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This conversation is being recorded on
Thursday, 8th of August, at 14.40 GMT.

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Seven days after, Smile Hanyam was
assassinated in North Tehran, and eight

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days after Fad Shokr was assassinated in
Zahiyam, South Beirut.

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As the war is expecting Iran's
retaliation, and Iranians have pledged to

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have a harsh response
to Israeli assault and

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assassination, one question
is in everyone's mind.

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How far this episode
of the conflict between

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Israel and the Axis
of Resistance will go?

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Will it open up to an all-out war?

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Or will it be contained like the last 309
days?

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One big and important element in this very
complicated geopolitical chessboard is the

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role of the resistance group in Lebanon
known as Hezbollah.

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And in order to understand
and to fathom into Hezbollah's

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response, we have to understand
the essence of Hezbollah.

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It's relationship with other parts of
Lebanese, very complicated social and

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political system, and also it's
relationship with Iran.

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Whether Hezbollah is a proxy of Iran or is
it independent?

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Is it a national liberation force or is
playing within the sectarian political

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system in Lebanon and enjoying that
sectarian power game?

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And also will it act with
the order of Iran or will

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it take the interest of
Lebanese people first or not?

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In order to discuss these very complicated
questions which are extremely relevant and

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necessary to understand
today's politics, we've

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invited Dr. Nataniel George
to be our guest today.

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Nataniel George is
a lecturer in politics of

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the Middle East at Sawas
University of London.

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He is a global political
historian of the modern

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Arab world and United
States foreign relations.

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His research and teaching focus on the
relationship between revolution,

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counter-revolution, sectarianism and
empire.

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And prior to joining Sawas, he was a
Raphael Morrison-Dorman Memorial

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Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard
University and also a fellow

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at Columbia University's
Center for Palestine Studies.

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Nataniel holds a PhD in history from Rice
University and MA in Middle East studies

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from American University of Beirut and a
BA in cinema from the University of Iowa.

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His research has been supported by the
Social Science Research Council,

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the Society for Historians of American
Foreign Relations and the General Ford

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President Foundation, among others.

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His writings have been translated into
Arabic and Spanish and have appeared in

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the fate of third-worldism in the Middle
East, Iran, Palestine and beyond.

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Arabic Studies journal Bidayat,
the Arab Left, Histories and Legacies,

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America involved 776 to the present and
others.

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Hi, Nataniel, thank you
very much for accepting

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our invitation and
being our guest today.

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Thank you very much,
Ali, for inviting me and your

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interest in my work and it's
a pleasure to talk with you.

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So, to start with, can I just take you to
this very moment?

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I know you are a historian
and you need at least 200

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years before being able to
make a comment on the events.

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But, can I just take you to what's
happening in this very moment?

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And just before studying our conversation,
I had a look and Galant said that,

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his bullet could cost Lebanese dearly,
they can't imagine what might happen.

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So, right now as the world is waiting and
anticipating Iran's response and

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everyone's holding
breath, whether it's going

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to be a regional war
or not and hopefully not.

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But, when you read Israeli papers, they
are more right about his bullet than Iran.

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What do you think?

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What do you think
Israel will do to his bullet

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if his bullet responds to
Fadjok's assassination?

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Well, I think that Israel's history and
track record is the best way of predicting.

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..

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is the best indication of what is to come.

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And its track record in Lebanon and in
Palestine, especially, are, you know,

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of one of genocide,
settler colonialism, and

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basically no restraints
on what they would do.

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In fact, the current genocidal assault on
Gaza could be said to have been perfected

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in its battles with Hezbollah and other
resistance factions in Lebanon.

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Specifically, in 2006, they developed what
was called the Dahia doctrine.

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Dahia just simply means suburb in Arabic
and that's the southern suburbs.

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Dahia is going to be where it's considered
to be.

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It is a major social constituency
for Hezbollah and Lebanon

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in the major center of the
Shia population in general.

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And in 2006, they basically leveled that
entire area in pursuit of the Hezbollah

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leadership, which was very unsuccessful in
killing or degrading Hezbollah's military

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capacity, but was very
successful in causing

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civilian casualties
and mass destruction.

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So basically, what was then later deployed
in Gaza in 2009, 2014, and later

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operations, and especially now,
this kind of massive assault from the air

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is what we could expect their tactic to be
in Lebanon.

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And it's the total indiscriminate nature
of Israeli actions in Gaza.

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We can expect that
basically to be unleashed upon

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Lebanon if the situation
of a full total war gets there.

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It comes to that, which on the other hand
is kind of a doubtful situation,

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or one that at least is a bit off at this
time.

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And I can talk about that a little bit
more if you'd like.

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Sorry.

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Before going further, because this very
sequence of this 309 days started with the

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bombardment of the Hezbollah
assault on the Israeli military

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base in Mitchell Shams in
Golan Heights, from right there.

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And then Israel claimed that also this led
to the death of 12 Jews, Israeli children,

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which Hezbollah has strongly denied.

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So two things happened.

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If it was possible to discuss that,
and first of all, do you think,

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because natural law is supposed,
I mean, is known not to make false

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statements much, but first of all,
do you think was that the false flag

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operation by Israelis, or was it like a
mist shooting of iron dome?

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What happened in Mitchell Shams?

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Because right now everything has started
from Mitchell Shams to some extent.

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Well, yeah, the Mitchell Shams
incident is what Israel used

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as a pretext to escalate the
military confrontation at Levant.

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And the truth is that we don't know what
happened in Mitchell Shams.

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Hezbollah, as you said, has strenuously
denied this.

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The Mitchell Shams is an occupied Syrian
Arab-Jews village in the occupied Golan

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Heights, the leadership of
the Lebanese -Jews community

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that has acknowledged
and accepted Hezbollah's...

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as well as their story, or their denial of
the responsibility they have in previous

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incidents in 2006 admitted that they
carried that accidents happen,

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and strikes happened
in occupied Arab territory

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killing Arabs that they
had not intended to hit.

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Hezbollah's version is that it's an errant
missile from the iron dome.

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The Israeli automated rocket defense
system basically.

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And we saw that exact scenario just
happened, I think yesterday or two days

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ago now, in Nahareya, when
there's video of that, Israeli

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military has admitted that that
was the cause of casualties.

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And honestly, we should be very,
you know, we should hold Israeli

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rationales and explanation under the
tightest scrutiny now.

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This is a party that is committing
genocide right now.

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And it's very quite cynical of them to
claim that this attack that didn't kill

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Jewish Israeli settlers, but that killed
Syrian Arab-occupied people.

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That attacked children,
or that caused the deaths

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and casualties of children
in the occupied Golan.

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It's a little too convenient, it seems,
for sowing political division within the

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Arab world against the activities of the
resistance access.

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And so, I think this has
been the case, but it can only

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fit into Israeli narrative
more than anything else.

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Now, we have to see more proof independent
investigations should be carried out,

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but I don't think the matter is very
conclusive at all.

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So, at this stage, actually, I start my
first actual question, and actually here

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is with what we need someone familiar with
this very complicated country,

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which is like Lebanon.

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Iran is complicated,
don't get me wrong, but it's

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nothing, not remotely as
complicated as Lebanon.

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So, my first question is, I mean,
many people believe that many people

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believed one of the objectives of Israeli
claiming this kind of attributing this

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incident to Israel.

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And so, what we need to do is,
we need to make sure that the Israeli

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people, as you said, was to accentuate or
exaggerate the rift within Lebanon,

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and somehow to echo the fights into
Lebanese sectarian society, hoping that

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Jews inside Lebanon start attacking his
Polar politically, and that, hopefully,

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from the Israeli point of view,
I salute his Polar and put pressure on his

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Polar from within Lebanese Jewish society,
but that didn't happen.

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Why not?

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Why this did not happen to the leaders of
Jews' community in Lebanon, which are not

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big fan of Nasrullah, to come out and
criticize him openly, and why this didn't

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go as Israel is predicted?

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Well, I mean, first of all, it's a bit
rich for the country, the state that has

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killed more children in the last ten
months than many years, at least the past

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four years of conflict, of all armed
conflict in the world combined.

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Israel has killed something like at least
15,000 children in Gaza, and it's claiming

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the deaths of 12 children to be an outrage
that's worthy of starting war with Lebanon.

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So it's a bit rich, first of all,
and the Lebanese in general, Arabs in

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particular, Lebanese in particular,
Arabs in general, and the Jews being a

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community that straddles Lebanon,
Palestine, and Syria are very well versed

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in the history and brutality of Zionist
settler colonialism.

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And the leadership and the Jewish
community in Lebanon has historically the

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biggest faction of which
is under the leadership

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now of the progressive
socialist party.

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It's called on a leadership of Walid
Jumbalat, and before him, his father,

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Kamal Jumbalat, have traditionally,
for much of their careers, been anti

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-Zionist supporters of resistance in
Lebanon.

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Now, Walid has shifted especially after
2005.

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He turned against Hizbullah and became a
very vocal critic of them.

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And Syria's role in Lebanon,
for instance, after having been

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tightly aligned with Syria
and Lebanon at various points.

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So he's gone back and forth, and his
politics really is about sensing where the

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balance of power lies and where is the
greater opportunity.

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And after leading the charge and being one
of the most vocal critics of Syria and

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Hizbullah's policy in the region and in
Lebanon in general, he realized that he

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was not strong enough
to defeat them, that the

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constituency that he would
be better served really.

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And it would be too reckless to continue
the confrontation, so he simmered down the

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tensions between the communities years ago
now, towards the... probably like five or

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six years ago, towards the end of the
Syrian war.

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And now, with the Israeli onslaught on
Gaza, it's come out quite strongly against

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Israelis, actions and aims and in favor of
resistance, access.

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I just look for a map of Jews in Lebanon.

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I'm not sure how accurate this is,
but it says that the red ones are Jews.

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Which is more towards the north of the
countries, isn't it?

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If the red is... No, the
red is the marionite.

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No, it's like the blue ones.

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So the blue is... so the blue
is like the blue, which is quite

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spread between the marionite
and the Shiites in the South.

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But here we are talking about the Jews in
Golan Heights.

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So this... Correct.

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What you said... if you elaborate on this
for a bit more, you said the relationship

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between the Jews, the
community and between Jumbalat

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and Hezbollah changed
towards the end of the Syrian war.

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Correct.

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Once it became clear, really, that the
campaign... so there was much of Lebanese

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politics since 2005 was divided in between
two broad coalitions.

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March 14th coalition, which
was a pro -western coalition

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headed by Rafiq Hariri's
Sunni Muslim future movement.

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And, on the other hand, the Jews under
Waleed Jumbalat and the Progressive

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Socialist Party of Waleed Jumbalat and as
well as the Lebanese forces and the Kiteib

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or Falange, which is the marionite
Christian component of this alliance.

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Now, this is a staunchly pro-western
alliance, very friendly to the US policy.

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Seeking in the politics of war and
confrontation with Israel and establishing

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a very liberal western capitalist
neoliberal order and one that would most

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importantly in the state of conflict
between Lebanon and Israel.

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Now, on the other hand, you had the March
8 alliance, which was predominantly

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Hasbullah and Amal on the one hand and
later added to it the free patriotic

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movements of General Michelin and other
smaller Christian parties as well.

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Now, these two... and
these March 8 alliance was in

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favor of Syrian policy in
Lebanon and the region.

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March 14 was against it in pro-western.

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So one side is more open to Iran and Syria
and Hasbullah and the idea of resistance

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and one more open to the west.

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Now, they tried very hard after 2005 and
2006.

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March 14 really went on the offensive
after the 2006 Israeli invasion of

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Lebanon, which was, of course,
extremely devastating.

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And, you know, wanted
to isolate the resistance

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and really stop it from
continuing its project.

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This failed, ultimately.

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They were not able to mobilize the
population against March 8.

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It's more and more people actually voted
for that coalition and the March 14

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coalition kind of imploded in itself under
the leadership of Assad Hariri.

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And then after the Syrian war began in
2011, 2012, really got going.

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This political block kind of pinned their
hopes on reducing March 8 as well as

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00:20:10,581 --> 00:20:18,520
influence by welcoming and working towards
the fall of the Syrian regime.

220
00:20:22,940 --> 00:20:30,940
Again, this did not come to pass and they
were unable to overthrow that regime and

221
00:20:30,941 --> 00:20:35,480
their political fortunes went down with
that as well.

222
00:20:36,385 --> 00:20:41,922
So, at that point, Willie
Jumbalat really switched his

223
00:20:41,923 --> 00:20:45,820
stance and began cooling off
of his confrontational rhetoric.

224
00:20:48,420 --> 00:20:51,560
So, let's go to the next question.

225
00:20:51,940 --> 00:20:55,280
But it wasn't only valid Jumbalat.

226
00:20:55,420 --> 00:20:57,154
I mean, so even like
someone like Samir Jaja, for

227
00:20:57,155 --> 00:21:00,820
example, if you can introduce
and elaborate on that a bit.

228
00:21:04,650 --> 00:21:10,930
On Samir Jaja, the other factions within,
which was expected to be much more hostile

229
00:21:10,931 --> 00:21:17,270
to Hisbullah and jump on this opportunity
of Israel criticizing Hisbullah for

230
00:21:17,271 --> 00:21:23,150
killing children, but even they didn't act
that hostile towards Hisbullah this time.

231
00:21:23,550 --> 00:21:24,270
Can we explain that?

232
00:21:24,490 --> 00:21:30,490
So, apart from Jerusalem, someone like
Jaja's position last week was quite

233
00:21:31,790 --> 00:21:37,470
unexpected for outside analysts then
observers.

234
00:21:37,970 --> 00:21:43,297
I mean, the conduct of Israel
over the last ten months has

235
00:21:43,298 --> 00:21:52,150
really embarrassed the patent
and really has rendered quite...

236
00:21:52,250 --> 00:21:56,385
quite obsolete the idea
that Israel's an entity

237
00:21:56,386 --> 00:22:00,211
that could be made
peace with in the region.

238
00:22:00,250 --> 00:22:03,750
Now, Samir Jaja is the head of the
Lebanese forces.

239
00:22:03,790 --> 00:22:05,810
It's a Maranite Christian party.

240
00:22:06,670 --> 00:22:12,450
He was somebody that was armed and trained
by Israel in the Lebanese Civil War.

241
00:22:13,370 --> 00:22:20,246
He's very active in fighting
alongside Israelis, him and his...

242
00:22:20,346 --> 00:22:22,930
him and his
Lebanese forces militia.

243
00:22:23,810 --> 00:22:28,112
He was really... the pinn...
is the pillar of sort of a

244
00:22:28,113 --> 00:22:32,830
Maranite supremacist politics
in Lebanon, which has...

245
00:22:33,030 --> 00:22:39,930
in the Lebanese Civil War, a very potent
force that has since dwindled to really a

246
00:22:39,931 --> 00:22:44,090
second or third order phenomenon within
Lebanon.

