally recognize a Palestinian state in the coming months. We'll be joined by Jonathan Shanzer of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies for more on that. But first, today's situation reports spotlight. Here on the PDB, we cover the actions of groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Iranian regime all the time. They're not just political actors. They're driven by a specific worldview, rooted, of course, in Islamic ideology. But what is it about that ideology that fuels such militancy?

What do these groups actually believe? And how does that belief system shape their strategies, their goals, and their violence? Well, this is a bit of a departure from our usual focus on hard news and day-to-day headlines. But to understand the conflicts that we cover, right, we thought it's critical to understand the ideas driving them. My next guest has spent years studying exactly that. Rabind Ibrahim is an expert on Islamic history and ideology and a former Arabic language specialist at the Library of Congress. He's best known for his 2007 book, The Al-Qaeda Reader, which offers a revealing translation and analysis of the political and religious writings of Osama bin Laden and Amen al-Zawahiri.

You can also find more of his work on his YouTube channel at the Holy War channel. Raymond, thanks very much for being here with us on the Situation Report. We appreciate your time. Yeah, my pleasure. Mike, good to be with you. I want to start with a question that may seem odd, but it's for the benefit of our viewers. If you had a minute, if you got in an elevator and you had one minute based on all your experience and all your work, studying Islamic history and ideology.

And you had that one minute ride in an elevator and you had one person with you in there. What is it that you'd want to tell them about what you've learned, what you've studied, what you think? I'd want to tell them, I guess, what I assume they don't know. And I'm also assuming they're not Muslims. And I think I'd want them to know that this particular religion is unlike other religions. It's very political. It's very, in a word, tribal. It's us against them.

You as a non-believer are a de facto enemy and how they approach you. As the enemy, there's different categories, different levels, but none of it is anything near or remote to what Western standards of religious freedom approximate. So basically, you know, it could be from fighting you to killing you to enslaving you to now's not the time and we can be your friend and smile in your face, but we have to do it later. And that's just in a nutshell, that's the doctrine, that's the history, that's the, you know, current situation of Islam, despite what they, what everyone's guys, mostly non-Muslims, actually. So, I mean, I want to expand on that if I could. I guess other religions, not just Islam, but you look at Christianity, right? You know, there have been a lot of wars fought in the name of a Christian god, right? And a lot of violence that's been perpetrating. in the name of that religion. So is it that there is more within Islam that it's more prone to violence because of its doctrine

and beliefs? Or you see what I'm saying. I'm struggling to ask the question here. Yeah. I understand. Yeah. I mean, the point you're raising has been raised countless times. That's one of the main responses.

I would argue that Christianity, okay, there's been wars in the name of Christianity. And, you know, when you say that immediately, everyone I think is thinking of Crusades. And we need to actually talk directly about that because that's the opposite case. It's actually it was a defensive war. But overall, the ultimate point that I'm trying to say is, well, I'm not interested if a person today goes and shoots up a mosque and says, I'm doing it for Jesus. What I'm interested in is can they actually trace it doctrinally and justify it? And the bottom line is a Christian can't justify it. Muslims can't because Islam, the prophet, all the jurists,

and it's too long to get into the jurisprudence of Islam, but they're all agreed to what I had said, which is that the kaffir, the infidel, the non-Muslim, is the de facto enemy who must one way or another be fought subjugated. It's all over in the Quran. It's all over in their, again, we can get into their technical names, the Hadith and the Tefsyr, et cetera. So it's all part of the religion.

So to me, that's very much different than saying a Buddhist decides to blow himself up and kill people and he screams Buddha. Yeah, he can do that. But that doesn't, he can't really justify it. And the same with Christianity. Whereas Islam abundantly justifies it. And as far as the, you know, the crusades, because I think what you had just said, which is, you know, there's been violence and war in the name of Jesus and Christ. Yeah. And that's usually the crusade.

But those are so much misunderstood that, you know, so much of my life work has become correcting them. So people understand exactly what the crusades were, which is they were completely defensive. These were defensive wars. So the best you can say is that they accorded with just war theory, which was, and should still be a Christian thing, at least in the premodern medieval era, just war was taken for granted.

You can always fight if it's in defense. and the crusaders were actually defending and trying to liberate formerly conquered Christian regions, which is the entire Middle East and the Holy Land, of course, and the persecution of Christians. So again, even the Crusades, which is sort of, you know, the creme de la creme of an example of evil Christians misusing Christ's name, was perfectly done in accordance with the just war, and it's nowhere near what we're talking about, which is the sort of offensive war, jihadist imperative, which is part and parcel of Islam. So the wording that's developed over the recent times and recent times, I'd go back to, let's, as a convenient point, let's go to 9-11, right? But, you know, typically you get these phrases,

radical Islamists, radical Islamic group, right? Whether they're referring to Al-Qaeda or, or Islamic jihad or whomever, ISIS. So is that a misnomer? It's not so much that they're radical. They're just following early doctrine or ideology? Yeah, on the one hand, I agree there needs to be a distinction that we can't just like label every single Muslim under one thing. On the other hand, I don't think the current distinction, modern and radical, does it justice

because what it, it doesn't make sense. It implies the correct way to look at it is the. observant Muslim is a radical. And a moderate Muslim, what we call a moderate Muslim, is essentially a laxadaisical, indifferent Muslim who's living according to 21st century lifestyle and whatever parts of Islam fit, he'll allow them and whichever parts don't fit, he won't necessarily allow them. So I think that is happening in the world, and it wouldn't be correct to say every single Muslim believes in jihad, just like it wouldn't be correct, say, every single Christian believes in any particular Christian tenet.

