The Team House - Inside the Israeli Invasion of Lebanon & What Would a Strike on Iran Look Like? | EYES ON PODCAST

Episode Date: October 15, 2024

Support the show on Patreon:⬇️https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouseToday we talk about the Israeli invasion into Lebanon and what an Israeli strike on Iran would look like, what would they target?Find Andy here:https://twitter.com/i/flow/login?redirect_after_login=%2Fandymilburn8https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmilburn2023https://amilburn.substack.com/https://www.amazon.com/When-Tempest-Gathers-Mogadishu-OperationsBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-team-house--5960890/support.

Hey guys, it's Jack. I just wanted to talk to you today about a way that you can help support the podcast if you're not already. To support the channel is to become a Patreon member. So we have Patreon memberships that start at just $5 a month. And when you sign up, you get access to all of our episodes ad free. That's the big bonus for that. I mean, we also do some Patreon bonus episodes for our subscribers. But this is the biggest and best way that you can support the Team House. channel and podcast if you'd like to and we really appreciate that so go it and check us out at patreon.com slash the team house hello everyone and welcome to another episode of eyes on i'm i'm andy milburn i'm jason lyons i'm demetri con tacos damn we almost eliminated the delay that you guys were on it today let's let's let's keep that one well everyone welcome to another episode if we're sounding jovial, it has nothing to do with the news. I think the, my, my, uh, my, uh, my, uh, my co-host was simply congratulating me on surviving, uh, Hurricane Milton. Um, a couple of points about that, D, if I can before we.

Yeah, please. Current affairs, yeah. So, so on a serious note, I, you know, I, having, having sat here through it, and we were about maybe two miles from the eye of storm. I mean, it literally came down the street that that alliance our neighborhood and um you know the death toll being so low is astonishing and um it's very easy i know all of us love to jump on and and and and criticize state and local government attempts at a disaster relief because normally they're not that good but in this case it worked i think you know um the evacuation order speaking as someone who didn't evacuate but i had good reason not to uh it

It really helped. But I think, too, that, I mean, there's no doubt about it, that it was a killer hurricane. That's what I'm saying. So when we look at double-digit deaths, yes, that's too many or even, you know, triple-digit deaths, it's still, it was still very fortunate. You'd have to see the, just the effect that this hurricane had. I mean, I've been, I've been through many typhoons. I've been through super typhoon rose when I was on a ship as a civilian.

So no stranger to storms. But this was, yeah, this was pretty frightening. And there were a couple of nemesis in our neighborhood trees coming down and all that. Power lines with a big deal. But again, low lack of relatively low death rate. And, you know, in the three biggest hazards, yes, wind surge. But the third one was Florida man. And that's always something that you have to bear into account here.

You know, all the rushes at the gas stations, the brawl, you know, Wawa, just up around the corner here, the front of Wawa is almost decimated, which is it's kind of a local tragedy here because a lot of people hang out there. But then there's this massive fight in the forequarter, the gas station, over gas. And I'm driving back from Tallahasse. the other day with my son. And yeah, all the gas stations are out. And it's like three in the morning.

We waited for two hours in line. And, you know, having made that comment about Florida, man, yes, there was some, there was some, definitely some free radicals out there just making it worse. But for the most part, everyone behaved very well and courteously. And so, you know, that really, that really kind of helped too. But, yeah, we emerged relatively unscathed. My ex's house was very nearly hit by this massive falling tree.

And, you know, she slept through at all, but it must have sounded like an artillery round. I mean, she had, I mean, she had her ears blocked up and everything. And when I saw it the next morning, I'm like, God damn. I mean, just a few meters and it would have crashed through, I mean, and hit part of her bedroom. So we are unscathed, but we're very humbled and realize that how much luck played on us on the side. I'm glad you and everybody close to you is good and obviously are, I know it's cliche these days to say thoughts and prayers are going out to everybody who was affected. You know, here, there and through the first storm, you know, and obviously whatever we can do, we will absolutely do. Yeah, it's an assurance nightmare.

You know, I mean, we pay a fortune for Hurricane Insurance in Florida anyway. It's through the fucking roof. And, I mean, I've got a massive deductible on both houses because that's the only way to bring, to bring insurance down. So a lot of people, my point is, sadly, a lot of people are facing economic ruin from this. They're finding out that they're not insured. For instance, for flooding, you know, Hurricane Insurance does not cover flooding. and if you're in a flood zone, it's pretty much impossible to get insurance for flooding. And of course, that's what's causing most of the damage.

