What A Day - Israel Hostage Rescue Mission Kills Scores of Palestinians

Starting point is 00:00:01 It's Monday, June 10th. I'm Trevelle Anderson. And I'm Priyanka Arabindi, and this is What A Day, where we are wondering which juror's cousin posted on the New York Court System's Facebook page about Trump's pending conviction. The day before the verdict was a post that said, quote, My cousin is a juror and says Trump is getting convicted. Thank you, folks, for all your hard work. And sir and or madam, what are you doing? What? What are you doing? On today's show, former President Donald Trump will meet with his probation officer today. Plus, Alex Jones agrees to liquidate his assets to pay damages to the families of the Sandy Hook

Starting point is 00:00:42 shooting victims. But first, a key member of Israel's war cabinet resigned from his post on Sunday after Israeli forces rescued four hostages held by Hamas in an operation that killed scores of Palestinians. During a televised conference on Sunday evening, following the news of the deadly attack, Israel's National Unity Chairman Benny Gantz said, quote, Netanyahu is preventing us from reaching real victory. Okay, so before we get into the details about Gantz said, quote, Netanyahu is preventing us from reaching real victory. Okay, so before we get into the details about Gantz, what happened with this hostage mission?

Starting point is 00:01:12 The hostages were rescued from a refugee camp in Gaza called Nusarat in an operation by air and ground. The four hostages had been kidnapped from the Nova Music Festival on October 7th. Upon their rescue on Saturday, they were all alive and in good medical condition, and news of their return was obviously a huge relief and cause for celebration among, of course, their families and Israelis, who have been increasingly distressed over the fate of the remaining 120 hostages. But the mission came at a high human cost in Gaza. Residents in Nusarat reported intense bombardments, and though it's unclear just how many Palestinians were killed, the numbers are

Starting point is 00:01:50 definitely high. Gaza's Ministry of Health announced that the death toll was 274, while Israeli defense forces say that it was under 100. Neither of those figures were able to be independently verified, and in an interview with CNN, U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said that we may never know definitively, though he did confirm that civilians were killed in this attack. Sullivan also added that while the U.S. supported Israel in efforts to locate the hostages, he did not specify how they helped. He only shared that no U.S. boots were on the ground. And thus far, President Biden has not commented on the situation. According to Hamas, three hostages, including a U.S. citizen, were killed as part of the Israeli military operation, though that cannot be independently verified either. And an Israeli military spokesman dismissed that as a lie. Okay, so tell us more about Gantz and his

Starting point is 00:02:41 resignation. Sure. So first, a little bit of background. Israel's military cabinet was made up of three men, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Minister of Defense Yoav Galant, and former Deputy Prime Minister Benny Gantz. Gantz is a centrist. He is considered to be Netanyahu's primary political challenger, but they formed a unity government in the wake of the October 7th attack. But Gantz has not been happy with Netanyahu. He actually threatened to resign last month unless Netanyahu adequately addressed his concerns over how this war would end, the return of the hostages, and the future governance of Gaza. And on Sunday, Gantz followed through. During his announcement, he said that Netanyahu was mismanaging the war and prioritizing his own political survival over the return of the

Starting point is 00:03:25 hostages, which is quite a jab, but also something that President Biden himself kind of echoed earlier last week. He also urged Netanyahu to hold a new election in the coming months. He said, quote, this is why we are leaving the emergency government today with a heavy heart, but with a whole heart. His departure doesn't threaten Netanyahu's control of the majority, but it does mean that the war cabinet will only contain members of Netanyahu's own party now. And all of this is happening as negotiators wait for Hamas to respond to the latest Israeli hostage deal and ceasefire proposal. Where does that stand as of now? Yeah, I mean, that still remains to be seen. In his media appearances on Sunday, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan urged Hamas to accept the deal, but it's unclear

Starting point is 00:04:10 how they'll respond or if this operation and the way it happened will affect that response. So we will continue to watch it and certainly report back on anything we learn. Yeah. And during all of this, President Biden was in France for a five-day visit. While the trip was nominally about commemorating the 80th anniversary of D-Day, Biden also used it to defend the idea of democracy itself. He drew a lot of parallels between World War II and the war in Ukraine, and he repeatedly emphasized the idea that democracy and the world order are once again at a major tipping point. Here he is in Normandy Thursday, just steps away from the graves of nearly 10,000 American troops who died in World War II. Isolationism was not the answer 80 years ago and is not the answer today. And here he is again in a speech at an official state dinner in pairs with French President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday. We stand at an inflection point in history. The decisions we make now will determine the course of our future for decades to come.

