November 12, 2024 • 20 mins
Robert sits down and walks through the reactions to Trump's victory among Gazans, and the different possibilities for what comes next.
Sources:
Palestinians dismayed by Trump's win, their leaders urge peace | Reuters
Gaza’s Cease-Fire Talks Will Probably Wait Until After Trump’s Inauguration - The New York Times
Trump Wants to End Gaza War on Israel’s Terms
Trump's election promises even more pain for Palestinians
U.S. presidential election: Why Trump's phone call with Netanyahu is so alarming.
Israeli Officials Embrace Trump Victory, Despite His Unpredictability - The New York Times
Donald Trump uses expletive to attack ex-ally Benjamin Netanyahu
No guarantees Trump will give Netanyahu all he wants
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Also media, Hello everyone, and welcome back to it could
happen here. I'm Robert Evans, and you know, along with
all of our other correspondents, I'm looking forward to what
we can expect from the Trump administration, which is a
broad and far reaching question given the ambitions that Trump
(00:22):
and the others who I think will be involved in
this new administration have already expressed.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
And the elevator pitch theme of today's episode is what's
going to happen in Gaza once Trump is president again?
Will things get better or worse? Obviously the expectation is worse.
I think that's where certainly the safe money goes if
you're putting money on this. But the short answer to
that question is no, one fully knows now. The first
(00:51):
thing that I did when trying to prepare for this
episode was tracked down as many articles as I could
that included interviews with Gozen's about their expectations were largely negative,
but a little more mixed than you might expect. A
Reuter's reporter interviewed Abu Osama, living in Conunis in the
southern Gaza strip. He called Trump's election a quote new
(01:13):
catastrophe in the history of the Palestinian people, adding despite
the destruction, death and displacement that we have witnessed, what
is coming will be more difficult. It will be politically devastating.
This essentially agrees with what a Palestinian from beit Lahia
in the Northern Gaza Strip, Ahmed Jerad told Al Jazeera quote.
(01:35):
Trump and Netanyahu are an evil alliance against the Palestinians,
and our fate will be very difficult, not only in
the fateful issues, but also in our daily concerns. This
is a sad day for Palestinians. Trump will endorse net
Nyahu's free hand regarding the possibility of the return of
settlements to the Gaza Strip and even the displacement of
large numbers of Palestinians outside it. We hope to return
(01:57):
to the north, and now all of our hopes have
and shattered, and unfortunately Jerrod's fears here have been immediately
proven well founded. On November sixth, as the rest of
the world reeled from Trump's victory, IDF Brigadier General Itzig
Kohen told Israeli reporters there is no intention of allowing
the residents of the Northern Gaza Strip to return to
(02:19):
their homes. Humanitarian aid would only be allowed to enter
through the south. His justification was that there are no
more civilians in the north. Reporting from The Guardian interviewed
several international humanitarian law experts, and the members of that
likely dying field described Israeli actions here as war crimes.
(02:39):
The forcible transfer of civilian populations and the use of
food as a weapon are supposed to be banned. Despite this,
we can safely assume that there will be no serious
consequences as a result of any of this. Now, the
timing of this announcement was predominant, and it is not
unreasonable to suggest that Israel might not have been as
(02:59):
bold as they're currently being if Harris had won another Gozen.
Seventy year old doctor Zakia Hilal told Al Jazeera it
is true that American administrations do not differ in supporting Israel,
but some are more severe and more intense than others,
like Trump. You can find numerous gosins expressing feelings along
these lines if you read long enough. But you will
(03:21):
also find a number who feel like what's coming won't
be worse, or at least won't be very different from
what they've already endured. Jehad Malaka, a researcher at the
Palestinian Planning Center, told Al Jazeera he does not expect
Trump's administration to be wildly different from Biden's. In this regard,
Trump uses rough tools and Biden and the Democrats resort
(03:42):
to soft tools, but the politics are the same. Biden
did not make any decision in favor of the Palestinians
and was unable to achieve a ceasefire. He did not
change the reality of the decisions of his predecessor Trump
at all. The positions of the two administrations regarding Israel
are the same and identical, and they put its interests
above all other considerations. You can also find some Gazans
(04:06):
who see a sliver of hope in Trump's new administration.
