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In this episode of Sekulow, we delve into the latest developments in the Middle East where significant diplomatic moves might herald a new era of peace. With President Trump’s strategic interventions, Israel and Gaza seem on the brink of a ceasefire, a moment many are cautiously optimistic about. The discussion extends to Israel’s broader regional opportunities and the potential impact on hostages still held in Gaza.
SPEAKER 08 :
We got breaking news. President Trump signals his next Middle East power play.
SPEAKER 04 :
Keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever. This is Sekulow. We want to hear from you. Share and post your comments or call 1-800-684-3110. And now your host, Logan Sekulow.
SPEAKER 08 :
We thought we were going to start off kind of a slow news day, but you know what it seems like is there’s a lot of chatter and a lot going on in Israel right now as it seems that they may be priming Israel and Gaza to go into a ceasefire, actively ending the war in Gaza. Now, this is something that we have heard about a countless amount of times at this point. So, you know, don’t hold your breath. However, coming on the heels of what happened in Iran and everything else that’s happened in America, and the deals that are being struck, and the Abraham Accords updated, there’s a lot of chatter that would lead you to believe that there is more to this than maybe previous attempts at this. And I want you to hear straight up off the bat from Benjamin Netanyahu, who, as you know, has not really been someone talking about a ceasefire very much. He’s been someone saying, you know what? The goal has always been to defeat Hamas completely, but maybe we can accomplish a few different missions simultaneously. This obviously comes from pressure from the Trump administration to wrap, up this war. Let’s hear from Prime Minister Netanyahu just from yesterday.
SPEAKER 03 :
Of course, we will also need to resolve the issue of Gaza to defeat Hamas, but I believe we will achieve both missions. Beyond that, broad regional opportunities are opening up, and most of which, almost all, you are partners.
SPEAKER 08 :
Beyond that, broad regional opportunities are opening up. This also comes when the members of the Israeli administration have been involved in conversations with america and some of those do involve the releasing of the remaining hostages or at least a again it’s sad to say this but a portion of those remaining hostages uh and there may be some deal on the table to again put this finally to bed after a couple of years. And I think you have in Israeli people that has finally seen what it’s like to have relative peace over the last few days, last few weeks. But of course, over the weekend, it got heightened back up. There was more missiles being shot. More stuff started happening. When that happens, I think they go, wait a second. Remember those nights we had that were kind of peaceful? We’re a peaceful people. Let’s see if we can get there. And with the United States help, maybe we can get there even sooner. Again, Phone lines are open for you. I want to hear from you at 1-800-684-3110. Obviously, this is a big week in the United States of America celebrating the 4th of July at the end of the week. I know a lot of you have been traveling right now. A lot of you are on vacation, but it doesn’t mean you can’t stay engaged on what is happening around the world. We’re going to have a packed show later on when we join. by mike pompeo we may also be joined by our team at aclj jerusalem as you know it’s always a bit up in the air whether we can get them if the connection works but i want to encourage you right now the aclj is involved in a lot of big key issues right now you know about last week we’ve been fighting and fighting against uh the abortion industry there’s some big news by the way uh on that case in massachusetts you know we’ve been talking about that for about a year now since i made that trip to boston i can’t wait we can’t share it with you yet But tomorrow’s broadcast, we will be able to, as of now, share some eye-opening and shocking information that is coming from there. So you want to stay tuned to that tomorrow. But, Will, phone lines are open because we definitely want to hear from people because they may not see an end to the war in Gaza as a positive.
SPEAKER 12 :
That’s right. And there are many factors that even the Israelis will have to take into account as they have these meetings, because right now, Ron Dermer, the minister of strategic affairs, he’s the former ambassador to the U.S. from the Israelis, is coming to Washington to meet with the Trump administration. And he’s kind of seen as almost as Bibi Netanyahu’s right hand man in this. He has been leading the hostage negotiations with Hamas. So he’s right in the thick of this. And what we’re looking at now is what President Trump said to the media at the end of last week is whether or not he said, I think we can get to a ceasefire maybe in the next week. With that in light of all the things that are happening on the ground, with the decimation of the proxy Hamas that Iran has, Iran doesn’t really have the capabilities to prop up these proxies right now. Could this be an opportunity for President Trump, the art of the dealmaker, be able to get in there and do something truly historic as he’s already been doing?