So, yeah, the distinction is necessary, but it's also what's wrong with the distinction is they're implying that the guys who do the jihad are somehow not following correct Islam, and that's false. They are following correct doctrinal historic Islam. They're following it more than the moderate Muslim is, you know, more is the pity. So that's the distinction. Okay, I think that's really interesting. And the point that you make, I think, is probably universally understood, which is that, regardless of the religion, you always have, you have the element that's zealous, right, that follows and believes to the core, whatever the doctrine of that religion is. And then, yeah, you get the, frankly, you got the majority who pick and choose for convenience purposes, you know, what to do, what to follow, what to believe. You know, I guess I followed the latter category.

And the interesting, I think, thing about this is, if I can, if I may just end it, because I think you'll like this particular aspect. But when you look at a fundamental Christian, they're the opposite of a Muslim. They're supposed to be kind and turning friendly and loving. And that's because they're following the scriptures so closely. But when the Muslims follow their scriptures so closely, and most Westerners don't know that,

but their scriptures are full of pure intolerance, pure violence, pure what we would call today, toxic masculinity, patriarchy, misogyny, all of that is in there. So, you know, if your life is all about trying to emulate what's written, the way, let's say a Christian is trying to follow the, you know, the Bible, it's ironic because you're going to have antithetical results, which reflect the antithetical nature of the two scriptures. So let me ask you this.

This is, again, it sounds like a simplistic question. I realize that. But if you have an observant Muslim, as you call it, that is cool. or this is, again, maybe too simplistic. At his core, what does he believe? Well, if you want to at least call yourself Muslim, they're supposed to believe what's called the five pillars of Islam, and these are like the most basic fundamental beliefs.

One is, of course, there's only one God and Muhammad is his prophet, meaning that whatever revelation Muhammad gave, that's what we follow, which is the Quran, the Hadith, the Sira, etc. And then there's the prayer. You have to pray five times. There's the fasting. There's zakat, which. which they translate as alms.

And here's another perfect example. So the Zakat, and there's pilgrimage to Mecca, but the Zakat, just to give you an idea, it's supposed to be alms. That's how you speak to someone and they translate it to you. They'll tell you, oh, look at the good side of Islam. They give charity, which is true. But most people don't know that actually,

according to Islamic law, this charity can never go to a non-Muslim. Again, underscoring that the non-Muslim is the enemy. Why would I give him money? Unless it's in the context, of trying to cajole him and win him over to Islam, then you can sort of, you know, give money and make contributions. But again, so I'm just showing you how even this one aspect that people think is a good aspect, itself is reflective of the intolerance and divisiveness that I was

mentioning in Islam. Okay, no, that's actually fascinating. Raymond, a long list of additional questions, but we have to take a quick break. So if you could stay right where you are, We'll be right back shortly with Raymond Ibrahim and more of the PDB situation report. Don't move. Hey, Mike Baker here. Well, in case you didn't notice, we are deep into the dog days of summer, right? When it's, well, it's too hot to think, but you know what? It isn't too hot for?

It's never too hot to grill. At tri-beef.com slash PDB, Tritails Beat is helping you push through the heat with a freezer full of ranch-raise black angus beef. I got to tell you something. This company is terrific and the beef is outstanding. Order now and get two free flat iron steaks just for being one of the smart ones who skipped a shrink-wrapped chew toys at the grocery store. Real beef, real ranchers, no middleman, no fluff, trybeef.com slash PDB. Ryan Reynolds here from MintMobil. I don't know if you knew this, but anyone can get the same premium wireless for $15 a month plan that I've been enjoying. It's not just for celebrities, so do like I did and have one of your assistants assistants

assistants switch you to MintMobile today. I'm told it's super easy to do at mintmobile.com slash switch. Up front payment of $45 for three month plan equivalent to $15 per month required. Intro rate first three months only, then full price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra. See full terms at mintmobile.com. Welcome back to the PDB Situation Report. And joining me once again is Raymond Ibrahim. You can find more of his work on at the Holy War channel.

That's on YouTube. Graham, thank you very much for sticking around. I want to pick up our conversation. And again, this probably is a very open-ended question with a lot of running room here. But the progressive left seems, maybe I'm going to phrase this wrong, but seems enamored with his. Islam. And I mean, I've had conversations with a variety of fairly hard left liberals. And, you know, they espoused this idea that Islam is, you know, the religion of peace. And they're very, they just seem unaware, perhaps, of the actual doctrine. And in particular, I suppose you could, you could look at recent protests over Israel's actions in Gaza. And I actually walked through a protest and you, you York at one point and there was a Queers for Palestine side that was being held up. And I thought, well, that's an unusual thought. What is it about is, is it just a clever disinformation campaign

on the part of some of the Muslim community? No, actually, I would say the Muslim community is, by and large, very vocal and up front about its beliefs. Of course, you have the ones who are engaged in what's known in Arabic as Takeya, which is basically, yeah, diplomatic outreach, if you want to call it that way, that conceals their true intent. But, you know, I'll give you a perfect example somewhere in, it's called Hamtrak, I think, Michigan. And, you know, it's now got the city, it has more Muslims, more than 50% of the population's Muslim, okay? And apparently the left, as you call them, were very supportive of the immigrant Muslim incoming community and they always catered to them in any way, shape, or form.