Reuter spoke with the owner of a grocery store in Gaza,
Khaled Desuso, who told their reporter, I think Donald Trump,
if he wins, he promised the Muslim people in America
to stop the war in Gaza. We hope that happens,
and it's not necessarily absurd to hope that there may
(04:26):
be some positive effects here. Trump has said many horrible
things about Palestinians, obviously, several weeks before the election, he
had a phone call with net Yahoo that may have
been a vihilation of the Logan Act, although laws don't
really matter anymore. Here's how Slate dot Com summarized what
happened in that call. According to Trump, the Israeli leaders
said he disregarded President Joe Biden's warning to keep troops
(04:48):
out of Rafa in southern Gaza, a decision that resulted
in the killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar in a
shootout in the area. Trump also said nat Nyahu asked
him for advice on how to respond to Iran's missile
attack on his to which Trump said he responded, do
whatever you have to do. Now, that's a dire sign,
and it is impossible to imagine that a new Trump
regime won't restart the sale in shipment of specific munitions
(05:12):
that Biden banned for export to Israel this July. Biden
halted the shipment of two thousand pound bombs to the
IDF because quote, they cannot be used in Gazo or
any populated area without causing great human tragedy and damage. Now,
the fact that munitions like this will very likely be
used as hideous and I think it's extremely unlikely that
(05:33):
we do not see an immediate rise in the death toll.
But at the same time, Israel's extant acts have caused
great human tragedy and damage. The munitions they have have
already been responsible for calamitous death and destruction on a
fairly wide scale. So where's the cause for any optimism
on this at all? It comes from Trump's own self interest.
(05:55):
As Khalide de Suso noted, Trump ran promising to end wars.
This means he does have some vested interest, even if
only in his own ego, in forcing NETANYAHUO to draw
things to a close in short order. And there is
indeed reporting that Trump has told net Nyahu to wrap
things up by January so that he can take office
(06:15):
with an end to the conflict and ideally use that
as a way to kind of bolster his early popularity
and gain some political capital for the other sweeping changes
he wants to make. Now. The fact that Trump is
pushing net Yahoo on ending things in January doesn't mean
a sudden, peaceful ceasefire. For one thing, Nothing is going
to happen in the months between then and now. To
(06:36):
reduce the level of bloodshed and almost every likely theoretical
ends with Israel massively escalating violence and using new, more
destructive weapons before bringing an end to their campaign. But
it does mean that Trump might be able to pressure
bb to bring things to an end. There's a good
article on this in the BBC. No guarantees Trump will
give net Nyahoo all he wants now. In that piece,
(07:00):
East correspondent Lucy Williamson writes, Donald Trump's first term in
office was exemplary as far as Israel is concerned. Said
Michael Oran, a former Israeli ambassador to the United States,
the hope is that he'll revisit that, but we have
to be very clear sighted about who Donald Trump is
and what he stands for. Firstly, he said, the former
president doesn't like wars, seeing them as expensive. Trump has
(07:22):
urged Israel to finish the war in Gaza quickly. He's
also not a big fan of israel settlements in the
occupied West Bank, has set Ambassador Oran, and has opposed
the wishes of some Israeli leaders to annex parts of it.
Both of these policies could put him in conflict with
far right parties in Netanyahu's current governing coalition, who have
threatened to bring down the government if the Prime Minister
(07:43):
pursues policies they reject. Michael Orn believes net Yaho will
need to take a different approach with the incoming president.
If Donald Trump comes to office in January and says, okay,
you have a week to finish the war, net Yahoo
is going to have to respect that. And we'll contain
you talking about what this means. But first here's semants.
(08:13):
So it is possible that we will see a quick
end to the violence in January, and perhaps a quicker
one than we would have seen under Harris. That's the
best case scenario and not necessarily the likeliest one, and
I should re emphasize here that best case scenario still
means that we will probably see a massive escalation in
violence as the IDF seeks to force more people out
(08:36):
of northern Gaza and in the conflict, with a large
slice of Gaza permanently wrenched from Palestinian control and hand
it over to Israeli settlers, there is no version of
what comes next that is not a calamity to the
Palestinian people. Now, the signs from within the Israeli government
on what a new Trump administration means for them are
(08:57):
certainly bullish, you could say, and reading these tea leaves
provides very little fuel for optimism. It Mar ben Vere,
the Minister of National Security, posted yes with several lesses
and an emoji of a flexed bicep in a post
on social media. When the first good return started coming
in for Trump on the day of the election itself,
(09:18):
and a sign of confidence in the coming results, Bibi
Netanyahu fired his Defense Minister Jove Gallant, who had been
his primary point of contact with the Biden administration. And
it's harder to imagine a much more direct sign of
what he wants to do than that. Now. I've struggled
to present the sweep of possible results of this, and
it bears reiterating that the bulk of predictions from Gazans
(09:41):
who are plugged into the politics of the region are
incredibly negative. Ahmed Fayad, an independent researcher in Israeli affairs
who currently resides in central Gaza, told Al Jazeera that
he felt Trump's influence would be entirely negative, adding that
Trump was a quote more dominating figure than Biden and
(10:01):
his influence would allow net Nyahu to quote conquer Gaza quote.