So, yeah, I don't want to pretend that this was a non-event. It was a massive. And it's a tragedy for many, many people. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah, I mean, last, the first one that hit hit my aunt's house pretty hard. it was like totally flooded like knee deep water in the house and stuff like that um i think they did okay on this next one like you know they missed they missed they missed

it they didn't really get hit that bad but uh the storm surge really fucked them up yeah your arts up in top and springs which is right on the coast you know that's in the uh see i know we're family d i know that's like a greek enclave man it is yeah last bastion of humanity Well, there's all kinds of go to phelia behavior. No comment. Oh, man. So from the hurricane here to the hurricane in the Middle East. And, you know, just a quick update to begin.

And then there's a couple of points I think that I think of particular interest. So from an Israeli perspective, the ground operation in southern Lebanon has, so far going gone according to plan okay from the Israeli perspective I'm going to tell you what what the plan was very quickly and what they're doing so um they moved um the Israelis actually moved uh two divisions to be yeah and it's difficult to quantify divisions in the Israeli army because they are very much um uh what's what's the term that we used uh you know where you move parts around from one one unit to another it's a very common term anyway the point is that they're not typically standing divisions that have the same units all the time.

You know, you could have a division headquarters with different brigades and they get shifted around all the time. So we like talking about divisions because we have things like, you know, the first Marine Division or 82nd Airborne and those always have the same brigades and same soldiers. That's not the case. But two divisions, at least up there on the border. But interestingly enough, the guys who crossed were all special operations. Initially, the guys involved in the fighting. And this is a trend that has continued throughout the war. And as I write my book, one thing I'm discovering is that, and this is universal.

You know, people can, people certainly can bring me to task for this, but I can produce many, much evidence to bear this out. But here's the bottom line. The Israelis don't have a lot of confidence in their conventional forces for these types of operations. Why? Because over the last two decades, in fact, three decades, focus on training and equipping of conventional forces. And particularly the reserves has atrophied in preference for a very clear focus on aviation, aviation strike, you know, long-range precision strike, technological.

both means, what technological means for intelligence acquisition and strikes, all the high-tech stuff. And then as far as manpower, all the focus has gone on special operations. And when I say special operations, the Israelis have a number of units that they call special operations. One interesting thing that they've done for this conflict is that they've taken the three the three prominent SF battalions, Maglan. I, Gars, and I'll remember the third one, not Sheldag.

I'll remember the third one at the moment, but it's three battalions, and they put them in this conventional brigade called the Commando Brigade with a Commander. Well, what happens then is, of course, they get used as very highly trained conventional infantry. When you look at what's been happening in Gaza, here is the pattern from the initial attack onwards, initial attack on in October, onto now. all right massive bombardment as we've seen okay um they're taking no chances that's kind of their their you know their policy whatever they may say that's you know that's that's it they are very surprisingly i don't want to use the term casualty averse but they are very very concerned about

their own casualties and they and and so what happens then after that massive bombardment is that special operations forces will go in typically the commander or brigade but they'll also they've also started to take not so much SF, but the high end of platoon units from conventional brigades, such as, you know, the reconnaissance units. And they will go in, they will seize their foothole in the area that's just had the shit kicked out of it, all right? These are, you know, what we used to call going firm, right? They will go in, they will seize, you know, they'll move into buildings, they'll seize them. They build around these buildings, what are called a McNarn. McNarns. They're like, they're strong points, all right, but they're out in the,

they're strong points outside buildings, those are used as assembly points and logistics nodes. So this, this is SF doing all of this, and they have engineers, Yaha Halam, who are special forces engineers and who help them with all of this, right? because then they are, as they clear the buildings, they're clearing, but they're also clearing them obviously of the explosives at the same time. And since after the initial phases of the battle, after the initial fight for northern Gaza, every attack has taken into account the tunnels. And so that is why the engineers are all important. Now, when they've, you know, they've moved in, they may have identified a few, the tunnel, what they call the tunnel frameworks. They isolate those and they will go through a process to before they send people down there.