SPEAKER 08 :
Phone lines, again, are open for you at 1-800-684-3110. Once again, 1-800-684-3110. If you’re watching on YouTube, I’m going to ask you to hit that thumbs up right now. Let’s get this into some more feeds because this is some real breaking news. This is real stuff that’s happening. We’re also going to cover a bit more coming up. Welcome back to Sekulow. Phone lines are open for you right now. I really would love to hear from you. We know a lot of people are just joining us right now, so we’re going to restate what’s going on. There is some movement out of the Middle East. You may go, Logan, that’s nothing new. But this new movement actually seems that Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel is starting to at least consider what a ceasefire will look like. President Trump even posted last night something to the effect of, get the deal done in Gaza, release the hostages, get it done. We know they’ve been working overnight to see this happen. I think President Trump’s coming off the heels of what happened in Iran. And while there was some hiccups there, overwhelmingly so far, it has been a quiet time. week or so now uh since there was the you know there was the ceasefire the ceasefire failed then president trump said i’m not dealing with this from either side of you and it calmed down now we could actually see some movement to the end of the war in gaza and there’s also moving the abraham accords which i know uh we’ll talk about that with mike pompeo as he was one of the people who really was one of the founders of the abraham accords and got that done later in the broadcast i think it’s important to remember that they’re still intact i even asked will that today I go well what’s even the status of the Abraham Accords because post-Trump in the Biden era it felt like we never talked about it and it felt like that they had just put them through a shredder if you will in the way that they America spoke about this but it’s not the way America is speaking about it was the way that Israel was having relationships with other countries that were never necessarily adversaries but were countries that were maybe hostile You could say there was an unrest between Israel and some of these places. And finally, you had a time when Jewish Israelis could travel to the UAE or to wherever and celebrate Hanukkah and have holidays there and use these big tourist destinations. Because at the end of the day, a lot of the interests are no different than the interest of the United States. Tourism, money, economy growth. Those are what a lot of Middle East want. They have just been hamstrung by some of these regimes, some of these regimes that have made it nearly impossible for travel to recover, for tourism to recover. And now I think that’s one of the reasons you’re going to see possibly. And again, I put possibly in big, giant quotes, hopefully. We see some sort of ceasefire because we also know you are coming into a time where you’ve had yet again another summer where it’s been very difficult or nearly impossible to travel to Israel, to travel to the Middle East. And that is where a lot of the revenue comes in is tourism, Christian tourism, Jewish tourism. And right now there’s obviously unrest and people don’t feel comfortable doing that and not even – Getting air flights has not been easy because they’ve had to cancel them, reopen them, cancel them, reopen them. But now we are potentially seeing movement. Again, Benjamin Netanyahu said there are many opportunities have opened up. That’s a direct quote. He goes, as you know, many opportunities have opened up following the victory. Firstly, to rescue the hostages. Of course, we will need to solve the Gaza issue, defeat Hamas. But I believe we will accomplish both of those missions and they can be accomplished. I am adding to that that they can be accomplished maybe in a different way than the original plan.
SPEAKER 12 :
Well, and what we’ve seen from President Trump is that his approach to the Middle East is not the same approach that we’ve seen from generations of American presidents. That the only way to get something accomplished is by military invasion and regime change. Now, do I think that all of a sudden the Iranians have changed their ways and are going to be a peaceful partner in the region? No, I think they’re still the bad actor. But one, they’ve been shown as a little bit of a paper tiger. that their response to, once they got a few missiles off, and unfortunately there were Israelis that lost their lives to that, but they didn’t have the capacity to strike back at Israel, mainly because of how well Israel targeted their capabilities within Iran. They didn’t have that. And then you also didn’t see their proxies rushing to help them out. They’ve been feeding munitions and intel and plans of war to their proxies for decades, but their proxies have now been decimated to the point where they couldn’t help out and send incoming rocket salvos to try and confuse the Iron Dome, so much so that it overwhelmed Israel. You also saw they had to forewarn the United States of, our retaliation is coming soon. Please don’t let anyone get hurt. We really don’t want this to escalate. And so you see that they are in this position of weakness for the first time in our lifetimes that they have been really backed into a corner and don’t have much of an option out. We know that Ron Dermer is in D.C. now meeting with the Trump administration on what this looks like. Now, the Israelis want to take out Hamas. Yes. And I think what’s going to be interesting to see is what plan or deal comes out of this. There’s a lot of chatter. Will they soften on what that means? There’s a lot of chatter that this could be an opportunity that the Trump administration is going to maybe push for this and may be able to bring it about as a part of an Abraham Accords that a group of Arab nations… take over control of gaza the the security as well as the u.s having oversight with diplomats and things within the rebuilding of gaza interesting could be very interesting now historically that’s not something israel would love no but But could the Trump effect have something different? Could more Abraham Accord countries come on board that now they have normalized relations with that these aren’t enemies at their doorstep? These are now trading partners. And I think we should listen to what Steve Witkoff said.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah. I think so, too. Let’s go to Steve Witkoff. Quickly, before we do that, just to kind of give you a little bit of an understanding of what he’s talking about here. His latest proposal from U.S. envoy against Steve Witkoff calls for a 60-day ceasefire and the release of 10 living hostages and 18 deceased hostages, which is something horrible just to say, in exchange for Palestinian prisoners. During this period, the two sides then would begin with internegotiation for a comprehensive ceasefire agreement that would end the war. which is a key demand from Hamas as any part of the deal. Of course, they’re saying it has to end the war. Israel’s saying, well, we end the war when Hamas is decimated. So again, they’re obviously going to be on different sides here, but maybe the U.S. can play that middle card and figure out how to end this. Let’s go to Steve Witkoff again, CNBC, just a couple days ago.
SPEAKER 02 :
One of the President’s key objectives is that the Abraham Accords be expanded, that more countries come into it. And we are working on that on my team and in coordination with the Secretary of State and the entire State Department. And we think we’re going to have some pretty big announcements on countries that are now coming into the Abraham Peace Accords. And we’re hoping for normalization across an array of countries that maybe people would have never complicated. would have never contemplated would come in. So we’re excited for that prospect. That will also be a stabilizer in the Middle East.
SPEAKER 08 :
You know, this is a very interesting moment. Again, this is Steve Witkoff. And Will, why don’t you give people who maybe don’t understand sort of an understanding of what his role is in all of this?