247
00:22:45,090 --> 00:22:53,090
So, the conduct of Israel in its genocide
campaign has really not added ammunition

248
00:22:53,091 --> 00:22:57,886
to the forces that seek to
have concluded and negotiated

249
00:22:57,966 --> 00:23:01,910
peace with Israel, because
Israel has even in the last...

250
00:23:02,410 --> 00:23:06,890
months or so, the Knessin has made it
clear that they're not completely

251
00:23:06,891 --> 00:23:13,070
uninterested in establishing a Palestinian
state or not just uninterested,

252
00:23:13,710 --> 00:23:18,450
but downright opposed to it in the
majority of Israeli political factions.

253
00:23:20,360 --> 00:23:28,110
And really since 1993, and the Oslo
agreements went into effect, and that's

254
00:23:28,210 --> 00:23:32,370
basically the framework of a negotiated
two-state solution under American offices,

255
00:23:33,460 --> 00:23:38,970
there's been no movement towards
Palestinian state since that time.

256
00:23:39,415 --> 00:23:42,350
In fact, only movements
away from it, only

257
00:23:42,351 --> 00:23:46,151
more and more Palestinian
land being usurped.

258
00:23:48,450 --> 00:23:56,450
So, the arguments that these forces had
for pursuing a path of a negotiated two

259
00:23:56,451 --> 00:24:01,250
-state settlement with Israel has really
closed.

260
00:24:02,150 --> 00:24:09,090
And the idea of launching a war against
Hasballa within the Lebanese politics,

261
00:24:09,810 --> 00:24:15,031
the body politic, which would
have been something that...

262
00:24:15,032 --> 00:24:19,750
which has been something
that the March 14 alliance...

263
00:24:25,530 --> 00:24:32,880
and it towards... and this has really
slowed down and become totally unrealistic.

264
00:24:33,700 --> 00:24:40,500
So, a new way of dealing with Hasballa is
being figured out right now.

265
00:24:41,240 --> 00:24:47,240
I mean, this is a Hasballa as a party that
has now been at war with Israel for 10

266
00:24:47,241 --> 00:24:55,080
months, and has held its own against it
and has actually established for the first

267
00:24:55,081 --> 00:25:02,120
time in Lebanese history and perhaps Arab
history in general, a military deterrent.

268
00:25:03,010 --> 00:25:06,180
Against a further Israeli invasion.

269
00:25:07,050 --> 00:25:08,050
This is formidable.

270
00:25:08,480 --> 00:25:13,380
This is something that's game-changing and
changes both the internal political

271
00:25:13,381 --> 00:25:18,186
calculus within Lebanon
and the Arab world, as

272
00:25:18,187 --> 00:25:21,740
well as the calculus
between the Arabs and Israel.

273
00:25:21,940 --> 00:25:27,880
So, the way forward for the opponents of
Hasballa is not very clear right now,

274
00:25:27,960 --> 00:25:31,920
and they're not very well poised for
launching a direct attack, whether

275
00:25:32,070 --> 00:25:34,600
politically upon it right now.

276
00:25:35,700 --> 00:25:39,320
Okay, I think that's what we're going to
ask later, but I'm going to ask now.

277
00:25:40,360 --> 00:25:44,480
And that's the situation inside Lebanon.

278
00:25:44,780 --> 00:25:48,320
Because from one side, I mean,
I'm coming from Iranian angle,

279
00:25:48,980 --> 00:25:53,040
and I know many parts of Iranian,
especially Iranian bourgeoisie,

280
00:25:53,340 --> 00:25:59,780
sections of Iranian middle class,
which have suffered in the last couple of

281
00:25:59,781 --> 00:26:03,860
years, and they don't like their tension
to increase.

282
00:26:05,320 --> 00:26:13,020
Because they see that tension as a way of
more damage to Iran's economy.

283
00:26:13,845 --> 00:26:20,700
And so, I guess from that kind of Iranian
angle, part of Lebanon's society are not

284
00:26:20,701 --> 00:26:27,140
happy of this either losing directly from
the war with Israel in South of the

285
00:26:27,141 --> 00:26:31,860
country, and also from the shadow of the
war, overall the country.

286
00:26:32,900 --> 00:26:38,460
elsewhere, apart from the South, because
the shadow of the war is present everywhere.

287
00:26:38,800 --> 00:26:45,300
And so, for example, you have someone like
Golan who tells you, if Hasballa isn't

288
00:26:45,301 --> 00:26:48,980
deterred, Israel can copypaste Gaza war to
Beirut.

289
00:26:49,480 --> 00:26:54,000
So, like, openly saying that we will turn
Beirut into a wasteland.

290
00:26:54,220 --> 00:27:00,520
And so, I guess it's like anxiety-driven
anxiety in Lebanon's society as a whole.

291
00:27:00,521 --> 00:27:04,820
And we don't want to, like, let me just up
say everyone is, like, pro-resistance.

292
00:27:05,200 --> 00:27:09,640
There is a very complicated society with
multi-factions.

293
00:27:11,320 --> 00:27:19,320
And so, my first question is, what's the
overall mood in Lebanon on the day 309 of

294
00:27:19,545 --> 00:27:23,740
the war between Israel, Gaza, Israel,
and Lebanon?

295
00:27:23,741 --> 00:27:26,480
How fatigue is the living society?

296
00:27:31,240 --> 00:27:36,651
And how much disagreement
and criticism and opposition

297
00:27:36,652 --> 00:27:40,160
to Hasballa is inside the
living society at the moment?

298
00:27:40,340 --> 00:27:44,700
Because that's important to understand how
much space of maneuver Hasballa has.

299
00:27:45,100 --> 00:27:53,100
Many people say the reason Hasballa cannot
respond to Israel properly or adequately

300
00:27:53,101 --> 00:27:57,840
is because it doesn't have enough support
inside the country, it doesn't have enough

301
00:27:58,040 --> 00:28:02,020
support inside Lebanese society as a
whole.

302
00:28:02,320 --> 00:28:06,780
So, if you open up this question a bit and
say, what's the situation inside Lebanon?

303
00:28:07,100 --> 00:28:11,460
So, yes, Samir Jaja and Jumbalat are not
criticizing Hasballa.

304
00:28:12,025 --> 00:28:13,380
But, what's the limit?

305
00:28:13,920 --> 00:28:17,769
How much would they
support Hasballa in

306
00:28:17,770 --> 00:28:22,080
getting more engaged
with Israel in the fight?

307
00:28:22,081 --> 00:28:23,180
And the confrontation?

308
00:28:26,300 --> 00:28:34,300
Well, first of all, Samir Jaja and his
Lebanese forces party and the Philanj

309
00:28:34,301 --> 00:28:39,100
party or Kiteb have criticized Hasballa's
conduct of the war.

310
00:28:39,280 --> 00:28:43,080
Don't let me... I don't want to be
misunderstood there.

311
00:28:43,820 --> 00:28:49,080
They have there against the idea of
dragging Lebanon into a...

312
00:28:49,081 --> 00:28:53,460
what they say dragging Lebanon into an
unnecessary conflict.

313
00:28:54,310 --> 00:28:59,080
And that it's definitely... there's
definitely...

314
00:28:59,640 --> 00:29:03,085
the Lebanese have
experienced multiple, multiple

315
00:29:03,086 --> 00:29:07,480
Israeli invasions,
occupations for 30 plus years.

316
00:29:07,820 --> 00:29:10,106
I mean, not all the Lebanese
have experienced to the

317
00:29:10,107 --> 00:29:13,640
extent that people of the
South have, not by any means.

318
00:29:15,930 --> 00:29:20,298
But, it's a very known
quantity in Lebanon,

319
00:29:20,299 --> 00:29:23,560
the ferocity of Israeli
invasions in the war.

320
00:29:24,140 --> 00:29:27,731
So, nobody wants there
to be a... pretty much

321
00:29:27,732 --> 00:29:31,000
nobody wants there
to be a full-scale war.

322
00:29:31,620 --> 00:29:37,440
Hasballa knows this, they know that
Lebanon is in a very fragile state,

323
00:29:37,580 --> 00:29:40,620
had economic collapse in 2019.

324
00:29:40,621 --> 00:29:47,980
They do not seek to launch a war,
an all-out war, at once.

325
00:29:48,440 --> 00:29:55,700
And they've carefully calibrated their
attacks for 10 months now to avoid that

326
00:29:55,850 --> 00:29:56,850
consequence.

327
00:29:57,820 --> 00:30:05,820
And by their own admission, constantly
seek to avoid a further escalation of

328
00:30:05,821 --> 00:30:09,380
hostilities and have repeatedly stated
that the only...

329
00:30:10,030 --> 00:30:16,760
way to secure cessation of hostilities on
the border and the very clear way to do

330
00:30:16,761 --> 00:30:21,360
that is by conducting, concluding a
ceasefire in Gaza.

331
00:30:25,410 --> 00:30:31,060
Now, the Fulange, or the Kiteib and the
Lebanese forces and the Anti-Hazballa

332
00:30:31,210 --> 00:30:35,860
forces in Lebanon are quite a bit of
Lebanese society.

333
00:30:36,780 --> 00:30:41,680
It's not probably the majority,
it's difficult to say who has a majority

334
00:30:41,681 --> 00:30:46,440
in Lebanon with such a distorted political
system as it has.

335
00:30:46,441 --> 00:30:52,960
That doesn't really allow the expression
of one person, one vote in any case.

336
00:30:54,040 --> 00:30:56,540
Certain regions have
more and sex have more

337
00:30:56,541 --> 00:30:59,461
representation than others
in the political system.

338
00:31:00,480 --> 00:31:04,880
And we can talk about that in that history
as we go further.

339
00:31:08,740 --> 00:31:13,603
But right now, it wouldn't
be very wise for the

340
00:31:13,604 --> 00:31:16,420
Anti-Hazballa forces to
conduct a full -scale war.

341
00:31:16,421 --> 00:31:18,496
It's a full-throated
campaign against them at

342
00:31:18,497 --> 00:31:21,601
the moment when the
war is confined to the South.

343
00:31:21,820 --> 00:31:28,740
You can expect that once if there is a
full-scale invasion or a significant

344
00:31:30,460 --> 00:31:38,460
broadening of the war in Lebanon,
you would hear an escalation of internal

345
00:31:38,461 --> 00:31:45,300
voices that criticize the policy now of
confrontation with Israel.

346
00:31:46,000 --> 00:31:50,093
Now, those dynamics
would be different based on

347
00:31:50,094 --> 00:31:53,341
the nature of that
escalation that we can't tell.

348
00:31:54,590 --> 00:32:02,040
If it's something that is clearly seen as
an Israeli aggression, even by the forces,

349
00:32:02,400 --> 00:32:08,000
the parts of Lebanese society that are not
so sympathetic to Hazballa and its aims,

350
00:32:08,320 --> 00:32:13,440
they will have a hard time making that
case a believable one.

351
00:32:14,040 --> 00:32:20,500
But if a miscalculation occurs and it can
be perceived successfully that Hazballa

352
00:32:21,790 --> 00:32:27,924
has provoked this conflict,
that would of course be an open

353
00:32:27,925 --> 00:32:33,040
door for the Anti -Hazballa
factions to mobilize further.

354
00:32:33,041 --> 00:32:40,501
But the extent of that mobilization will be
probably less than even it was during 2006.

355
00:32:40,820 --> 00:32:41,300
We don't know.

356
00:32:41,440 --> 00:32:44,260
It's really a changed historical
environment.

357
00:32:46,160 --> 00:32:51,100
And getting into predictions is not where
I like to go, but as a historian,

358
00:32:52,060 --> 00:32:55,800
but learning from the past is more solid
ground.

359
00:32:55,801 --> 00:33:01,280
And I think that the scale of Lebanese
opposition is going to be determined by

360
00:33:01,281 --> 00:33:04,480
the nature of the exact sequence of
events.

361
00:33:05,940 --> 00:33:13,720
And the Magdol Shams massacre was not
convincing in the Lebanese arena,

362
00:33:14,140 --> 00:33:18,440
even amongst opponents of Hazballa,
that it was not sufficiently credible to

363
00:33:18,441 --> 00:33:23,460
really discredit the current line that it
is pursuing.

364
00:33:24,010 --> 00:33:30,340
Or a useful rally point for rallying the
opposition.

365
00:33:31,140 --> 00:33:32,720
Okay, it's very interesting.

366
00:33:34,650 --> 00:33:39,040
So, I mean, the Fallenges, Jaja,
Maronite section, et cetera, those

367
00:33:39,041 --> 00:33:46,300
sections which before back in the 70s,
they did get support from Israel even now.

368
00:33:46,620 --> 00:33:52,366
Even those factions now
have no confusion about the role

369
00:33:52,367 --> 00:33:55,960
of Israel in the region and
what Israel wants for Lebanon.

370
00:33:59,780 --> 00:34:02,060
Sorry about that, that's not how it turned
out.

371
00:34:02,360 --> 00:34:04,400
We want to sterile.

372
00:34:04,840 --> 00:34:07,700
No, that's normal thing.

373
00:34:09,580 --> 00:34:14,220
That's fine, but it's not only Israel that
Hizballa is dealing with.

374
00:34:15,130 --> 00:34:17,040
It's also United States.

375
00:34:17,720 --> 00:34:23,128
At the very beginning of the
post-7th of October, United States

376
00:34:23,129 --> 00:34:27,540
made it very clear both openly
and also by sending messages.

377
00:34:27,541 --> 00:34:34,460
Just to be rude, that if Hizballa wants to
intervene for the sake of Gaza,

378
00:34:36,170 --> 00:34:37,860
it's not facing Israel.

379
00:34:38,100 --> 00:34:39,560
It will face United States.

380
00:34:39,820 --> 00:34:44,320
And that's why the warship, United States,
warships, started moving towards Lebanon.

381
00:34:45,580 --> 00:34:50,980
And that's different because while all
these Lebanese forces are against Israel,

382
00:34:51,770 --> 00:34:57,000
but United States is part and parcel of
Lebanese economy and politics.

383
00:34:57,500 --> 00:35:03,120
Even before 7th of October, Lebanese
economy was exhausted.

384
00:35:04,260 --> 00:35:08,800
Lebanon was being labeled by some as a
failed state.

385
00:35:09,790 --> 00:35:16,220
What happened in summer 2020 with the
explosion of Beirut Port was a game changer.

386
00:35:16,340 --> 00:35:20,683
But even before that in
2019, in October 2019,

387
00:35:20,684 --> 00:35:25,001
we had protest against
the economic situation.

388
00:35:25,050 --> 00:35:32,900
So this episode of Conflict with Israel,
which has gone for 309 days, is like...

389
00:35:32,901 --> 00:35:33,760
It's very long.

390
00:35:33,900 --> 00:35:38,540
It's one of the longest, I think,
for the recent history.

391
00:35:39,090 --> 00:35:42,780
It's very exhausting as it is war of
attrition for Israel.