When they send people down the tunnels, those guys are all, you know, they're all engineers or SF guys. They're not sending conventionals down the tunnel. And remember, conventional forces haven't even come in yet. They are waiting in an assembly area. When everything is relatively calm, then they bring them in. And then those guys are the ones who do the clearing. It's not without risk.

Of course it isn't. But what I'm saying, it's not like Fallujah, where we poured infantry in for the initial. I mean, it was all infantry. I didn't see a single SF guy, you know. I mean, nothing. It was all us, you know, kicking down doors going in and clearing. That's not the Israeli way. They, you know, when an infantry guy goes in, a lot of people have gone in that room.

So, you know, people have gone in that room before. The Israelis are using very, very skillful use of drones inside to clear rooms. They'll send drones in. They send dogs in. They have probably arguably one of the most capable dog units in the world. In fact, we and Marine Special Operations used to send our guys to the Israelis to get trained to train our military working dogs right at the beginning. Okay. So you see what I'm saying.

I'm not simply saying, oh, they're shitty soldiers. No, I'm saying that there's been a very, I'm not saying that at all. I'm saying there's been a very clear emphasis on certain types of military. capability, but naturally the others suffer. So you take the average conventional soldier, right, he comes in at 1819 and he does three years, right, in his brigade. And then after that, he gets out, he or she gets out, and then they're in the reserves. But when you talk to the training that they, about them, to the training they've received, conventional units have done very little in the last two years, with the exception of one massive exercise and cyber

in 2023 involving the 98th division. But for the most part, you can come across a brigade commander, especially in the reserves, who has never commanded a brigade. He's never actually commanded a brigade in operations, not even an exercise, right? So everything from the level of training of the individual soldier to the commanders, the Israelis realize that, you know,

it's a very risky enterprise if they're going to commit conventional forces first And so to Lebanon, that is something that has concerned them from the start, right? Because they don't want a repeat of the 1980s where, you know, half the Israeli army, you know, two-thirds of the IDF at any given time was squatting in Lebanon and dealing with all the shit that occupation involves a messy counterinsurgency. This time they've gone in with, especially with the EGAS. The EGAS is a, it's a unit, a battalion that basically are trained, they've focused on Lebanon, but they, you know, they are trained to blend in with locals. So they have an

intelligence acquisition part of this too, as well as a strike capability. And when you look at the casualties, most of them have been from the August, with the exception of the casualties, for instance, yesterday, of course, by Lebanese has bothered drones coming across the border. And some of you may have heard yesterday, there was a base, the Golani Brigade base in Benhamina, which is south of Haifa, all right, as significant, was hit by two drones. More, four IDF soldiers killed, but 40 to 60 wounded, all right? And what's interesting is, apparently, I am told, Halivi, the chief of staff happened to be on the Golani base when this strike occurred. So who knows if it was intelligence or it was just pure blind luck, all right? But Hezbollah knew what they were doing in the sense.

When you look at the drone infiltration route, they came in from what's the directions. But they both came through gaps in the Israeli ADA system. And one came in over the Mediterranean, which is quite interesting. So my point is this, that, you know, is the Israelis expand that foothold, their lodgment in Lebanon, they're doing what they need to do. their pattern, what they, you know, what their objectives are, the pattern is that they'll move in. They'll seize one of these, they call them reservations. It's essentially a village with, you know, tunnel networks and Hezbollah fortifications built by the Radwan force, which is their assault

force. And the Israelis are saying, all these villages along the front line there in Lebanon, And the plan was to use them as stepping up points, stepping off points for a ground assault. And that a lot of preparation went into this. And so their argument is that we prevented a ground assault into Israel that would have been like 7 October. They're going through, they're clearing these villages, which includes a lot of tunnel work, blowing shit up. And then they'll move on to the next village. And then they'll bring conventional forces in to kind of sit on that, you know, to hold, right? This is within a few kilometers of the border.

and they've even started to take journalists in across the border. So they're confident enough that they are safe there in those areas. Ironically, the areas that are not safe are still back in Israel, where you've got dozens of rockets every day still been fired. And this is going to be a problem that faces the Israelis indefinitely, right? You know, I mean, how do you, you guys all know how easy it is to set up a rocket and shoot it. And as Bala has a lot of practice in this and they had a shitload of rockets. There's no doubt about it that the Israelis have removed the, you know, they have perhaps not neutralized, but they have decimated Hezbollah to the extent that yet, no, it cannot conduct a coordinated operation. But that's not what it needs to do. All it needs to do is so doubt and fear in the Israeli population by continuing to strike these areas. So you kind of see the dilemma that's going to be facing the Israeli.