Amidst the weakened Palestinian Front and absence of any Arab
unity and solidarity, the whole Palestinian cause faces its worst
threat yet. Now. What does bear watching is the degree
to which BIEB might face threats from his own right flank.
(10:22):
Net Nyahu himself is almost certainly on the side of
doing what will please his patron Trump all the more,
and that would be forcing a quick violent end to
the fighting and taking northern Gaza as the spoils of war.
But this might bring him into conflict with radicals on
his own side, who can't be placated by anything but
what they would see as total victory. In the event
(10:44):
net Nyahu feels pushed, it is not impossible that he
will wind up in conflict with Trump. This has happened before,
as BB's sense of self preservation led him to take
actions that enraged Trump. The best example of this took
place in the immediate aftermath of the twenty two election.
If you want to think back to those happier days,
b B was again the first world leader to call
(11:06):
and offer Biden congratulations on his victory, as he was
with Trump. This is a habit for the man who,
among other things, is an expert at toadying for favor
with US leaders. Trump was livid, and he spoke out
about this, telling Israeli journalist Barak Ravid that he believed
that he had saved Israel from destruction, and in response,
Netnyahoo had stabbed him in the back. I'm going to
(11:28):
quote now from an article in the BBC. Mister Trump
accused mister Netnyahuo of congratulating too quickly mister Trump's successor,
Joe Biden on winning the twenty twenty US election. Mister
Trump disputed the election result, though his claims were never upheld.
The first person who congratulated Joe Biden was Bbe, the
man that I did more for than any other person
(11:48):
I dealt with. Bibe could have stayed quiet. He has
made a terrible mistake. He was very early, mister Trump said,
like earlier than most. I haven't spoken to him since.
Fuck him. I actually don't know that he said fuck
The actual text of the article says expletive him. But
I'm assuming he said fuck him. I think that's probably
a fair assumption for me to make. Now, some evidence
(12:11):
does suggest that Trump and Bib don't personally get along,
as that quote I just read implies, certainly not to
the degree that net Nyahu and Biden once did once.
I should say this may hinge partly on the fact
that Trump really only believes in himself and his own benefit,
whereas Joe Biden was a strong and committed believer in
Israel and was willing to take actions against his own
(12:33):
political self interest in furtherance of that belief. And we've
all seen where those actions got him. Just last December,
Trump attacked net Nahou at an early campaign rally in
New York, saying bib had quote let us down by
pulling Israeli support for the operation that killed Iranian General
Cossum Solomoni at the last minute. He also criticized the
(12:55):
Israeli leader for not being prepared for Hermas's October seventh attack. Now,
I want to be clear here that these divisions between
both men are blisteringly unlikely to mean anything that approaches
relief for the Palestinian people, at least in the near term.
The immediate and probably long term future of Gaza is
much bleaker today than it was a few weeks ago.
(13:18):
The Guardian recently published an article interviewing former CIA director
and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. He predicted Trump would give
Bibe a blank check for aggression, which might invite the
possibility of open war with Iran. Now that's the kind
of thing that can lead one to panic, especially when
you assume a guy like Panetta is privy to a
lot of inside information. We may not be, but I'm
(13:40):
actually not really sure that he is. I don't see
any evidence from this article that Panetta is speaking from
direct personal knowledge about extant plans to carry out an attack. Instead,
he quoted Trump's description of the call that Trump had
had with bb before the election, telling net Yahoo, do
whatever you have to do. So Leon may just be
(14:01):
working from the same information the rest of us have
and coming to a somewhat different conclusion. I'm not as
sure as he is about an imminent attack on Iran
because Trump campaigned heavily on ending wars, and while I
don't credit Trump is a particularly honest man, I do
think he sees his personal benefit right now in being
able to portray himself as a peacemaker, in part because
(14:23):
he has so much domestically he wants to do, and
so much else internationally he wants to do. Right expending
a bunch of political capital, dealing with the kinds of
protests and unrest and even anger from his base that
a war with Iran would mean, especially once it gets
bogged down in the kind of violence that would come
with that. He may not and likely doesn't see that
as being of benefit to him. Now, that doesn't mean
(14:46):
it will never happen. It doesn't mean his calculus won't change.
