The Team House - Trumps Middle East Trip | EYES ON GEOPOLITICS

Episode Date: May 16, 2025

Today we’re joined by Marc Polyneropoulos former Senior CIA Officer to talk about Trump’s Middle East trip. Support the show on Patreon:⬇️https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouseNew merch, patches, and stickers! ⬇️https://theteamhouse-shop.fourthwall.comFind Marc Polymer here: ⬇️https://x.com/Mpolymer?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthorhttps://bsky.app/profile/mpolymer1.bsky.socialFind Mick Mulroy here: Fogbow ⬇️https://fogbow.com/Lobo Institute ⬇️https://www.loboinstitute.org/Twitter ⬇️https://x.com/mickmulroy?s=21&t=-Ze3F_Ix2vlJ18KFvORTCALinkedIn ⬇️https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-patrick-mulroy-31198b52/Bluesky ⬇️https://bsky.app/profile/mickmulroy.bsky.socialMick’s publications ⬇️https://www.loboinstitute.org/publications/publications-of-michael-mick-patrick-mulroy/Find Andy Milburn here: Twitter ⬇️https://twitter.com/i/flow/login?redirect_after_login=%2Fandymilburn8LinkedIn ⬇️https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmilburn2023Substack ⬇️https://amilburn.substack.com/Andy’s book ⬇️https://www.amazon.com/When-Tempest-Gathers-Mogadishu-OperationsBluesky ⬇️https://bsky.app/profile/andy-milburn.bsky.socialFind Jason Lyons here: LinkedIn ⬇️https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-lyons-666873316?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=ios_appBluesky ⬇️https://bsky.app/profile/bgsilverback73.bsky.sociBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-team-house--5960890/support.

Hey guys, welcome to another episode of Eyes on Geopolitics, very special one with Mark Polymeropoulos and myself, Dimitia Contacos, all Greeks today. So no outsiders. Mark, of course, former CIA officer, frequent guests of the team has, freaking guests of Aisong Geopolitics, MSNBC correspondent, sorry, I can never get that right.

Mark, what's up, man? How are you? Good to see you again. Good to be here. it's been a wild week in the Middle East, a place where I spent most of my career. And I mean, so many things to talk about from, you know, Iran nuclear talks to the new Air Force One, I guess. Israel being sidelined, Syria back into the world arena. And, you know, if people who know me, I think probably your audience does. some of these moves the U.S. is doing in the Trump administration, I actually support, which I'll probably be stricken down for saying that. But dare you. But ultimately a wild, wild week. And yeah, let's talk about it.

Yeah, all right. So we kicked off. Trump's doing a Middle East visit. He's visited Saudi Arabia. He's going on Qatar. He's in Qatar. He's left Qatar. Now he's in the UAE. Okay. So he's doing like the rounds. Interestingly enough, and people, people, I've seen it in the news a bit, like some ruffle feathers that he's not visiting Israel. And this comes at the heels of the American Israeli hostage that was released last week or this week that was kind of done seems outside of Israel, like just bilaterally with the U.S. and Hamas.

So, you know, I'm sure Israel's kind of bristling at the seams because they have, let's be honest, they don't really outside of the Trump administration or America as a whole. they don't really have many allies in terms of what's going on in Gaza generally. So, yeah, I mean, there's so many places to start. I mean, the thing that just broke right now while Trump's in the Middle East is, I'm going to mess up his name, Barack Ravid from Axios had a scoop about the Jikpoa, the nuclear deal, 2.0 because it's essentially a carbon copy of Obama's back in 2015, 15 or 17, one of those.

So there's been a lot of talk we've had Mick. Mick's been on. He's been talking about it too. Like at some point, the Trump administration was going to have to give up some ground in terms of whether it's enrichment or whatever, you know, whatever the deal points were to get an actual deal. And I'm sure it's not sitting great with Israel. Right. So this thing is so interesting because we have to remember, you know, Republican foreign policy orthodoxy was that the JCPOA, Obama. Obama's agreement with Iran. That was, you know, the worst deal in U.S. diplomatic history.

Republicans on the Hill, both the House and the Senate, every Republican presidential candidate, and of course, even President Trump railed against the deal, and Trump then pulled us out of it. So now it comes under the new, you know, the Trump 2.0, the Trump administration, where the last several months, they've been a lot of tough talk about potential strikes on the Iranian nuclear facilities, we moved, what, a third of our B-2 fleet, F-35 squadrons. There's two carrier battle groups in the Red Sea, there were. And so it looked like we were gearing up for a strike. And the Israelis, of course, believe this is something seriously to consider

because, you know, Iran has been so weakened. The Iranian air defenses, I think their S-400 systems, were disabled, were greatly degraded from previous Israeli strikes. And, of course, Hezbollah, which is the Iranian proxy, which in essence was an aircraft carrier sitting on Israeli's border, on Israel's border, that has been degraded as well. So the time was right to take a shot at the Iranian nuclear program, which is an existential threat to Israel. But then all of a sudden, we have to remember that Donald Trump during the campaign and the MAGA base