yes, undoubtedly what they're doing is effective. And I will take a side seat for a moment and make a partisan comment from the U.S. point that, yes, the United States government is delighted to see Hezbollah dismantled. You know, from, I mean, Hezbollah has been, aside from a thorn on the side of or the biggest obstacle to, arguably, to regional peace aside from Iran itself, Hezbollah has stiff-armed Lebanon and prevented it from having a government for the last 20 years. and affected government from the destruction of Herrera, I mean, assassination of Prime Minister Herrera back in whenever it was 2005, to most recently blocking, you know, the investigations

of the 2020 explosion. His Bola is a cancer, and it is being eviscerated from Lebanese poly. The U.S. government's happy to see that. But you'll see, you know, what I'm talking about, you'll see that at some point Israel will have to pull back into Israel. And the real question is what happens then. will uniform be strong enough in conjunction with the Lebanese government to enforce UN resolution 1701, which forbids armed militias, read Hezbollah, south of the Latani River?

Will they even be able to enforce what the Israelis right now are asking them to enforce, which is a 10-kilometer buffer zone? We don't know, but the U.S. is going to play, you know, a huge role in that. It's, and, you know, the other part of this is the Lebanese government willing to to do this. Who leads to Lebanese government? No one right now because Hezbollah has blocked bringing in a president for the last two years. So you see how destruction of Hezbollah actually and everything that's going on, I'm just stating an argument. Well, we'll arguably help Lebanon in the long run if Lebanon, the international community, international community, especially in the United States,

I'm willing to step in and they do the things that need to be done. Okay, that's me talking way too much, guys, what would have? No, that was awesome. That was awesome. So, pulling out a little bit wider in the Middle East, I think we discussed this before we started taping, I was asked to pass on a question to you based on, in their words, your expertise in the area. Will Israel ever go after the Ayatollah once and for all? And if either way, whether they do or don't, do you know if there is a successor in place that's been groomed to take over? Jason, yeah, that's a great comment.

Great question. And I'm embarrassed, but I'm also grateful to be called an expert. It's very rare that happens. I'm not. He's the deal, I think, when it comes to asking, would the Israelis do X? I would say that nothing really is off the table when it comes to them aligning what they're about to do with the continued with the defense of Israel. So that is the ultimately, that's the ultimate for them, you know, beyond questions of

international morality, beyond questions even of U.S. support, it comes down to that, you know, for them, that fundamental question, is this, if we don't do this, does that, does that make things, I'm trying to word this right. If we don't do this, does that pose a significant threat to the defense of Israel? And if the answer is yes, then they're going to do it. Okay, I'll give an example. I mean, if you have to, if you read, um, um, uh, rise and kill first, right? Do you remember the discussion in there about killing Arafat. You know, Ariel Sharon in the early part of the 20th, I think it was in the 90s, early part of the 20th, he was so obsessed with killing Sharon that he even hatched the plan

to do it by shooting down a civilian airliner while Arafat was riding on it. I mean, can you imagine that? Okay. Now, fortunately, he was kind of blocked by people slow rolling him within Mossad and the Air Force, too. I mean, they had this plan. They were going to launch F-16s to shoot down an airbus or rather F-15. So, I mean, it's pleasing. So if I was, if we were going to, if someone had called in and said,

Hey, Andy, do you think that the Israelis would shoot down a civilian airliner to go after one guy? You know, of course, I would have said, no. That's insane. But there it is. You know, I mean, that's a great book, by the way, I do recognize it. Yes. That's an awesome. But the other, you know, so what does Israel do in the counter strike?

You know, there's three options, all right? And it may be a combination of all three. And the U.S. is trying to weigh in here too. Okay, one is to go after Iran. No, no, let's start with the most, probably the most benign, okay, sanctions. No, it's not going to be sanctions. This is going to be a kinetic strike. All right.