SPEAKER 12 :
That’s right. He is basically the envoy for the president with all of these high stakes negotiations.
SPEAKER 08 :
Sort of a liaison.
SPEAKER 12 :
He has been the negotiator with Russia and Ukraine. He has been the negotiator with Iran until that fell apart. But Iran is still kind of looking about maybe coming and having some talks again. And he also has been involved in just about any hot point negotiations. He’s like the lead negotiator for the U.S. And when he talks about expanding the Abraham Accords, the original signatories… where Bahrain and the UAE, and then Morocco and Sudan soon after followed. Now, these are all countries with a long history of no dealings with Israel.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, a lot of times there’s issues, passport issues.
SPEAKER 12 :
Publicly against the state of Israel. Now, these weren’t necessarily, except for maybe Sudan, where there could be a hotbed of terror, and Morocco as well, but where… Radicalized people could get out of there. They weren’t necessarily military threats to Israel and to the existence of Israel. But it’s a big signal because once again, Bahrain and UAE, both big money countries in the Middle East. The next steps that they’re talking about, some of the chatter online, some of these experts that are analyzing things and what they’re seeing is that it could be Saudi Arabia, which they were very close to at the end of the first Trump term, but then after the debacle of 2020 and the Biden administration’s foreign policy, that fell apart. So that could be an option returning to the table. And when he mentions even countries no one would have thought of, the two that are popping up are both Lebanon and Syria. Lebanon, now the leadership of Hezbollah, which has a lot of influence on the country of Lebanon, the government of Lebanon itself would be a lot easier to deal with than with Hezbollah. If Hezbollah has now been decimated and could strengthen the real leadership of the Lebanese government, You could see something remarkable there, and that would be an enemy to the north that could be then a friendly to the north of Israel. And then Syria, another bordering country that was a proxy of Iran. Bashar al-Assad was propped up by the Iranian government. Now, there’s a lot of other geopolitic you can get into. The leader of Syria now, former Al-Qaeda guy, not someone you necessarily want to be a leader of a country, but he’s trying to push to be on the world stage. And President Trump, we know, is pushing him.
SPEAKER 08 :
to hey you want to show that you really want to join the world stage make a deal that could be completely something novel something we’ve not seen in our lifetime yeah this could be one of the first times you know in the last couple of years we actually see some movement and look when you see the extreme anti-semitism that’s come out you also have to remember now we’re seeing i would say a stronger response than we have had in two years where people are going out and saying things you may have seen stuff over the weekend whether that is in New York City, whether that is in London, wherever it may be. And you actually see the people and the government and the media say, you know what? It’s too far. Maybe we are seeing those signs of movement and change It took a couple years for them to come around. We’ll believe it when we see it. But you know what? This is an important moment. Phone lines are open for you at 1-800-684-3110. I’m going to encourage you to support the work of the ACLJ. We’ve got a big week coming up. We’re breaking it down. All that’s going to happen. And again, Mike Pompeo is going to be joining us. One of the creators of the Abraham Accords. Couldn’t think of a better voice to have on for that. Coming up in just a few minutes. Welcome back to Secula. We do have a few lines open for you at 1-800-684-3110. I’d love to hear from you. A lot of you are watching right now. I encourage you. If you’re watching on one of our social platforms, whether that’s YouTube or Rumble or even on ACLJ.org, I’m going to ask you to hit that thumbs up. Only a few of you have, and it really helps when we get that into more people’s algorithms. It’s a whole game you got to play right now. But over 500,000, almost 500,005 subscribers, 505,000 subscribers have subscribed on YouTube alone. Understand the impact of that. When you have millions of people that watch on YouTube each and every week, which we do, that is bigger than a lot of what the mainstream media gets on their television networks, what they get on their podcasts, what they get on anything. We are able to provide an alternative look at this, whether that’s through talking about the news, but also talking about how we can be directly involved. You know how we’ve been directly involved in Israel. You know how we’ve been directly involved with the work in the Middle East. And of course, at the European Center for Law and Justice, my brother just returned from, I think still probably recovered from jet lag after a month of traveling to make sure that your voice is being heard all over the world. We’ll hear from him as well. And of course, this is on the heels of the 4th of July. the day that we are going to be celebrating our nation’s freedom and independence. And we can’t forget that right now. And it is a big week. And I know it’s a travel week for a lot of you. A lot of you are maybe listening on the road. Maybe you’re on vacation already. Maybe you’re checking this out hours later. Maybe you’re laying in bed after a long day at the beach. You know, you got that sun sleep. You know what I’m talking about, Will? Oh, it’s the best. You get that sun sleep, and you’re like, I need something to chill out. So you put on this show because you really want to hear about what’s going on in the Middle East.
SPEAKER 12 :
Well, you know, sometimes you got to get caught up on the day’s events, especially in the middle, at the beginning of July as we’re approaching that just one day away. But one thing I do want to bring up, Logan, in light of this, and I want to ask the callers, do you think that – President Trump’s novel approach to both the way we’re dealing with Iran, the way that he’s pushing for a different path forward in Gaza in the end of the war, it’s on brand for him because he’s saying, what does he want? Less killing.
SPEAKER 08 :
I’ll make sure you know you said end of the war. war.