And then once the city council became a Muslim majority, they canceled all the homosexual stuff, the so-called pride stuff. And the left felt betrayed. And they even, you know, well, we helped you how could you do this to us? So there's definitely that dynamic always at work, which is you have foolish leftists doing whatever they can to empower this particular creed that actually hates them and very openly says it hates them. And when they come to power, it shows it hates them. So I think ultimately this, you know, what we call the left is why they do this or why they would cater to Islam. It's more a reflection of, you know, the old. old maxim, you know, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. And they just ultimately hate Western

civilization. They hate Christianity. They hate morality. So they're going to try to buttress it with anything they can. Why not all of that's original enemy, which is Islam from a historic point of view? So I think that's really what's going on here. They just, to spite, you know, everything that's traditional or Christian or moral, we are going to help the Muslims that everyone hates because they're Islamophobes, et cetera. Okay, but you know, as you say, gays for Palestine, are they not aware that, you know, according to Islamic law, the Muslim homosexuals get stoned? That's why they throw them off the roof because that's an approximation of stoning because you fall on the pavement and you die by stone. That's the logic. It's based on the

Saddam and Omar idea. So, yeah, but I mean, I have to also get this off my chest. I hate the the left because it really legitimizes something that should not be legitimized. When we say left, we have in our mind some constructs, right, middle, left. Middle is supposedly objective, right is conservative, left is liberal. But what we're talking about now is pure insanity, okay? The left is, for example, says there's no genders or there's a thousand genders. That sort of thing should not be given respectability by being called left because it actually puts it on a political spectrum.

It needs to be called for what it is, insanity, stupidity, or even worse. And so I think once we do that, because there's also a war on words. And when we use these words, we actually legitimize and play their game, even inadvertently. So I think we should also be cognizant of how we start labeling things. I take your point. Yeah, and I've never, I guess I've fallen into that trap, a lot of people have. I use it too all the time. I know.

I mean, what else am I going to say? That's the only word people use. Well, that's the problem. Yeah, it's convenient. It moves the conversation along because people understand the phrasing, I suppose. But let me ask you about this. The concept of expansion, the concept of recruitment, of proselytizing, of converting. Is that baked into the ideology?

I mean, so and to what degree is that, you know, on L. of, if you look at Europe, for example, I'm a dual British citizen, U.S. citizen. And, you know, in London, for example, there's a fair amount of back and forth right now over the degree to which their open policies over the years have created an atmosphere, right, where London, you know, in the words of a lot of people, London's not London anymore, or the UK is not the UK, or France or whatever. But, you know, and so that's led to sort of this, this, yeah, this led's to the concept of, well, but it's part and parcel of the plan. They're, they're slowly taking over. I mean, how do you address that? Well, okay, so it's actually a good

question. So jihad, which is again, a doctrinal aspect of Islam, which is all, jihad isn't about forcibly converting people. It's about gaining governance all around the world and enforcing Islamic law. And then within that, you can, for example, if you're people of the book, if you're a Christian or Jew, you can keep your religion, but you have to pay tribute and essentially become a second-class citizen, okay? So you lose a lot of your rights, okay? And if you're not, if you're a pagan, you just get butchered or convert, that's the classic understanding of Islam. But within that whole view, there's different forms of jihad. So remember the word jihad, a lot of apologists will tell you. It doesn't mean holy war. It means to strive, to struggle.

And they're correct. That is the Arabic meaning of the word. But in a way, that actually really makes it worse, because it shows you, it underscores again, how multi-tentical the idea of jihad is. It's not just limited to warfare, even though that has been its primary expression historically. So there are categories of jihad. There's the jihad of the tongue, jihad of the pen. This is propaganda, lying, or pen. So you're propagandizing on behalf of Islam to help empower Islam vis-à-vis the non-Muslim, let's say Europe. There's jihad of the money, which means you contribute, you pay money to the propaganda campaign, to the jihad groups. You're a rich Saudi. You don't have to actually engage in it, but you contribute. And there's also,

a little known, the baby jihad, or the demographic jihad. And this is the idea of impregnating women, especially Muslim women, and having as many babies as possible and literally outbreeding the infidels. And that's what's happening, especially in Europe. And Muslims have said this multiple times. They boast about it all the time, going back decades. Mara Gaddafi of Libya once talked about how that's going to happen in Europe. And lo and behold, it is happening. You have all these major capitals. I think London is one of them where the number one newborn name of newborn baby boys is Muhammad. And this is not just in the UK. This is all throughout. So yeah, it's not all about converting. Of course, Muslim will try to convert you as well and there's

brownie points in it for them. But it's about gaining power. And in fact, historically, it was better for the caliphates if people did not convert because then they can milk them for tribute and more tax. So there was actually, they didn't want people to convert. It was a way to get off paying the tribute. So ultimately, it's just about gaining power one way or another through force, through fraud, through babies and the, you know, demographic, overwhelming demographic boom. Yeah, all of that is at work. How, I'm curious, because you're very straightforward about talking about all of this.

how is the response over the years been? Have you noticed a shift in the way people react to your discussions, your explanations, your writings? Yeah, yeah, I think definitely for sure, especially with my last books that deal with history because history is so powerful and there's so much fake history. And history is often the first premise for the conclusions that we have about the modern era and so much of what people think about today when you go back in his, especially vis-a-vis Islam, Europe and Islam, it's the exact opposite.