So the choices for a kinetic strike are military facilities. especially those with ADA and missile launching abilities. What Israel would really like to do is to remove any Iran's pretense to having integrated air defense, right? Because that sets the stage with the future. Yes, the Russians will replace it, but it's going to take a little bit of time. And if Israelis can continue to trick Russian air defense systems, it enables, and that allows them to pose a great,

threat, right, implicitly to Russian's nuclear, I mean, Russia, Iran's nuclear, nuclear ambitions, right? And secondly, economic strikes, okay, on gas oil facilities. They could be, you know, very obvious, very obvious targets are the Iranian gas oil rigs in the Gulf, right? but there are, you know, there are those Iran's oil reserves within Iran itself. Undoubtedly, the Israelis could go after those. I don't think they're concerned too much about economic shock to, you know, the global system. How much of the shock that would be varies according to experts.

You know, it depends how much is being held. Oil is being held in reserve by OPEC, et cetera, et cetera. But undoubtedly, that would cause oil prices to spike, which would have a shitty effect on the global economy and the U.S. does not want that to happen and it's trying to dissuade Iran from doing that. But the question is, what does Iran do instead? Now, I guarantee you, I don't know, but I guarantee you that there is a segment within the Iranian government right now, Israeli government right now, who are saying, hey, this is our chance to go after nuclear facilities, the, the tants that the, the centrifuges that are deeply buried and that the global atomic energy community believes

are the ones that are going to be enriching you, you know, military grade or weapons grade uranium or already beginning to do that. And we've talked about how far away Iran is from breakout and estimates vary there, from two years to six months. Okay. So that is a significant threat. undoubtedly the Israelis are saying, hey, we have now an open hand to go after Iran's nuclear facilities because we've been hit. The world expects retaliation. U.S. supports us. The question is, right, can Israel do that by itself? And it used to be, and I believe still is, that they would need support from us in certain areas. Okay. Undoubtedly, they're going to want U.S. I believe they need U.S. support, but undoubtedly they're going to want U.S. support.

And that is the question whether, you know, which are those? Why the delay? Well, first of all, I believe Netanyahu didn't want to ruin Russian Ikra, which is in the Jewish holiday of a tournament, which is taking place right now. But the second reason is the desire to coordinate actions in advance with the Biden administration. Okay. I do believe that's true. I mean, you know, whatever Netanyahu believes, I know.

that that is the advice he's been given. You know, the our president, national security and national security advisor, Jake Sullivan of Afghanistan fame. And, you know, and other officials are sending seemingly, you know, contradictory messages to Israel, though, in the last few days. And that is potentially a problem. You know, a few of them have said, some of these comments have said that Iran's actions would have serious consequences, right? is, right? You know, we're saying that as though we are part of the retribution and we've already started to impose sanctions. But the suggestion to the international community when we say that is that we might,

the United States might even join the expected Israeli attack. I'm not going to make a comment on whether that's a good idea or not. I'm just saying if that is the case, we need to be crystal clear as Trump Cruz says and a few good men, crystal clear. So, Andy, do you think the, I read about the recent deployment of the THAA air defense systems to Israel, do you think that's a signal of that, of the U.S. is quote unquote all in? Or is that just a, hey, we're just doing our part to support? No, Jason, I think that's just, you know, doing our part to support. I mean, we have, I'm pausing here because I, I, I, Yeah, I don't want to go into the realm of classified, but from memory classified, you know, not actually, you know, I don't, I don't even get near that. But I, yes, this is part of a, this is part of a pre-agreement, okay, to, to, I mean, we, the United States has always been committed to defense of Israel. Thad, deploying Thad is a very high profile, very visible and effective way to show that, that we are serious about doing exactly. that but it's not

I don't think it's an implicit yes you know green light to anything okay so it's kind of like the deployment of the carrier group it's just like yeah yeah yeah but but it is you know it is interesting

that and I understand why that the US also doesn't seem to be pressing Israel to hurry up and then the war in Lebanon anymore you know before Nazraal as killing last month, but the administration had been trying to force

the sides into an immediate ceasefire, remember, but it seems to have concluded that that's just going to be impractical. It's just not going to be able to do that. But I think also, you know, it sees an opportunity to shake up Lebanon's political system, as I mentioned, in a positive

