The Duran Podcast
Blinken ceasefire confusion. Gantz out. UNSC Russia abstains
All right, Alexandra, let's talk about the situation in Gaza and in Israel, and we do have quite a bit of news. We have a Security Council resolution that has been passed, Russia abstained from this vote. I'm curious why did Russia abstain? We have Blinken in the Middle East. This is his eighth trip to the Middle East. I believe he is currently in Cairo, and he is pushing for this 3.3-phase plan that is also a bit confusing because the United States says this is an Israeli plan, Israel doesn't seem to be signed up to this plan, and the United States is signaling that Hamas will accept this plan via Qatari intermediaries, and it seems a bit confusing exactly what's happening here. And finally, you could address the resignation of pulling out of the war cabinet of Gantz, who is seen as Netanyahu's number one competitor, his main opposition. He was part of the war cabinet. He's out. He says that Netanyahu does not have a plan going forward for dealing with Hamas and Gaza, and it's my sense that he is, that Gantz is aligned with the Biden White House's plan going forward, and perhaps he's going to be the man that they would like to engineer into the prime ministership of Israel. Anyway, what is going on in this region? I think we're perhaps starting to enter the end game of the Gaza crisis, and it's playing out if you go back and watch our various programs going all the way back to October, it's playing out almost exactly as we said it would. We said that the focal point placed to look at, a lot of people pushed back against us on this, but the focal place to push to look at was the UN and what happened at the UN. And if you remember, we predicted that there would be Security Council ceasefire resolutions passed, that the Biden administration would not be able to withstand this indefinitely, and we are there now. And there, well, obviously we had another ceasefire resolution passed some weeks ago, which Israel ignored, but this is a much stronger ceasefire resolution. And importantly, the United States is committed to it because they themselves drafted the resolution. Now, we say that, of course, a lot of people, a lot of other players have played a role in sorting this resolution out, all of the Arab states will have done so. But the United States, the Biden administration has, in effect, given this resolution, it's clear seal of approval by drafting it and by presenting it to the Security Council. And what we said would happen way back in October is that there would be a war in Gaza if the Israelis did what they were planning to do, that the war would be presented as an attempt to destroy Hamas, that Israel would be unable to destroy Hamas, that the political consequences of trying to do that were the massive casualties that would result would cause huge embarrassment and political problems for the Biden administration, both at the diplomatic level and domestically in the United States, that the United States, that the Biden administration would buckle and that there would be seized by resolution, which basically left Hamas intact and in control of Gaza. Now, if you look at this resolution, that's clearly what it does. It provides for a fairly complex process centered on the release of the hostages and by the way, the release of some Palestinian prisoners, but it envisages a permanent ceasefire and a complete withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza. Hamas, its destruction is not there in the resolution. Hamas, of course, remains intact at the end of this process, as we have repeatedly said, if Hamas remains in existence and Israel is forced to withdraw, Hamas has won. It has won politically, it has even won in a kind of way militarily because its entire objective was to ensure its own survival. And that is almost the point which we have reached. Now, we came very close to that point a few weeks ago when there was a meeting in Qatar between William Burns, the CIA director, who is the Biden administration's point man, the person who does the real negotiation, negotiating, nor Blinken. Anyway, he broke it a deal that was almost identical to this one. The Israelis were furious about it, they saw it as a betrayal, they strongly denounced it, they created a shock within Israel, and of course, Israel responded by launching its operation in Rafa. The operation in Rafa is also not going well, politically, it's causing a huge amount of damage, the Israelis have been talking about enlarging and extending the war by an attack on Hezbollah in Lebanon, the US doesn't want that either before the election, the presidential election in the United States. So the United States, the Biden administration has now sprung this same piece formula which Israel previously rejected. And of course, what they're saying, and I think this is a bare-faced lie, by the way, what they're saying is that this is actually an Israeli plan, that the Israelis have agreed to it, it's a trick, but it's the only way, I think, that they feel that they can somehow square the circle, as you absolutely rightly say, because Netanyahu won't accept this plan, and the hardliners in his government won't accept this plan, even though it's being presented as an Israeli plan. What is happening is that the government is gradually being reshaped, the liberal, the more accommodating politician has been persuaded to leave, and arrangements are being put in place eventually, so that Netanyahu is ousted, glance takes over, and he signs off on this plan. We are exactly where we're heading exactly to that point, which we predicted Israel would find itself in, if it did what Netanyahu and Biden decided it should do back in October – a terrible war, which has exacted a terrible economic cost, which has left Israel isolated, it's