You find out that it was actually Muslims persecuting and conquering and killing Christians, including in Europe for centuries. So I think when people see that how it went on, then things start making sense that today makes actually sense when you see Gihadists acting the way they are. But I would say despite anything I or anyone says or what the masses believe, which is all good. The machinery just continues nonstop. And, you know, I just made a video and I wrote an article, just give you an idea about, you know, what's happening to the Druze in Syria, right? And it's basically under the new Syrian president, who's a jihadist, who's an al-Qaeda member

formerly. And lo and behold, the religious minority are being attacked and butchered and slaughtered and raped and burned alive, okay, the Druze over the last couple of weeks. And to me, though, it's kind of like, how is this news? This is not news. You take jihadists and you empower them and you throw them amongst minorities. This is what happens. This is ISIS with the Yazidis precisely a decade ago. And, you know, and at the time, Donald Trump used to accuse Obama, rightfully so of being the founder of ISIS. That's actually what Trump multiple times refer to Obama. And I'm wondering, well, what are you the founder of Donald Trump? Because you just said that guy, Ahmed al-Shara, the new president, the Al-Qaeda guy of Syria, he said he's a great

guy, he shook hands with him, he's easing sanctions with him, patting him on the shoulder, and this guy is committing a genocide. So to me, it's just become very tiresome. It's the same mechanism. The U.S., the West helps jihadists. They end up killing everyone, and then they turn around a bite the hand that fed them and attack the U.S. And we're supposed to offer an analysis about this every other year when it keeps happening non-nonstop. So to me, frankly, it's getting sickening. So, yeah, I think a lot of the people, their eyes are opening. But the, you know, the leaders and the powers of the bee are just, they're staying the course no matter what.

Why? And I want to be mindful of time here, but to pick up on your point, why do you think that is? Why, you know, when you say leaders of the Western nations help jihadists, you know, why? I always, I try to simplify things, and to me, it's either sheer naivity and stupidity and whatever, or it's something diabolical. I'm pretty, pretty confidence to the latter at this point, because you can't be that naive and that stupid year in and year out, decade after decade. This goes back to Ronald Reagan, you know, when he was helping the Mujahideen, Al-Qaeda,

against Russia in Afghanistan, they came back and attacked us, and I love it. So it's just, you know, it is what it is. I think they have their plan for the Middle East, and it involves using Islamic terrorists to get the dirty job done, is what I think. That's fascinating. And that gives me a whole other line of questioning, but we are out of time. Raymond, I hope you'll come back when we call you again. I've enjoyed this conversation very much.

That would be great. And again, you can find more of Raymond Ibrahim's work at his YouTube channel. that's at the Holy War Channel. Raymond, thank you very much for being here on the Situation Report. My pleasure. Well, several Western nations are threatening to recognize a Palestinian state, and they're putting a squeeze on Israel to accept a ceasefire. We'll be joined by Jonathan Chanzer from the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies

to unpack what all that means. Stay with us. Hey, Mike Baker here. Well, now look, we've seen major changes, right, coming out of Washington lately, and a lot going on around the world, by the world. the way. But while the headlines focus on national policy and international stories, your personal savings, well, those are still your responsibility. And now, frankly, is the time to take control. Look, one of the smartest ways to protect your savings is through diversification,

especially with gold from the Birch Gold Group. They're the precious metal specialists. Gold is up some 40 percent just in the past year alone. In settled banks, we know what they're doing. They're buying up record amounts of gold, partly due to global instability, which you may have noticed is rising. Birch gold makes it incredibly easy to own physical gold, either in your IRA or, like a lot of folks, just stored safely at home. Here's what you got to do. Just text PDB to the number 989-89-89-89, and Birch gold will send you a free information kit on gold. There's no obligation. It's just useful information. Look, with an A-plus rating with a better business bureau and tens of thousands of happy customers, take control of your savings today. It's simple. Text PDB to 989-8.8.

9-8. Welcome back to the PDB Situation Report. Now, pressure is mounting on Israel, with several Western nations, including France, Canada and Malta, don't forget Malta, announcing plans to officially recognize a Palestinian state. And the UK, the United Kingdom, may follow suit as early as September during the UN General Assembly if Israel refuses to accept a ceasefire. It's a coordinated push, it seems, that could reshape the international landscape, and it comes as outrage over Israel's military campaign in Gaza continues to grow, with critics accusing the Jewish state of committing genocide. To help us break this doubt, we're joined by Jonathan Shanzer. He's the executive director of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.