way, in a way that would reduce the decisive influence as Bala acquired over the past decade, thanks to its military wing, and especially, you know, it's Radawe and force. which is kind of a, you know, it's used the term elite, but it's their specially trained assault units. And by the way, Israel just killed the head of the Rydwan's force anti-tank unit,

who was somewhat of a hero from 2006 for knocking out, you know, Israeli armoured vehicles. So, yeah, I mean, as well as, I, I, I paused before saying, using terms like honest, its knees, but of course it's been, its ability to, as I said, conduct offensive operations has been, I would say, on a, on a coordinated scale has been eliminated. But all you need is a couple of drones, a few rockets and a handful of dudes, right? And, you know, hot, cold positions, blah, blah, blah. They've got these set up all over Lebanon. And the problem is, too, you know, I mean, despite all these air strikes, which had been very effective, the purpose of these air strikes has been going after command and control notes, all right? Like, like, for instance, you know, the bunker, as well as bunker, which the Israelis have located way back in October.

But the second piece is they're going after these longer range missile systems that can range in Israel from beyond, even, you know, from way beyond the Vatani even from northern Lebanon now. And that is, that's another challenge for them to, because as you know, using kinetic strikes alone is unlikely to, to eliminate that threat. You know, there may be a plan at some stage to put in soft guys into certain areas on the ground if they haven't already done so in northern Lebanon to ensure destruction of Lebanon's longer range capabilities. I got a question going back to Iran. Can Israel actually destroy their nuclear facilities that are on the ground with the centrifuges that are like the primo ones yeah it's a really good question um the the um I'm pausing because you know the

the bombs that were used against Nasrallah um were the bombs that we would have expected to you know that type they um to to to use against uh the GBUs facilities yeah they um what's it GbU 28. I don't know the exact moment. Yeah, I think it's GbU 28. Anyway, it's a, you know, it's got a, it's more than a delay. I mean, it's a ground penetrating. I'm using the wrong terms and people are going to call in.

But anyway, it goes deep before exploding, right? It does have a massive delayed fuse and it is a massive explosion. They use the, they use several dose, right? After Nasrallah, they've got plenty. But I don't know. I don't know is the answer. I, you know, if you read about, read up on this among the atomic nuts, and in fact, you've had, you might want to get, D, one of your, one of your most, one of your favorite guests, actually, as you know, was part of the atomic energy watchdog commission.

Shut up. So you can bring them on. But, you know, my point is when you talk to these people, you don't always get a consistent answer. So I, so I think the answer is no one knows. They know that, you know, these undoubtedly the Iranians now have a good understanding of Israeli capabilities. And they don't want their nuclear facilities to be within range of those capabilities. So who knows what they've done, how deep those centrifuges are now. Someone does.

I mean, I'm sure the U.S. intelligence does. And they're doing weaponeering on this and trying to end it and trying to decide that. But that's, yeah, that's a big question. Yeah. This would be a good question for Alex. Alex. calling you out. Alex Hollings, of course, of airpower, sandbox news.

Yeah. Is he going back? Yeah, we could get him to come back. Absolutely. Well, shame. You know what? While all this is going on, so we talked about Iran, we talked about what's going on in Lebanon. Kind of interesting, the Israeli government has the IDF going back in for offensive operations in Gaza, too, right?

So, you know, but talking to guys who are involved in this operation, the goals are not immediately clear. So the operations in northern Gaza, I'm being told were ordered without a lot of in-depth discussion, right? You know, normally in the IDF, one of the strengths of the IDF is that there is, you know, they encourage, not argument, but, you know, open discussion on things. They are much better in that sense than we are in the U.S. military. We may talk about mission command, but we ignore it totally. The Israelis make an effort, okay? And normally they'll argue back if they think something doesn't make sense. Well, they don't understand the intent, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Well, apparently I'm told, yeah, there was a lot of, hey, why are we doing this, but not a lot of answers. So there is, I read an article, okay, I'm going to preface this in the, in Heretz, which is one of the Israeli newspapers. In fairness, you know, considered kind of a more, some would say liberal, some would say left wing, I mean, centrist, left of center paper. But in Heretz, it says it's possible that the operation is laying the groundwork for a decision by the government to put in effect what they call surrender, or starve plan, right? And that which would call for all residents of northern Gaza to be evacuated to humanitarian zones in the south with those choosing to remain deemed Hamas operatives

and legitimate military targets. While Gazans in the South are getting humanitarian assistance, those who remain in the north will face, you know, death or hunger, right? I mean, it's, all right. Now, the Israeli government, when the Heretz came out with this, were quick to see.