really was very vocal about no more Middle East wars, no more never-ending wars. The Tucker Carlson's and the J.D. Vance's of the world were absolutely opposed. Tulsi Gabbard as well, absolutely opposed to U.S. military action in Iran. Iran. And so Trump now has decided to go forward with the nuclear talks with the with the Iranians to the absolute horror of the Israelis against all kind of the kind of the Iran Hawks in Congress to many of the think tanks in Washington, D.C., kind of the pro-Israel think tanks. And so ultimately, you have this kind of mind-boggling moment in which it looks like, and NBC reported it today as the Wall Street Journal, that we might be getting close to an agreement, which does, Dee, as you said, very much

resemble the original JCPOA. This is causing, you know, my head to explode a little bit. But again, if you think back, forget Trump's rhetoric during the campaign. Just think about the MAGA base and the desire for no more never-ending Middle East commitments and wars. And so we're at a point now where, and this is going to, you know, probably enraged some of the listeners here, our viewers here. And certainly I said it the other day, I think on social media. I don't know if I did it on MSNBC hit, but Trump's kind of following the Biden foreign policy when it comes to Iran. Pretty extraordinary. My friends in Israel and the Israeli intelligence community, their heads are about to explode.

I think, again, some of the pro-Israel folks in Congress are on suicide watch right now. Yeah, I could just imagine what's going on in Lindsay Graham's office. I mean, but you know what? You know, Trump, I think is not only, so again, he's, you know, I think he wants a Nobel Prize. He thinks this is, you know, this is what he calls. craves the most. And it's interesting, he does have the ability to go against many people in his orbit, although not, of course, the MAGA base. And so we'll see. The question will be, will the Republicans rally around. I mean, it's going to be funny. So there's two parts of this,

D. One is the substance of it. Should we actually commit to a strike on the Iranian facilities or do a deal? And we can debate that all day. The other is the hypocrisy on the Republican side, which I find I want to pop, you know, popcorn and crack a beer open because it's such utter bullshit. If any Republican is going to back this diplomatic agreement, because it is a Obama slash Biden policy. In my view, I'm actually one of the Iran Hawks. I can't remember where Mick Mulroy is in this, too. But I think this would be a good time to take a shot at the Iranian nuclear program because I think this is not only an existential threat to Israel, but also the United States as well. you've got to remember that the Iranians have been responsible for the deaths of numerous Americans.

And we're trying to kill former Trump administration officials and Trump himself. Yeah, he's going to sign a deal. So really kind of head spinning stuff going on when it comes to this. And I find it hard sometimes as a commentator to separate that I want to point out the hypocrisy all the time of the Republican on this. Actually, then let's debate the merits of should there be a nuclear deal or not. I was always, I've been a hawk all the time. I think that we should consider a strike. It should be a joint U.S. Israeli strike.

But let me tell you, that's off the table now. So the Israelis just have to consider, are they going to take a crack at it on their own, risk infuriating Trump or just deal with a bad situation like they did under the Obama administration? But pretty amazing change of events. Yeah, I'm going to be honest. I disagree with you in terms of like that smoke Iran.

Because number one, what does it really do? even if we hit him with our big boy bunker busters, like the whatever, the mop 57, the GBU 57. Like they said, like it probably only bring back the program three to six months, right? And Israel kind of needs us because they don't have that.

If they could make it like perfect scenario for me would be like in the deal, there's some kind of language for proxy forces that can be monitored. And like that'll be a step up from the first agreement. I don't know about like what's bombing Iran going to do for us. Well, it's not by, I mean, it's hitting the new. Strikes. I'm sorry. Yeah.

We're not going to war with Iran. It would be kind of very pinpointed strikes. But you raise a good point is there's other parts of what a deal could include, which would be the Iranian support to their proxy forces all the region, Iranian missile production. In what, in the reporting that I've seen, I don't know if that's included again, which is going to make one's kind of head explode. I didn't see it either. Ron Hawk.

I think that ultimately Trump wants a deal enough in which he's going to agree to something, which is going to look very similar to... Right. And he's going to take credit and say it's way better and he didn't. And Democrats are going to have...

So he's going to get some Democratic support for this, too. The irony, of course, is that this is the Democratic Party would have supported a president Kamala Harris, for example, if she had gone down this road. Hey, guys, it's Jack. I just want to talk to you for a moment

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And there is also going to be a link to our new merch shop. So if you guys want to go and get some things, Team House merchandise. We got stickers, and we also have patches. And I should mention, if you sign up for Patreon at $10 a month, we will mail you this patch as well. So we really appreciate that. But they're also for sale on the merch shop. And additionally, they got t-shirts up there, water bottles, tote bag, coffee mugs, all that good stuff. So please go and check them out and support the show. We really appreciate it, guys. Thank you. So it's really, it's really, you think Republicans would?

No, so yeah, right. Impossible. No shot. It would be Armageddon right now. And you have Netanyahu, you know, addressing Congress again, screaming about a nuclear deal. So this really throws everything up in the air. But you also have to think, think about what's happened, for example, now it's turned to Yemen. General Corolla, you know, the head of Central Command laid out about, what, a 10-month plan to severely degrade and perhaps to try to destroy the Houth.