Jonathan, thanks very much for being here on the PDB Situation Report. I pleasure. What do you, and this is a very open-ended question, and I apologize, but there's a lot of running room here. What do you make of this move now? First, France, the UK weighs in, now Canada, we've got the Arab League making their declaration. What do you make of all this? Look, I think it's a lot of rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic when you cut through all the noise. I mean, first of all, let's just understand that recognizing a Palestinian state isn't going to

help anything in the Gaza Strip right now. The Palestinian Authority is the governing body right now in the West Bank, and that's essentially who they're talking about recognizing. This is an entity that is run by 89-year-old Mahmoud Abbas, who's been in power now since 2005. This guy is an autocrat, corrupt, has wasted hundreds of millions of dollars, maybe billions of dollars of assistance. This is not the answer for stability in the region.

Declaring the state empowering the Palestinians to have a state when they're not ready is a recipe for more unrest, for more instability, and I just don't see how any of this helps right now. Now, that all said, I think that there is a moment if the international community wanted to come together and say, look, we are rejecting Hamas. We are calling on Hamas to leave the Gaza Strip entirely, right? We are asking them, we're demanding of them to return all the hostages and to end this. crisis. And when that happens, we are committed to rebuilding the Gaza Strip and defining a government that works and maybe even recognizing it. But right now, they're putting the cart before the horse. They've skipped all the way to the end here by recognizing a state that doesn't

exist and that doesn't function, and they haven't solved for the problem of Hamas. Yeah, it does. I mean, it does have the smell of performative art. And also, sort of the, we can all feel good about ourselves now, right? I mean, it's, easy to pat yourself on the back and then kick the can down the road. I don't want to sound really cynical. But now, now how does the Arab League and the EU and I think some 17 other nations all came up with a declaration during the two-day conference that's been going on? And it did, I mean, obviously it was targeted at Israel in part, but it also was targeted at Hamas and did talk about, you know, the need for them to leave. Do you give that any

Any credibility? Look, I like it. It's better than nobody doing it. I think actually the most interesting part of it was that the Qataris took part in this statement. And the Qataris are key sponsors, patrons of Amas. I mean, up until the October 7th attacks, they were giving them $30 million a month. And on top of that, you still have top leaders that are based in Qatar right now.

I don't really understand what they were thinking here. I don't know why they decided to join, but I mean, I will want it to the extent that they're willing to follow through. And I mean, look, this is what should have happened a long time ago. They should have kicked Hamas out of their country immediately. They should have put pressure on Hamas to end the hostage crisis immediately, right? I mean, they could have stopped so much bloodshed had they used their leverage in Qatar against Hamas. I think, by the way, that right now that's a sign to me that maybe this is the moment. And we know Stephen Whitkoff is going to Gaza. He's going to assess whatever's going on there with the aid mechanism.

By the way, I'm not sure exactly if he knows how to assess this. But I mean, I suppose it's a good thing that he's going and he wants to see with his own eyes. But really, if you want to ask what the positive role of the U.S. would be right now, it would be to lead an effort to get the entire Arab world, to get Hamas's patrons, Hamas's supporters, but also these Western countries that are virtue signaling right now to the Palestinians. get them all to come together and for the first time actually declare that this hostage crisis needs to end it, that they're holding Hamas responsible, and that there will be ramifications for not doing this. I mean, it's kind of amazing to me that we're 650 plus days into this war, and we have not yet seen a coordinated action along these lines. I think what the Arab world did and what the Europeans did with this statement, they actually just gave us a glimmer of what's possible. And for that, I've got to say, I commend them. Yeah, it is, it is surreal in a way that it took this long for them to all agree to condemn the 7th October 2023 attacks.

I mean, if you think about it, really, what, I mean, how many committee meetings did you have to have to decide that you could condemn something like that? Look, to play devil's advocate, you talked about the fact that they should have been calling for the departure of Hamas years ago. I mean, you could make the argument, and I'm about to, that in part 7 October happened because in part the Israeli government almost appeared to have gotten to the point where they accepted Hamas as the governing element there in Gaza, and they had kind of gotten to the point where they thought, okay, I think maybe they're more interested in just bettering the lives instead of maybe they're moving away from a war standing. it seemed like they sort of fell asleep with the wheel, in part because Hamas was playing a

disinformation campaign that was fairly well thought out. Look, this is we're going to lull them to sleep and then take advantage of them as they did on the 7th of October. So it almost looks like Israel had gotten to the point where they had accepted in a way the fact that Hamas was there to stay. Am I wrong about that? No, you know, it was interesting. A couple of days before the October 7th attack, this is like late... September. I spoke to a senior Israeli official whose file was the Palestinians, and he handled this for the Netanyahu government. And I asked him about Gaza, because we were talking a lot about West Bank and what was going on there, because, you know, leading up to Tensetta, and that's

where all of the attention had been placed was what's going on in the West Bank and how dangerous was it, et cetera. And the guy said, look, we actually believe we can work with Yaya Sinwar, the guy that ultimately went on to launch the 10-7 attacks that led the military effort whose planet was to attack Israel on that day. The Israelis believed that he was more interested in providing products and services to the 2 million people of Gaza. And yeah, they were feeding information through, you know, I think probably devices that they understood that were being listened to by the Israelis.