Starting point is 00:05:21 We have a lot of opportunity, but a lot of responsibility. And while Biden never mentioned former President Donald Trump by name, it was also pretty obvious that he was trying to draw a contrast between himself and his main rival in this next election. Absolutely. I mean, nothing could be more different than what he just said from Trump's America first approach to all of this. So very telling. But tell us more about how he did this. Yeah, well, Biden's speeches throughout the trip were a major rebuke of Trump's brand of American isolationism and transactional politics, like you just mentioned, the kind

Starting point is 00:05:58 of politics that underpin Trump's comments about, for example, leaving NATO and his decisions to withdraw America from major international pacts like the Paris Climate Agreement and the Iran nuclear deal. And, you know, to be fair, Europe is also dealing with that same strand of politics. Just look at Sunday's European Union elections. Far right parties are projected to make major gains in the European Parliament, especially in France. The losses were so bad in France that President Macron dissolved the country's government on Sunday and called for snap elections starting later this month. Yeah, it seems like this trend has not stopped, has only gotten stronger at home and around the world, which is frightening. But world leaders and especially European leaders are probably preparing for the possibility

Starting point is 00:06:48 that they could end up working with Trump again if he wins in November, right? How do we think that they're feeling about that at this point? Well, reportedly, they're terrified. That's according to McKay Coppins. He's a senior staff writer for The Atlantic. And he traveled all over Europe this past spring, wrote this big piece about Europe's anxieties about Trump getting reelected. And I spoke to him about his story and started by asking him what scares European leaders the most about a lot of the officials I interviewed would point to was that moment earlier this year when Donald Trump told a story at a rally about speaking to European leaders and saying that

Starting point is 00:07:34 any country that doesn't pay enough for defense, he would encourage Russia to do whatever the hell they wanted. You didn't pay your delinquent. No, I would not protect you. In fact, I would encourage them to do whatever the hell they want. You got to pay. You got to pay your bills. That's an example of something that got a good amount of news coverage here in the US, but it was like a five alarm fire in Europe when he said that because Europeans' entire defense structure is built on the idea that America is a steadfast ally. And that's been true for 75 years, right? And if Americans elect a president in this context

Starting point is 00:08:16 with Russia waging war in Ukraine and Trump decides to make good on his threats to withdraw the U.S. from NATO, that could not only cause the collapse of the alliance, but could really enter Europe into an entirely new stage of dealing with Russian aggression and basic instability that we have not seen on that continent in 75 years. Now, you write that you encountered a, quote, undercurrent of dread in almost every conversation you had while traveling through Europe this spring and that nearly every official you spoke with thought a second Trump term was basically inevitable. How did this become the prevailing sentiment in Europe. Yeah, it's one of the kind of weird things that I started to notice in my conversations with Europeans. Like, first of all, they're all intensely, almost pathologically fixated on our election to the point where they can cite granular polling data from Michigan and

Starting point is 00:09:18 Pennsylvania. And they know how the Electoral College works. They know how the Republican primary system works. They are more keyed in to our election than, frankly, a lot of Americans are. I was about to say, not a lot of people here know about the electoral college. You know what I mean? Yeah, well, and that's what surprised me. And so I often found myself in the position of kind of telling them, like, I don't think a Trump election is a foregone conclusion at all. You know, it's a close race, like the polls show a close race, and Trump is ahead in battleground states right now, but that could change. I think that a couple things are going on there. I think

Starting point is 00:09:55 psychologically, European officials are still scarred from the shock of Trump's win in 2016, right? And then what happened over the next four years was a period of instability in the transatlantic relationship that we had not seen in three quarters of a century. And so I think for a lot of Europeans, they're almost kind of preparing for the worst case scenario

Starting point is 00:10:18 out of both their own kind of psychological trauma and also out of prudence, right? It makes sense for them to make plans based on the worst thing that could happen instead of kind of hoping for the best and then being caught by surprise. Right. And so I wonder what do these same leaders and officials think of President Biden and how he's been leading in this moment, since we at least know that they're not excited about the potential of another Trump presidency? I think it's fair to say that almost everyone I interviewed preferred the Biden administration, preferred Joe Biden's approach to geopolitics, to diplomacy, in part because it's just much