And after a month, Trump got bored because we burned through a billion dollars of ordinance. We lost three F-18s and a whole bunch of MQ9 reapers. And so literally, against, again, it just said, now we're done and declared a ceasefire with the Houthis and leaving everybody hanging out to dry. Other, you know, Israel, again, the Houthis are still shooting stuff off at the Israelis. And we don't even know if this kind of ceasefire between the U.S. and the Houthis also applies to other kind of international. I don't think it does.

I think it's just American assets. And so again, Trump going against kind of advice of certainly the U.S. military and ultimately kind of going back to that mega notion of no more never-ending wars in the region. And what is interesting to see is kind of the foreign policy blob, you know, which I'm kind of a part of here in D.C. You're in New York, so you're a little separate. but you know, you're kind of an adjunct. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

But ultimately, you know, people are, people, you know, so, so as literally sent com on their social media and all, everybody was saying, you know, we, this is a, this is a, this is a campaign against the kind of the homicidal hooty terrorists. Now we just pack up and leave. Okay, we're done. So how do you, I mean, you know, it's hard, it's hard for someone to support these, these policies in which Trump just seemingly on a dime just flips, switches. And then let's also throw in what you mentioned before. Okay, so now the war in Gaza. Well, Trump seems to be getting sick of Bibi, Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister. Somehow someone has gotten to him finally with the notion about the horrific humanitarian conditions there, which is actually a fact. I mean, there's a strange kind of current in Washington that kind of defends the Israeli behavior there, which is indefensible in terms of civilian casualties. I think they've gone way overboard. I've been a friend of Israel my whole career. We're closely with.

them, but the idea of killing 50,000 Palestinians is a bit extreme. And then ultimately, you know, not solving the Gaza issue, well, Trump is now annoyed. You know, we had five American hostages that presumably one has just been, the one living one has been released, but we did it by going behind the Israelis back. The Israelis found out about it from their own intel collection. And so they're furious about that, too. Again, because I think what Trump sees dangling in front of them, you know, the way to describe Trump now is he's doing some right some of the right things for all the wrong reasons.

It's not because of, you know, I think he wants a Nobel Prize. I would agree with you. Again, so some daylight there. And then the final piece is on Syria, on normalization. A country, which I know really well, I live there, I served there. There was a huge argument to be made that we have to re-engage with Syria to drop these sanctions. these were third-party sanctions. So ultimately, the U.S. by doing this, will allow Syria to reintegrate into the kind of

the global financial system with aid reconstruction coming in. Right now, 90% of Syrians live below the poverty line. Damascus has about an hour of electricity every day. And if you want to ensure Syria, if you want to ensure Syria become another state sponsor of terrorism, another safe haven, you do this. You let them become a failed state. So this is obvious. And I think what I read in the National Review.

view the other day, I do read conservative publications, is that the CIA, my old outfit was really pushing for engagement. There was people in the National Security Council, Seb Gorka, who's certainly an extremist, I think, was pushing against this. And Trump overruled his own NSC. And on this trip said, I'm giving a favor to Muhammad bin Salman, the Saudi ruler, sure, we're dropping all sanctions. Again, everyone's head in D.C. exploded. Yeah, yeah. There really wasn't much, like, lead up to it, right? What? And it was also like, oh, yeah, I'm going to meet Al-Shara, too, in Saudi Arabia.

And then he says, you know, Aftana was someone who, you know, I call him Al-Qaeda curious, but he was a member of Hayat Tahir Shamm, you know, certainly an al-Qaeda affiliate, imprisoned by us, released, fought U.S. forces. And Trump, on Air Force One the other day, I said something like, yeah, he was a tough guy, a strong fighter. Like, imagine Joe Biden saying that. No, forget it. But again, I think it's the first.

the right policy. Right. You get it for the wrong reasons, but the right policy. So, you know, and again, that is something the Israelis were not pushing. They were very suspicious. And in fact, there's been incredible Israeli military activity. Yeah, which we haven't really spoken about much. You see a couple blurbs here and there on Twitter and stuff like that, but it's not really reported that that frequently.

So, so again, this, maybe I should have said this in the beginning. My theme on this, this is like a strangely Biden-esque foreign policy, you know, caution in Yemen, re-engaging with Syria, pushing Bibi for a settlement in Gaza, getting a hostage home. By the way, Biden administration throughout there kind of into the wind, the notion of direct dialogue with Hamas and all the Republicans went crazy, so they didn't do it. And then finally, a JCPOA. So all of a sudden, Trump is pursuing policies, which on every single level are against traditional, you know, Republican orthodoxy. But you can also make the argument, it does fall in line with that mega notion of isolationism, you know, getting out of the Middle East.

And in fact, Trump's speech in Saudi Arabia was pretty extraordinary because it was definitely an isolationist. Yeah, well, he was talking shit about our intervention and interventionists. Yeah, I mean, pretty wild. Listen, I kind of understand that a little bit. I'm not saying like, oh, we remove all presence of like special operations and CIA, obviously. Like, we're going to do what we're going to do.