I do foresee some situations in which Trump might decide
that his personal benefit is in there being a wider
ground conflict with Iran that US forces get drawn into.
You know, we'll talk a little bit about some of
the possibilities around this, and we're getting outside of the
(15:06):
realm of kind of established fact at this point, but
I do think it's worth considering some of this. But
first consider these ads. So, when we talk about the
possibility of a ground conflict with Iran starting between Israel
(15:30):
and Iran, but almost inevitably drawing in more US forces,
the unknowns and unknown knowns in this situation are pretty staggering.
If I let myself analyze every possibility, my mind can
go to some dark places. Trump sees war with Iran
as a negative. Now I'm quite sure, But how would
he feel about it in the wake of, say, a
Musk centered plan to in the federal reserve and tank
(15:51):
the dollar, in the wake of the changes that all
of his immigration policies would make on the price of food,
the Pression era levels of inflation and unemployment returning to
the United States, and the attendant social unrest that that
would cause. If Americans find themselves on the verge of
food rights, perhaps Trump would gamble on war being the
best distraction he could manage. It's certainly not impossible. Now,
(16:15):
I don't know how useful it is to bury myself
in theoreticals and probabilities. The known threats are dire enough,
and they demand full time awareness in order to attempt
to counter and endure. So instead of spiraling, I'm going
to leave you today with the words of another Ghazan,
Mohammed R. Mausch. He's a journalist who wrote an article
for MSNBC right after the election titled My family and
(16:38):
I Survived the War in Gaza. We know Trump's America
won't save us, and here's Mohammed For us. The election
of Donald Trump isn't just a blip on the political
radar or a shift in foreign policy. It's a challenge
to sustain existence while the world seems intent on erasing us.
It's about surviving seventy seven years under occupation and over
(16:59):
a year of all ongoing genocide, the very genocide I
barely survived last December, when my family and I, including
my elderly parents and three year old son, were buried
under the rubble of what was once our home after
it was struck by an Israeli fired US missal. The
date December seventh, twenty twenty three. Our bones were crushed
between layers of concrete and twisted metal as we spent
(17:20):
hours in the dark, buried together and praying to be
pulled out in one piece. The trauma of that night,
in both its physical and emotional toll, of my son's small,
fragile hand clinging to mind, comes back to me now
as Trump prepares to take power once more. I've seen
how American political leader's toy with the idea of change.
(17:40):
How they dress up their campaigns with grand ideas about
peace and justice, yet each president brushes off our reality.
Barack Obama promised hope and change we could believe in,
yet we got more bombs. Joe Biden offered a different approach,
pledging and yielding support for Israel, leaving us to live
through even more horror. Vice President Kamala Harris Niceties included
(18:01):
no concrete promises to protect Palestinians, but she did pledge
to continue financial support for Israel, and Trump's blundness as
he promises to come back swinging reminds us not to
hold out hope for change. So, you know, not much
optimism here, but I do really recommend reading that article
(18:22):
that MSNBC published. You know, it's bleak, but important, especially
given the fact that you know we may be soon
entering a world where it would be harder for people
like Muhammad to express their feelings and their truth to
an audience. I don't think it's unlikely that a clamp
down is coming on some of these things. It's hard
(18:43):
to say how extensive it will be, but there's a
threat that you know, Israel and their backers see in
the way that public sympathy has built so quickly for
Gaza in a way that wasn't present with a lot
of previous stages of violence between Israel in Gaza. Right now,
this is the result of a lot of videos spreading
(19:03):
on social media. It's the result on of voices from
Gaza getting out and getting to people in a way
they really hadn't before. And so one thing that does
worry me greatly when I think about what's going to
happen in Gaza under President Trump is not just what's
going to happen to the people living there right now,
but what's going to happen to their ability to tell
their story, to get information out to the rest of us.
(19:27):
That is very much an open question at this moment,
but it's certainly one that should be on your lips,
and it's one that we will be investigating here at
cool Zone as long as we're able to continue doing
that until next time. I'm Robert Evans. We'll be back
tomorrow and every other day reporting on you know, the world.