SPEAKER 12 :
End of the war, not the end of the world.
SPEAKER 08 :
Not the end of the world.
SPEAKER 12 :
We’ll talk about that later. End of the war, and that he’s pushing for these things because his goal, as he stated on his campaign in the first administration, is he wants less killing around the world. Do you think that his approach could work? to some of these complex issues that have riddled American administrations for decades, for generations, before we were even alive, these things have been going on. Do you think that this could actually bring about unique, different, lasting change in that region? Give us a call at 1-800-684-3110. But I think we should also talk about this because the mayoral candidate of New York is getting a lot of press these days. And he was on Meet the Press with Kristen Welker over the weekend on the Sunday shows. And he was getting questions about his refusal.
SPEAKER 08 :
About Donnie?
SPEAKER 12 :
Yes, this is Zoran Mamdani, and he has been criticized a lot because he has been seen at pro-Palestinian protest. He has taken part and been alongside of people that are using genocidal language. And he was asked about the term globalize the intifada. And I want you to hear his response because many people these days thought they could solve the problem now by pushing genocidal talk on the world stage. We’ve seen how big and broad the anti-Semitic rhetoric has gone around the world. And this is now a candidate to be the next mayor of New York and how he’s handling it. And then we’re going to contrast that with how President Trump is actually putting words to action and getting things done. But let’s roll bite six for people.
SPEAKER 05 :
about the term globalize the intifada if it makes you uncomfortable in that moment you did not condemn the phrase now just so folks understand it’s a phrase that many people hear as a call to violence against jews there’s been a lot of attention on this issue so i want to give you an opportunity to respond here and now do you condemn that phrase globalize the intifada
SPEAKER 01 :
That’s not language that I use. The language that I use and the language that I will continue to use to lead this city is that which speaks clearly to my intent, which is an intent grounded in a belief in universal human rights. And ultimately, that’s what is the foundation of so much of my politics, the belief that freedom and justice and safety are things that to have meaning have to be applied to all people. And that includes Israelis and Palestinians as well.
SPEAKER 08 :
This is the issue here, because 90 percent of what he said is typical political logic. You know, jargon. There’s nothing wrong with it. It’s just saying, you know, it’s the full diversion. But he’s diverting from a question from, again, from Kristen Welker on Meet the Press. This isn’t like he’s put in some situation where he is in a hostile environment feeling like he’s about to get set up. She’s giving him the opportunity. Really, that’s what it is. Kristen Welker is saying, here’s the opportunity to clear this up. And instead of clearing it up, takes a turn. And you know what that turn says to me? Because when I really read it, and I hear him, he may be somebody, I mean, look, he’s certainly on the other side of this issue, but he may be someone who says, you know what, maybe we shouldn’t use that. But he’s too scared to say that because his whole base is this. And this is when you have the media, like I said, over the last few days, and it’s with him, and it’s with what happened at Glastonbury, you see this shift coming in the media where they’re all of a sudden saying, you know what, the rhetoric and the acceptance of certain rhetoric against Jewish people, against, by the way, mainstream Muslim people, against people of all faiths. Maybe we have taken this all too far. And I think this sort of referendum you’re about to see on Imam Dhani or you see of what’s going on in the UK is that sort of gut punch to say we need to fix this issue. But he’s given the opportunity to fix it. Just say, you know what? He goes, it’s not words I use. I don’t use globalize the intifada.
SPEAKER 12 :
Well, and the problem is, and we don’t have to belabor this by playing two and a half more minutes of him. She pushed him two more times saying, no, no, but will you condemn the phrase globalize the intifada? And in the very last one, because each time he diverts, He says, I don’t want to go down the line of language and making clear what language I believe is permissible or impermissible takes me to a place where the president wants to put people in jail for saying certain things. He turns it back to Trump and tries to make it. But globalize the intifada. means bring Palestinian terror worldwide. We have to define what that means. The Intifada were terrorism against Jews in Jerusalem and across Israel as a pushback. It means that they wanted to take over and when you globalize that terrorism, that means terror everywhere. So you can’t condemn saying worldwide terror You can’t, you have to say, those aren’t words I use. Imagine if you, after September 11th, this is the man running for the mayor of the city that was struck not just, what are we at, 24 years? And he’s now unable to say, I condemn people wanting to globalize terror. Imagine 10 years ago in that city saying, would you condemn the rhetoric of Al Qaeda? I mean, it’s not the words I would use, but I don’t want to go down the line of parsing out things. Terror is terror. And you should be unafraid to call it that.
SPEAKER 08 :
And it’s unfortunate that he feels like he needs to do this. And again, the only way that gets changed is if the voter base also changes. We need to work on that as well. We need to make sure that we are getting all the truth out there. The team at the ACLJ does that, but we can’t do it without you. We’re about to head into the month of July. It’s going to be a big, hot summer, and we need you. So go to ACLJ.org, be a part of the team right now. Join us in the fight. Become an ACLJ champion if you can, which is a monthly recurring donor. But again, it’s the end of June. We’ve got a big, big month ahead of us. So I encourage you right now to do that. We’ve got a second half hour coming up. Find us broadcasting live on ACLJ.org, on YouTube, on Rumble, and of course Archive Dawn later on. We’ll be right back.
SPEAKER 04 :
Keeping you informed and engaged, now more than ever. This is Sekulow. And now your host, Logan Sekulow.