And that's just how it goes. And if people think differently, they're fucking naive, right? Like, that's the business. That's what we do, right? That's what every country really does. So, yeah, but it was pretty hardcore, like, anti-interventionist and, like, foreign wars, which I can kind of get behind. But, like, I think there's a balance to be struck there that I think we can get to,

I hope anyway. I think there's a difference between that rhetoric of that speech and then what he's doing, actually, in the region. Sure. Because you can make an argument that we actually are present. I mean, we were bombing the Houthis for 51, you know, some odd days. But, you know, there is engagement. So, you know, isolationist means non-engagement.

So, but we are engaged. Right. It's just with kind of following the old Democratic playbook. Yeah. So it's, it's fascinating. I think that one of the things, and this is, you know, it's worth discussing. I thought, you know, we were talking about this morning on MSNBC as well as, you know, for those of us who've been big critics of the Trump administration, you know,

you are now faced with some things. things that he's doing that you actually might support. So you've got to kind of put that aside. So what I have to do is call balls and strikes the way I see it. And when he does something that I think is right, I got to say that. Yeah. You have to dissect why he did that. So again, maybe for the wrong reasons he's doing the right things. But some of these policies, I think, are smart. And, you know, in particular on Syria and also on Gaza as well. I mean, the war in Gaza's got to end. It's just, bro, it's like, it's ridiculous. I mean, bro. It's genocide. Let's be real. Like there's elements of BB's government that want to wipe it all out, right? Let's be honest.

It's getting to the point now where, and again, I think President Trump has recognized that, you know, enough already. That humanitarian suffering, there was an article, I think yesterday in the New York Times, quoting four senior Israeli intelligence or military officials talking about pending famine in Gaza. Like, this just can't happen anymore. Yeah. Again, to, I think we're coming to a point where there's going to be a break on Gaza, a full, with Israel on this. And then the Israelis are going to have to decide what to do. Now, to the credit of my Israeli friends, they want this thing to end as well. There is no, you know, because there is no endgame in Gaza. And here's, here, D is that is something that I think that listeners will, will certainly understand. You know, you see President Trump with Muhammad bin Salman and with Ahmed Shada, this new Syrian president. In such an easy kind of next frame, you could also have seen

President Netanyahu there. Prime Minister Netanyahu there because if the Israelis had agreed to any type of day after in Gaza, any type of future Palestinian entity, and it's called a state or not, but something, there's so much push for this normalization agreement between Israel and Saudi Arabia and the Saudis want it and but they need progress in the Palestinian issue. But Netanyahu's intransigence on this and the crazies and the crazies and understanding the right who kind of thwart him from doing anything on the Palestinians. He could have been there. And I think that missed opportunity is now dawning on Israelis.

If you read the Israeli press, which I certainly do, and I have friends again in the Israeli security establishment, they all, they're looking at this and saying, holy shit, we missed out. And I think it's a spectacular opportunity. I'm sure there are sensible Israelis in the national security apparatus and stuff like that. But from my sense, and I have nobody on the inside, it's just from what I read and what I see is that the war cabinet and Netanyahu specifically are extremely belligerent. They don't care about starving 2 million plus people at all. They're using it as a tactic,

which is a fucking war crime, however you slice it. We've been into a couple wars the last 20 years. Did we use starvation as a tactic? Not really. Right, right. I mean, like, I know war is disgusting no matter what,

but like there is some, there are some rules. And like starving 10 year old people, kids, maybe. Maybe not do that. Right. The monstrosity of October 7th. And I think I told you all before, I went a couple of years ago.

You saw the 45-minute thing. I saw the raw footage at the Israeli embassy. I was invited there. And it's heart-wrenching. That said, killing 50,000 Palestinians in return and trying to starve them is not the right answer. And so it is what it is. It's happened now. That sounds horrible.

But it can also end. Right. And now it's time for the war in Gaza. to end and for there to be some type of future Palestinian entity. You know, there's some, the signs that encourage me a little bit, I've been wrong all the time is the Israelis took a shot at Muhammad Sinwar. That's the new kind of the military leader of Hamas. That's the brother of Yaya Sinwar, right? So there's, we're still waiting for the kind of the BDA on this, the bomb damage assessment. You could conceivably see that as kind of the excuse or the reason why

the Israelis say, okay, we can wind this down. And then again, the pressure that Steve Whitkoff, the U.S. envoy, is placing on the Israelis. I think he talked to Netanyahu several times even yesterday. Trump wants this, that wants this thing to wrap up. And again, is it for the right reasons? Maybe not. He wants a Nobel. Sure.

And he wants to see kind of, you know, this, you know, kind of the more a region in which, you know, you can have a lot more, you know, international trade and investment. But again, you know, we might come to the point where the U.S. and it's unique because it's a Republican administration. Right. More closely aligned with the current Israeli government. But pressure from Trump on Netanyahu certainly is more effective than pressure from Biden on that. Yeah, there was no pressure.