They were feeding intel to senior Israeli officials that was clearly wrong. and yes, the Israelis got played. But I don't think there was ever a moment where the Israelis are saying, oh, yeah, Hamas will be fine. What I think they arrived at was this mistaken assessment that, you know, Hamas was a group that they could do business with in the short term. Medium, long term, they were going to have problems as they have, right, every couple of years, there's a war that erupts because Hamas, you know, launches that war. What they didn't see was the full scale of this. But now I got to say, when you look at the outlook for the Gaza Strip, no prospects whatsoever unless Hamas leaves.

And I think that's really the rub that we're looking at right now where, you know, the Israelis are saying, we can't stop fighting, right? And we can't stop what we're doing in the Gaza Strip because Hamas is still there. And Hamas is taking advantage of that because the Israelis have taken responsibility for all the borders, all the aid, everything that goes on inside the Gaza Strip. So Hamas has done a little jujitsu here. And he said, yeah, we're weak and we don't have the capabilities any longer. You know, whose fault everything is now, the Israelis.

And so the Israelis have to think about how they're going to flip the script. I don't think that they have come up with the right approach yet. They're flooding the Gaza Strip with aid. I think that's important. They probably need to keep doing that. That will have, unfortunately, for Israel, a little bit of a backfire effect because it's going to give more agency to Hamas. But I do think that the Israelis can, for example, I mean, I just wrote about this recently,

they can declare that, you know, look, AIDS going to come in, but not one ounce of reconstruction material will come until Hamas relinquishes all the hostages and hands over all its weapons and its top leaders leave the Gaza Strip. That's still something that Israel can ask for, and that would change that leverage once again. A couple of parts here. I want to ask you about, you know, has Hamas essentially one know, the, the messaging war with, I look at the pressure that's coming on now, this idea that, you know, they're on the brink of salmon or, you know, children are dying from starvation. And it's clearly,

yes, clearly it's a crisis. Right. I don't think anybody, you know, can argue that the people, the civilians of Gaza, are desperately hurting for assistance. And so the situation is dire, but you can also argue that Hamas has been very clever in understanding, the power of that message and has amplified it to a willing media that's been, you know, keen to go along with the notion that, you know, everybody's starving in Gaza. So, I mean, there's this element of, you know, has Hamas actually, to your terms, flip the script here in a point where they're on their back foot, they're clearly, leadership is decimated, stockpiles or did tunnels destroy, etc.

and yet they've found this still, this ability to drive the narrative. And then the other part of this, and honestly, what we'll do is I'll leave you with these two points to ponder during our break. The other question is, at this point, why would Hamas give up the remaining hostages, knowing that that's their only leverage? And they're clearly desperate to retain power, retain control. So I want to ask you, again, this is a tough question, but how do you beat that? But first, Jonathan Schanzer, if you'll stick around, I will be right back with more of the PDB situation report, and Jonathan Shanzer from the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, don't go anywhere. Hey, Mike Baker here.

Let me ask you an intriguing question, if I may. What if you could delay your next two mortgage payments, right? I think about it. Imagine putting those two payments in your pocket and finally getting a little breathing room. Well, it is possible when you call American financing today. Look, if you're feeling stretched by everyday expenses, you know what I'm talking about, grocery bills, gas bills, you've got utility bills, you've got a variety of bills, they're all piling up.

Well, let me tell you something, you're not alone. And frankly, many Americans are putting those expenses on credit cards, and for many of them, there doesn't seem to be a way out. Well, let me tell you, American financing can show you how to use your home's equity to pay that debt. So give them a call today before you get to a point where all those payments, while they seem unmanageable. Look, their salary-based mortgage consultants are helping homeowners just like you restructure their loans and consolidate debt, all without upfront fees, and that's very important. And their customers are saving an average of some $800 a month. Now, I'm not a rocket

scientist, but I think that's something like a $10,000 raise. It's fast, it's simple, and it could save your budget. Look, call now before it's too late. The number, 866 885 1881. Again, the number 866 885 1881. Or just visit Americanfinancing.net slash PDB. Welcome back to the PDB Situation Report. Joining me once again is Jonathan Schanzer from the Foundation for the Defense of Democracy. He's the Executive Director, by the way. You know that if you had his business card. Jonathan, thank you very much for sticking around. I left you with two rather large questions. I'll let you decide which you want to tackle first. Sure. First, let's talk about Hamas's mouthpieces. Let me just say that there should be no surprise to anybody that the narrative

right now has shifted towards more support for Hamas, more criticism for Israel. Here's a couple reasons for it. I mean, one is, you know, look at the people that are out there that are setting the tone for this discussion. I mean, it's the Gaza Ministry of Health, which is a Hamas-run entity. obviously a propaganda organ. It doesn't mean that everything they say is false, but everything they say is tinged with Hamas ideology, which means it's always going to be negative toward Israel, and they're going to amplify and they're going to blow things out of proportion. That's one. You get the UN, obviously, not exactly big fans of Israel. And then on top of that, you've got like the BBC and CNN, and a lot of these mainstream outlets have shifted hard left, hard, hard,