Starting point is 00:11:01 more like a normal American president, at least, you know, in modern times. I will say, though, I encountered a lot of Europeans who wondered why Joe Biden was running again. You know, it's not that they had anything against him, but they would kind of ask me, you know, like, is this really the best the Democrats could do? Like, is there not another candidate? Like, it seems really risky to have somebody so old

Starting point is 00:11:24 and so out of touch with his base in some ways. But I think that the reality is, in a contest between Joe Biden and Donald Trump, there's no question who they would prefer. But they also kind of wonder about the domestic politics of it here. you know, about Biden's standing with these EU leaders, particularly in the last six months, right, with the war in Gaza and his staunch backing of Israel. There also was the, you know, months long delay to get military aid to Ukraine. How has his standing been particularly right in this, you know, volatile time. So those are two separate things. I did hear about Gaza repeatedly in my interviews. And it's an interesting thing in Europe that a lot of people are not fans of the way the Biden administration has backed Israel in this conflict,

Starting point is 00:12:17 that they feel like Israel is going much further than they should and that America should try to rein Israel in. At the same time, a term that I heard all over and over in my conversations was, you know, given our history, referring to, you know, the Holocaust and World War II, they would say, given our history, we do feel like we have to support Israel and we understand that it's a complicated situation. That was especially true in Germany. But on the Ukraine funding, I think more than anything in the last few months, the long delay in passing that Ukraine funding bill underscored to a lot of Europeans that Joe Biden just doesn't have as much power as they

Starting point is 00:12:59 frankly wish he had, given the geopolitical stakes. Yeah. So Biden struck a very reassuring tone, I feel like, in his speech on D-Day in Normandy. He said, We will not walk away. Because if we do, Ukraine will be subjugated and will not end there. Ukraine's neighbors will be threatened. All of Europe will be threatened. And make no mistake, the autocrats of the world are watching closely to see what happens in Ukraine. To see if we let this illegal aggression go unchecked. We cannot let that happen.

Starting point is 00:13:43 How else are Biden officials trying to counter these European fears? sure that the alliance, that NATO is as strong as possible so that in the event that Donald Trump comes into power and decides to, you know, weaken America's commitment, that the alliance is as strong as possible. So a lot of European countries are ratcheting up their own defense spending. In 2017, only three or four NATO countries were spending at least 2% of their GDP on defense, which was the standard that NATO had collectively agreed to in 2014. By the end of this year, it's going to be at least 18 countries and maybe more. The alliance has expanded with the Biden administration's support. Finland and Sweden have both been added to the alliance. Both of them have relatively modern and capable militaries, so they're bringing a lot to

Starting point is 00:14:45 the table. There are also kind of behind-the-scenes talks of moving the logistical responsibility for getting weapons to Ukraine out of U.S. hands and into NATO's hands in case Trump comes into office and decides to abandon the war. And I think that almost everyone in Europe says that regardless of what they do now, regardless of this increased defense spending and everything else, they need America. America is the linchpin to the alliance. It is the most powerful military in the alliance by far. And if America withdraws, the fate of that alliance and European security are really in question. That was my conversation with McKay Coppins, senior staff writer at The Atlantic. Biden will be back in Europe later this week for a meeting with G7 leaders in Italy.

Starting point is 00:15:35 So we will be sure to keep an eye on that. But that's the latest for now. We'll get to some headlines in a moment. But if you like our show, make sure to subscribe, share it with your friends, and we'll be back after some ads. Now let's wrap up with some headlines. Headlines. interview convicted felons to create a pre-sentencing report for the judge in their case. The meeting will reportedly take place virtually. Trump's defense team is expected to submit its sentencing recommendations on Thursday to Justice Juan Marchand, who will ultimately decide the former president's punishment in July. Trump faces anywhere between probation and four