SPEAKER 08 :
Welcome back to Sekulow. Second half hour coming up. We’ve got to restate what’s going on. We weren’t sure exactly what we were going to talk about this morning. There’s obviously news that happens over the weekend, but it was relatively quiet. But of course, what happens… is there’s finally movement that may indicate the war in Gaza could be coming to an end. A lot of people have questions about this. And I did see in a phone line, unfortunately just dropped off. Somebody who called in, you can call in by the way at 1-800-684-3110 asking, well, how do we trust these ceasefires? How do we trust the end of the war? And the question is, or the answer to that is, it’s very difficult. Okay. You got to roll the dice. As you said, you got to sometimes make concessions and hope for the best. Now look, look what happened in Iran. There was a brief moment of tension there, but look, been relatively quiet that’s a good thing that shows this can happen shows movement can be made and look i’d rather live in a world where you could actually have this kind of movement israel needs it the middle east needs it there needs to be calm and stability uh as much as there can be of course it’s very difficult to trust any regime that has also uh you know been the reason why thousands of people have been killed but it’s just where we’re at right now I want to take a call real quick. Let’s go to Joseph in Texas online for Joseph. You’re on the air.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yes. Hello. Thank you, Logan. And I just want to say thank you to you. And you have always been wonderful. And we’re so thankful and grateful for your portion. And I just wanted to say I’m so grateful to Donald Trump. You know, when he came into office, he hit the floor running immediately. And he shut up the border and all it’s almost every day he’s doing something big. And I just wish the American people would just get behind him and support him. He is our president. And I don’t care if you’re a Democrat or Republican. We should all be behind our president and support him because he’s doing so much. Iran was an incredible win for us. He shut down Pakistan and India from fighting. He’s working with Putin and Ukraine. He’s doing so much and we need to support him. He shouldn’t have our country, half of our country, not half, but a portion of our country fighting against him.
SPEAKER 08 :
you know everyone should be behind him and and and being strong for him and supporting him joseph politics is politics i understand that as well but you’re right there can be a unifying force like even see some of the tariff deals that got done over the weekend uh big wins for the trump administration there where they’re dealing with canada and some of those details we’ll have to like get into the nitty-gritty of that but those deals are happening you aren’t wrong You aren’t wrong to think that there’s a lot happening. Look, it makes our job a little easier in the terms of what content we’re going to come up with. Because every time we think like, oh no, we’re not going to have a new news piece. What are we going to talk about? Something comes up and it’s usually like you said, Joseph, something with monumental consequences. Like, I don’t know, peace in the Middle East. And you have Israel actually changing their tune a little bit. And look, I’m not saying that’s good or bad. We have Jeff Balaban joining us a little bit later from ACLJ Jerusalem. That’s the plan. Again, you never know what can happen, but that’s the plan right now to have him on to discuss his thoughts. Because I’m sure the people in Israel, a lot of them probably have a different thought than President Trump does, a different thought than even Benjamin Netanyahu does. But remember, time is changing. People are moving. Things are happening right now. And if there can be an end to this war, it would be a nice sigh of relief for a lot of people.
SPEAKER 12 :
You want a little prediction, though? Let’s say President Trump brokers a deal with Israel. They end the war in Gaza. They get Hamas ousted. And there’s this coalition of actual signatories to the Abraham Accords that help rebuild it. The press is going to get a leak and be like, oh, actually, it’s not that great. And there’s not real peace.
SPEAKER 08 :
We did this deal under the Biden administration. He’s just taking credit for it now. Yeah, exactly. All right. Phone lines are open for you. We will have a little bit opportunity to take some phone calls. Not as many because we’re going to hopefully have a packed second half hour here coming up because we’ve got Jeff Balaban joining us. But up next, we got Mike Pompeo. Again, if you want to talk about the Abraham Accords. However you feel about Mike Pompeo, the Abraham Accords is one of the biggest successes that you can imagine in terms of, again, I get very emotional when we talk about it because I finally saw what looked like peace in the Middle East for quite a long period of time. But of course, the Biden administration had to go in, unravel a lot of that. But they still exist. And now we’re going to see some progression in the Abraham Accords. Phone lines again are open for you. Support the work of the ACLJ. Right back with Pompeo. Welcome back to Seculo. Secretary Mike Pompeo is joining us right now. And Secretary Pompeo, I wanted to get your feedback initially. It’s why I jumped right in on this, because the movement that’s happening right now that that does indicate that we may see some changes, what’s happening in Israel and what’s happening in Gaza, but also the potential of. more countries coming on board to the abraham accords unfortunately uh the abraham accords is something that felt like a bit of the past it was something that you had such a strategic place to play to you got so much done during it and unfortunately during the biden administration though technically it was still on paper it felt like america was no longer supportive of it but it does seem like there may be some movement to finally see more countries joining up on the abraham accords and as you being one of the architects of it i wanted to get your feedback on that and why it is important that this exists.
