Title: When Will Israel Attack Iran?
Show: Rachel Blevins
Date: 2024-10-23
URL: https://youtu.be/JKpyBR-tmuk
Duration: 33:00

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[00:00] it is October 23rd 2024 and all eyeses are on the Middle East right now after we had documents leaked here in the US coming from the US intelligence Community specifically referring to Israel's plan the plan to attack Iran those documents also notably confirm the existence of Israel's nuclear weapons program and I wanted to talk about all of that I wanted to talk to an expert in the fields we were able to do just that but just a quick note

[00:30] before we get into the interview just a reminder that I do have a new episode of sanctioned my exclusive series for paid subscribers that is out today in this episode we are doing a deep dive on Israel's current Siege in Northern Gaza the fact that it didn't just start in the last three weeks we are seeing Israel in a position where it is working over time to ethnically cleanse the Gaza Strip of Palestinians we saw a year ago that they were ordering Palestinians to

[01:01] leave the northern half of the Gaza Strip their attempt has been to clear it of people altoe and that attempt hasn't worked in the last year so now they're specifically targeting the remaining 400,000 Palestinians with a new stay and starve order in which they are literally looking to starve out nearly half a million people from this area by cutting off all food water and Medicine in this week's episode of sanctioned we took a look at where things stand now how we

[01:32] got to this point and of course how Netanyahu is looking to proceed on the road to Greater Israel you can find that episode if you are a paid subscriber over on my page on substack that's Rachel bl. substack docomo find it for paid subscribers on my patreon that's patreon.com Rachel blevens thank you so much to all of you who have already signed up as paid subscribers and already are joining the community over there your support truly means the world and now let's get back to today's

[02:04] interview over here on the free feed we talked about the latest when it comes to the Middle East we also talked a little bit about the situation in Ukraine when it comes to us support for Kev and the question of how long that is going to continue as well as where things stand for the media here in the US I know I've talked a lot about the fact that we've seen the kind of unofficial official end of Russian media funding here in the us as we know it and so we took a look at the impact of that here in our media

[02:36] World especially with the upcoming election we discussed all that and more earlier so let's take a listen to that conversation now joining me now to discuss is John kyaku an author journalist and former CIA officer and whistleblower John thanks so much for taking the time to join me oh thanks very much Rachel now I want to get your take on the latest on a few different topics but I want to start off with these leaked documents coming from us intelligence you've got the US saying

[03:06] it's now investigating after highly classified documents were leaked and published on telegram that appeared to show the pentagon's analysis of Israel's plan to attack Iran as presented to Washington's five eyes allies now the files also notably included the acknowledgement that Israel has nuclear weapons which both the US and Israel won't say public so how do you view this I mean yes we all knew that Israel was planning to attack Iran that that attack supposed to

[03:36] be coming at some point but how significant were these files and the fact that they were leaked this is extraordinarily uh important for a couple of reasons first of all every country every every belligerent in in this situation has what they call off-the-shelf plans right so there is always the skeleton of a plan uh for an attack whether it's against Iran or Iraq or the Israelis have it for Lebanon and

[04:08] Yemen and Iran and everybody has has at least the shell of an operational military plan but to have what the United States is apparently calling the plan the actual plan and it's presenting to five eyes is incredibly important what makes it even even more important is this apparent acknowledgment that the Israelis have a nuclear uh bomb now we we all know that the Israelis have a

[04:39] nuclear bomb we've known since the 1980s but this is one of those things that the United States has never publicly acknowledged and certainly Israel has never publicly acknowledged it in fact uh there was an Israeli whistleblower in the 1990s who went public with the fact that Israel has a bomb and um served most of the rest of his life in an Israeli Penitentiary so this is dramatic I just as as side Rachel I have a friend who uh

[05:09] a former CIA officer a former Pentagon uh senior Pentagon um civilian official who wrote a book in retirement about Israel and he made one fleeting reference to um to Israel and he wrote um Israel's nuclear program those were the only three words and when he sent the book to the CIA Publications review board those were the only words that were redacted Israel's nuclear program so now the cat's out of the bag and uh

[05:40] and that makes this a very big deal I'll add I'll add one more thing if you don't mind sure most of the information that we see come out in these leaks is classified at the secret level this because it's nuclear in nature uh would be classified at the top secret level so legally the leak would have to be defined as something causing what they call grave damage to the National Security not ours in this case

[06:12] but Israel's grave damage that's how important this is wow that is interesting and I really I appreciate you breaking it down and really kind of explaining that because I look at this and the first thing I think is not is the Israeli government really scrambling right now the first thing I think is how is Netanyahu going to use this to his Advantage now we know that right now he can get away with just about whatever he wants it seems like on the p on the surface but I also wonder too is there a