392
00:35:43,470 --> 00:35:46,840
Possibly some people say it might be war
of attrition for its opponent as well.

393
00:35:47,115 --> 00:35:54,400
So if it's possible, open up again more,
what kind of condition, economic,

394
00:35:54,800 --> 00:35:59,620
political, and social condition we are
dealing in Lebanon today with?

395
00:36:00,180 --> 00:36:07,180
And how much more Lebanon can take this
exhausting, fatiguing war of attrition?

396
00:36:08,455 --> 00:36:16,180
And second, can America or West use those
economic, financial weapons, instruments,

397
00:36:16,880 --> 00:36:22,060
such as sanctions or putting more pressure
on Lebanese economy?

398
00:36:22,360 --> 00:36:29,600
Having less help through cutting some of
the money coming from abroad, for example,

399
00:36:30,065 --> 00:36:31,065
and other things.

400
00:36:31,105 --> 00:36:35,184
So if it's possible, open up
Lebanese economy and how much

401
00:36:35,185 --> 00:36:41,400
more resilience it has to allow
maneuvering space for Israel.

402
00:36:44,790 --> 00:36:45,790
That's a good question.

403
00:36:45,940 --> 00:36:53,740
Well, there are about 97,000 displaced
southerners from the border region.

404
00:36:54,100 --> 00:36:59,700
That's one of the major stresses in the
Lebanese society and economy.

405
00:37:00,680 --> 00:37:02,660
These people are without work.

406
00:37:03,720 --> 00:37:07,880
Most of them, without many of them,
children are out of school.

407
00:37:08,240 --> 00:37:08,700
This is pretty.

408
00:37:09,190 --> 00:37:15,120
Putting enormous pressure on families even
within, as well as prime constituency.

409
00:37:16,220 --> 00:37:20,197
However, there's no
indication there that

410
00:37:20,198 --> 00:37:24,060
they're parturning
against it or by any means.

411
00:37:24,380 --> 00:37:25,560
Quite the opposite.

412
00:37:25,860 --> 00:37:28,180
There's continued strong loyalty there.

413
00:37:28,960 --> 00:37:31,400
Now, the Lebanese economy itself.

414
00:37:33,460 --> 00:37:39,360
I've interviewed many people, like more
sympathetic towards resistance.

415
00:37:39,560 --> 00:37:46,120
And they always talk about Hisbullah's big
victory of making hundreds of thousands of

416
00:37:46,121 --> 00:37:49,860
Israelis living in the north of Israel
homeless.

417
00:37:50,180 --> 00:37:54,012
And so Israel has to
pay for them to be settled

418
00:37:54,013 --> 00:37:56,820
in hotels and to
relocate them to hotels.

419
00:37:56,821 --> 00:38:01,080
Now, in September, that will be second
year for the children without a school.

420
00:38:01,320 --> 00:38:06,620
But 97,000 Lebanese as well have been
dislocated.

421
00:38:07,650 --> 00:38:08,691
So, who's paying for them?

422
00:38:08,840 --> 00:38:10,760
Is Lebanese government paying for them?

423
00:38:10,860 --> 00:38:17,420
Have they been relocated to hotels like
Israelis or how have the Lebanese society

424
00:38:17,421 --> 00:38:22,100
and polity absorb this massive
dislocation?

425
00:38:24,260 --> 00:38:25,980
That's a great question.

426
00:38:27,200 --> 00:38:34,540
Lebanon has traditionally been lacking in
the state capacity, and this is by design

427
00:38:34,541 --> 00:38:39,444
of the architects of the
Lebanese state and economy,

428
00:38:39,445 --> 00:38:43,300
to not provide social
safety net or social services.

429
00:38:43,325 --> 00:38:50,340
It's a very laissez-faire or neoliberalism
before there was neoliberalism,

430
00:38:50,440 --> 00:38:54,880
was a thing, was kind of how the Lebanese
economy has been designed.

431
00:38:55,140 --> 00:38:58,580
So, very little state support and state
action and social welfare.

432
00:38:59,400 --> 00:39:01,980
So, how are the displays being handled?

433
00:39:05,420 --> 00:39:13,120
Most of them are paying for their own,
paying to rent at exorbitant prices.

434
00:39:13,540 --> 00:39:15,880
You can find more stories about this
recently.

435
00:39:16,180 --> 00:39:21,860
Lebanese landlords are taking opportunity
to profit off of this situation.

436
00:39:22,980 --> 00:39:28,460
Many of them, let's say, many of the
people from the south are Shia,

437
00:39:29,270 --> 00:39:33,840
and they might want to take refuge in
areas where Shia don't predominate.

438
00:39:33,960 --> 00:39:38,800
There's sectarian concerns there of people
that don't want to rent to the rural

439
00:39:39,350 --> 00:39:43,920
southern Shia for classist and sectarian
reasons.

440
00:39:44,790 --> 00:39:48,860
Rents are up even 300 or more percents in
many places.

441
00:39:49,790 --> 00:39:56,400
People are staying with families when they
can, multiple large families from the

442
00:39:56,401 --> 00:40:01,080
south are staying together in one small
rental accommodation, for instance.

443
00:40:05,680 --> 00:40:10,069
People that... children that
attend public schools have been

444
00:40:10,070 --> 00:40:12,880
able to transfer their studies
to another public schools.

445
00:40:12,881 --> 00:40:18,000
But another thing that Lebanon is
distinguished for is the predominance of

446
00:40:18,100 --> 00:40:20,760
private education and private religious
education.

447
00:40:21,490 --> 00:40:27,620
It's a huge proportion of people of
children are... are in the south that go

448
00:40:27,770 --> 00:40:32,620
to private schools are completely out of
education as those private institutions

449
00:40:32,770 --> 00:40:39,980
don't have branches elsewhere or they're
not able to absorb those display students.

450
00:40:44,370 --> 00:40:52,020
There are some state shelters for refugees
and there's funds from UN organizations

451
00:40:52,021 --> 00:40:57,380
and other NGOs that are organizing relief
for the southerners.

452
00:40:59,160 --> 00:41:04,050
But it's all quite ad
hoc as most things are

453
00:41:04,051 --> 00:41:07,360
in delivering social
services in Lebanon.

454
00:41:07,361 --> 00:41:13,900
It's not like they're the Israeli
government which is paying for its many

455
00:41:14,580 --> 00:41:22,580
displays about an equal number numbers
range from 60 to 120 or even at the

456
00:41:22,581 --> 00:41:27,620
beginning or say 150,000 Israelis were
displaced from the north.

457
00:41:28,530 --> 00:41:32,608
And the Israeli
government is now using the

458
00:41:32,609 --> 00:41:36,180
number of 60,000 which
seems somewhat suspicious.

459
00:41:36,181 --> 00:41:40,900
It seems designed to reduce the number
because I don't know where the

460
00:41:40,901 --> 00:41:47,120
differential has where 150 that they were
trumpeting themselves has turned into 60.

461
00:41:47,380 --> 00:41:51,020
It doesn't really seem to add up.

462
00:41:52,720 --> 00:41:55,989
But yes, the question here
in assessing the war and

463
00:41:55,990 --> 00:41:59,680
the effects on both these
societies is a relative one.

464
00:42:00,380 --> 00:42:06,221
Now, the Lebanese southerners and really
needs to be considered in relative context.

465
00:42:06,680 --> 00:42:09,931
The residents of Lebanese
south have been...

466
00:42:09,932 --> 00:42:13,361
this is not the first
time that they fled.

467
00:42:13,570 --> 00:42:15,940
They fled over and over and over again.

468
00:42:16,840 --> 00:42:21,987
By 1978, one of the first
major Israeli invasions

469
00:42:21,988 --> 00:42:26,320
of Lebanon, they displaced
250 ,000 people at least.

470
00:42:27,780 --> 00:42:30,460
In 1978, 1982 was even bigger.

471
00:42:31,120 --> 00:42:36,660
1993, 97, 2006, continuous waves of
displacement.

472
00:42:37,460 --> 00:42:39,780
And it goes all the way back to 1948.

473
00:42:42,580 --> 00:42:50,580
1948, Israel also a very similar situation
to now actually occupied and depopulated a

474
00:42:50,581 --> 00:42:54,420
number of Lebanese border villages and
stayed there for about a year.

475
00:42:54,720 --> 00:42:58,993
So, we're talking about
generations of dealing with

476
00:42:58,994 --> 00:43:02,960
fleeing and dealing with
civil war, Israeli occupation.

477
00:43:03,670 --> 00:43:10,600
And, you know, Lebanese society can absorb
this in a way that Israeli society cannot.

478
00:43:11,500 --> 00:43:13,480
So, it's not a similar situation.

479
00:43:14,010 --> 00:43:20,300
So, in North Israel during the years of
occupation of south Lebanon, the

480
00:43:20,301 --> 00:43:23,780
resistance wouldn't attack those villages
and those settlements.

481
00:43:23,781 --> 00:43:31,481
In North Israel, I mean, the conflict never
spilled over to that part of Israel before.

482
00:43:33,260 --> 00:43:41,260
Hardly, yeah, I mean, in the era of the
arm struggle of the 1960s through the,

483
00:43:42,050 --> 00:43:46,320
well, until liberation of most of Lebanon
in 2000 was focused.

484
00:43:46,321 --> 00:43:49,520
In the 1960s, this was the basic pattern.

485
00:43:49,640 --> 00:43:54,194
This is why it's so important
to understand what the

486
00:43:54,195 --> 00:43:57,780
resistance has imposed upon
Israeli society in the North.

487
00:43:58,340 --> 00:44:04,540
So, in the 1960s, when the PLO first
started organizing its arm struggle in

488
00:44:04,715 --> 00:44:11,580
southern Lebanon, you know, you'd have an
infiltration or an RPG attack,

489
00:44:11,850 --> 00:44:16,260
you know, a minor attack or sabotage on
northern Israeli settlement.

490
00:44:16,261 --> 00:44:21,520
And individual small actions, you know,
barely anybody would be hurt.

491
00:44:22,120 --> 00:44:27,040
And Israel would retaliate massively and
disproportionately.

492
00:44:28,590 --> 00:44:31,260
They would destroy entire villages.

493
00:44:31,660 --> 00:44:39,460
They would destroy 10, 20 houses that they
picked that may or may not have had

494
00:44:39,461 --> 00:44:43,420
anything to do with the arm struggle just
to actually...

495
00:44:43,570 --> 00:44:51,360
But Israeli strategy in the 1960s and 70s
was to raise the cost of resistance within

496
00:44:51,361 --> 00:44:54,560
Lebanese society by turning Lebanese
society against it.

497
00:44:54,900 --> 00:44:58,800
So, what they would... they tried to show
that resistance is futile.

498
00:44:59,480 --> 00:45:04,000
That resistance only breeds a
disproportionate response.

499
00:45:05,780 --> 00:45:11,980
And the attacks on the settlements
basically in northern Israel receded into

500
00:45:11,981 --> 00:45:18,800
fighting Israeli troops and their proxy
allies, the south Lebanese army or the

501
00:45:18,801 --> 00:45:23,180
free Lebanon army as it was called before
it was renamed the south Lebanon army.

502
00:45:25,980 --> 00:45:30,055
To... yes, the resistance
was basically Israel

503
00:45:30,056 --> 00:45:33,681
brought the fight to
Lebanese territory.

504
00:45:33,900 --> 00:45:37,220
And the resistance was fighting Israel in
Lebanon to liberate Lebanon.

505
00:45:38,040 --> 00:45:42,300
Now, what is different from this conflict
since October is that for the first time,

506
00:45:43,240 --> 00:45:49,920
Hasbullah has formed a security zone
inside northern Israel.

507
00:45:49,921 --> 00:45:54,127
So, it's 5 to 10 kilometers
of northern Israel

508
00:45:54,128 --> 00:45:56,860
is now emptied of
most of its inhabitants.

509
00:45:57,110 --> 00:46:01,620
This has never happened in the history of
Arab-Israeli wars.

510
00:46:02,160 --> 00:46:07,700
This is fundamentally significant in
changing the military balance of power.

511
00:46:08,050 --> 00:46:09,500
Yes, that is true.

512
00:46:11,330 --> 00:46:12,900
So, it kind of kind of stuck you here.

513
00:46:13,905 --> 00:46:21,480
So, because many people in the Arab world,
in Iran and other places, especially in

514
00:46:21,481 --> 00:46:27,680
Arab world, Arab world, they were
criticizing Isbullah for what happened to

515
00:46:27,681 --> 00:46:33,260
all your shore price, all your talk of 180
,000 missiles that you have.

516
00:46:33,710 --> 00:46:36,640
Why don't you support Gaza people more?

517
00:46:37,800 --> 00:46:42,210
But you say inside
Lebanon, the interpretation

518
00:46:42,211 --> 00:46:45,541
of the last 309 days is
the other way around.

519
00:46:45,660 --> 00:46:53,320
They understand it as the first time in a
small, non-government, non-state actor has

520
00:46:53,321 --> 00:46:59,820
held Israel back and has opened up in
depths of 10 kilometers of north of Israel

521
00:47:00,320 --> 00:47:02,160
as and created a security zone.

522
00:47:02,161 --> 00:47:05,360
So, if you open up, if you elaborate on
this a bit more.

523
00:47:05,580 --> 00:47:11,780
Yeah, I'm not saying that every Lebanese
takes that perspective, but it is...

524
00:47:11,781 --> 00:47:17,160
that's the narrative that, of course,
Hasbullah's perspective, but it's also

525
00:47:17,310 --> 00:47:23,800
just factually correct that this is the
first time that the tables have turned in

526
00:47:23,850 --> 00:47:29,160
such a way that Israelis have been
displaced in such a...

527
00:47:29,385 --> 00:47:36,800
And any proportion, really, in 1967 war
was fought on Arab territory, 1973 war was

528
00:47:36,801 --> 00:47:41,360
fought on occupied Arab territory,
82...

529
00:47:41,510 --> 00:47:48,400
Israeli invasions of 1978 and 82 were
obviously all within Lebanon, the

530
00:47:48,401 --> 00:47:53,754
occupation of Lebanon from
78 to 2000, obviously a war that

531
00:47:53,755 --> 00:47:57,980
took place in occupation
within Arab Lebanese territory.

532
00:48:00,290 --> 00:48:02,722
There's just... factually,
there's no disputing

533
00:48:02,723 --> 00:48:05,821
that this is new
and this is the case.

534
00:48:05,880 --> 00:48:11,080
Now, Lebanese that are opposed to
Hasbullah, I think this is reckless as

535
00:48:11,081 --> 00:48:17,720
well, or say that this decision to go to
war has been taken by a non-state actor,

536
00:48:18,220 --> 00:48:20,300
and this usurps the role of the state.

537
00:48:21,050 --> 00:48:26,100
Now, this gets to the heart of a real
political controversy in Lebanon.

538
00:48:30,100 --> 00:48:36,800
Is the presence of Hasbullah and its
policy?