(19:51):
It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media.
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
Coolzonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeart
Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
You can now find sources for it Could Happen here
listed directly in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening,
Also media, Hello everyone, and welcome back to it could
happen here. I'm Robert Evans, and you know, along with
all of our other correspondents, I'm looking forward to what
we can expect from the Trump administration, which is a
broad and far reaching question given the ambitions that Trump
(00:22):
and the others who I think will be involved in
this new administration have already expressed.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
And the elevator pitch theme of today's episode is what's
going to happen in Gaza once Trump is president again?
Will things get better or worse? Obviously the expectation is worse.
I think that's where certainly the safe money goes if
you're putting money on this. But the short answer to
that question is no, one fully knows now. The first
(00:51):
thing that I did when trying to prepare for this
episode was tracked down as many articles as I could
that included interviews with Gozen's about their expectations were largely negative,
but a little more mixed than you might expect. A
Reuter's reporter interviewed Abu Osama, living in Conunis in the
southern Gaza strip. He called Trump's election a quote new
(01:13):
catastrophe in the history of the Palestinian people, adding despite
the destruction, death and displacement that we have witnessed, what
is coming will be more difficult. It will be politically devastating.
This essentially agrees with what a Palestinian from beit Lahia
in the Northern Gaza Strip, Ahmed Jerad told Al Jazeera quote.
(01:35):
Trump and Netanyahu are an evil alliance against the Palestinians,
and our fate will be very difficult, not only in
the fateful issues, but also in our daily concerns. This
is a sad day for Palestinians. Trump will endorse net
Nyahu's free hand regarding the possibility of the return of
settlements to the Gaza Strip and even the displacement of
large numbers of Palestinians outside it. We hope to return
(01:57):
to the north, and now all of our hopes have
and shattered, and unfortunately Jerrod's fears here have been immediately
proven well founded. On November sixth, as the rest of
the world reeled from Trump's victory, IDF Brigadier General Itzig
Kohen told Israeli reporters there is no intention of allowing
the residents of the Northern Gaza Strip to return to
(02:19):
their homes. Humanitarian aid would only be allowed to enter
through the south. His justification was that there are no
more civilians in the north. Reporting from The Guardian interviewed
several international humanitarian law experts, and the members of that
likely dying field described Israeli actions here as war crimes.
(02:39):
The forcible transfer of civilian populations and the use of
food as a weapon are supposed to be banned. Despite this,
we can safely assume that there will be no serious
consequences as a result of any of this. Now, the
timing of this announcement was predominant, and it is not
unreasonable to suggest that Israel might not have been as
(02:59):
bold as they're currently being if Harris had won another Gozen.
Seventy year old doctor Zakia Hilal told Al Jazeera it
is true that American administrations do not differ in supporting Israel,
but some are more severe and more intense than others,
like Trump. You can find numerous gosins expressing feelings along
these lines if you read long enough. But you will
(03:21):
also find a number who feel like what's coming won't
be worse, or at least won't be very different from
what they've already endured. Jehad Malaka, a researcher at the
Palestinian Planning Center, told Al Jazeera he does not expect
Trump's administration to be wildly different from Biden's. In this regard,
Trump uses rough tools and Biden and the Democrats resort
(03:42):
to soft tools, but the politics are the same. Biden
did not make any decision in favor of the Palestinians
and was unable to achieve a ceasefire. He did not
change the reality of the decisions of his predecessor Trump
at all. The positions of the two administrations regarding Israel
are the same and identical, and they put its interests
above all other considerations. You can also find some Gazans
(04:06):
who see a sliver of hope in Trump's new administration.