[06:44] chance that Netanyahu takes this and he goes oh well you can handle this information and then he uses it to further get leverage over the US government or does he have so much leverage already that it doesn't even matter at this point how do you see kind of the situation when it comes to Israel reaction that's a great question um and I think the I think it has two answers so on the one hand this has to just be infuriating for for Netanyahu and really for any Israeli government official that

[07:14] the cat is out of the bag so there's no upside to Israeli military Secrets being leaked on the other hand the answer to your question is yes this is going to allow Netanyahu to extract yet more concessions from the United States you know he's going to be able to say you couldn't even be trusted with my nuclear secrets now you owe me whether you owe me you know assistance in

[07:45] planning an alternative a carrier battle group in the Eastern Mediterranean maybe you handle Yemen while we handle Iraq or I'm sorry Iran and Lebanon whatever it is it's going to embolden him to ask for yet more yeah and I think that that's uh something the US is probably well scrambling on certainly I did think it was interesting that when it comes to those Anonymous us sources that are then being quoted reacting to this you haven't heard anyone saying oh no you

[08:16] know kind of downplaying it being like Oh those documents weren't real right those were just drawn up instead it's the thing of oh yeah we're we're investigating that right we're we're dealing with it on our end that's right and also curious to when it comes to Israel's plan right the plan to attack Iran the fact that we've kind of had these you know Anonymous us officials again who have been speaking out in recent weeks saying there's going to be an attack it's going to likely happen before election day here in the US which

[08:47] is coming up in just a couple of weeks so how do you view how far the US is willing to let this go in terms of expanding to a full-on war with Iran I mean it it seems like the Biden Administration right they'll they will allow a full-on genocide in Gaza they will allow the killing of hundreds of civilians in Lebanon but when it comes to war with Iran that's been the one thing that they've been like okay let's be a little bit careful here does it seem like they're getting to that point is this just about waiting until getting

[09:18] really through the upcoming election that's that's a tough one to answer I I think in part it's about getting through the election but Netanyahu is going to be focused almost solely on on on offense right he's got an ongoing War genocide in Gaza he has an ongoing war in Lebanon we learned just yesterday that the Israelis killed the new uh leader of Hezbollah we didn't even really know his name very very well here in the United States he had only been

[09:49] the head of his Bala for what a week a week and a half maybe um but all eyes are on Iran and the question at least the question being posed in the in the The Press here in the United States is do the Israelis hit Iranian economic targets because thanks to the jcpoa and the opening of trade relations between Iran and Europe under the jcpoa the economy is actually pretty good right now do the Israelis hit military targets

[10:20] most likely or do the Israelis hit nuclear targets now we know that most of the nuclear Targets in Iran that are worth hitting are deep underground bunker Buster bombs might get some of them the Israelis don't have those bunker Busters we do or do the Israelis use nukes to get to them the conventional wisdom right now at least what's being reported in the American Media uh is that the Israelis are going to go after uh

[10:50] Iranian military targets they're not going to go after the economy they're not going to go after the nukes and they're not going to Target civilians because public opinion is already a problem for the Israelis International public opinion so I think that's what we should expect to see and I think it's going to be um a tough attack in that they're not going to foot around and just you know launch a couple of missiles into into military airport runways to make it difficult for a plane to take off I think we're looking at a

[11:23] pretty heavy attack coming up yeah and especially as more time passes right there's more of a buildup now you've got these League documents out there and I'm also curious too because I know that when it comes to Iran when they initially retaliated against Israel on the 1 of October they had said look if you respond to us we are going to keep escalating right this is going to get very bad they put that warning out there ever since there's been some back and forth of is the US have have they been able to talk to Iran to kind of calm

[11:55] them down a little bit to get them to allow some sort of response from Israel but given all of the assassinations Israel has carried out since then how do you see the position that Iran is in right now and what they could do if Israel does carry out those attacks on Military targets yeah this is a tough one you know everybody really uh that at least everybody that I know lauded the patience that Iran showed U after Ismael hunia was killed in an Israeli attack in

[12:27] Teran right they they blew up the guest house in which he was staying he was the lead uh negotiator uh for Hamas and this was an attack on Iranian uh soil violation of Iranian sovereignty the Iranians responded by launching drones but they were slow drones and the Iranians warned the jordanians and warned the Americans and warned the British that these drones were coming it took them six hours to to reach Israel and seven got through there