539
00:48:37,260 --> 00:48:40,140
Is it the cause of Lebanese state
weakness?

540
00:48:41,120 --> 00:48:45,663
Or is the presence of
Hasbullah and its policy the

541
00:48:45,664 --> 00:48:48,800
effects or the symptom of
Lebanese state weakness?

542
00:48:50,220 --> 00:48:52,480
Now, these are the two ways of looking at
it.

543
00:48:53,110 --> 00:48:58,560
The Hasbullah crowd says Hasbullah is a
state within a state that prevents and is

544
00:48:58,561 --> 00:49:02,560
responsible for the incapacity of the
Lebanese state.

545
00:49:03,035 --> 00:49:09,740
This was the same argument deployed
against the PLO, I might add, in its era

546
00:49:10,040 --> 00:49:13,880
of running the resistance in Lebanon.

547
00:49:15,790 --> 00:49:20,960
Versus the supporters of anti-colonial
resistance in Lebanon say, no,

548
00:49:21,140 --> 00:49:25,696
the Lebanese state is
absent, it has been absent, and

549
00:49:25,697 --> 00:49:28,741
the resistance is doing what
the state should be doing.

550
00:49:29,060 --> 00:49:32,266
Basically, it is defending
the people on the territory

551
00:49:32,267 --> 00:49:34,960
of the South, the territorial
integrity of the state.

552
00:49:36,615 --> 00:49:41,600
And this is the basic division on this
issue.

553
00:49:47,770 --> 00:49:54,620
Okay, so, the question is, the people who
suffer most at the moment, as you said,

554
00:49:54,800 --> 00:50:00,238
are that 97,000 displaced
people of the South, have they

555
00:50:00,239 --> 00:50:03,420
been criticised on Hasbullah,
has it been any protest?

556
00:50:03,421 --> 00:50:11,100
Has it been any protest, has it been any,
outspoken complaint about this,

557
00:50:11,600 --> 00:50:19,081
asking for the war to end as soon as possible,
or has it been a full flight support?

558
00:50:20,135 --> 00:50:25,520
There has been no organised political
opposition whatsoever coming from the

559
00:50:25,770 --> 00:50:30,800
displaced people Against Hasbullah's
policy.

560
00:50:31,530 --> 00:50:33,340
None whatsoever that I've seen.

561
00:50:33,520 --> 00:50:37,356
Now, that does not mean
that those displaced people

562
00:50:37,357 --> 00:50:39,700
are happy with their
displacement whatsoever.

563
00:50:40,020 --> 00:50:40,120
No.

564
00:50:40,700 --> 00:50:48,700
They are bearing an intense political and
social and personal private economic cost

565
00:50:49,300 --> 00:50:50,960
that is undeniable.

566
00:50:53,050 --> 00:50:56,063
But they're not... but what
that mean, when they're not at

567
00:50:56,064 --> 00:50:59,580
the same time turning against
has been loved by any means.

568
00:50:59,581 --> 00:51:05,060
And the main provider of social services
to many of those displaced people is

569
00:51:05,061 --> 00:51:10,200
Heizbollah itself, which is even major
Western newspapers have noted that they

570
00:51:10,930 --> 00:51:16,546
are providing food and just
cash checks, several of $200,

571
00:51:16,547 --> 00:51:20,800
$300 or more dollars to
displaced families of South.

572
00:51:21,740 --> 00:51:22,740
And that helps...

573
00:51:23,530 --> 00:51:28,400
You know, that that that that that that
that nullifies the situation to some extent.

574
00:51:28,700 --> 00:51:28,800
No.

575
00:51:29,350 --> 00:51:31,240
Of course, these people want to go back
home.

576
00:51:31,340 --> 00:51:32,940
They want to resume their normal lives.

577
00:51:33,060 --> 00:51:37,860
But they... they weren't born yesterday
and they weren't born on October 7th.

578
00:51:37,900 --> 00:51:40,954
They know that they're
a land... they experienced

579
00:51:40,955 --> 00:51:43,721
30 years of air of
Israeli occupation.

580
00:51:44,330 --> 00:51:45,780
They experienced liberation.

581
00:51:46,760 --> 00:51:49,000
And they know who's responsible for that.

582
00:51:49,240 --> 00:51:51,600
And they have a great deal of trust.

583
00:51:53,880 --> 00:51:58,580
To... in Heizbollah, to manage the
situation.

584
00:51:59,980 --> 00:52:01,501
So... Okay, very interesting.

585
00:52:01,760 --> 00:52:05,450
So, in a sense, with the
South, Heizbollah is... there's

586
00:52:05,451 --> 00:52:08,600
no worry for them because
there is a trust between the...

587
00:52:09,120 --> 00:52:11,420
basically between Heizbollah and the
people of the South.

588
00:52:11,600 --> 00:52:14,000
But as we came up, was more complicated.

589
00:52:14,260 --> 00:52:18,560
And you were going to explain the economic
situation in the overall country.

590
00:52:18,760 --> 00:52:24,420
So, let's go back to that part and see,
especially after the explosion of the port.

591
00:52:25,040 --> 00:52:30,740
What was the situation of Lebanese economy
in the first place?

592
00:52:31,290 --> 00:52:33,720
Many people talked about it as a failed
state.

593
00:52:34,020 --> 00:52:36,660
Was it really a failed state or was it
like exaggeration?

594
00:52:37,400 --> 00:52:41,777
And so, if you start from there, then you
understand how much the risks of society.

595
00:52:41,778 --> 00:52:41,580
..

596
00:52:41,581 --> 00:52:48,320
those parts of Lebanese, modernite,
Sunni communities, which were

597
00:52:48,321 --> 00:52:52,420
traditionally closer to Saudi Arabia,
all the West, France, etc.

598
00:52:53,240 --> 00:52:56,850
And they were not...
big fan of Heizbollah, or

599
00:52:56,851 --> 00:52:59,100
at this Heizbollah
popularity was not there.

600
00:52:59,220 --> 00:53:00,620
It's not unconditional there.

601
00:53:02,980 --> 00:53:08,820
If you open up the economy of the Lebanon
before 7th of October, and since the war,

602
00:53:09,040 --> 00:53:12,480
then we can understand...
we can predict the future better.

603
00:53:14,610 --> 00:53:18,300
Okay, well, the thing don't understand...
so...

604
00:53:18,660 --> 00:53:24,321
Lebanon experienced a
massive financial crisis in

605
00:53:24,322 --> 00:53:28,020
2019 with the immense
devaluation of its currency.

606
00:53:28,770 --> 00:53:33,560
And the basic problem there does not have
to do with...

607
00:53:33,610 --> 00:53:37,311
or not has very little
to do with the policy of

608
00:53:37,312 --> 00:53:41,100
Heizbollah and its
confrontational wars with Israel.

609
00:53:41,280 --> 00:53:46,440
It has something much more fundamental
that goes back to the very design of the

610
00:53:46,441 --> 00:53:52,920
Lebanese state and political economy by
the elites and colonial powers.

611
00:53:53,160 --> 00:53:54,880
Indeed, that's... that shaped it.

612
00:53:55,440 --> 00:53:59,820
And that was the decision that has been
taken by the leaders and the politicians

613
00:53:59,821 --> 00:54:02,760
and the state and leading figures in the
economy.

614
00:54:02,761 --> 00:54:08,120
That Lebanon should be a service-oriented
capitalist economy.

615
00:54:08,610 --> 00:54:13,720
It should avoid state interventionism.

616
00:54:14,220 --> 00:54:16,220
It should avoid developmental policies.

617
00:54:17,370 --> 00:54:20,280
That it should be a bastion of free
enterprise.

618
00:54:21,160 --> 00:54:26,740
And that the industrial and agricultural
sectors should not be developed while the

619
00:54:26,741 --> 00:54:29,660
service or the financial service sector
should be.

620
00:54:30,540 --> 00:54:38,540
Now, for the Lebanese bourgeoisie of the
40s through 50s and 60s of the... what is

621
00:54:38,541 --> 00:54:41,467
known as sort of
the golden era of this

622
00:54:41,468 --> 00:54:44,820
political economic regime,
this worked for them.

623
00:54:45,340 --> 00:54:47,080
It didn't work for everybody else.

624
00:54:47,580 --> 00:54:50,760
Lebanon was a very unequal society even at
that time.

625
00:54:51,560 --> 00:54:55,715
But there were regional
comparative advantages

626
00:54:55,716 --> 00:54:59,640
that enabled Lebanon
to serve as this kind of...

627
00:54:59,690 --> 00:55:06,840
international finance and transport hub
that was linked to the oil economies of

628
00:55:06,940 --> 00:55:07,940
the Gulf.

629
00:55:09,160 --> 00:55:14,780
And there were... so from the 50s through
60s and to the Lebanese Civil War in 75,

630
00:55:15,160 --> 00:55:22,340
there was pipelines from Saudi Arabia to
Lebanon that delivered a huge amount of

631
00:55:22,890 --> 00:55:26,040
oil to Europe basically.

632
00:55:26,041 --> 00:55:32,860
And the Americans took over the protection
of Lebanon after the evacuation of the

633
00:55:32,885 --> 00:55:40,720
French and sort of supervised the Lebanese
political system and political economy as

634
00:55:40,721 --> 00:55:47,540
being an example of free market democratic
liberal capitalism that developed without

635
00:55:48,240 --> 00:55:50,241
any... without revolution.

636
00:55:50,480 --> 00:55:57,740
And that was even the title of a book by a
prominent Lebanese academic who later

637
00:55:57,741 --> 00:56:03,020
became the Foreign Minister of Lebanon in
the 1980s named Ali Salem, a book called

638
00:56:03,470 --> 00:56:06,860
Analysis of Lebanon called Modernization
Without Revolution.

639
00:56:08,000 --> 00:56:15,960
And so that was... that really kind of
sums up and is very similar in a way to

640
00:56:15,961 --> 00:56:19,400
the politics of pre-revolutionary Iran
basically.

641
00:56:19,401 --> 00:56:26,340
This would be a western-facing,
western-inspired, capitalistic modernization.

642
00:56:27,410 --> 00:56:32,500
But even less... I mean the Shah
implemented even the white revolution as

643
00:56:32,501 --> 00:56:38,000
they called it in the 60s to do some more
development projects and things like that

644
00:56:38,100 --> 00:56:42,656
in order to stave off of
the opposition of labor

645
00:56:42,657 --> 00:56:45,820
and communist movements
and things like that.

646
00:56:45,821 --> 00:56:50,260
You had much less of that in Lebanon,
much less of a developmental state.

647
00:56:51,760 --> 00:56:59,760
So what led to the Lebanese crisis in 2019
was firstly this structural choice to have

648
00:57:00,035 --> 00:57:03,460
an economy based on finance and services.

649
00:57:04,680 --> 00:57:12,680
You had a history of violence and wars and
degradation of the Lebanese society,

650
00:57:13,120 --> 00:57:14,560
economy, and politics.

651
00:57:14,561 --> 00:57:19,360
And so that was the case in the 1960s,
principally, overwhelmingly most important

652
00:57:19,361 --> 00:57:23,761
factor would be the series
of Israeli aggressions on

653
00:57:23,762 --> 00:57:27,240
Lebanon that consistently
degraded that infrastructure.

654
00:57:28,720 --> 00:57:34,840
And coupled with the decision by the
economic elites even after the civil war

655
00:57:34,880 --> 00:57:43,560
ended, to not embark on major income
redistribution or developmental infrastructure.

656
00:57:43,610 --> 00:57:49,113
Infrastructure development
programs, but to focus on, again,

657
00:57:49,114 --> 00:57:52,740
maintaining the primacy of
the financial services sector.

658
00:57:55,680 --> 00:58:03,680
They did that by creating an incentive for
the Lebanese lira to the dollar,

659
00:58:04,480 --> 00:58:06,866
even though Lebanon
doesn't export hardly

660
00:58:06,867 --> 00:58:10,701
anything and needs to
import most of its goods.

661
00:58:13,320 --> 00:58:19,920
They tried to stabilize the currency by
offering sort of outrageously high

662
00:58:20,520 --> 00:58:24,800
interest rates on parking your foreign
capital in Lebanon.

663
00:58:25,980 --> 00:58:33,980
And this basically, of course,
failed because, yes, they attracted some

664
00:58:33,981 --> 00:58:38,600
capital from Lebanese immigrants and
things like that.

665
00:58:38,960 --> 00:58:40,945
But where that interest
payment was supposed

666
00:58:40,946 --> 00:58:43,541
to come from, there's
no added value there.

667
00:58:43,980 --> 00:58:50,280
And eventually this system collapsed in
2019 with a total devaluation of currency.

668
00:58:52,240 --> 00:58:53,240
Correct me.

669
00:58:54,430 --> 00:58:56,900
Let's just make a bit shorter.

670
00:58:57,080 --> 00:59:00,940
I know you're academic, so you give a full
essay for everything.

671
00:59:01,545 --> 00:59:06,101
But I understand, yes,
everything you say is correct, but

672
00:59:06,102 --> 00:59:13,240
it took us all the way back
to post civil war like 1980s.

673
00:59:13,241 --> 00:59:19,460
But I understand, even after 2006 war,
which was a massive devastation to part up

674
00:59:19,461 --> 00:59:25,140
a road, Beirut got itself back to its feet
really quickly.

675
00:59:25,580 --> 00:59:33,040
And I remember, kind of a portage in BBC
in 2008 or 2009, I think, when the world

676
00:59:33,041 --> 00:59:36,980
was suffering from the financial crisis,
Beirut was doing OK.

677
00:59:38,740 --> 00:59:46,740
So, in a sense, because one, remittance,
so the money of about 15% of Lebanese

678
00:59:46,940 --> 00:59:53,320
economy is like remittance coming from
Saudi, Qatar, Emirates, Lebanese who are

679
00:59:53,321 --> 00:59:57,900
working there and many of the marine high
paid skilled jobs, one of them.

680
00:59:57,901 --> 01:00:03,300
And second thing is Qatar and Saudi were
always investing there, so who rebuilt

681
01:00:03,800 --> 01:00:08,157
Beirut after 2006, who
allowed Lebanon not to

682
01:00:08,158 --> 01:00:12,180
suffer, not to stay as
a broken society much.

683
01:00:12,720 --> 01:00:15,440
So, what is specific about this time now?

684
01:00:15,760 --> 01:00:23,320
Because many people say that Qatar and
Saudi, because Lebanon has been colonized

685
01:00:23,321 --> 01:00:28,783
by Islamic Republic of Iran,
these countries don't become

686
01:00:28,784 --> 01:00:31,980
a battleground of rivalry
between all these forces.

687
01:00:32,760 --> 01:00:38,080
Same way that Syria got absolutely
shattered and ruined by their competition

688
01:00:38,081 --> 01:00:41,927
between Turkey, Iran,
Saudi and Western forces,

689
01:00:41,928 --> 01:00:45,160
in Lebanon they are
doing another kind of war.