Reuter spoke with the owner of a grocery store in Gaza,
Khaled Desuso, who told their reporter, I think Donald Trump,
if he wins, he promised the Muslim people in America
to stop the war in Gaza. We hope that happens,
and it's not necessarily absurd to hope that there may
(04:26):
be some positive effects here. Trump has said many horrible
things about Palestinians, obviously, several weeks before the election, he
had a phone call with net Yahoo that may have
been a vihilation of the Logan Act, although laws don't
really matter anymore. Here's how Slate dot Com summarized what
happened in that call. According to Trump, the Israeli leaders
said he disregarded President Joe Biden's warning to keep troops
(04:48):
out of Rafa in southern Gaza, a decision that resulted
in the killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar in a
shootout in the area. Trump also said nat Nyahu asked
him for advice on how to respond to Iran's missile
attack on his to which Trump said he responded, do
whatever you have to do. Now, that's a dire sign,
and it is impossible to imagine that a new Trump
regime won't restart the sale in shipment of specific munitions
(05:12):
that Biden banned for export to Israel this July. Biden
halted the shipment of two thousand pound bombs to the
IDF because quote, they cannot be used in Gazo or
any populated area without causing great human tragedy and damage. Now,
the fact that munitions like this will very likely be
used as hideous and I think it's extremely unlikely that
(05:33):
we do not see an immediate rise in the death toll.
But at the same time, Israel's extant acts have caused
great human tragedy and damage. The munitions they have have
already been responsible for calamitous death and destruction on a
fairly wide scale. So where's the cause for any optimism
on this at all? It comes from Trump's own self interest.
(05:55):
As Khalide de Suso noted, Trump ran promising to end wars.
This means he does have some vested interest, even if
only in his own ego, in forcing NETANYAHUO to draw
things to a close in short order. And there is
indeed reporting that Trump has told net Nyahu to wrap
things up by January so that he can take office
(06:15):
with an end to the conflict and ideally use that
as a way to kind of bolster his early popularity
and gain some political capital for the other sweeping changes
he wants to make. Now. The fact that Trump is
pushing net Yahoo on ending things in January doesn't mean
a sudden, peaceful ceasefire. For one thing, Nothing is going
to happen in the months between then and now. To
(06:36):
reduce the level of bloodshed and almost every likely theoretical
ends with Israel massively escalating violence and using new, more
destructive weapons before bringing an end to their campaign. But
it does mean that Trump might be able to pressure
bb to bring things to an end. There's a good
article on this in the BBC. No guarantees Trump will
give net Nyahoo all he wants now. In that piece,
(07:00):
East correspondent Lucy Williamson writes, Donald Trump's first term in
office was exemplary as far as Israel is concerned. Said
Michael Oran, a former Israeli ambassador to the United States,
the hope is that he'll revisit that, but we have
to be very clear sighted about who Donald Trump is
and what he stands for. Firstly, he said, the former
president doesn't like wars, seeing them as expensive. Trump has
(07:22):
urged Israel to finish the war in Gaza quickly. He's
also not a big fan of israel settlements in the
occupied West Bank, has set Ambassador Oran, and has opposed
the wishes of some Israeli leaders to annex parts of it.
Both of these policies could put him in conflict with
far right parties in Netanyahu's current governing coalition, who have
threatened to bring down the government if the Prime Minister
(07:43):
pursues policies they reject. Michael Orn believes net Yaho will
need to take a different approach with the incoming president.
If Donald Trump comes to office in January and says, okay,
you have a week to finish the war, net Yahoo
is going to have to respect that. And we'll contain
you talking about what this means. But first here's semants.
(08:13):
So it is possible that we will see a quick
end to the violence in January, and perhaps a quicker
one than we would have seen under Harris. That's the
best case scenario and not necessarily the likeliest one, and
I should re emphasize here that best case scenario still
means that we will probably see a massive escalation in
violence as the IDF seeks to force more people out
(08:36):
of northern Gaza and in the conflict, with a large
slice of Gaza permanently wrenched from Palestinian control and hand
it over to Israeli settlers, there is no version of
what comes next that is not a calamity to the
Palestinian people. Now, the signs from within the Israeli government
on what a new Trump administration means for them are
(08:57):
certainly bullish, you could say, and reading these tea leaves
provides very little fuel for optimism. It Mar ben Vere,
the Minister of National Security, posted yes with several lesses
and an emoji of a flexed bicep in a post
on social media. When the first good return started coming
in for Trump on the day of the election itself,
(09:18):
and a sign of confidence in the coming results, Bibi
Netanyahu fired his Defense Minister Jove Gallant, who had been
his primary point of contact with the Biden administration. And
it's harder to imagine a much more direct sign of
what he wants to do than that. Now. I've struggled
to present the sweep of possible results of this, and
it bears reiterating that the bulk of predictions from Gazans
(09:41):
who are plugged into the politics of the region are
incredibly negative. Ahmed Fayad, an independent researcher in Israeli affairs
who currently resides in central Gaza, told Al Jazeera that
he felt Trump's influence would be entirely negative, adding that
Trump was a quote more dominating figure than Biden and
(10:01):
his influence would allow net Nyahu to quote conquer Gaza quote.