SPEAKER 07 :
So it’s exciting to hear that Trump administration thinks there may be others joining the Accords. But for America, it’s really important because as these nations, these Islamic nations, these Gulf Arab state nations just do the basic, which is recognize Israel’s fundamental right to exist as the Jewish homeland. As they do that, there’s less risk for young men and women. Our young men and women have to go fight and risk their lives in this place. There’s more prosperity and there’s more peace. You’re right. It fell on hard times during the Biden administration, not because of anything that the Biden administration did, but because of all the things they didn’t do. They broke our allyship with the Gulf states. They didn’t support the Israelis. They didn’t do a darn thing to push back on Iran. And those three tools were what give nations confidence to say, I’m going to recognize Israel’s right to exist and enjoy the fruits, the benefits that flow from that. And so I’m unsurprised in the aftermath of what President Trump did in Iran. what the Israelis did to Hamas and to the Houthis and to Hezbollah, I’m unsurprised that these nations now have the confidence they need to do the essential, which is to just simply say we’re no longer going to have the desire to destroy the nation of Israel as our fundamental foreign policy goal. And so I’m excited about this. I hope more nations will join, and I’m very confident that they will.
SPEAKER 12 :
Mr. Secretary, you mentioned that the Biden administration did nothing with the Iranians to keep them in check during those years. But what we’re seeing now post the airstrikes on the nuclear facilities that Iran is to some degree seems to be playing nice or at least licking their wounds for a minute. But we know that while their proxies are decimated, their capabilities for now may be decimated. The ideology of the mullahs and the Ayatollah has not been decimated. What do you think happens long term as Iran goes back to the drawing board on how to take on what they see as the great and little Satan, America and Israel?
SPEAKER 07 :
We should not for a moment think that the Ayatollah has changed his stripes. There’s no chance of that. Or I shouldn’t say no chance. There’s near zero chance of that. Miracles do happen, I suppose, as a Christian believer. I should accept that. But absent that miracle, they’re not going to change. They may be chasing for the moment. They may, to your point, lick their wounds. But they’re going to continue to try to build out their nuclear program, to recreate these proxy forces. They’re wounded. It will be hard for them to do. But the motive, that intention hasn’t changed. And so what the United States must do is not rest on our laurels in spite of the great accomplishment that was achieved, but make sure we have a program that is verifiable with respect to their nuclear weapon systems and their technologies. We need to make sure that they commit not to rebuilding those proxies. Their ballistic missile program must stop forever. It’s not enough just to get rid of the enriched uranium. It is not enough just to set back their centrifuges. Their objective remains. And so we now have a maximum point of leverage created by President Trump. We should use that leverage to get a comprehensive resolution with the Iranians or accept the fact that this is just a pause in the conflict and that we will one day again have to go back at this because the Iranians under this regime are unlikely to change their goals.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, I mean, it is one of those unfortunate circumstances. We had a call that came in and said, well, how do we trust if there’s a ceasefire? You can’t really. I mean, somewhat of it is you have to make sure that we are staying on top of it. We got to make sure that we are keeping them accountable and also being very understanding of the fact that sometimes these are symbolic, sometimes these are on paper. But look, we also had, and it’s something I wanted to get your thoughts on, the successful uh, attacks in Iran where the wind took out. Obviously we all know about this, took out the nuke facilities. However, a bunch of information leaked out shortly after. And now, uh, a lot of people, the FBI said, Hey, we’re going to, we’re going to have an investigation on this. It was you, someone who was obviously the director of the CIA at some point. What are your thoughts on the fact that we need to make sure that those who are leaking this information, that this information is getting out, which is crazy that it’s getting out, but it’s getting out and it’s getting to the press that those people that are leaking are found out and are held responsible.
SPEAKER 07 :
I lived this for four years, especially when I was in the State Department. The risk that someone will take private information or classified information or just information that is not timely for the public to know for a host of reasons and put it out is unacceptable. I’m equal opportunity that was unacceptable if it was someone who was in the Biden administration leaking to, you know, a conservative outlet. It’s just it’s not how our US government must be. And so I hope they’ll investigate. I hope they’ll find them. I hope they will make sure they got the right person. And when they do, I hope they’ll prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law. Individuals don’t get to make decisions about releasing classified information. Only the president and his designated folks can do that. It is harmful to American national security when our leaders, wherever they sit politically, when our leaders are unable to have conversations or pass documents that have to be private for a host of reasons, when they leak out, we really risk the ability of the executive, the commander in chief, President Trump today. to make good decisions with confidence that they have our young men and women safe if they’re going to move into harm’s way. If we have risk that someone will learn about an operation beforehand, boy, that is really dangerous.
SPEAKER 12 :
One final question to you today. As we look, we know that Ron Dermer, who’s the minister for strategic affairs in Israel, former ambassador to the United States from Israel, is in Washington meeting with the administration. And there seems to be a push also to end the war in Gaza from the Trump administration. Once again, we know that these wars can never be fully ended until the ideology is eradicated. But is there some hope that the hostage situation with those remaining that are purportedly still alive as well as the remains coming home to family and that a new chapter even without Hamas could begin in Gaza under American strength and leadership with the Israelis and potentially hopefully with new Abraham Accord allies as we look forward?