690
01:00:45,480 --> 01:00:47,740
And so why would Saudi pump money into it?

691
01:00:47,820 --> 01:00:51,254
Why would America be
merciful to the financial

692
01:00:51,255 --> 01:00:54,800
system using Lebanon
as a place to park finance?

693
01:00:54,801 --> 01:00:58,280
A very capital and to transfer money
through that etc.

694
01:00:58,860 --> 01:01:00,100
What would you answer to that?

695
01:01:00,420 --> 01:01:06,300
How much of the role of resistance,
how much of the presence of Hisbullah is

696
01:01:06,301 --> 01:01:14,300
responsible for the current financial and
economic disaster in Lebanon?

697
01:01:16,410 --> 01:01:19,520
Well, that's quite a group of questions
there.

698
01:01:19,780 --> 01:01:27,081
Now, I believe it's best to look at it sort
of in a historical chronological context.

699
01:01:27,490 --> 01:01:33,240
So, as you said, after the 2006 war,
after Israel's invasion and massive

700
01:01:33,340 --> 01:01:39,760
destruction of the South and of mostly
southern Beirut and many of the Lebanese

701
01:01:39,761 --> 01:01:45,680
infrastructure around, there was a
political battle that was waged for

702
01:01:45,681 --> 01:01:53,680
reconstruction, knowing that the politics
of the day after, and we hear a lot about

703
01:01:53,681 --> 01:01:56,941
this from the Americans
especially, in reference to

704
01:01:56,942 --> 01:02:00,200
the Gaza conflict, what
happens after the war stops?

705
01:02:03,180 --> 01:02:11,180
Now, it was the American, it was the
Qatar, Saudi and Iran, all these forces

706
01:02:11,181 --> 01:02:15,354
knew that winning the peace
in Lebanon was important,

707
01:02:15,355 --> 01:02:19,240
so they all poured money
in for their various reasons.

708
01:02:21,335 --> 01:02:28,580
Especially, so the Gulf, and the Gulf for
the Gulf countries, was to ultimately,

709
01:02:29,490 --> 01:02:33,380
or especially Saudi Arabia, was to reduce
the influence of Hisbullah by replacing it

710
01:02:33,580 --> 01:02:34,580
with their money.

711
01:02:35,060 --> 01:02:41,000
Qatar was a little bit more permissive in
terms of being less antagonistic to

712
01:02:41,001 --> 01:02:45,364
Hasbullah, let more open
to the Iranian resistance

713
01:02:45,365 --> 01:02:48,541
access and having
less of a political agenda.

714
01:02:49,490 --> 01:02:52,520
It went further south, for instance,
and the Saudi money did.

715
01:02:54,160 --> 01:03:00,300
But yeah, there was a battle to
reconstruct Lebanon using various funding

716
01:03:00,301 --> 01:03:03,000
sources, and this is a very political
battle.

717
01:03:07,000 --> 01:03:15,000
And ultimately, the anti-Hazbullah forces
failed to cut into their support,

718
01:03:15,600 --> 01:03:21,060
and Hasbullah led the reconstruction
charge quite efficiently, not without

719
01:03:21,160 --> 01:03:26,180
criticism from urban planners,
architects that would have liked to have

720
01:03:26,181 --> 01:03:31,380
seen a more progressive change in the way
that things were reconstructed.

721
01:03:31,560 --> 01:03:37,560
Hasbullah basically put it a premium on
reconstructing exactly what had been there

722
01:03:37,561 --> 01:03:41,360
before rather than using it as an
opportunity to redesign things.

723
01:03:42,240 --> 01:03:44,742
But that's what they
did, and by doing that,

724
01:03:44,743 --> 01:03:47,701
they were able to
reconstruct it very quickly.

725
01:03:50,200 --> 01:03:55,060
Now, after the failure of that Western and
Saudi, particularly Gulf money,

726
01:03:55,310 --> 01:04:03,000
to reduce the influence of Hasbullah in
that confrontation between March 14th and

727
01:04:03,001 --> 01:04:07,580
March 8th, that we talked about,
their investments started to wane,

728
01:04:07,700 --> 01:04:11,980
and especially during the Syrian war,
when Hasbullah intervened there,

729
01:04:12,500 --> 01:04:16,200
and they were, in fact, growing more
powerful rather than less powerful.

730
01:04:17,440 --> 01:04:20,920
That Western and Gulf support more or less
evaporated.

731
01:04:21,660 --> 01:04:22,960
And now, the U.S.

732
01:04:23,860 --> 01:04:26,160
sees Lebanon and U.S.

733
01:04:26,420 --> 01:04:30,460
aligned forces see Lebanon as a bad
investment because they're really just

734
01:04:30,960 --> 01:04:38,960
strengthening the very groups that they
were looking to reduce the influence by

735
01:04:38,961 --> 01:04:43,800
reconstructing Lebanon and having
Hasbullah was the leading factor of it,

736
01:04:43,960 --> 01:04:47,920
and the Lebanese state, not taking an
active role in doing that, and the

737
01:04:47,921 --> 01:04:51,520
Lebanese state further discredited itself
in doing that.

738
01:04:52,060 --> 01:04:57,980
And part of the reason, again,
for the financial crisis in Lebanon,

739
01:05:00,045 --> 01:05:07,620
was those traditional sources refusing to
jump in and save the huge budgetary hole

740
01:05:08,270 --> 01:05:13,100
that the policy of pegging the currency to
the U.S.

741
01:05:13,280 --> 01:05:14,480
dollar had actually created.

742
01:05:14,900 --> 01:05:19,040
We're talking about some at least 40
billion dollars.

743
01:05:19,400 --> 01:05:24,440
I'm not sure the exact failure,
but huge figure of tens of billions of

744
01:05:24,441 --> 01:05:32,060
dollars of deficit that the Lebanese state
owes.

745
01:05:33,000 --> 01:05:37,760
Nobody's going to come in and pick up that
tab, basically, because on the one hand,

746
01:05:38,080 --> 01:05:44,880
the economy is not functioning,
and there's no plan to reorient anything.

747
01:05:44,900 --> 01:05:50,040
Or to change anything, to produce more
things that would get more people to buy

748
01:05:50,690 --> 01:05:55,480
Lebanese goods, or to increase the value
of the currency on the one hand,

749
01:05:56,000 --> 01:06:02,200
and on the political side of that,
those rich benefactors in the West and the

750
01:06:02,201 --> 01:06:06,640
GCC no longer see Lebanon as a friendly
political state.

751
01:06:08,280 --> 01:06:16,280
So, in a sense, it's not wrong to say that
part of Lebanon's society is justified in

752
01:06:16,281 --> 01:06:22,880
thinking, yes, resistance is winning in a
military way, but as you called it,

753
01:06:23,060 --> 01:06:30,820
Persian Gulf countries, and come to the
GCC, are making revenge on Lebanon in a

754
01:06:30,821 --> 01:06:34,880
different terrain on economy financially
by not helping.

755
01:06:34,881 --> 01:06:37,040
So, are these two connected?

756
01:06:38,980 --> 01:06:44,861
There's a grain of truth
there, but the bigger question

757
01:06:44,862 --> 01:06:48,580
is the health of the
Lebanese economy in general.

758
01:06:49,220 --> 01:06:56,340
Whereas, in 2006, and even after in 1990,
after the end of the Civil War,

759
01:06:56,600 --> 01:07:02,480
there was a general optimism and feeling
that there was that this Lebanese economy,

760
01:07:02,700 --> 01:07:07,100
the economic system, this liberal,
they say, fair capitalist system that had

761
01:07:07,200 --> 01:07:13,600
produced this banking affluence for
certain amount of people, and that was

762
01:07:13,601 --> 01:07:16,300
actually a financial services hub before
the war.

763
01:07:17,150 --> 01:07:22,160
And this occurring in the Lebanese Civil
War, occurring at the end of history,

764
01:07:22,460 --> 01:07:25,680
and the collapse of socialism,
communism, and Soviet block.

765
01:07:29,540 --> 01:07:37,540
So, there was a tremendous global optimism
that capitalism and the Lebanese system of

766
01:07:37,541 --> 01:07:43,360
capitalism would be able to regain and get
back on its feet.

767
01:07:46,940 --> 01:07:54,940
But Lebanon was seen as one of the semi
-prior state, because now all of it,

768
01:07:54,960 --> 01:08:01,800
but part of it was alongside Iran and
others, as access of evil, was acting

769
01:08:02,000 --> 01:08:07,400
against the security order, American
security, unilateral security order,

770
01:08:07,825 --> 01:08:10,300
which was underpinning that globalized
capitalism.

771
01:08:10,301 --> 01:08:15,740
So, in a sense, why would America and the
West, I mean, just acting as a devil

772
01:08:18,980 --> 01:08:26,980
advocate, but why would American system
reward Lebanon, which is the host for an

773
01:08:26,981 --> 01:08:34,160
organization, a non-state actor,
which is undermining and resisting our

774
01:08:34,610 --> 01:08:35,860
security global order?

775
01:08:36,720 --> 01:08:37,720
Right.

776
01:08:38,000 --> 01:08:42,920
So, Lebanon has been traditionally since
the post-sense and independence very

777
01:08:42,921 --> 01:08:47,600
quickly moved away from, it was a French
colony of French mandatory power,

778
01:08:47,820 --> 01:08:53,780
and moved extremely quickly to become a
close ally and friend of the United

779
01:08:53,781 --> 01:08:58,800
States, and it received a lot of
investments politically, militarily,

780
01:08:59,160 --> 01:09:00,600
and financially.

781
01:09:00,601 --> 01:09:08,020
In this, in propping up Lebanon as this
pro-Western liberal, democratic state

782
01:09:08,245 --> 01:09:13,980
within a revolutionary, anti-colonial,
Middle East, where ideas of pan-Arabism

783
01:09:13,981 --> 01:09:17,241
and socialism and national
liberation were taken

784
01:09:17,242 --> 01:09:19,920
hold and state-owned and
state -directed economy.

785
01:09:20,015 --> 01:09:27,940
So, in the Cold War, Lebanon, it had a
positive balance of payments at the time,

786
01:09:31,110 --> 01:09:38,960
had major financial reserves, because of
the spending of the Allied armies in the

787
01:09:38,961 --> 01:09:44,240
World War II and the
services it provide as the main

788
01:09:44,241 --> 01:09:47,840
banking hub for the Gulf
and for the oil economy.

789
01:09:49,240 --> 01:09:54,600
Even after 78, even after 78 and after
civil war has started.

790
01:09:56,880 --> 01:10:03,420
With, from 1975, when this is a real sort
of vicious beginning of the main Lebanese

791
01:10:03,421 --> 01:10:09,440
civil war, that started to decline
immediately, basically.

792
01:10:09,640 --> 01:10:15,280
But it took some time, because it took
time for the Gulf states to develop their

793
01:10:15,281 --> 01:10:22,380
own financial systems and capabilities,
much of which was by, you know,

794
01:10:22,680 --> 01:10:26,320
actually Lebanese immigrants and
Palestinian immigrants had been in

795
01:10:26,321 --> 01:10:30,060
Lebanon, did a lot to work and develop the
Gulf.

796
01:10:30,185 --> 01:10:37,200
But the insecurity of Lebanon,
from the protracted civil war of 75 to 90,

797
01:10:38,500 --> 01:10:46,500
really tanked that reputation,
tanked the objective quality of Lebanon as

798
01:10:46,650 --> 01:10:50,840
being this welcome place for international
capital.

799
01:10:51,340 --> 01:10:53,726
Now, there was an attempt
after the Civil War to resurrect

800
01:10:53,727 --> 01:10:58,320
that because of the good
memories of the 1940s, 50s and 60s.

801
01:10:58,400 --> 01:11:06,301
And that's the Rafiq Hariri movement, the
future movement's dream was doing that.

802
01:11:06,660 --> 01:11:13,380
And the division of labor in the Lebanese
political system, political economy of the

803
01:11:13,381 --> 01:11:17,202
post -war era was that,
okay, there was a Syrian

804
01:11:17,203 --> 01:11:20,040
tutelage, basically,
over Lebanon politically.

805
01:11:20,041 --> 01:11:24,380
And both Hariri and Hezbollah were pro
-Sirian.

806
01:11:24,990 --> 01:11:31,105
They were dependent on
Syrian freedom, Syria allowing the

807
01:11:31,106 --> 01:11:34,160
freedom of their various
political movements to operate.

808
01:11:35,055 --> 01:11:37,911
And that Hezbollah would
be the military resistance,

809
01:11:37,912 --> 01:11:39,680
fighting Israeli
occupation in the South.

810
01:11:40,300 --> 01:11:43,948
And that Rafiq Hariri
would be the economic

811
01:11:43,949 --> 01:11:47,041
and political chief of
the Lebanese state.

812
01:11:50,280 --> 01:11:54,740
And Rafiq Hariri's team is the one that
picked Riyadh Salamah with the central

813
01:11:55,415 --> 01:12:02,180
bank, the governor of the central bank who
was discredited and was behind this whole

814
01:12:02,730 --> 01:12:03,900
financial Ponzi scheme.

815
01:12:04,240 --> 01:12:05,940
And for a while, it appeared to work.

816
01:12:06,060 --> 01:12:07,060
It was a bubble.

817
01:12:07,770 --> 01:12:10,520
But this bubble burst, finally.

818
01:12:11,090 --> 01:12:19,040
And Lebanon is a bad investment from the
perspective of America and the GTC,

819
01:12:19,420 --> 01:12:23,748
both because of... there's
no clear way of how Lebanon

820
01:12:23,749 --> 01:12:26,880
can recover and be a viable
investment for anybody.

821
01:12:27,440 --> 01:12:31,917
And on top of that, politically,
it's entered the realm

822
01:12:31,918 --> 01:12:34,900
of the resistance access,
which is opposed to that.

823
01:12:37,770 --> 01:12:39,460
Let me just tell you where I'm coming
from.

824
01:12:39,540 --> 01:12:40,900
I think it will be easier for you.

825
01:12:40,960 --> 01:12:45,560
Because in a sense, I'm more interested in
the tropes, which then can be weaponized

826
01:12:48,680 --> 01:12:57,280
by media warfare, by opponents, as putting
all the fold and wrongdoing on resistance.

827
01:12:57,281 --> 01:13:00,020
So that's why I'm asking this question.

828
01:13:00,120 --> 01:13:04,720
But as you are saying that, Hisbola was
fine with Rafiq Hariri working with Saudi,

829
01:13:05,160 --> 01:13:07,215
working with the
Westerners, bringing money,

830
01:13:07,216 --> 01:13:10,720
doing financial thing, and
wouldn't sabotage that.

831
01:13:10,840 --> 01:13:17,040
So that was this complicated, unwritten
contract that Syria is giving security and

832
01:13:17,041 --> 01:13:23,660
military stability, Hariri, one side with
Syria, working with Hisbola, but also

833
01:13:23,661 --> 01:13:26,480
working with America, working with Saudi
with Qatar, everyone.