Amidst the weakened Palestinian Front and absence of any Arab
unity and solidarity, the whole Palestinian cause faces its worst
threat yet. Now. What does bear watching is the degree
to which BIEB might face threats from his own right flank.
(10:22):
Net Nyahu himself is almost certainly on the side of
doing what will please his patron Trump all the more,
and that would be forcing a quick violent end to
the fighting and taking northern Gaza as the spoils of war.
But this might bring him into conflict with radicals on
his own side, who can't be placated by anything but
what they would see as total victory. In the event
(10:44):
net Nyahu feels pushed, it is not impossible that he
will wind up in conflict with Trump. This has happened before,
as BB's sense of self preservation led him to take
actions that enraged Trump. The best example of this took
place in the immediate aftermath of the twenty two election.
If you want to think back to those happier days,
b B was again the first world leader to call
(11:06):
and offer Biden congratulations on his victory, as he was
with Trump. This is a habit for the man who,
among other things, is an expert at toadying for favor
with US leaders. Trump was livid, and he spoke out
about this, telling Israeli journalist Barak Ravid that he believed
that he had saved Israel from destruction, and in response,
Netnyahoo had stabbed him in the back. I'm going to
(11:28):
quote now from an article in the BBC. Mister Trump
accused mister Netnyahuo of congratulating too quickly mister Trump's successor,
Joe Biden on winning the twenty twenty US election. Mister
Trump disputed the election result, though his claims were never upheld.
The first person who congratulated Joe Biden was Bbe, the
man that I did more for than any other person
(11:48):
I dealt with. Bibe could have stayed quiet. He has
made a terrible mistake. He was very early, mister Trump said,
like earlier than most. I haven't spoken to him since.
Fuck him. I actually don't know that he said fuck
The actual text of the article says expletive him. But
I'm assuming he said fuck him. I think that's probably
a fair assumption for me to make. Now, some evidence
(12:11):
does suggest that Trump and Bib don't personally get along,
as that quote I just read implies, certainly not to
the degree that net Nyahu and Biden once did once.
I should say this may hinge partly on the fact
that Trump really only believes in himself and his own benefit,
whereas Joe Biden was a strong and committed believer in
Israel and was willing to take actions against his own
(12:33):
political self interest in furtherance of that belief. And we've
all seen where those actions got him. Just last December,
Trump attacked net Nahou at an early campaign rally in
New York, saying bib had quote let us down by
pulling Israeli support for the operation that killed Iranian General
Cossum Solomoni at the last minute. He also criticized the
(12:55):
Israeli leader for not being prepared for Hermas's October seventh attack. Now,
I want to be clear here that these divisions between
both men are blisteringly unlikely to mean anything that approaches
relief for the Palestinian people, at least in the near term.
The immediate and probably long term future of Gaza is
much bleaker today than it was a few weeks ago.
(13:18):
The Guardian recently published an article interviewing former CIA director
and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. He predicted Trump would give
Bibe a blank check for aggression, which might invite the
possibility of open war with Iran. Now that's the kind
of thing that can lead one to panic, especially when
you assume a guy like Panetta is privy to a
lot of inside information. We may not be, but I'm
(13:40):
actually not really sure that he is. I don't see
any evidence from this article that Panetta is speaking from
direct personal knowledge about extant plans to carry out an attack. Instead,
he quoted Trump's description of the call that Trump had
had with bb before the election, telling net Yahoo, do
whatever you have to do. So Leon may just be
(14:01):
working from the same information the rest of us have
and coming to a somewhat different conclusion. I'm not as
sure as he is about an imminent attack on Iran
because Trump campaigned heavily on ending wars, and while I
don't credit Trump is a particularly honest man, I do
think he sees his personal benefit right now in being
able to portray himself as a peacemaker, in part because
(14:23):
he has so much domestically he wants to do, and
so much else internationally he wants to do. Right expending
a bunch of political capital, dealing with the kinds of
protests and unrest and even anger from his base that
a war with Iran would mean, especially once it gets
bogged down in the kind of violence that would come
with that. He may not and likely doesn't see that
as being of benefit to him. Now, that doesn't mean
(14:46):
it will never happen. It doesn't mean his calculus won't change.