[13:00] was no damage the Israeli Iron Dome shot down hundreds of them so it was a show of force but nothing really came of it and everybody said okay the Iranians saved face they didn't do any damage that's going to be the end of it it wasn't the end of it the the Israelis are provocative they continue to be provocative against the Iranians and so we we've gotten to the point now with the assass assination of um of

[13:31] hella where the Iranians had to respond now they did respond it was tougher than it was with the initial drone attack now the Israelis are going to respond again you're you're probably a little too young to remember a Bugs Bunny cartoon but our former our our former colleague um Wimer Leon and I were talking about this the other day where there's this famous cartoon it's from the 50s and um Bugs Bunny and um yed Sam are fighting

[14:04] and one punches the other the other pulls out a knife the other pulls out a gun the other pulls out a cannon they get to the point where their their the world is is uh in between the two of them one's on one side of the world one's on the other and they use nuclear weapons against each other right so it was this very quick um worsening in the situation that's what we're seeing right now between Israel and Iran okay you killed a guy in our country we're going to send

[14:35] some slow motion drones then the Israelis kill Hass asala okay now we're going to use missiles then the Israelis respond we're going to hit your military so what's the response from Iran going to be it's going to have to be tougher and one of the things that we're not hearing in the media right now is what if the Iranians respond but not in Israel not on the battlefield what happens if the Iranians blow up an Israeli Embassy somewhere or a a Jewish uh you know Community Center or

[15:06] somewhere or attack a hotel that is you know frequented by by Jews it's something that we haven't considered and so you know we're frankly not sure how bad this thing can get yeah that I hadn't considered that either I mean I think I was so focused on okay it's going to be the back and forth between the two of them but yeah it does make wonder and we also have the US with troops quite literally all around the world is you know sitting ducks in

[15:36] various places and so a lot of concerns there and I also wonder too you know looking at this from the perspective of an American we're going okay we know that for the US government no matter which party is in office they are going to go above and beyond for Israel it doesn't matter if Israel is carrying out an all out genocide of the Palestinians the US will be there to support them and to make it possible but that's not the only place in the world that the US is meddling or is sending tro well I should say weapons

[16:06] and ammunition to maybe not troops just yet at least officially they also were quite busy over in Ukraine right and you have this situation where the us at least under the Biden Administration they have given Ukraine so much support to the point where they're literally on the road to World War III against Russia now you have at least one of the candidates and in the upcoming election claiming he's going to stop this war now whe whether you believe him or not is another story right but how do you view

[16:36] the current state of us support for Ukraine and how that plays a role in really what we as a country can handle at this point because we have all of these different fires going on in the world that we help set and that we help make bigger and yet the US is acting like we've got everything and everything's fine there was an article in the Washington Post a couple of days ago saying that talk of uh of a potential peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine is an invention of the

[17:08] American political system and it is meant solely for American public opinion and I think that's true but the reason that I believe this conflict is almost over is because the Republican party here in the United States has made a decision that it will not support a blank check for Ukraine this war has been going on now for coming up on three years and it's essentially a stalemate I think what we're going to end up seeing is Congress refusing to

[17:42] play along any longer I should I should even be more specific republicans in Congress refusing to play along the conventional wisdom is that the Republicans are going to retake control of the uh Senate even if the Democrats take control of the house uh you can't get legislation through without agreement from both parties and there just is not agreement on continued Aid to Ukraine if Donald Trump is elected president forget it the whole thing's over literally it's over

[18:14] you know overnight um even if even if kamla Harris wins I don't think she'll be able to get um continued Ukraine Aid through a Republican Senate and so I think that it's beyond time to let the diplomats do what they're paid to do and negotiate an agreement and my guess is that that agreement is going to be exactly what the Russians had proposed in

[18:44] 2022 that they keep uh donet and luhansk of course they keep Crimea uh and Ukraine does not enter NATO I don't think the Russians care if Ukraine joins the European Union but they do not want yet another NATO country on their border I think that's what we're going to see probably sooner rather than later all right to play Devil's Advocate just a little bit here because I may be a bit more cynical I did see and this was several weeks ago now Mr Mike Pompeo came out and he said

[19:17] don't worry if Trump gets in office right he was still plenty supportive of Ukraine when he was in office he's not Joe Biden sure but he still supported them we'll make sure that there is someone in his ear to make sure that Ukraine still gets support from the US now you look at Trump you look at what he said you look at even his running mate JD Vance JD Vance has said we need to stop giving money to Ukraine right we need some accountability there so do you think that a possible second Trump Administration is bulletproof or is