left, to the point that they're just overtly cheering for Hamas, a lot of this has to do with, in my view, it comes down to the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. This is that private entity set up by the United States and Israel to disseminate aid in the Gaza Strip. You got to understand the very existence of this thing threatens, it's an existential threat to Hamas and to the U.N. In other words, these are the two entities that maintained absolutely. control, a full monopoly on the administration of the Gaza Strip, when Israel and the United States and others came in and said, here's this new private sector entity, it's going to supplant the UN and it's going to disseminate the aid. That was the moment that all of this,

everyone's hair was on fire, all of Israel's enemies, and the messaging started to come out. Now, I'm not going to tell you that everything that they've said is false about the aid situation. I'm sure that Gaza is not a picnic. I mean, we all know it, right? There's a lot. a war that's been going on there for 600-something days. Of course, it's not a pleasant place to be. But man, did this all start to tick up? And we really could feel the intensity of this narrative the moment that the UN and Hamas began to realize that GHF was no joke. And so they're trying to delegitimize both Israel and the Ghazi Humanitarian Foundation. And look, they're doing a great job of it, right? The New York Times, right, running pictures that were,

I mean, it looks like it was deliberate misinformation that they just bought hook line and sinker. Huge problem. And you've got these willing, useful idiots for Hamas. And boy, they've just gotten suckered into this. So I think, you know, you just need to continue to call things out without denying that there are basic facts that we can't change. That this is a war zone. And it's going to be a challenge. But don't let them get away with every one of the lies that are being spun here. It's an interesting balance that Israel is going to have to work with, that the U.S. is going to have to work with. And I think we're going to see where things go next. But I think it's important to note that Israel, by flooding the zone with aid in the Gaza Strip, it's taken the right first step.

What happens from there, we don't know. Now, as for your second question, you asked about why would Hamas ever willingly relinquish power? And the answer is it won't. But let me put it this way. if the people of Gaza, right, there's two million people in Gaza right now and they've been suffering because of a war that Hamas launched on October 7th of 23, they know who is responsible for their suffering. If the Israelis come in and say, look, we're giving you all the food that you need, but you're never, ever going to have a normal life again, you're not going to see reconstruction, those apartment buildings, the schools, all the things that you want to return to whatever normal,

was in Gaza. It will not happen until the hostages are gone and until the top leaders of Hamas stepped down. I actually think that that's the moment that the people of Gaza begin to realize that they have more leverage. And again, this is all about perception. It's about flipping the script. We've not seen the Israelis try to put pressure on Hamas in this way. We haven't seen the international community try to put pressure on Hamas in this way. I'm not going to tell you that I got all the answers, but I do, I think we can all say this, that right now what Israel's doing has not been a success. I mean, they've vanquished Hamas. They've defeated them militarily, but look how they're struggling right now with this political environment. They need to figure out

how to get past it. That means coming up with a different strategy, right? Every, as they always say, you know, every strategy sounds great so you made contact with the enemy. It's amazing that the strategy lasted this long and it's worked, but now it's not. So what's Israel's next move, we'll find out. Yeah, yeah, and it is fascinating that you look at the at the statements from France, from UK, from Canada now, and then you also look at the declaration from the Arab League and the EU nations and some others. And it all sounds grand, right, until you kind of get into the details where they're saying, you know, contingent upon Hamas giving up control. And nobody, nobody has a as a way of getting to that point, right? I mean, you know, the Israelis are at this stage where

I think they've isolated the remaining Hamas fighters. The assumption has to be that the hostages are in those areas, right? Which may be accounting for the fact that you don't see a lot of the aggressive military operations right there in those spots in an effort to try to protect the remaining hostages and recover the others. But it's one of the, it's one of the those points where if you take this to its logical conclusion, there's no, there's no solution, right? There's no, there's no, okay, so how then are you going to do this? It's nice that you've made these declarations. It's nice that everybody can pat themselves on the back, but the reality is a lot more difficult. And I think that's what, you know, the U.S. and Israel are trying to say.

The problem is that this narrative that's built and has been very successful and seems to be gaining steam that, you know, that's it. You have to finish now. And so you've got two scenarios. Either the international community continues to grow for this demand that you have a ceasefire, which leaves Khamas in place, or you don't, and you continue to this effort that doesn't seem to have a solution. I like what you're saying about in terms of, you know, but that requires then the people of Gaza to rise up, right, in a way. I mean, I don't want to sound too grand, but it's going to have to come internally to some degree to say that's enough. We've got to get rid of Hamas. Yeah, but I think none of that actually happens until you start to see a steady drumbeat

of declarations coming out of Western capitals, coming out of Washington, saying, look, I'm saying it again every day. The problem is Hamas. The misery that Hamas, I mean, let's just, you know, I mean, look back just briefly to history. Hamas took over the Gaza Strip in a civil war in 2007, been to war with Israel. Now, five different times. Each time it's led to more misery, more destruction, now look at where we are, right? And to have world leaders say that repeatedly, and to remind the world that Hamas is the problem, that begins to change the psychology here. Then you have the Israeli say, no more reconstruction until, you know, Hamas leaves and until the hostages are gone. And people continue to call. Donald Trump calls for the release of the hostages