Mark, there was no pressure from Biden. Well, there was, but he's hamstrung by the Republican Congress. Mike Johnson then asks Speaker of the House Johnson asks Beebe to come address Congress. So the time the U.S. tried to do anything, the Republicans in Congress howled that we were abandoning Israel. Now that Netanyahu, now that Trump is doing all these things that Biden wanted to do, there's relative silence from the Republicans. So maybe you go down the theory of the notion that, hey, Trump is the one who could actually get this. There's no question, right? He's not going to face the double standard that a Democratic administration would face dealing with the Republicans

and stuff like that. Even with the, and the same thing goes for the Jigpola, right? If he were to sign an exact carbon copy, he's not getting as much shit. Not even close. Not even close. Like probably not even like there might be a quote here and there, but like John Bolton might show up on Fox News, fine. Right. But it's not going to be from inside the party. Republicans are cowards when it comes to Trump. I agree. I agree. I realize, I think this is you know and so, but of course they know better. But this will, because Trump will also see this as his crowning achievement diplomatically, his road to a Nobel and he will, I'm sure that it will be messages sent that you oppose me on this will primary you.

Sure. Yeah, I believe that too. But what all this means, Dee, is that the Middle East is a fucking mess. But it's a radically different place than literally the last time I came on this show. Yeah. It's pretty amazing because, you know, every once in a while something extraordinary happens. And in this case, it's in multiple aren't. It's in Gaza, maybe, definitely in Syria and Yemen 100%, because we took our toys and going home.

and on Iran on steroids. I mean, this is literally today you read the Washington Post in New York Times. It says, Trump says, nearing diplomatic agreement with Iran on nuclear weapons. And if you had put that in front of someone, you know, six months ago, they would have thought you were, you know. No way. Yeah. You were, you know, doing some. The interesting thing about the messaging for the Iran deal, especially initially, was like, it was,

mixed messaging because Rubio had started talking about like enrichment and whether there be able to enrich and not able to enrich. And then the administration came out and said, no, they wouldn't be able to and all that stuff. There was like a lot of mixed messages going on. Which can, I mean, I'm just confused most, I mean, most Americans don't know what the fuck's going on. Let's be real.

Right. Right. Like they don't care. Unfortunately. But it's just like, I don't know. Like, I feel like one side of the administration doesn't know what the other side is Oh, they don't. Right. So, Dee, you bring up an awesome, awesome point. And so this is such an unorthodox place. There's no, in my view, there's no interagency process. So ordinarily what you do is, is the National Security Council would over time conduct a series of meetings, starting at mid-level, then going up to the senior levels, eventually the what's called a deputies committee and then a principals committee. And these are decision points. About changing policy. And you have, and each relevant agency.

has a chance to weigh in. I don't think any of this happens now. No, no shot. I think stuff is done on a napkin in the oval. And, you know, one of the things that I think is, reflects that is that you have different cabinet members, you know, espousing different positions all the time. So, you know, at one point, and I know we're getting into the technical details, but, you know, Rubio or someone would say, well, we need, we need to have full dismantlement of the Iranian program, including their civilian program. And then, the next day someone, Whitkoff, the envoy says, no, no, we're good with low enrichment. Nobody, and then you have the DC think tanks, the pro-Israel think tanks,

howling all the time that they need, you know, full dismantlement. No one really knows. Right. If this is, and I don't know, I don't think Trump really cares, actually. I think he wants a deal. So I think we're going to probably get a deal, which is much closer to the Iranian position, then it would be to the hardcore position of full dismantlement. Sure.

Of the entire program. Like, because that model is Libya. And Moimer, MoMA Gaddafi gave up the Libyan program, the Libyan nuclear program with a deal reach of the United States. And then later on, got deposed and killed. Yeah. So when you say the Libyan model, another country is like, wait a second. I don't want that. Yeah.

That doesn't sound great. But this lack of interagency process, and I know this is kind of our world here geeking out on foreign policy. but that is, I think, really important because there seems to never be a coordinated position. Let me just a little bit. I'll take one quick second to demonstrate this again. And we're not talking Russia, Ukraine today. We don't have time to do that. But right now in Turkey, there's a gathering of U.S. officials, Ukrainian officials, and Russian officials. And there's all sorts of chatter on who would show up. And Putin was invited, but he's not showing up. He is showing up. We don't even know what's going to make come of these talks.

There's threats if these talks don't succeed. They'll be more sanctions. And then Trump in a truth, sorry, in a statement in the UAE today, says, well, nothing's getting done on any of this stuff until I see Putin directly. And everyone's like, where'd that come from? So he just throws everything in a disarray once again. And so, you know, again, that's based on very unorthodox decision making. Now, I will say that that is this craziness, which, you know, foreign.

government's hate, I think we don't like it as well because U.S. is not reliable or predictable. It probably does lead to some of these wild swings in policy like Trump literally talking to the Saudi ruler, Muhammad bin Salman, and says, fuck it, we'll relax sanctions, which the NSC, their staff, their heads blew off. Yeah. So you are able as a king to make these pronouncements when you don't have a process in which, you know, your advisors come to in a kind of a concerted policy making positions. And so I think, you know, I guess the best, why do you think Trump is so happy in the Gulf now? He wants to be the Emir. Yeah. The Crown or the Kim. He loves this. And I just kind of wish there was a little bit of, I just wish there was kind of a little bit of like

strategy. A little bit. Yeah, I know. That's like the crazy thing. It's just like every day it might be. And everyone's supposed to fall in line. Right. Hey, we're doing this, fall in line. And everyone's like what, our whole policy was to, frankly, try to entice behavior change with the Syrians based on a slow process of removing sanctions. Nope, they're done. Just, yeah, which is, that's what I thought to initially. I'm like, wait, they're removing sanctions that have been around for 40 years or whatever. Shouldn't it be like.