[19:47] there con some concern about some swamp creatures still being a part of his cabinet that are able to get in his ear and say Hey you know Mr Putin he's not giving you everything you want or he's not taking your calls or whatever that thing may be that kind of talks right to Trump's ego and makes him say okay we'll continue on in this way or has he learned more than I'm giving him credit for well Donald Trump is notoriously poor at uh at choosing people with with

[20:17] uh whom to surround himself um you're right about Mike Pompeo Mike Pompeo is a swamp creature here in Washington M Mike Pompeo is very much a Cheney neoconservative as was John Bolton so Trump does have a poor track record of saying the right things when it comes to a more isolationist foreign policy and then appointing neocons who never saw War they didn't want to jump into with both feet but JD Vance is not Mike Pence

[20:51] and Mike Pompeo is not going to be Secretary of State and Republicans on Capitol Hill are far more public now than they were four years ago about Ukraine I think that Trump is going to wield far more Authority on foreign policy than he wielded in his first term because he allowed himself in the first term to be influenced by neoconservatives like John Bolton and they're just not going to be around anymore yeah and I I hope that that's

[21:21] the case right I think I I look at him and I go okay exactly as you said look you were influenced in your first term right you allowed this to be your cabinet you have to learn from that and you have to do better if you get that second shot in the white house now that's right speaking of the upcoming election I know that one of the conversations that has been had it was interesting we we went through Russia gate in 2016 2020 rolled around and all of a sudden you've literally had the US intelligence Community days after the 2020 election going no foreign

[21:52] interference everything's fine right we figured everything out and then come 2024 and all of sudden you've got us intelligence officials already warning that both Russia and Iran may try to incite postelection violence now this is an unclassified assessment that was released today that says the rather released on Tuesday that says the US intelligence Community is increasingly confident that Russian actors are considering and in some cases implementing a broad range of influence

[22:22] efforts timed with the election some of these are aimed at inciting violence and calling into question the validity of democracy as a political system regardless of who wins this may be a new one right it's not just oh they're Pro Trump they're Pro Biden or Harris now it's just our political system as a whole how do you view These Warnings and how seriously we should be taking them well I think that the warnings are probably true on the one hand and on the other

[22:53] hand I don't think we should take them seriously and I I'll tell you why we always do this to other countries always uh other countries always do this to us it's just a reality of life in the 21st century or in the 20th century it happened all the time I I read something recently about uh this warning that the Russians or that that organizations connect connected to Russia were uh taking out Facebook ads in Pennsylvania

[23:23] okay probably true but guess what Facebook said that they were able to trace $30 worth of ads in the state of Pennsylvania $30 so okay let's say that it's true who cares it's not going to amount to anything there was a report that came out yesterday that this this phony report about Tim Walls you know grooming some young guy for sex or whatever uh it turned out

[23:55] that the guy had his identity stolen and he didn't know anything anything about it he's never met Tim Walls he never studied under Tim Walls Tim Walls was not his coach this may have been a Russian operation okay let's assume it was a Russian operation what's the damage there's none because nobody cares the me the mainstream media never picked up this stupid story and the alternative media that did pick it up made it sound so stupid and so foolish that nobody took it seriously so you know this is just this

[24:26] is just a reality that we live in in the in the digital age where there are going to be foreign intelligence actors meddling like this and those foreign intelligence actors include the United States we medal like this I'll give you one other example I used to be the chief investigator at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee uh when uh 2009 to 2012 and um I went to Afghanistan to do a study on the heroin poppy crop

[24:59] and I concluded that this was a serious problem because at the time Afghanistan was producing 93% of the world's heroin well then I was told you might not want to publish this study because we want Afghanistan to produce 93% of the world's heroin because almost all of that heroin goes to Russia and Iran and we want them to be addicted to heroin because it weakens their societies well it's the same thing

[25:31] today right they want to interfere in our elections because it causes a little bit of chaos and perhaps it weakens us that's just a reality of the way the world works today yeah and I really want to know if anyone's vote if anyone's mind at all are their opinion on any issue has ever been changed by a Facebook ad right whether exactly Hillary Clinton Harris Trump I don't care I want to know if you were out there reach out to me and let me know because yeah it's it's mindboggling to think and I know the US always tries to

[26:03] act like they have the upper hand right how dare anyone else have any sort of whether it's Facebook ads whether it's direct meddling or you know putting out stories that may cause people to be like oh well that I didn't know that about Tim Walls and of course that's also the concern too is are people going to do their own research but I guess that's also up to the people right if you hear a story about Tim Walls are you taking the second step to look further into that to see what are the actual sources where did this come from is it corroborated by multiple different