every day when he gets up in front of the cameras, this is the kind of pressure campaign that we haven't seen. And I don't really understand why, because it's not hard to condemn it, a designated terrorist organization, right? Hamas is seen as a terrorist organization in most of these countries around the world. Why have we not seen a unified voice? It's just, it's remarkable to me, but I do think that psychologically, politically, diplomatically, you can start to change this narrative, but you have to want to. I think this is going to sound strange. It's going to sound harsh. But I'm searching for an answer to your question as to why we haven't seen that to happen. And part of it is, I suspect, that the other side, meaning Israel, has put themselves in a

position where a lot of people just don't find sympathy for them, right? Because of the steady drumbeat of what's happened in Gaza, the level of... of response. I think you can have people who are sympathetic based on the awfulness of 7 October and those attacks and what, you know, Hamas has done. But even with that, the narrative turned remarkably quickly after 7 October back towards, well, but, you know, look, I mean, Hamas, you know, and it was, so I just look, I agree with you. I mean, I think that you need that steady drumbeat. I don't think it's practical. I don't think it's going to happen. from the international community, you know, this denouncing of Hamas in a big way,

I'm amazed that the Arab League came out the way they did, unified in a statement criticizing Hamas. But I don't think you're going to get much more than that. You know, again, I don't have a question there. This is more of a ramble in our conversation. I get it. And I understand the skepticism. But I think, you know, the broader point. here is, I think Israel needs to make some unilateral moves and declarations. I think the U.S.

and the Israelis should be working together on communication here. Again, it doesn't deny that there are challenges in terms of food security in Gaza. I think, you know, Israel and the U.S. are going to have to handle that. And they should. It's the right thing. It's the moral thing to do. But that's not going to solve the problem in Gaza. The food insecurity thing can be solved with more pallets, it can be solved with more trucks coming in, right? I mean, that stuff is, it's fairly simple logistically. And we've already seen some of the photos and the reports that massive amounts of food have been injected into Gaza in response to these reports. You know, they're not messing around here. They're not waiting. But really the big problem is that Amas is

still there. That is, I mean, and it's really not hard for anybody to understand this, even if you're, you know, new to understanding this conflict, you understand that one is a not. non-state actor that is a terrorist organization that murder 1,200 people in one day and kidnapped 254. The other one is a U.S. ally, a democracy that is trying to figure out how to fight an urban war. By the way, we didn't do particularly well out in here in this country when we try to fight those kinds of urban wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Israelis are struggling with it in much the same way. We should have some sympathy for them as they do this. We should try to help get them out of this crisis, change the narrative, but more importantly, change the facts on the ground because nobody wants

this war anymore. And I think that's a lot of what's happening here. To be honest, people are just, right? I'm sorry for interrupting. I want to be mindful of the time. And I had one last question that, you know, we're not going to have enough time for you to give it justice, but hopefully for the next time we get together. Netanyahu, Prime Minister Netanyahu, came out with a proposal just in the past couple of days that he presented to his cabinet. And I wanted to get your take on it in sort of a short period of time we have left, where he talked about a proposal for annexing parts of Gaza. And much like they did with the Golan Heights, East Jerusalem, this idea that they just, you know, okay, we have it militarily. Now let's just by de facto take it over and annexed

these portions, whether it's the buffer zone or other areas. Do you think, from your perspective, do you think that's basically him just playing politics internally and placating the more hard right members of his cabinet? Or do you think that they would actually be serious in considering something like that? Yeah, look, I think it's absolutely, you know, it's signaling to his, to his cabinet, to some of the right-wing politicians in Israel that really want to hold on to the Gaza Strip. They see it. is an inextricable part of Israel for some reason or other. Let me just say as a guy who's been to Gaza, nobody actually wants to be there.

I don't think that, you know, any of these Israelis really are serious about going back. Maybe there's some settlers that would be curious about it, but I get to tell you, Bibi needs to learn the rule of holes. When you're in one, stop digging. So right now, with all of this negative press that's going on about Israel, the last thing that he needs to do is to talk about annexation. What he needs to do is talk about getting enough food into the Gaza Strip and then figuring out out of beat Hamas, then he could talk about the day after. But I saw that as an unforced error

on the part of Netanyahu. Okay, very interesting. Jonathan, thank you very much for all your insight, your expertise. I hope that you'll come back when we call you again. Because, again, being a pessimist and a cynic, I think this problem is going to be raging for a while. Jonathan Chancer, the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, thank you, as always, for stopping by. Well, that's all the time that we have for this week's PDB situation report. God, what a mess, right? I mean, you think about how complex that problem is. Anyway, if you have any questions or comments, please reach out to me at PDB at thefirsttv.com. Look, every month, you know what happens. Our amazing team at the PDB, we even allow the interns at the conference table. Everybody gathers around. We empty out the mail bags from the previous month of all your questions and your comments. We select a, bunch of them, and we smush them into an episode that we call Ask Me Anything. The next one is coming out here, probably in the next 24 hours, so keep an eye out for that. Finally, to listen to the

podcast ad-free, you know, you can do that as well, and it is very simple. Just become a premium member of the President's Daily Brief by visiting pdb premium.com. And one last thing, if you got a moment in your busy day, don't forget to check out and subscribe to our YouTube channel. You can find that on YouTube, of course, at Presidents' Daily. brief. I'm Mike Baker. Until next time, you know the drip. Stay informed. Stay safe. Stay cool.