say no, no, no, we would never do that because it violates international law and we would lose the support of the United States, blah, blah, blah. And it would absolutely undermine the legitimacy of Israel's entire Gaza defense. Well, it's actually the IDF who's arguing that, why that would not be a good idea. It's very interesting. And I'm not saying that is the plan. I'm just saying that's the debate going on. So, What has happened, there's a wide-ranging operation taking place in northern Gaza. You've probably been reading about this since the collapse of the latest hostage talks with the aim of pressuring Hamas to return to the negotiating table. Yaya Sinwa, still unlocated, still alive and out there.

He's probably figuring at this stage, I'm sure he's facted in. He's going to die sooner or later. He's got nothing to gain at this stage by any negotiation. So now the other thing, I mean, you're reading again about the Juba refugee camp and casualties there, the 162nd division in Gaza was ordered to attack, to launch an attack on that area. But again, the intelligence, I'm being told, not that clear. you know it's and when you talk to israeli intelligence guys i'm talking about military intelligence guys you know i'm not not you know not pretending that been roads with shun bet um but um

no i'm sorry they they they they estimate that uh they you know there's probably some four thousand fighters um four thousand gars and galsans who known as hamas fighters uh just in the north alone with an even greater number in the south um Even though Hamas's rafa brigade has been degraded and has ceased operating as an organized army, many of the fighters just left the combat zone before the IDF entered, apparently, you know, according to the IDF guys on the ground. And other Hamas fighters are operating from the camps in Central Gaza Strip where the IDF hasn't been active. But here's the really concerning part of this.

Hamas dominates all civilian activity in the... the enclave in Gaza Strip still. You know, the defense establishment, the IDF is trying to urge the government to agree to some form of international governance for Gaza, but those appeals have been turned down. So, you know, Hamas even has a police force called the Arrow Force, right, that number several hundred people. And its main task is just to crack down on anyone opposed to Hamas' rule. So, you know, obviously Sima's goal.

greatest concern is that the difficult humanitarian conditions in Gaza will cause the residents to revolt against Hamas. And there's already been evidence of local groups, unaffiliated with Hamas, like family groups, trying to, you know, trying to take control their neighborhoods and keep Hamas operatives out. So there's kind of an internal struggle going on that. So, you know, the idea of saying, hey, look, putting an end to Hamas rule in Gaza is, much more complex challenge than the war itself. And although it's been hit hard militarily, it is still the only civilian authority in Gaza. And that's concerning.

And if anything, the civilian populations become even more dependent on the organization because it distributes humanitarian aid. It's also one of the remaining sources of paid work. So many are joining it, even if they don't respect its aims or ideology. wouldn't that same thing the same issue in in uh lebanon if uh hesbola is um fractured i mean because kind of don't they kind of serve as the de facto glue that holds the society together for now so yeah you know if they're kind of beaten up and um not altogether taken out but um weaken to the point where they can't won't they have that vacuum that uh you know you'll see others

move in to try to fill? Yeah, I think it'll take it a time because, you know, they've got to replenish their stocks and they've lost a shitload of experience. That's really the part here about leadership. I know we talked about, you know, cutting off the head of the stake and all of that. But what even Brian Price, I think, would, I mean, not even, but Brian, Brian would agree was that this is kind of, this wasn't cutting off the head of the stake. This was removing, you know, a complete echelon of experience from the, as well,

this lineup. But to your point, yeah, the seeds for its regrowth are buried in the rubble, right? I mean, you guys, this is what I don't understand about our failure to mirror image. We mirror image all the time, but we don't mirror image in one key area, and that is the intangible effect of nurturing a futer insurgency, all right? When you decimate an area or population, you cause a large number of civilian casualties, and remaining neutralness that applies to anyone. You don't walk away from there and everything's good and things get built up because deep within the human soul is this raging anger and it's going to come back. All right. Now all these, you know, nuts who are like, yeah, fucking annihilate them, kill them. Yeah. But they can't mirror image. They

can't imagine. What would happen, dude? If you were the only one left in your family, you're watching your kids dead in the street, your wife, her stomach whipped open. Are you going to roll over and say, in the years to come, hey, that happened. No, man, you, me, D, anyone. You're going to commit your life to getting revenge. Absolutely. Okay. I mean, that's human nature. And because we're trained the way we do, we're going to, I mean, that's, you know, sadly,

that's, that's going to drive everything we do. So my point is, yeah, it may be a few years, but there's a lot of, this is going to come back. It's, Hasbola has not gone away. Oh, D, I'm sorry. No, that was incredible. No. Real bummer, but are we done? Yeah, all good news.

Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I think, yeah, I don't want to predict what's going to happen, guys. I really don't because there are so many. there are so many free radicals. We don't even know what the U.S. government stance is, and we've got an election coming up.

Yeah, that's what I'm curious to see, morbidly curious, what is going to happen after this election as far as all this is concerned. Yeah. Yeah, that's a cool one. My guess, I mean, I could, you want me to speculate? I could speculate. Yes, you are, are, you are,

I'm a conspiracy. Yeah. I think it's going to be kind of more the same, even if Kamala is elected, it'll just be more publicly facing like Israel needs to kind of calm down, but we'll still send them billions and billions of dollars of aid and military equipment. And I think it'll probably be more overt if Trump is elected that, you know, we're going to fucking destroy. Like just the PR is going to go out the window. But I think it's going to be pretty much the same either or.

It's certainly, you know, it's an unknown, right? And that's adding to all of this, all of this chaos. But anyway, it's going to be very interesting to see. And stay tuned. Folks, as they say, we will keep you updated. Guys, that's it for today, man. That was great. Do me a favor.

I need everybody to do me a favor. You see that book over Andy's right shoulder? It's when the tempest gathers. It's his memoir. It's incredible. the link is in the description buy it enjoy it uh what else jason's coming out with a book soon about erotic stories i'm very excited about that hell yeah it's his memoir right yeah behind the uh brown door uh all the links will be in the description not for jason's book it's not out yet he's

still writing it um andy's book andy's substack andy's twitter andy's lington everything also the most important thing for the channel in general is patreon.com slash the team house. I know it's annoying. I put it in the beginning. I say it at the end. YouTube literally is down 80% over 80%. It's crazy because our views aren't like that aren't as bad. Like it's not down 80%.

We need you to join. If you want to help support the show and keep both of these shows going, Patreon.com slash the team house. The link is in the description. Oh, and real quick, prayers, please from my boy, Percy, my dog. He got his ass handed to him by Rottweiler this weekend. Oh, no. Yeah, he, I was sitting in the kitchen and I saw this flash go by the window. I'm like, what the hell is that?

So I go outside and I look and I don't see him in the yard. And then I hear somebody yelling out in the street. And I jump over the fence, run out there. And there's this guy just laying on top of Percy, like screaming, you know, you're okay. you're okay and this massive rotweiler just sitting there as if he's like in a dog show and there's just blood all over i'm like oh my god and so apparently he heard the rotweiler and another dog barking at each other and was like oh i want to get in on this and went right after the rotweiler so uh tore his um paw open his front front right paw open it was like at an angle uh his back paw

ripped the pat off the back paw um bite marks all over so he's all bandaged up laying on the oh no yeah my man and and the thing is though he was completely calm through the whole thing like he they did a little surgery monitoring surgery on him and stuff and stapled him up and he just sat there he's like sorry dad just looking at me oh man something something about something about her dogs man you know i don't mean to sound hard hard hard hard but i mean i find it easier to see people in pain than animals. Maybe it's because they are. Because they can't communicate, really.

They can't tell you, you know. Maybe it's because I prefer dogs to people. Yeah. Yeah. So he's all drugged up laying on the couch, you know. But I had actually, and he's like 80, almost 90 pounds. And I had to carry him up and down the stairs outside to go pee. You know, so I'm like, hopefully someone.

That's where you do those workouts, Jason. Yeah, exactly. So, but somebody going to do it for me. This is for my kids. Y'all are doing this for me when I'm 90 years old and can't walk. So. Y'all blessing. Yeah.

So thanks, everybody. Yeah, thoughts for Percy. Percy, good dog. Check out of the show with you guys and the team house. Percy makes a cameo. Yeah. So, all right. Thanks, everybody.

Thanks, guys. Bye, guys.