Starting point is 00:16:39 years in prison. Conspiracy theorist and InfoWars founder Alex Jones asked a bankruptcy court on Friday for permission to liquidate his personal assets to pay the families of the Sandy Hook shooting victims. For months, Jones has tried to get out of paying the $1.5 billion in damages for spreading the lie that the 2012 elementary school shooting that killed 26 first graders and staffers was a hoax. If they grant Jones's request, free speech systems will shut down immediately and his assets will be handed over to the families. But here's the thing, Jones isn't a billionaire and the total worth of his assets reportedly only stands between 10 to 12 million dollars. So the families still won't get all of the money that they're due. Yeah, there isn't enough money in the world to make what Alex Jones did to these people better

Starting point is 00:17:32 or make it go away. That just isn't possible. But Alex Jones is 10 to 12 million. That's a start. Get rid of it. That's theirs. Absolutely. The head of the United Nations World Food Program

Starting point is 00:17:42 says that Sudan could become the, quote, world's largest humanitarian crisis amid a year-long civil war there. Speaking on CBS's Face the Nation on Sunday, director Cindy McCain said that the conflict has also become a forgotten crisis as the agency struggles to get aid in. We need more crossings. We need safe and unfettered access. And making sure that we can get in and make sure we can feed at scale. Bottom line is people are going to starve to death unless we get in there.

Starting point is 00:18:09 The war in Sudan started in April of last year amid a power struggle between two generals who were vying for control of the country. American officials estimate as many as 150,000 people have been killed since the war broke out. And a looming famine could kill hundreds of thousands more. Stanford University says it's bringing back its standardized testing requirement. The school recently made the announcement, making it the latest elite university to reinstate test scores after ditching the requirement during the pandemic. While the tests will remain optional for students applying this fall, students applying in fall 2025 will need to show scores for either the SAT or ACT to be considered for admission. Other schools that have brought back testing requirements include Harvard, Yale, Brown, and Georgetown. To hear more about why all these schools are bringing back standardized testing requirements, you can listen to the most recent episode of How We Got Here.

Starting point is 00:19:06 Our very own Priyanka Arabendi co-hosts the episode. Check it out right here in the Wooda Day feed, wherever you get your podcasts. I will say, Priyanka, I do not miss standardized testing. Oh, no, I do not either. But the one thing I do miss was my pre-standardized test ritual of watching Jersey Shore the night before. That might really put me in a specific age range for people, but that is what I did to relax the night before the SAT. I love that.

Starting point is 00:19:36 I love that for you. It worked. It worked. Very relaxed. And those are the headlines. One more thing before we go. In December of 2014, Judge Loya died at a wedding in India of a heart attack. And at the time, his passing barely made the news.

Starting point is 00:19:54 But when his niece approached a journalist two years later, she shared a different narrative. That the circumstances around Judge Brij Kapal Loya's death have made his family doubt the official story. Killing Justice, hosted by CEO of the branch Ravi Gupta, follows the reporting and legal fallout from this tip. He examines the conflicting evidence to answer how one man's death became a magnet for the increasingly polarized politics in India and what this means for the future of the world's largest democracy. Listen to the first four episodes of Killing Justice on Apple or Spotify. And for ad-free episodes, join the Friends of the Pod community at Cricut.com slash friends. That is all for today. If you like the show, make sure you subscribe, leave a review,

Starting point is 00:20:40 watch what your cousins post about you on Facebook, and tell your friends to listen. And if you are into reading and not just SAT requirements like me, what a day is also a nightly newsletter. Check it out and subscribe at crooked.com slash subscribe. I'm Priyanka Arabindi. I'm Treville Anderson. And sharpen your number two pencils. Actually, you can leave those number twos at home

Starting point is 00:21:02 because apparently the SAT is all on the computer now. Oh, no. Crazy. Is this what we've become as a country, Priyanka? They don't know how to write in cursive. They're not going to know that they had to have two number two pencils and a big, fat pink eraser. They won't know what a Scantron is.

Starting point is 00:21:17 I know. I feel for them, really. What a Day is a production of Crooked Media. It's recorded and of Crooked Media. It's recorded and mixed by Bill Lance. Our associate producers are Raven Yamamoto and Natalie Bettendorf. We have production help today from Michelle Alloy, Greg Walters, and Julia Clare. Our showrunner is Erica Morrison, and our executive producer is Adrian Hill. Our theme music is by Colin Gilliard and Kashaka.

What A Day - Israel Hostage Rescue Mission Kills Scores of Palestinians

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