led to court judgments, international court judgments against Israel, and I want to stress again that our judgments, because we've had orders made by the international court of justice, and of course, we've also had legal action that had been taken against Netanyahu himself and other Israeli officials. So an absolute complete debacle in every conceivable respect, it'll be interesting to see what the Israelis do and how they get out of it, and notice how this huge event, the media in the West, in the United States, they've clearly been told, say as little about this as possible, we don't want huge control to see, we don't want to get the Israel supporters upset and angry, try and play it down as much as you can, and go along with this pretense that this is an Israeli plan, when it obviously is no such thing. Yeah, so I imagine Netanyahu is going to push back on all of this or a lot of this, obviously he has his own personal problems domestically in Israel that are preventing him from seeking any type of solution or compromise, and the Russian abstaining from the vote, why? Do you have any idea why they have seen it? This is exactly, it goes directly to the point that we've just been discussing, because of course this is being presented as an Israeli plan, and an Abenzia who is the Russian ambassador came forward and said, how is this an Israeli plan? We don't understand what Israel has agreed to, we're being asked to support something which we don't really understand who is agreed to it and who has not. So we're not going to veto it because in every respect we agree with what is contained here, in almost every respect we agreed with what is being contained here, but we're not sure at the moment exactly how this is going to work and how this is actually being put together. And again, it's a position which I'm sure the Russians have agreed with the other countries in the Security Council, which is of course, if it all does fall apart, which it might very well do by the way, and it's far from certain that the Israelis will ultimately go along with this, and it's quite plausible that Hamas might also make issues about it, but on that, be certain that if it does all fall apart, the administration is going to claim that it's Hamas that wrecked the plan to try to shift attention away from the fact that the Israelis are not signed up to it and haven't agreed to it. Anyway, that gives the Russians, it means that they've kept their pounder dry so that if it all falls apart when we go back to the Security Council, the Russians will be able to say, look, we told you so, this has never really agreed. We will span the story and a fable, and we must therefore build on what the United States is agreeing to, but this time we must make it mandatory on the Israelis, and that might involve introducing chapter seven elements into the subsequent resolution. So that's why the Russians have stained. It was precisely because there is uncertainty about what Israel's actual stance really is. There is no uncertainty, the Israelis don't like this. This resolution effectively says Israel has lost, and for that reason, the Israelis are not happy about it at all, and they've not agreed to it. It's exactly the same proposal that they previously rejected. Yeah, it's so confusing because you read the articles that are coming out about this agreement and the interviews with Blinken, and Blinken is in every interview, in every statement that he is saying, he is positioning this as an Israeli plan, and then you read the statements coming out of Netanyahu and his administration, and they're saying, we don't like this plan. That's pretty much what they're saying. This is not our plan. Exactly. We don't like it, but here's Blinken traveling around the Middle East saying, of course Israel signed up to this plan because this is their plan, and you're just like, what is going on here? Yes. I mean, it's that lovely thing, postmodernist narrative construction. It doesn't matter what the actual facts are, whether the Israelis have really agreed to this or not. Just call it an Israeli plan, and it becomes one. Okay, so final question, do you think they're going to get to elections? In September, they're going to have elections. In September, do you think that they will eventually get Netanyahu to call elections? Will his war government and his coalition, will it be forced into elections? And do you also have the hunch that the United States does want Gantz in as Prime Minister? Yes, and I think they will. I mean, I think it's going to be a difficult and tricky thing to do, but there are lots of friends in Israel, and of course they can lean on people in the United States as well. Israeli support is there, who also have influence in Israel. I think that if the military campaigns in Gaza had been a success, Netanyahu's position would have been absolutely solid, but they have not been a success, the political damage has been too great. The legal decisions have been too damaging. He still has support, Netanyahu still has support. And Johnson, Speaker Johnson, has invited him to come to the United States to address Congress. So it's not a foregone conclusion that this is going to turn out the way we said. But if I was a gambling man, which I'm not, by the way, and if I was going to put money on it, I would say more likely than not, that Netanyahu, there are going to be elections in September, and more likely than not, Gantz will emerge as the new Prime Minister of Israel. A Prime Minister who will have to pick up the pieces after a major defeat, and that is what we're looking at. Okay, we will leave it there, thedaran.locals.com. We are on Rumble Odyssey, but shoot Telegram, Rockfin, and Twitter X, and go to the Daran Shop. Pick up some football merch, use the code Football24, take care. [MUSIC] [BLANK_AUDIO]