834
01:13:26,855 --> 01:13:30,740
And so, in a sense, Lebanon could become a
financial hub.

835
01:13:31,260 --> 01:13:35,180
But you are saying that if didn't work,
it was because it was not compatible with

836
01:13:35,605 --> 01:13:42,020
the realities of the actual Lebanese
situation.

837
01:13:42,580 --> 01:13:47,640
And so that, like many other bubbles of
financial bubbles burst, and that wasn't

838
01:13:47,840 --> 01:13:49,220
had nothing to do with Hisbola.

839
01:13:49,580 --> 01:13:50,720
Am I right?

840
01:13:50,721 --> 01:13:51,721
Right.

841
01:13:53,420 --> 01:13:55,160
That's what I was pushing back on.

842
01:13:55,320 --> 01:14:00,400
So the opponents of Hisbola are quick to
blame.

843
01:14:00,700 --> 01:14:07,140
Hisbola for everything that goes on in the
Lebanese state that is wrong with it.

844
01:14:08,120 --> 01:14:16,120
But like you are saying, Hisbola was fine
really with the Hariri order.

845
01:14:16,320 --> 01:14:17,320
They didn't challenge it.

846
01:14:17,850 --> 01:14:21,493
It's a mistake to think of them
as some kind of Marxist or

847
01:14:21,494 --> 01:14:25,580
socialist party that had an
alternative economic program.

848
01:14:26,480 --> 01:14:29,980
They are not.

849
01:14:30,200 --> 01:14:31,200
They never claim to be.

850
01:14:31,720 --> 01:14:37,740
In fact, they are anti-Marxist and anti
-socialist.

851
01:14:37,741 --> 01:14:41,300
If they did have a class element,
we can get into that.

852
01:14:42,000 --> 01:14:49,121
Very similar to Iran, I think in the political
economy of Iran, after the revolution.

853
01:14:49,520 --> 01:14:56,280
They are not choosing to be, to really
mount a full welfare state's economy or

854
01:14:56,281 --> 01:15:01,180
something that is in opposition to global
capitalism, but to rather negotiate,

855
01:15:02,520 --> 01:15:03,660
cut out a place within it.

856
01:15:05,480 --> 01:15:10,906
But they are not fundamentally
opposed to seeking to

857
01:15:10,931 --> 01:15:16,420
remodify, to reconfigure
Lebanese state and economy.

858
01:15:16,660 --> 01:15:22,240
And that's kind of what allowed them to
develop this military resistance capacity.

859
01:15:22,620 --> 01:15:27,300
It's that they allowed politics and
economy to be managed by other forces,

860
01:15:28,430 --> 01:15:31,700
especially Hariri and Hisbola in the 90s.

861
01:15:32,140 --> 01:15:40,040
And then when Hariri turned sharply
against Syria and Hisbola and after 2005,

862
01:15:40,041 --> 01:15:44,060
that's when the problems began between the
two blocks.

863
01:15:45,080 --> 01:15:51,620
So, yes, I think it is an
oversimplification to think and really

864
01:15:52,000 --> 01:15:57,850
ignoring of the historical record
to think that Lebanon's economic

865
01:15:57,851 --> 01:16:06,600
woes are primarily in any way
due to the policies of Hisbola.

866
01:16:07,000 --> 01:16:13,540
And in fact, the region has developed and
all the time that Lebanon was being fought

867
01:16:13,541 --> 01:16:20,460
over in the civil war and in the Arab
-Israeli wars, the role that it was

868
01:16:20,660 --> 01:16:25,100
playing successfully in the past was,
you know, became obsolete.

869
01:16:25,610 --> 01:16:32,460
And the Gulf has been the increasing
center of, of course, financial capitalism

870
01:16:33,210 --> 01:16:35,100
and western alliances.

871
01:16:35,101 --> 01:16:41,100
And military bases and things like that
for the West and the Lebanon became a

872
01:16:42,150 --> 01:16:44,360
casualty of that.

873
01:16:45,280 --> 01:16:45,440
Okay.

874
01:16:45,640 --> 01:16:48,894
So, we're going to go through
the second part because I

875
01:16:48,895 --> 01:16:53,880
think already we've been
together for one over an 18 minutes.

876
01:16:53,881 --> 01:16:56,000
And that was a promise of the 90 minutes.

877
01:16:56,860 --> 01:17:00,781
But the main part of the kind
of interview was to understand

878
01:17:00,782 --> 01:17:05,380
the very complicated relationship
between Hisbola and Iran.

879
01:17:06,000 --> 01:17:09,680
And if you give me time, I think this is a
start that as much as we can cover that,

880
01:17:10,060 --> 01:17:15,640
but maybe we do it another program,
but let me just start with this video,

881
01:17:16,020 --> 01:17:22,620
or like with this tweet from an Iranian
famous...

882
01:17:23,780 --> 01:17:28,880
Women's activists, as you can call it,
but I still have someone who met with

883
01:17:29,400 --> 01:17:35,105
Pompeo, I think, is an insult
to many genuine organic

884
01:17:35,106 --> 01:17:38,580
women activists in Iran to
call her a women activist.

885
01:17:38,840 --> 01:17:43,520
I think she's a kind of a studio of State
Department.

886
01:17:43,800 --> 01:17:45,940
And I say that someone, she can take me to
court.

887
01:17:46,480 --> 01:17:49,025
I know her personally, she
was an old friend, but I think

888
01:17:49,026 --> 01:17:52,600
what she's done in the last
few years advocating for...

889
01:17:52,900 --> 01:17:57,080
a military attack to Iran and for more
sanctions on Iran are like apparent and

890
01:17:57,505 --> 01:17:58,505
unforgivable.

891
01:17:58,640 --> 01:18:02,840
But anyway, she says I agree with it,
whatever first lady before, which is a

892
01:18:02,841 --> 01:18:07,040
Lebanese account, Beirut will be free only
when Islamic Republic is gone.

893
01:18:07,520 --> 01:18:10,786
In this video, I talk about
how the regime in Tehran

894
01:18:10,787 --> 01:18:14,040
spends millions on proxies
in Lebanon, Syria and Yemen.

895
01:18:14,580 --> 01:18:17,940
The people of Iran and Lebanon have a
common foe.

896
01:18:18,040 --> 01:18:19,820
And let's just see part of her video as
well.

897
01:18:19,821 --> 01:18:26,120
I am here to tell you that the Islamic
Republic has money, but they prefer to

898
01:18:26,220 --> 01:18:31,760
send their money to the proxies in
Lebanon, in Iraq, in Syria, in Yemen.

899
01:18:32,580 --> 01:18:35,800
Watch these videos and judge for yourself.

900
01:18:36,840 --> 01:18:37,920
We are here.

901
01:18:38,340 --> 01:18:41,200
And you can see that everything in the
world is in you.

902
01:18:41,700 --> 01:18:43,980
That one of us is a leader and a leader.

903
01:18:45,330 --> 01:18:50,240
And let's say that the world is good for
the peace of the country.

904
01:18:50,660 --> 01:18:54,960
We are the one who has the power to
protect the people and the people of Iran,

905
01:18:54,961 --> 01:19:00,120
and we are the ones who have the power to
protect the people of Iran.

906
01:19:11,060 --> 01:19:15,500
Now, we are back.

907
01:19:15,501 --> 01:19:16,861
We are back in our first sentence.

908
01:19:19,260 --> 01:19:27,260
How many people in Iran are talking about?

909
01:19:28,470 --> 01:19:30,431
In the first sentence, why are they
talking about?

910
01:19:44,020 --> 01:19:49,340
So we see one aspect, the other aspect,
goes here to Lebanon.

911
01:19:49,760 --> 01:19:51,220
To our neighbors in Lebanon.

912
01:19:51,460 --> 01:19:53,340
And that's like a famous Israeli account.

913
01:19:53,600 --> 01:19:57,780
To our neighbors in Lebanon, your country
has been taken hostage by Hisbullah.

914
01:19:58,250 --> 01:20:00,080
A terrorist organization, which has...

915
01:20:00,350 --> 01:20:05,540
wreaked destruction terror and instability
across Lebanon.

916
01:20:06,060 --> 01:20:09,237
Hisbullah is not only a
threat to us in Israel, but a

917
01:20:09,238 --> 01:20:12,640
threat to the safety and
security of the people of Lebanon.

918
01:20:13,320 --> 01:20:15,080
Now is the time to speak up.

919
01:20:15,660 --> 01:20:21,380
And this is like what's being
courted by... a threat by Elon Levy.

920
01:20:21,780 --> 01:20:24,380
So Israelis warning our neighbors in
Lebanon.

921
01:20:24,860 --> 01:20:26,160
Now is the time to speak up.

922
01:20:26,240 --> 01:20:32,260
Hisbullah is dragging our countries into a
totally unnecessary war in service of

923
01:20:32,261 --> 01:20:35,740
their warlord patrons in the Iranian
regime.

924
01:20:36,205 --> 01:20:39,320
It's not too late to stop this madness.

925
01:20:39,580 --> 01:20:46,300
It goes like day and night between like
Iranians and Lebanese and other factions.

926
01:20:46,301 --> 01:20:52,680
So I just want to show a couple more,
so we open this conversation properly.

927
01:20:53,180 --> 01:21:00,800
So this one, for example, by Emily
Schrader, a known Israeli propagandist,

928
01:21:01,000 --> 01:21:05,880
and talks about the colonization of
Lebanon by the Islamic Republic because of

929
01:21:05,881 --> 01:21:07,600
this picture somewhere in Beirut,
I guess.

930
01:21:08,075 --> 01:21:12,900
And so I searched the word colonization of
Lebanon and it's like big.

931
01:21:13,160 --> 01:21:14,380
I mean, you can see hundreds.

932
01:21:14,940 --> 01:21:22,380
So, or this one, Hossein Abdul Hossein,
who says, as a Lebanese, nothing sounds

933
01:21:22,381 --> 01:21:27,920
better than when reading an Iranian
spreading the propaganda of a group of

934
01:21:27,921 --> 01:21:32,118
Lebanese mercenaries who work
for the Iran regime about what the

935
01:21:32,119 --> 01:21:36,380
Lebanese people and their
state want to think like or dislike.

936
01:21:36,780 --> 01:21:40,619
Any chance the Lebanese
can demand decolonization

937
01:21:40,620 --> 01:21:43,800
from Islamist Iran
regime and its supporters.

938
01:21:44,460 --> 01:21:48,860
And I finished with this one with a tweet
from Clifford D.

939
01:21:48,980 --> 01:21:52,840
May, the founder of Foundation
for Defense for Democracy

940
01:21:52,841 --> 01:21:56,220
which is very close to Liquid
Party based in Washington.

941
01:21:56,720 --> 01:22:00,500
It says Lebanon is no longer an
independent and sovereign nation.

942
01:22:00,950 --> 01:22:04,240
It's a captive of an empire based in
Tehran.

943
01:22:04,690 --> 01:22:10,220
It's supreme leader imposes his will
through his beloved, a foreign legion.

944
01:22:10,640 --> 01:22:13,909
Those who claim they oppose
imperialism and colonialism,

945
01:22:13,910 --> 01:22:19,600
either don't understand
that or don't give a damn.

946
01:22:20,360 --> 01:22:21,360
So, let's go.

947
01:22:21,860 --> 01:22:24,627
Let's go directly to
this question before, I

948
01:22:24,628 --> 01:22:27,060
think that would be a
pity not knowing that.

949
01:22:27,560 --> 01:22:30,700
And so my question is, is Hezbollah a
proxy of Iran?

950
01:22:31,660 --> 01:22:39,560
Has Iran colonized Lebanon for its own
benefits and for its own national

951
01:22:39,561 --> 01:22:42,700
interests and for its own regional
imperialism?

952
01:22:43,460 --> 01:22:47,546
Or no, you think
Hezbollah does calculate its

953
01:22:47,547 --> 01:22:52,061
decision based on what's
important in Lebanon?

954
01:22:54,380 --> 01:23:00,600
Well, that's very high-pitched Zionist
propaganda there, selection that you've

955
01:23:00,601 --> 01:23:05,326
called very representative
of that perspective,

956
01:23:05,327 --> 01:23:09,160
but no, I don't think
you can say colonization.

957
01:23:18,830 --> 01:23:25,880
Colonization would... it seems to other
the huge amount of Lebanese Shia in

958
01:23:25,881 --> 01:23:31,700
particular and the many people in Lebanon
beyond the Shia population in Lebanon that

959
01:23:31,900 --> 01:23:38,620
support the agenda and the politics of
this party and its allies in the region.

960
01:23:38,820 --> 01:23:41,700
This is a lot of rhetoric.

961
01:23:42,020 --> 01:23:43,020
What can I say?

962
01:23:43,885 --> 01:23:51,480
Look, the people that support Hezbollah
and resistance have again been educated on

963
01:23:51,481 --> 01:23:57,100
what it means to live in a region next to
a vicious settler colonial state,

964
01:23:57,390 --> 01:24:02,040
such as Israel, which is committing an
unrestricted genocide right now in the

965
01:24:02,041 --> 01:24:07,300
Gaza, which set up prison camps and
torture camps within Lebanon that it

966
01:24:07,400 --> 01:24:08,400
captured people.

967
01:24:08,970 --> 01:24:12,500
Just as I occupied the West Bank and all
the things that was doing the West Bank

968
01:24:12,501 --> 01:24:17,036
and it used to do in
Gaza when it was directly

969
01:24:17,037 --> 01:24:21,081
occupied before it
evacuated and besieged it.

970
01:24:21,500 --> 01:24:28,640
Anyway, Lebanon was just another occupied
territory, southern Lebanon, where you had

971
01:24:28,641 --> 01:24:34,380
a belligerent military occupation from
even actually...

972
01:24:34,381 --> 01:24:39,687
My own research has shown
that from 1948 they have

973
01:24:39,688 --> 01:24:44,180
stolen Lebanese lands
and annexed it to Israel.

974
01:24:44,800 --> 01:24:48,700
There's a series of villages in the south
that were completely destroyed and taken

975
01:24:48,900 --> 01:24:54,380
in the 1948 war, depopulated completely,
ethnically cleansed.

976
01:24:57,200 --> 01:25:05,200
They stole water from Lebanon in the 1960s
with their diversion of the River Jordan

977
01:25:05,450 --> 01:25:12,220
project and the tributaries that came from
Lebanon as well.

978
01:25:12,420 --> 01:25:20,060
They repeatedly attacked the
infrastructure of Lebanon from the airport

979
01:25:20,061 --> 01:25:25,060
in the late 1960s, many times,
and destroyed almost the entire fleet of

980
01:25:25,510 --> 01:25:30,840
Lebanese national airlines in 1968,
very famously.