I do foresee some situations in which Trump might decide
that his personal benefit is in there being a wider
ground conflict with Iran that US forces get drawn into.
You know, we'll talk a little bit about some of
the possibilities around this, and we're getting outside of the
(15:06):
realm of kind of established fact at this point, but
I do think it's worth considering some of this. But
first consider these ads. So, when we talk about the
possibility of a ground conflict with Iran starting between Israel
(15:30):
and Iran, but almost inevitably drawing in more US forces,
the unknowns and unknown knowns in this situation are pretty staggering.
If I let myself analyze every possibility, my mind can
go to some dark places. Trump sees war with Iran
as a negative. Now I'm quite sure, But how would
he feel about it in the wake of, say, a
Musk centered plan to in the federal reserve and tank
(15:51):
the dollar, in the wake of the changes that all
of his immigration policies would make on the price of food,
the Pression era levels of inflation and unemployment returning to
the United States, and the attendant social unrest that that
would cause. If Americans find themselves on the verge of
food rights, perhaps Trump would gamble on war being the
best distraction he could manage. It's certainly not impossible. Now,
(16:15):
I don't know how useful it is to bury myself
in theoreticals and probabilities. The known threats are dire enough,
and they demand full time awareness in order to attempt
to counter and endure. So instead of spiraling, I'm going
to leave you today with the words of another Ghazan,
Mohammed R. Mausch. He's a journalist who wrote an article
for MSNBC right after the election titled My family and
(16:38):
I Survived the War in Gaza. We know Trump's America
won't save us, and here's Mohammed For us. The election
of Donald Trump isn't just a blip on the political
radar or a shift in foreign policy. It's a challenge
to sustain existence while the world seems intent on erasing us.
It's about surviving seventy seven years under occupation and over
(16:59):
a year of all ongoing genocide, the very genocide I
barely survived last December, when my family and I, including
my elderly parents and three year old son, were buried
under the rubble of what was once our home after
it was struck by an Israeli fired US missal. The
date December seventh, twenty twenty three. Our bones were crushed
between layers of concrete and twisted metal as we spent
(17:20):
hours in the dark, buried together and praying to be
pulled out in one piece. The trauma of that night,
in both its physical and emotional toll, of my son's small,
fragile hand clinging to mind, comes back to me now
as Trump prepares to take power once more. I've seen
how American political leader's toy with the idea of change.
(17:40):
How they dress up their campaigns with grand ideas about
peace and justice, yet each president brushes off our reality.
Barack Obama promised hope and change we could believe in,
yet we got more bombs. Joe Biden offered a different approach,
pledging and yielding support for Israel, leaving us to live
through even more horror. Vice President Kamala Harris Niceties included
(18:01):
no concrete promises to protect Palestinians, but she did pledge
to continue financial support for Israel, and Trump's blundness as
he promises to come back swinging reminds us not to
hold out hope for change. So, you know, not much
optimism here, but I do really recommend reading that article
(18:22):
that MSNBC published. You know, it's bleak, but important, especially
given the fact that you know we may be soon
entering a world where it would be harder for people
like Muhammad to express their feelings and their truth to
an audience. I don't think it's unlikely that a clamp
down is coming on some of these things. It's hard
(18:43):
to say how extensive it will be, but there's a
threat that you know, Israel and their backers see in
the way that public sympathy has built so quickly for
Gaza in a way that wasn't present with a lot
of previous stages of violence between Israel in Gaza. Right now,
this is the result of a lot of videos spreading
(19:03):
on social media. It's the result on of voices from
Gaza getting out and getting to people in a way
they really hadn't before. And so one thing that does
worry me greatly when I think about what's going to
happen in Gaza under President Trump is not just what's
going to happen to the people living there right now,
but what's going to happen to their ability to tell
their story, to get information out to the rest of us.
(19:27):
That is very much an open question at this moment,
but it's certainly one that should be on your lips,
and it's one that we will be investigating here at
cool Zone as long as we're able to continue doing
that until next time. I'm Robert Evans. We'll be back
tomorrow and every other day reporting on you know, the world.
(19:51):
It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media.
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
Coolzonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeart
Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
You can now find sources for it Could Happen here
listed directly in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening,
It Could Happen Here News
Hosts And Creators
Robert Evans
Garrison Davis
James Stout
Show Links
AboutPopular Podcasts
24/7 News: The Latest
Today’s Latest News In 4 Minutes. Updated Hourly.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.