All of that. Yeah, shouldn't it be like you said, in increments? I don't know if he should just open the fucking deluge and, you know. Done. Yep. Because he doesn't care. Yeah. Now, I still think it's the right move, but it is kind of funny that there's no process.

Now, you know, what this makes is fun for us to talk about. Sure. There's really serious stuff on this. But if you're either an ally or an adversary, the U.S. is so wildly unpredictable right now. I think, you know, you literally as an intelligence officer from a foreign country cannot make any kind of of analytic judgments because Trump is just so unpredictable and can swing so wildly, maybe based on the last person he talked to. If you're the SDF, are you worried?

Well, yeah, particularly because we have, you know, we, we, we, we, uh, Trump's kind of close relationship with, uh, with, with the, with Turkey. Right. Right. It's rare to one. Um, now I think there are, you know, there are kind of pieces of this, which perhaps are going to be okay. If there can be some kind of rapprochement between the SDF and the Turks. I mean, things are changing in Turkey as well. The PKK leader now decided that the armed struggle is over. But yeah, I mean, so, but I do you, I mean, that's, that's the perfect. That's what would happen on a policy paper. Right, right, right. What happens to the SDF?

Right. You're doing what happens here and there and you kind of maneuver around instead of, but now it's like, okay. And by the way, every ally of ours is saying, what does this mean? Hold on a second. Yep, wait, wait, wait, what just happened? And the prime example, of course, being the Israelis. Sure. Listen, I'm going to be completely honest. I think there needs to be ceasefire yesterday in Gaza. What's going on is a fucking travesty.

And like Israel's, I've said it before, Israel's really good at like targeted assassination and intelligence. That's the route they should have took with dealing with Hamas in Gaza instead of like just wiping out the whole place. Because what would we say? There was 30, 40,000, Gaza. fighters, Hamas fighters in a city of 2.3 million people, right? Like the civilian casualty to a combatant casualty rate is like out of control. It's just, and it's sad, man. Like it's a, it's a real bummer and I have no faith in Netanyahu and his war cabinet.

I think me, Netanyahu wants to keep a perpetual war going because you know he's going to have to face the corruption charges if and when it's over because there was also reports about even if they do deals for for hostages we're still going into Gaza right and so again that that's going to be against the wishes of president Trump so that we're coming the daylight now is is is getting to be so great and there's a lot of Israelis I talk to who are actually very supportive of Trump given you know being tough with Netanyahu because nothing else has worked yeah and so so you know now it's going to be kind of a crunch time you you know, what's going to happen here when.

And, and, you know, Steve Wickoff, the envoy has been very critical of the Israelis. And so, I mean, so, you know, again, it's, I wake up and it's Thursday. And you're like, okay, what's happening today? So he's in the UAE. But then there's, but there's also these meetings going on in Istanbul with Russia, Ukraine. But then you think about, okay, what are the next steps? You know, particularly with Gaza, because, and again, all this is kind of lost and all this noise. Netanyahu said they would actually start their offensive at the end of Trump's trip to the Middle East.

If though, but Trump said, oh, I want a hostage deal and a ceasefire. That's tomorrow. Like here, I mean, maybe not tomorrow because it's a religious holiday. You know, it's Friday in Israel. But we're talking every day you wake up and say this is a significant day. Every day. Yeah, it's nuts. And it's also a little nerve-wracking because every day the administration could change.

changes policy position 1-8. Absolutely. Which is nuts. I'm not saying like... Right. Yeah. Like this... So, you know, accepting this, this, Qutari Air Force 747 is such a cheap but own goal by Trump.

Now, you know, the cutteries never should have offered. They kind of own half the town already. I mean, it's ridiculous. They're dropping a ton of money and like lobbying and stuff? They do. And everything, you know, they're funded universe. And all this is kind of up and up. of it. They funded universities. Think tanks in D.C. They spend a ton of money. Their influence is

massive here. And that's just the way Washington works. Yeah. The Israelis do the same. The Saudis do the same. The Greek lobby is very active. I mean, everybody lobbies here. Greek lobby sent me some fucking money, man. Right. But ultimately, this was a real, it's a huge own goal because it distracts from, you can argue, was a successful trip. Right. Right. Everyone is talking about this because the corruption is so blatant and disgusting. And, you know, I mean, you know, you know, Senator Kennedy from Louisiana said he trusts the cutteries as much as he trusts a bathroom restop, which then on MSNBC yesterday, I commented on air, that gives me memories of New Jersey Turnpike restops. But ultimately, the Trump administration also has a kind of this self-defeat mechanism that they seem to hit every once in a while,

whether it's signal gate or some kind of just ridiculous, like the plane. fiasco was just totally unnecessary. Yeah. And took away from that's what everyone's talking about on the trip. And also think about it, like you said, it's going to cost hundreds of millions or a billion dollars to retrofit Air Force One to become secure, right? Because it's an Air Force jet that the president rides on. Because it's their command post.