981
01:25:30,841 --> 01:25:37,580
And they started occupying territory in
1970, building military roads,

982
01:25:37,800 --> 01:25:41,880
taking belligerent positions within the
country even before the civil war.

983
01:25:44,000 --> 01:25:51,600
And then a belligerent occupation and
series of invasions from the late 1970s

984
01:25:51,800 --> 01:25:56,498
to, well, the present when
we have 97,000 people

985
01:25:56,499 --> 01:26:00,820
displaced as a result of
Israeli actions in the south.

986
01:26:01,120 --> 01:26:05,379
All because they want
to continue the genocide

987
01:26:05,380 --> 01:26:09,321
within the Gaza and
in Palestine in general.

988
01:26:10,220 --> 01:26:17,900
And so Lebanese people by the tens of
thousands have been affected by the

989
01:26:17,901 --> 01:26:20,623
hundreds of thousands
have been affected by

990
01:26:20,624 --> 01:26:24,201
Israeli policy and US
policy in the region.

991
01:26:24,380 --> 01:26:28,380
And now, one thing about those videos,
other than the fact that they're very old,

992
01:26:28,700 --> 01:26:31,540
that video of Hassan Estralo speaking,
for instance.

993
01:26:32,080 --> 01:26:36,060
And you can find similar videos to that
now.

994
01:26:36,220 --> 01:26:41,718
He openly and the leaders of
Hamas repeatedly state we are

995
01:26:41,719 --> 01:26:46,680
receiving Iranian funding
and military assistance for free.

996
01:26:46,860 --> 01:26:47,860
They're giving it to us.

997
01:26:47,940 --> 01:26:49,220
They are funding us, yes.

998
01:26:50,280 --> 01:26:54,905
Now, that has to be considered
with what was on offer to the

999
01:26:54,906 --> 01:26:59,540
Lebanese states by the United
States before the civil war.

1000
01:26:59,660 --> 01:27:03,560
And indeed, one of the very reasons of the
Lebanese social conflict is the limited

1001
01:27:03,561 --> 01:27:09,960
assistance of the Lebanese state's major
patron, United States refused to equip the

1002
01:27:09,961 --> 01:27:16,800
Lebanese army with adequate weapons to
defend itself or in the south.

1003
01:27:17,250 --> 01:27:20,280
Because they were afraid of it then
turning the weapons against Israel.

1004
01:27:20,900 --> 01:27:23,629
Now, this is something
that Iran, obviously,

1005
01:27:23,630 --> 01:27:26,100
this is not a restriction
that Iran places.

1006
01:27:26,220 --> 01:27:33,120
In fact, they encourage their military
equipment to be pointed in that direction

1007
01:27:33,121 --> 01:27:38,020
rather than on the inside, which is where
the Americans continue to fund.

1008
01:27:38,021 --> 01:27:44,200
I mean, the US has funded even hundreds of
millions of dollars since 2006.

1009
01:27:44,201 --> 01:27:47,400
I think over a billion dollars,
they have funded the Lebanese army because

1010
01:27:47,401 --> 01:27:55,320
they see it as a method of internal
security and a potential alternative.

1011
01:27:56,280 --> 01:28:02,160
And maybe it could be built up to use to
be one day against Hasbullah.

1012
01:28:02,420 --> 01:28:04,100
Well, that's not working out at all.

1013
01:28:04,240 --> 01:28:05,240
I'll just say that.

1014
01:28:06,610 --> 01:28:12,060
But I mean, Lebanese
people have experienced this

1015
01:28:12,061 --> 01:28:16,120
brutality for decades and
displaced by the millions.

1016
01:28:17,200 --> 01:28:19,260
But let me just ask them one by one.

1017
01:28:19,600 --> 01:28:22,800
So, Is Hasbullah funded by Iran or not?

1018
01:28:23,020 --> 01:28:24,740
Is Hasbullah established by Iran or not?

1019
01:28:24,741 --> 01:28:25,180
Not one.

1020
01:28:25,700 --> 01:28:25,860
Two.

1021
01:28:26,220 --> 01:28:31,680
Does Hasbullah go to Syrian war with the
order of Iran or not?

1022
01:28:34,060 --> 01:28:42,060
Now, Is Hasbullah taking part in this
exchange of fire into war with Israel,

1023
01:28:43,120 --> 01:28:45,980
with the order of Iran or not?

1024
01:28:46,280 --> 01:28:50,460
What's the relationship between the
decision making in Da'iam and Tehran?

1025
01:28:50,840 --> 01:28:53,660
Is Hasbullah following the suit from
Iranians?

1026
01:28:53,661 --> 01:28:55,860
Or does it have some space for
independence?

1027
01:28:56,040 --> 01:28:57,040
These are the questions.

1028
01:28:57,260 --> 01:28:59,510
And because it's like
sometimes the lack of clarity,

1029
01:28:59,511 --> 01:29:03,600
that's where they come and
create these understandings.

1030
01:29:04,035 --> 01:29:09,201
So, if you start with that one, Is Hasbullah
a proxy established by Iranians or not?

1031
01:29:09,280 --> 01:29:11,060
Is it like... let's start from here.

1032
01:29:13,520 --> 01:29:17,620
Well, there is a relationship between Iran
and Hasbullah, absolutely.

1033
01:29:18,780 --> 01:29:25,040
The Iranian Islamic Revolution and the
Islamic Republic provided an ideological

1034
01:29:26,140 --> 01:29:34,140
poll of inspiration for its supporters in
Lebanon, and knowing the structure of the

1035
01:29:34,141 --> 01:29:41,660
Lebanese state and the large size of the
Shia community as being recognized even in

1036
01:29:41,661 --> 01:29:49,380
the 1970s, is probably being the single
largest community, which was deprived of

1037
01:29:49,530 --> 01:29:53,046
the power of that was given
hierarchically in the sectarian

1038
01:29:53,047 --> 01:29:56,520
regime to the Maranite
Christians and the vast majority.

1039
01:29:57,500 --> 01:30:04,060
And then the Sunni Muslims were given the
second rank of political privileges within

1040
01:30:05,100 --> 01:30:09,623
the state, while the
Shia were the largest

1041
01:30:09,624 --> 01:30:13,520
community and had the
least amount of resources.

1042
01:30:13,860 --> 01:30:19,740
That made the community in general support
be a reservoir of opposition for

1043
01:30:19,741 --> 01:30:26,700
opposition to the Lebanese state and its
policies in general, which started by

1044
01:30:26,701 --> 01:30:32,540
being expressed through an Arab
nationalist and Marxist lens, and then by

1045
01:30:32,541 --> 01:30:38,000
the failure of... by the time that the
Arab nationalist and Marxist trends were

1046
01:30:38,150 --> 01:30:45,100
defeated in Lebanon, especially in 1976,
with the American ranged Syrian

1047
01:30:45,101 --> 01:30:48,925
intervention in Lebanon
that prevented that actually

1048
01:30:48,926 --> 01:30:51,761
defeated the Lebanese
left in the civil war.

1049
01:30:52,320 --> 01:30:55,900
And then the Israeli occupation,
of course, again funded by the Americans,

1050
01:30:56,440 --> 01:31:01,392
the left was reduced in
power and the attractiveness

1051
01:31:01,393 --> 01:31:06,280
of Islamic political
mobilization increased.

1052
01:31:06,281 --> 01:31:13,220
And then the 1982 war was really the
breaking point there, where even some Shia

1053
01:31:13,221 --> 01:31:19,220
factions, such as Amal, worked with the
Lebanese government, which was perceived

1054
01:31:19,270 --> 01:31:23,600
as maintaining and acquiescing in the
Israeli invasion.

1055
01:31:24,400 --> 01:31:31,520
So, yes, Iran did send Iranian
revolutionary guards to Lebanon in 1982,

1056
01:31:31,521 --> 01:31:36,806
and afterwards that was
allowed by Syria to promote

1057
01:31:36,807 --> 01:31:40,540
a group that would be
loyal to the Islamic regime.

1058
01:31:41,340 --> 01:31:46,900
But those Lebanese constituency that had
found readily were the victims of Israeli

1059
01:31:46,901 --> 01:31:52,140
aggression, displacement, occupation,
harassment, and killing.

1060
01:31:52,141 --> 01:31:53,400
So, we have a synergy there.

1061
01:31:54,020 --> 01:31:58,560
They are not a proxy, but they are strong
allies, basically.

1062
01:31:59,920 --> 01:32:06,600
And yes, of course, Iran is a state actor,
it's a oil power, it's much bigger than

1063
01:32:06,601 --> 01:32:09,660
Haslallah, it has a greater weight in the
relationship.

1064
01:32:10,360 --> 01:32:15,540
But the way that Haslallah and his
leadership and as navigated the waters,

1065
01:32:16,370 --> 01:32:20,900
the very treacherous waters of the Israel
of the Lebanese political environment has

1066
01:32:21,100 --> 01:32:26,240
increased their support over the years and
increased their relative autonomy within

1067
01:32:26,241 --> 01:32:31,620
this relationship, which is really,
I think, relative autonomy is a good way

1068
01:32:32,220 --> 01:32:33,700
to describe the relationship.

1069
01:32:34,575 --> 01:32:39,340
So, is there any kind of evidence that
President Allah is acting autonomously?

1070
01:32:41,780 --> 01:32:44,240
Is there evidence that they are acting
autonomously?

1071
01:32:44,340 --> 01:32:49,280
I mean, what evidence is there that they
are not acting autonomously?

1072
01:32:50,150 --> 01:32:57,900
I would first say, you can watch the
speeches of Haslallah, he describes in

1073
01:32:58,445 --> 01:33:06,420
detail the rationale of their policies,
it's always framed within the Lebanese and

1074
01:33:06,421 --> 01:33:10,734
Arab context, he makes
no secret that there's this

1075
01:33:10,735 --> 01:33:14,320
positive alliance with Iran
and the support in them.

1076
01:33:15,000 --> 01:33:19,620
But there's also a network that Haslallah
definitely raises funds from within the

1077
01:33:19,621 --> 01:33:24,660
Lebanese community as well, there's
networks of linked businesses to them.

1078
01:33:25,260 --> 01:33:31,940
There are fundraisers, people under the
donation boxes around their wealthy class

1079
01:33:32,660 --> 01:33:40,660
of Lebanese immigrants, particularly who
also fund the activities of Haslallah.

1080
01:33:40,661 --> 01:33:47,500
There's a Haslallah, Apro Haslallah,
Shia, Bujwa Zee that has the domestic

1081
01:33:47,501 --> 01:33:50,460
sources of income, that all funds this
movement.

1082
01:33:51,780 --> 01:33:59,780
So, it is also very strongly locally
funded as well as receiving very generous

1083
01:34:00,230 --> 01:34:03,420
Iranian subsidies and no one really denies
that.

1084
01:34:07,170 --> 01:34:14,820
Okay, the reason I'm asking is because
every day there are pictures in Iran of

1085
01:34:15,860 --> 01:34:21,275
kids looking into being like
showing extreme poverty

1086
01:34:21,276 --> 01:34:26,200
in Iran or village schools
not having basic amenities.

1087
01:34:26,201 --> 01:34:31,780
And they say the reason for that is
because Iran has spent all this money for

1088
01:34:31,781 --> 01:34:37,900
Haslallah and all the money which has to
go for a welfare of Iranians has been as

1089
01:34:37,901 --> 01:34:41,520
you saw in Kamasi al-Renjard, like
propaganda things.

1090
01:34:42,260 --> 01:34:45,400
But then in reality, so let me just maybe
it's easier.

1091
01:34:45,540 --> 01:34:51,600
That's what I want to... I mean,
I want to open programs not trying away

1092
01:34:51,601 --> 01:34:56,180
from propaganda, because these are
important propagandists to be like...

1093
01:34:56,181 --> 01:35:03,320
But then in reality, I think even based on
what Galan said back in April last year,

1094
01:35:04,820 --> 01:35:07,526
Iran is giving $700
million a year to Haslallah,

1095
01:35:07,527 --> 01:35:10,900
which is like there's lots
of money for every country.

1096
01:35:11,590 --> 01:35:14,812
But in the context of Lebanese
money coming from Saudi,

1097
01:35:14,813 --> 01:35:17,800
Qatar and other countries,
how much is this money?

1098
01:35:17,801 --> 01:35:19,760
I mean, is it like significant amounts of
money?

1099
01:35:20,550 --> 01:35:26,540
Is it such a big budget that makes
Haslallah significantly richer than other

1100
01:35:26,541 --> 01:35:31,020
organizations and other sects and other
parts of Lebanese political establishment?

1101
01:35:32,300 --> 01:35:38,540
Well, first of all, this is a number that
we should hold in great skepticism.

1102
01:35:38,820 --> 01:35:43,860
It's coming from the archfowl of Haslallah
and Iran.

1103
01:35:43,861 --> 01:35:50,560
It's a Israeli number that is clearly...
they have an interest in playing up the

1104
01:35:50,561 --> 01:35:54,180
dependency on the linkage between these
two groups.

1105
01:35:56,170 --> 01:35:59,473
So, of course, I have no
knowledge of the financial

1106
01:35:59,474 --> 01:36:02,500
transactions that go on
between these two entities.

1107
01:36:03,155 --> 01:36:07,240
And to be quite honest, I don't think that
the US or Israel does either.

1108
01:36:07,795 --> 01:36:09,240
They're just playing this game.

1109
01:36:11,800 --> 01:36:15,000
But even if this number is true,
it's like basically nothing.

1110
01:36:15,320 --> 01:36:19,668
I mean, I was said that
Saudi Arabia spent $70 billion

1111
01:36:19,669 --> 01:36:23,460
a year killing Yemenis over
the last seven years' war.

1112
01:36:24,100 --> 01:36:28,671
The genocidal war that
Saudis had in Yemen, killing

1113
01:36:28,672 --> 01:36:31,820
over 350,000 mainly
children and women in Yemen.

1114
01:36:32,200 --> 01:36:34,500
And I was $70 billion, so it was about
$80.

1115
01:36:35,020 --> 01:36:35,280
Correct.

1116
01:36:35,980 --> 01:36:37,080
90 times more than this.

1117
01:36:37,960 --> 01:36:43,946
Yes, I'm not sure of the specific
numbers of Saudi investment

1118
01:36:43,947 --> 01:36:46,801
in either Lebanon or in
Yemen or anything like that.

1119
01:36:47,360 --> 01:36:50,320
But I have no doubt that they are very
high.

1120
01:36:50,600 --> 01:36:56,580
And when you combine, I know more about
the US support for Lebanon, which has

1121
01:36:56,581 --> 01:37:01,560
added up to over a billion dollars just to
the Lebanese army.

1122
01:37:01,561 --> 01:37:03,700
Then there's other payments that have
occurred.

1123
01:37:04,780 --> 01:37:12,180
The US is also building one of the largest
embassies in the world in Lebanon right

1124
01:37:12,181 --> 01:37:19,380
now, which it alone is $1.5 billion or
more embassy complex, basically.