[26:35] sources lastly what are your concerns when it comes to the American people where we stand and also how complacent we have become in some ways when it comes to our news media and what we just ultimately believe if it kind of fits into our Echo chamber of where our political belief stand I'm worried about that Rachel I don't know if you saw any of the um the media reports related to the demise of our former Outlet uh Sputnik you and I were colleagues of course at sputnick uh

[27:07] it it wasn't very widely reported but there were a couple of radio oriented uh journals that said that we had been shut down and they they celebrated the fact that we were shut down and they criticized us they criticized You by name as a matter of fact uh because they said that uh you spent some of the time in your last show talking about the so-called genocide in Palestine so yes I did yeah so my my point is we were the only ones talking

[27:39] about the the genocide in Palestine we were the only ones talking about human rights and now we're gone we're not on the air and people can't have access to an independent voice on Foreign Affairs and politics or whatever it else whatever else it is that we were talking about um that's not the American way our media today uh is just an echo chamber where you know you can Tinker around the edges there are little

[28:10] differences between you know Fox and CNN and MSNBC I suppose but if you want an alternative voice in America you can't get it I used to watch Al jazer um every day every single day not all day but I would switch I I I watch all the networks and I include Fox and CNN and MSNBC and BBC and um Al jazer and whatever else I could get on my on my provider well aler is gone it's just

[28:42] gone you can't watch it anymore you can't watch RT anymore here in the United States it just doesn't exist you can watch BBC which just Echoes what you see on CNN but that's it if you want an alternative voice you're of luck it doesn't exist and so this this is bad for America because it doesn't give both sides of every story it doesn't help to educate or inform Americans so that Americans can make an informed decision

[29:14] in the voting booth or in the newspaper oped columns or anywhere else we get only one side we get the American side the official side and then that's it and that makes us worse yeah oh absolutely and that's the thing is it's like if you don't like if you're CNN in Fox News you don't like how popular rch or Sputnik are becoming instead of looking at their news and what they're putting out and going okay what can we do better right what can we

[29:44] do to bring viewers back to us they're just like how can we shut down the opposing side right or not even not even opposing side but how can we shut down the other voices out there the competition that is out there and you know if if I have to have a final show and I'm criticized for you know talking about an ongoing genocide then I will take that because I don't think that I'm ever going to look back exactly I don't think I'm ever going to look back and think well I wish I hadn't done that or I wish I hadn't raised awareness about the Palestinians that were being

[30:15] slaughtered using weapons that were made in the USA let me add one other thing too before we leave um The Washington Post listened to one of my shows as well and it was a show uh in which we had a guest named Paul Wright who's the founder of the human rights defense center in Florida it's a it's a prisoners rights organization we also had the independent journalist Kevin gustala and on this uh episode of of my show on Sputnik we were talking about a

[30:47] crooked judge in Pennsylvania who had taken bribes to send children juvenile Defenders to a private prison so the private prison makes a a profit when it's full and it was kicking back some of the profit to the judge the Washington Post listened to that episode and said the next day that I was weakening our democracy those were their words I was weakening our democracy by talking about this issue on

[31:17] a Russian radio station it wasn't the judge who was weakening our democracy or the private prison company incarcerating children for a profet I was the one and it's like you know our media they just don't get it they just don't get it yeah they don't even realize that it's literally what they're saying out loud right this is the reason that no one trusts you and that trust in the media here in the US is that in alltime low here this year as it should be and

[31:48] yet another reminder why anyone watching this be sure if there are any independent journalists out there alternative media that you value make sure that you are following them on all platforms because as we've seen the big Tech ones are not safe certainly a lot of moving Parts here all around and I really appreciate you taking the time to join me today to break down all of the latest John kyaku an author journalist and former CIA officer and whistleblower thank you so much for your time and insight thank you Rachel I want to say

[32:20] also that it was such a great pleasure to work with you you are a real newsperson I wish you the very best going at alone you deserve success oh well thank you I appreciate that and I hope we get to have more of these conversations I know you have a million projects going on all at once and so I look forward to following everything that you do thank you Rachel if anything in this video resonated with you be sure to like it share it with your friends leave a comment and as always don't forget to subscribe and if you want to keep up with all of my work make sure

[32:52] that you're subscribed to my page on substack that's Rachel bin. substack doccom if you want to support my work you can also check out my page on patreon that's patreon.com Rachel blevens that's where you can join the community there and as always thank you all so much for all of your support I'll see you next time