SPEAKER 07 :
I live in hope. The ACLJ has been so involved in helping get these hostages back to their families. Bless the ACLJ for all of its work. Look, I hope we can find a pathway to get the hostages home and the remains of those who have perished under control of Hamas. I hope to get them back just as quickly as we can. And I hope you can find peace in Gaza. But I must say, they still have thousands of folks that are under arms. There are still folks who are trying to undermine Israel’s security. And the Israelis are going to have to make sure that they stay on top of this. Since October 7th, this terror activity that took place on October 7th, 2023, Hamas, just like the Ayatollah, hasn’t changed its stripes. It’s going to require enormous vigilance for a long time. And we ought to make sure we are able to feed the kids that sit in Gaza. They are truly innocents. But the security requirements there are going to remain. And a ceasefire, while useful, still presents risk that Hamas will try and build itself back and again present risk to the United States and to Israel.
SPEAKER 08 :
so much for joining us uh mike pompeo senior counsel for global affairs here at the aclj and just an invaluable voice uh for all of these things so it’s been so directly involved and i always appreciate you joining us each and every week michael’s calling on line one i want to take this call because i believe in the next segment we are going to head over to aclj jerusalem with jeff balaban uh we’re gonna do our best uh so this may be one of the last calls of the day we’ll see uh michael you’re on the air in florida gentlemen
SPEAKER 11 :
That last bite that you gave for what I believe to be the candidate for the New York City mayor. Yep. We’re also familiar with Kamala’s version of a word salad. To me, what he was talking about was an Ivy League word salad. Yeah.
SPEAKER 08 :
Exactly, Michael. And that’s what I said is you can tell he is parsing his words intentionally and just kind of rambling on to not answer the question, which is very typical politician to not answer a question. But it’s almost as if they were softballed this question, giving them to it easy, saying, hey, you know what, let’s clear this up, give you the opportunity to do it. I believe they’ve asked him many times, do you think Israel should be a Jewish state? And he’s like, I believe it should be a state for everybody. There should be freedom for everybody. And it’s like, well, of course, but you know what we’re saying. You know what we’re asking here. And of course, he won’t answer those questions. Do I think he’s someone who has ill intentions to the people of Israel? I don’t know. Do I think he’s been an active participant, clearly, in the pro-Palestinian side? Sure. Sure. Does that represent a good portion of New York right now? Clearly. But what I don’t like is just not being honest. And I don’t like when politicians play this game. They pretend to be the new, young, hip group of politicians, but they still just don’t tell you the truth. They still don’t just tell you how they feel. They have to come up with, like you said, a word salad that says nothing and means nothing, but gets them through. Just gets them through an interview on Meet the Press. When we get back, we’re going to hear again from our team at ACLJ Jerusalem, give you their perspective of what’s going on right now, as we have heard the rumblings, the feelings of their negotiations happening as we speak in Washington, D.C. and in Israel that could lead to another ceasefire, maybe a long-term ceasefire, maybe the end of the war. Again, I sound like I’m on repeat, but hopefully that’s what we’re headed towards. Everyone wants, like you said, like President Trump said, the death to stop. Phone lines are open for you, but when we get back, we’re going to head to ACLJ Jerusalem. Welcome back to Secular. We are joined by Jeff Balaban, ACLJ Jerusalem, head of ACLJ Jerusalem on the phone today. Jeff, as we know, there’s been a lot of rumbling. We’ve been talking about it on this show this morning as we’ve been starting our show. You know, prep, we’re looking at what we’re going to do. We’re going to talk about. We’re like, I don’t even know what we’re going to talk about. But then this sort of rumbling started happening that Prime Minister Netanyahu and the Israeli government is starting to discuss war. another version of what a ceasefire that again i feel like we’re on repeat sometimes could lead to the end of the war again a ceasefire that would release certain amount of hostages living and deceased as well as a ceasefire that would then begin negotiations to end the war it does seem like we’ve heard this many times before but just heading out of the success in iran maybe maybe this is the time and i wanted to get your thoughts i’m not even sure if you would agree that this is the time
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, you know, I think that it might be time. In my view, this is not a war that started October 7th. This war, honestly, has been waged against Israel’s existence since the beginning. We’re approaching 100 years of this war. And I think maybe this is just a time out to figure out a plan to really end this forever war. And I think that with Donald Trump in the White House, with the support of Republican House and Senate, I think now is a good time for Israel to reorder itself, focus on getting the hostages back, and think about a longer-term strategy than just win a battle or win a skirmish, but actually try to end this forever war.
SPEAKER 12 :
Jeff, obviously things that we’ve talked about on this broadcast before. A lot of times we talk about these terms like ceasefire, end of the war. The war will never end, as you said, just because it never began just on October 7th. That has always been going on. It’s for generations, for thousands of years, this war between countries that want to see the destruction of Israel and the Jewish people. And and they’re very ripe for survival. But something like this. And I think a lot of times with with the president that we have and the way that they go about things, if we look at just aside from the terms themselves, ceasefire, end of war, we need that after action that changes the reality on the ground. that a ceasefire with Iran right now is good because there’s not missiles falling into Tel Aviv, but we know there’s still an endgame, that the Ayatollah and the regime cannot be a threat to Israel ongoing. A ceasefire here would need that after action as well, where the security and safety of Jews in Israel and all people of Israel are ensured in perpetuity.