Right. So like, how is that helping us? You're getting a $400 million gift, but you have to pay another billion to make it work. Also, Pam Bondi, I'm going to get a little partisan here. Pan Bondi is a rat. She was a Qatari lobbyist, making $115,000 a month from the Qatari government to lobby for them. She okayed this as if it's as if it's normal. Like meanwhile, you get a gift for-

Right, but when I talk privately to any Republican, they're just like, oh my God. Yeah. How can you not? It's just so. And it's Qatar, which is kryptonite here in DC too because of their role as me is a mediator with the Taliban with Hamas. Right. Now, LUDA Air Force Base is the biggest U.S. military base in the region. So the Qataris are an ally.

But there's some dark side to cuttery stuff. And so it's probably, you know, I mean, I don't know if Trump went to France and President Macron gave him an airbus jet. Right. It didn't happen because it's a European company. But I don't think anyone would care as much. The fact that came from Qatar. I don't know about that. You think so?

If the French gave us a jet, I don't know. It would be like the Statue of Liberty. I don't know. I don't know, man. I think it's like that. I mean, listen, I get like the connotations that Qatar has where they are deeply involved in everything. No, you can't have Air Force One be from a foreign government.

At all. Yeah, you can't do it. French intelligence would have a field day with this. But I guess, you know, they chose, they certainly chose the wrong country. I mean, I don't know. Get a jet Canada or something. They should have done what the Saudi government did and just buy like $500 million worth of Trump's, Trump mean coin.

What they probably have done. That's what they should. should have done. That's what's going on right now. Yeah. And now that there's another whole whole discussion here is how screwed up Boeing is that these these Air Force One jets are so the cost overruns are massive. They're there are certainly delayed. Boeing is at a rough time. Although Boeing had a great trip. The irony of this is Trump is pissed at Boeing because they've screwed up the whole Air Force One procurement. Yet, yeah, Boeing had just made, you know, $90 billion. Yeah. On this trip. And so, you know. Yeah, there's,

There's no real clear strategy. And if someone tries to tell me he's playing 5D, 4D chess, I'm like, no, he doesn't probably know how to play regular chess. Let's be honest. I can't, you know, again, that's, and every once in a while, you'll see a mega foreign policy person pop up and say, look at the genius of Trump. Yeah, I can't. I'm sorry.

It's like at the same level, like people talking about how Putin's a strategic genius. Yeah, like, yeah. Right. Because Putin thought this to be over in a week in Ukraine, and he's three years in. So, man, it's crazy because it's like there's so much happening. and I guess this is part of their you know the flood the zone thing but to like pinpoint

stuff of what's going on it's really wild and to me I mean if I'm a foreign government I'm it's transactional we're all right with Trump specifically in the administration so I'm if I really want to curry favor I'm making things transactional just like Saudi Arabia

Qatar does UAE does um yeah I don't know what the fuck's going to happen tomorrow going to be on I mean, it's good if you're smart. If you're smart, you would say, you're living in Brooklyn or Queens. Brooklyn.

If you're smart, you would, you would tomorrow come to the administration with a proposal to build a Trump tower in Brooklyn. Yeah, I know. I would get probably paid. That's it. That's it. And so, you know, and so everyone has that playbook. You know, one of the things that I think would be fun to see, which would probably be very

brief, would be the leadership. The leadership profile that intelligence services always do. on foreign leaders on foreign heads of state. The one on Trump is probably a paragraph. You know, the one on, on, you know, on Biden or Obama was probably five pages. Yeah. But Trump is pretty easy.

Right. How to, how to examine, manipulate, deal with. You know, everyone loves getting on their hands and knees. It seems to work. Now, it works for a short period of time. Right. You know, what I always tell people is, you know, got to be careful if you're going to go blow Trump because he's going to, you know,

he's going to give you something right after that. but, you know, three hours later. Yeah, he's like a goldfish. And so, but that's what works. And so you see, you know, flattery seems to work. The Brits have seemed to have mastered this because Trump is enamored with the British royal family. So, Stormer, the British Prime Minister comes with an invite to see King Charles. And Trump's like, great, I love you.

Yeah, yeah. There's little pieces like that that, you know, the Gulf Arabs know that Trump loves pomp and circumstances is wowed by wealth. And so when he goes there, he sees, you know, wealth on steroids. Yeah. That gets to him. You know, everybody kind of has that, you know, what is that one key thing that's going to that's going to kind of peak his interest? And so those leadership profiles are probably not that complex. Yeah, it's not super in-depth cited.

Yeah, it's just like give him a carrot. Give him something shiny and it'll do almost everything you want. Yeah, an investment, Trump Tower or something. I mean, Ahmed Shadda said, I want to build a Trump Tower in Damascus. Yeah, I saw that. music and in fact the matter is i've lived in damascus you could do it there's a four seasons there sure oh and so you know there and and it's it's a it's a magical city that's the oldest city on the planet you could think of a thousand reasons why this could actually happen yeah so

are you are you worried at all that's guys a former jihadi i mean you know uh uh uh sure i mean it's it's a data point but you also have to understand he's got you know the turks um uh you know behind him in the sense of as probably a modulating force. But most importantly, it's trust and, you know, you know, you don't trust, you or whatever, trust but verify. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, you know, everyone's watching. You know, is he going to have an inclusive government so far, sort of? You know, is he, you know, is he going to kick out the Iranians? He says he's going to. Is he going to kick out the Palestinian rejectionist groups? He says he's going to. Let's see. And so, you know, along with there's going to be stumbles along the way. But I guess the opposite,

it is that you can't leave someone like that without, you know, in a state of kind of desperation and poverty. Sure. And so, and this is, this is completely different than the Taliban. You know, Damascus is a place where, you know, people can walk out in the streets, you know, free, there's alcohol, women go to school. It's not, I mean, it's not draconian at all. Right.

And so, you know, is there a reason to be to monitor? Sure. So I know SDF is like the real like the main force driving the fight against ISIS in the area. But they're going to as well. That's why I was good. That's my question. 100%. Yeah.

And if you think about that as well, not only is he apparently shot out, they have helped in a counter ISIS fight. But of course, Al-Qaeda and ISIS are enemies. Right. So, so, you know, ideologically, Shada doesn't like ISIS to begin with, even if you say he's never changed from an AQ guy. Yeah, yeah. But again, but I think that there's there's enough evidence out there to show that he has reformed enough. And you just got to keep one. Plus, he's the boss now.

So he's there. Like, you got to deal with whoever's there, right? And it's better than Assad as of right now. I mean, it's not even close. So that's a, that's a no-brainer. You know, you know, Bashar al-Assad killed half a million Syrians, six million refugees is a war. Yeah. He's been an old kind of terrorist asshole.

But he seems to have reformed. enough for us to deal with them. Is Russia angling to get back in there? Yes, that's a key point. So that's another thing is that we're going to want to keep Russia out. Now, that's a big question. But that's another thing that we can monitor. Yeah.

And so that, you know, the, the Russian influence there, that's, I'm sure is a point of discussion between U.S. and Syrian officials. And, of course, the Turks are going to want to keep the Russians out as well. Yeah. Syria is like this fucking place, this menager. of like mayhem dude who's fighting who who's aligned with who but they're also aligned with this other group it is unbelievable man um mark where can people find you on twitter on blue sky everywhere at m polymer on blue sky as well i don't even know my blue sky thing but you can find me

on there at m polymer or something blue sky um uh and uh and as i've hinted before it's the the the long-awaited debut of a new kind of podcast series I'm involved with is coming at the end of the month. Nice. Oh, good, good. That's awesome. Overseas-based in a friendly country. I was going to say, not Qatari, right? Oh, God, no. But it's going to be fun, and I will certainly let you all know. And I can still come on as a guest.

We better. Come on, man. I'm going to put all the links to Mark in the description. Check them out. Check them out at MSNBC and look out for his new podcast. coming out in a couple few weeks. And again, the big story here not only changes in the Middle East, but I've actually agreed with Trump administration policy. And I hope your listeners notice that because it doesn't happen often. Honestly, so of I.

I'm telling you, if he's pushing for a ceasefire in Gaza, I'm in. If he's also pushing for an Iran nuclear, however it looks like, I would love some proxy force language in there. I'm in because I don't think bombing Iran is really a bombing Iranian nuclear. facility is really going to do anything to stop them. I found my reign, I would dig deeper and build it even deeper where no one can get it. And then like, hey, I have a nuclear weapon now. What are you guys going to do?

Right. Because that's the ultimate regime security, right? Like we talked about with Libya. So, yeah, I do agree with some of the stuff. Hopefully tomorrow or next week it doesn't change completely. Probably will. This is fleeting. Right.

Yeah. So, guys, stay tuned because every day is a new adventure. And they'll screw something up in Russia, Ukraine, too. So anyhow, but D, awesome, awesome to see you as always. Keep the faith. And as we've said before, you know, when we have the kind of the Greek mafia taking over the team house, that's always a good thing.

We're already running the CIA. That's right. All right. So take care of. See you later, Mark. Thank you. I'm going to finish up. Guys, do me a favor.

Don't forget to like and subscribe. Check out Mark, of course. His links are in the description. And the best way to support the show is patreon. dot com slash the teamhouse you get both eyes on and the team house add free if you join and uh yeah thanks a lot mark thanks again man thanks bud see yeah guys it's jack i just want to talk to you for a moment about how you can support the show if you've been watching it enjoying it um but you'd like to get a little bit more involved and help us continue to do this you can check out our patreon it is patreon

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