SPEAKER 06 :
I think that Israel’s enemies have all seen the strength of what Israel’s capable of accomplishing, and it’s seen that Donald Trump will stand with Israel. I think that everyone is reassessing their future in this region. And there is a moment, you know, Donald Trump ran repeatedly not just on ending Iranian nukes, but also on ending all these wars. Not just even America’s involvement in these wars, but these ongoing wars. And I do think, and I believe this, there’s a time now, potentially, because the mighty blow that just was struck by Israel against the worst actors in the region, by Donald Trump along with him, there’s a moment to really assess this and end this one. It does seem like it’s eternal, but it doesn’t have to be eternal. And, you know, everything in Israel, it’s very hard to think about Israel just logistically without thinking about the Bible or thinking about God or thinking about miracles. And everyone here is very conscious of that. Everyone here, even, honestly, the most secular people here recognize that it’s something much bigger at play. And it seems like we’re ending a new phase of, potentially, of existence, which always, of course, means just as there’s great good, there’s always great evil in parallel. So hopefully we make the right choices, but it does feel like there’s a change. I want to add something also that I just heard today shortly before I got on the air, which is with me and I want to share with everyone, you know, the ACLJ audience. One of the things that I am noticing here, and someone just articulated it well, is Israelis, by and large, feel very alone in the world. And Donald Trump standing with them was very important. Showing that America stands with them is very important. But honestly, I talk from Jerusalem to our audience mostly in America, I think. I think it’s important also that not just the people that I speak with here at a high level, but that the Israeli public, populace, needs to know there’s so many tens of millions of supporters just in America alone, so many Christians who love Israel and who love the Jewish people and who care, And so, honestly, I think that’s another role that ACLJ can help play. And I’m just sharing this with you because it just happened moments before I came on air, is that it’s starting to live in the message to the Israeli public that they are not alone, that there are people who do care about this, and there is a moment to change everything.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, Jeff, I think we saw some of that over the weekend. This is what happens, I feel like, and maybe there’s good that can come from the bad, which is when you have extreme rhetoric happen, whether that is some of the things that the New York mayoral candidate, Madami, has said, or you go over and see what happened in Glastonbury. at the music festival where there is a bit of a red line where you see the BBC, you see America respond, you see people go, no, no, no, no, this isn’t what we’re talking about. You have now taken it over the line and now you’re going to see the consequences of that. I think this is an interesting time because it’s like, how far could they push us? They pushed the American people and let’s just say the Western people, including the UK, pushed them very far and maybe, Maybe that line is being pushed over the line where a bunch of people, including the own government, has to go, no, we cannot condone this anymore.
SPEAKER 06 :
It’s interesting that Israel expected that they were going to get sympathy and support after October 7th, which they got briefly, but then basically the world turned on it and said, it’s all your fault, and you need to give these Palestinians a state, and you’re doing terrible things, and they’re calling for genocide in the streets. And then isn’t it interesting that when Israel extends itself and shows just what it’s capable of doing, really, honestly, just wiping out Iran’s air defenses and basically controlling it, that now there’s support. You would think it would be the opposite, but the truth is, People are sensitive, whether they’re conscious of it or not, to the fact that God’s in play here. God’s at work, and people are watching it.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, Jeff, I appreciate you joining us today. I know that, look, currently in Jerusalem and throughout Israel, it’s a difficult time, but also maybe there is some light on the horizon. Maybe there is some hope coming through. We appreciate you joining us, joining the team at the ACLJ, obviously keeping us updated because we can talk about as much as we want. You’re living it. You’re there and we appreciate it. It’s why you brought on Secretary Pompeo in the last segment. Why? Because we’re going to talk about the Abraham Accords. We’re going to talk about someone who was involved in being one of the architects of the Abraham Accords. We’re able to do that because of people like you who support the work of the ACLJ, who listen to this show, who watch this show, who engage on a daily basis on ACLJ.org and our social media platforms, who aren’t just… Listeners, you are part of the team. You are engaging with us, and we really do appreciate it. Do we want to try to take this call, or are we running out of time? Let’s go quickly. Jeff, just give me a quick comment. I wanted to get to you, but hold for a little while. Jeff in Ohio, go ahead.
SPEAKER 09 :
Hey, yeah, Logan, I wanted to know, did Operation Rising Lion, we heard about how it degraded their air defenses, their leadership, but what about their secret police, the Basad Iran? Are they degraded enough where the… Iranian people may have a genuine chance to take their country back.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah, I can see Will’s jonesing. Go ahead. Yeah, well, Jeff, I think that’s yet to be seen. And I think it did show that their leadership weren’t as strong as they projected to their people. Now, once again, the information within Iran is very limited. They did shut off the Internet. The lies the Ayatollah is feeding the people are that they beat America. So it all depends on what information could get in there and if this is the right time for the people to overthrow that regime and create a true peaceful society there instead of one that is ruled by the heavy hand of this theocratic dictatorship.
SPEAKER 08 :
All right, that’s going to do it for today’s show. We really appreciate it. As we wrap up this month of June and head into July, we know a lot of you are going to be out on vacation this week. So we encourage you, if you’ve been thinking about supporting the work of the ACLJ, it’s a good time to do it. Go to ACLJ.org. You can join us in the legal fights. And, of course, tomorrow we’re going to be kicking off even more throughout the summer. Be a part of this with us. Again, go to ACLJ.org. I appreciate everyone who listened today. I know that these shows can be packed with information, but hopefully we’ve equipped you with enough information to go take this, talk to your friends, talk to your family. Hopefully you have a good Fourth of July free of politics. But you know what? If it comes up, you’re going to be ready. Talk to you later this week.