1125
01:37:20,030 --> 01:37:23,960
They are very suspicious,
like open... practically a

1126
01:37:23,961 --> 01:37:29,060
military base that's being
constructed in Lebanon, basically.

1127
01:37:29,670 --> 01:37:34,980
You don't see anything like that open
-labeled Iranian embassy in Lebanon.

1128
01:37:35,565 --> 01:37:36,600
It's nothing like that.

1129
01:37:37,760 --> 01:37:42,040
Although, yes, there's no doubt that...
and nobody is saying that there's no...

1130
01:37:42,090 --> 01:37:45,380
not a significant Iranian investment,
but you have to remember that.

1131
01:37:45,805 --> 01:37:48,880
Lebanon is a country of 6 million people
max.

1132
01:37:49,910 --> 01:37:54,360
It's probably putting that money mostly in
the South for the Shia community.

1133
01:37:55,180 --> 01:38:02,880
This is probably peanuts in comparison to
Iranian state budgets that it spends

1134
01:38:03,080 --> 01:38:04,080
elsewhere.

1135
01:38:04,380 --> 01:38:07,380
And I wouldn't expect that it's...

1136
01:38:08,230 --> 01:38:14,420
that cutting the budget for it is really
taking food out of it would really put

1137
01:38:14,421 --> 01:38:19,380
food back into Iran's mouth if they were
to cut the budget here.

1138
01:38:19,560 --> 01:38:26,680
It's not the decisive factor of the
economic crisis in Iran, which is probably

1139
01:38:26,681 --> 01:38:31,229
far more related or far
more materially related to the

1140
01:38:31,230 --> 01:38:34,200
brutal sanctions regime
that's been opposed upon it.

1141
01:38:34,625 --> 01:38:39,600
So, let me just take the question a bit
like from different angle, because I want

1142
01:38:39,601 --> 01:38:41,840
to understand what is the nature of
Hezbollah.

1143
01:38:41,940 --> 01:38:45,520
The reason is, if I understand the nature
of Hezbollah is...

1144
01:38:45,521 --> 01:38:48,580
I mean, those who claim is proxy of Iran,
so it doesn't matter.

1145
01:38:48,780 --> 01:38:52,580
So, if Iran says no, attack Israel,
don't attack, so everything has happened

1146
01:38:52,581 --> 01:38:56,360
to Iran, which seems to be like a
caricator of the reality.

1147
01:38:57,030 --> 01:39:01,180
But I want to understand the nature and
the relationship between Hezbollah and

1148
01:39:01,181 --> 01:39:06,700
other factions in Lebanon, to understand
what are the constraints of Hezbollah's

1149
01:39:06,975 --> 01:39:12,780
action against Israel, how much more it
can go into the war with Israel,

1150
01:39:13,340 --> 01:39:16,940
and how much it's restrained, and so how
much maneuvering the space it has.

1151
01:39:18,110 --> 01:39:24,320
For that reason, let me just ask you,
how do you define Hezbollah?

1152
01:39:24,740 --> 01:39:32,740
Is it a liberation, national liberation
organization, and it can be understood as

1153
01:39:32,741 --> 01:39:38,060
a nationalist, even though it's labeled
itself within the religious terminology

1154
01:39:38,061 --> 01:39:45,600
and it defines the ideology religiously,
but its output and its real function is

1155
01:39:45,601 --> 01:39:49,568
like not different from
other national liberation

1156
01:39:49,569 --> 01:39:53,660
armies that we've had from
Ireland to other countries.

1157
01:39:53,661 --> 01:39:58,560
From to Bask and to during the
colonization era.

1158
01:39:58,995 --> 01:40:05,080
Is this for a national liberation army,
or does it have a more pan-Islamist,

1159
01:40:06,880 --> 01:40:14,880
regional aspiration to have like Shiite
caliphate across region, or is it a

1160
01:40:14,881 --> 01:40:19,220
sectarian organization wants to turn
Lebanon into velayat, and is really as

1161
01:40:19,280 --> 01:40:27,280
fatali and making an Iranian, similar to
Islamic Republic of Iran, is Shiite State

1162
01:40:27,281 --> 01:40:30,640
in Lebanon and established Sharia,
and rule of Sharia.

1163
01:40:31,210 --> 01:40:35,380
If you explain more about the current
Hezbollah, have you understand,

1164
01:40:35,660 --> 01:40:38,440
under the leadership of Nasrullah?

1165
01:40:38,441 --> 01:40:41,340
Is it different from the previous things?

1166
01:40:41,980 --> 01:40:45,860
Because, I mean, many people are still...
I mean, when they talk about hisbola in

1167
01:40:45,861 --> 01:40:51,580
the West, they say it was a terrorist
organization which announced his existence

1168
01:40:51,581 --> 01:40:57,220
by killing over 200 American Marines in a
terrorist action.

1169
01:40:57,380 --> 01:41:00,120
Even though hisbola has never accepted
responsibility for that.

1170
01:41:00,820 --> 01:41:05,540
So, they picked it, not that different
from ISIS or Al-Qaeda.

1171
01:41:05,980 --> 01:41:10,460
So, how do you see and how do you define
the essence of hisbola in 2024?

1172
01:41:13,150 --> 01:41:19,720
It's a very pointed and prescient
question, I would say, that hisbola is an

1173
01:41:19,721 --> 01:41:25,780
armed political movement that is focused
on its war with Israel.

1174
01:41:27,420 --> 01:41:35,420
This is a established now view that I take
from scholars of the movement itself.

1175
01:41:35,860 --> 01:41:42,600
I recommend people like Adham Sohli,
Amal Saad, Or Ali Dahar, these people have

1176
01:41:42,650 --> 01:41:50,340
written very detailed analyses and
histories and analyses of the movement.

1177
01:41:51,080 --> 01:41:53,560
And I think that, yes, all these things
are controversial.

1178
01:41:54,240 --> 01:41:56,740
And within Lebanese society, especially,
too, yes.

1179
01:41:57,460 --> 01:42:05,160
The question is, is Hezbollah more
interested in establishing Waleedifakir,

1180
01:42:05,380 --> 01:42:08,380
Shiite Islamic regime in Lebanon?

1181
01:42:09,240 --> 01:42:12,660
That is what its opponents have
traditionally emphasized.

1182
01:42:13,660 --> 01:42:15,780
But where's evidence for that exactly?

1183
01:42:16,120 --> 01:42:20,700
We have Hezbollah's organization that's
been around for almost 40 years now.

1184
01:42:22,040 --> 01:42:30,220
And it certainly has far more power militarily
than any other force in the country.

1185
01:42:30,810 --> 01:42:37,340
If it had wanted to take power in Lebanon
and establish a political regime there,

1186
01:42:37,680 --> 01:42:39,680
it certainly could have.

1187
01:42:40,080 --> 01:42:45,400
And it had very obvious moments where it
could have done so, especially in 2008.

1188
01:42:45,780 --> 01:42:46,780
It did not.

1189
01:42:47,100 --> 01:42:53,880
Because as I think scholars such as Adham
Sohli correctly argue, they're more

1190
01:42:54,055 --> 01:42:57,530
focused on war making
with Israel rather than

1191
01:42:57,531 --> 01:43:01,541
imposing an islamization
of Lebanese society.

1192
01:43:01,760 --> 01:43:09,200
Now they want to produce... I disagree
with those, I mean, or I would caution

1193
01:43:09,201 --> 01:43:13,520
against the total this scene Lebanon is a
purely... excuse me.

1194
01:43:13,880 --> 01:43:16,840
Hezbollah is only a
resistance, a secular

1195
01:43:16,841 --> 01:43:20,180
resistance, military
resistance against Israel.

1196
01:43:20,660 --> 01:43:21,660
It's not that.

1197
01:43:21,700 --> 01:43:23,480
It doesn't claim to be never did.

1198
01:43:24,530 --> 01:43:28,687
It announces clear ideological
ties to Iran, to even the

1199
01:43:28,688 --> 01:43:34,820
leadership of the Fakir as in
Hamani or whoever is a leader.

1200
01:43:35,800 --> 01:43:44,701
It believes in the in the justice of that
regime and of the authority of that person.

1201
01:43:44,830 --> 01:43:51,680
But it does not and there's very little
evidence for them trying to force upon

1202
01:43:51,681 --> 01:43:56,020
either their religion or their way of
being on any other Lebanese sect.

1203
01:43:57,180 --> 01:44:05,180
Or and within the Shiite community,
they work towards islamizing the society

1204
01:44:05,680 --> 01:44:08,720
from below rather than from the top.

1205
01:44:09,160 --> 01:44:11,420
And they do this through grassroots
mobilization.

1206
01:44:11,740 --> 01:44:15,820
They have organizations for women,
for engineers.

1207
01:44:16,180 --> 01:44:18,419
I mean, and in this,
they... that's what is very

1208
01:44:18,420 --> 01:44:20,640
similar to international
liberation movements.

1209
01:44:21,280 --> 01:44:25,660
And then Lebanon, the previous experience
of the PLO, especially the Palestinian

1210
01:44:25,661 --> 01:44:30,960
revolution in Lebanon, which created a
network of social services, schools,

1211
01:44:31,740 --> 01:44:37,658
medical centers, you know,
a resistant society is what

1212
01:44:37,659 --> 01:44:42,140
Hasballa is often explicitly
says is the goal of building.

1213
01:44:42,380 --> 01:44:48,520
And that was the goal of the secular third
worldest national liberation movements

1214
01:44:48,521 --> 01:44:52,480
when, yeah, when they were secular in the
70s and 80s.

1215
01:44:52,520 --> 01:44:58,700
That was they would they wanted to do in a
secular way, of course, what the

1216
01:44:58,701 --> 01:45:04,060
mobilization of society for people's war
against Zionist settler colonialism,

1217
01:45:04,160 --> 01:45:07,760
that Hasballa has actually organized
basically.

1218
01:45:08,260 --> 01:45:13,740
But I think the overwhelming evidence just
to make a very quick summation is that the

1219
01:45:13,741 --> 01:45:18,700
experience of Hasballa is overwhelmingly
shows that they're geared towards military

1220
01:45:18,701 --> 01:45:25,060
confrontation with Israel, establish
liberating occupied lands, establishing

1221
01:45:25,061 --> 01:45:30,920
deterrence with Israel to make sure it can
no longer intervene in Lebanese politics,

1222
01:45:32,040 --> 01:45:33,321
the way that it did in the past.

1223
01:45:33,500 --> 01:45:36,120
And this is the primary characteristic of
the organization.

1224
01:45:37,250 --> 01:45:40,935
So you mentioned that
Hasballa is offering help

1225
01:45:40,936 --> 01:45:44,701
and aid and social welfare
to other communities.

1226
01:45:45,060 --> 01:45:46,620
Does it come with a string?

1227
01:45:47,000 --> 01:45:49,520
Do they try to convert them to shism?

1228
01:45:49,800 --> 01:45:54,480
Because many Islamists organizations
across the region, from Iqwan and

1229
01:45:54,481 --> 01:45:57,600
Muslimin, Muslim brotherhood in Egypt and
Tunisia, etc.

1230
01:45:58,200 --> 01:46:03,040
They always have been trying to offer
social welfare, but that has always been

1231
01:46:03,041 --> 01:46:08,120
accompanied by recruitment engine,
trying to get them to the organization.

1232
01:46:08,680 --> 01:46:13,846
Is Hasballa trying to convert
non-Shia communities into

1233
01:46:13,847 --> 01:46:17,320
shism to gain majority and
then Islamisize the country?

1234
01:46:17,500 --> 01:46:19,920
No, there's none of these evidence
whatsoever.

1235
01:46:22,280 --> 01:46:30,280
No evidence whatsoever for an attempt to
convert non-Shia into to be coming Shia.

1236
01:46:30,400 --> 01:46:31,960
No, there's no evidence of that.

1237
01:46:34,500 --> 01:46:40,804
They... and what they provide
in social services is not is even

1238
01:46:40,805 --> 01:46:44,420
not that it is not exceptional in
the Lebanese circumstances.

1239
01:46:44,740 --> 01:46:48,946
Each of these sectarian
parties and the main ones were

1240
01:46:48,947 --> 01:46:52,640
also militias and they still
possess some kind of weapons.

1241
01:46:52,880 --> 01:47:00,260
Nothing like, you know, nothing like the
Arsinal that Hasballa has, but the main

1242
01:47:00,460 --> 01:47:05,280
governing parties in Lebanon are parties
that were the main militias and are in

1243
01:47:05,281 --> 01:47:07,460
political movements of the Lebanese Civil
War.

1244
01:47:07,840 --> 01:47:11,800
I'm like the Lebanese forces, the
Christian community, the progressive

1245
01:47:11,801 --> 01:47:19,520
socialist party and the Druze community
and then later in the Sunni community

1246
01:47:19,521 --> 01:47:27,100
didn't have much of a consolidated
sectarian militia in the war and they

1247
01:47:27,101 --> 01:47:31,880
became mobilized in the in the in the in
the future movement.

1248
01:47:32,560 --> 01:47:40,560
But all these parties provide welfare to
their two constituents, mostly their own

1249
01:47:41,100 --> 01:47:49,100
sect, but also they all provide a limited
amount of welfare to people of any other

1250
01:47:49,101 --> 01:47:52,263
religious capacity or
religious sect that that

1251
01:47:52,264 --> 01:47:55,441
might live in the area
where they provide services.

1252
01:47:55,540 --> 01:48:02,460
So there's a limited amount of cross
sectarian welfare going on.

1253
01:48:02,905 --> 01:48:09,840
But of course Hasballa's welfare system is
the most advanced and the most extensive

1254
01:48:09,841 --> 01:48:15,560
and they have the largest infrastructure
basically of that and that's there.

1255
01:48:16,320 --> 01:48:17,320
That's what they built.

1256
01:48:17,780 --> 01:48:19,960
They have an infrastructure of hospitals.

1257
01:48:20,700 --> 01:48:26,800
They provide salaries to, of course,
the fighters and the martyrs that have

1258
01:48:26,801 --> 01:48:30,880
fallen to and they provide pensions to the
families of the martyrs as well.

1259
01:48:31,080 --> 01:48:35,060
So their budget is of course activities
are much more extensive than other

1260
01:48:35,061 --> 01:48:42,300
Lebanese parties, but the idea that
different political sectarian parties are

1261
01:48:42,301 --> 01:48:46,500
providing social services to their
constituents is nothing new.

1262
01:48:46,900 --> 01:48:53,220
And there's no none of the parties,
I should also say, are trying to convert

1263
01:48:53,420 --> 01:48:54,420
anybody else.

1264
01:48:56,090 --> 01:49:03,540
This is really taboo within the Lebanese
and really within society and what my many

1265
01:49:03,541 --> 01:49:08,820
have called the, what excuse me,
for instance, some of Marxists called the

1266
01:49:08,821 --> 01:49:11,840
ecumenical frame and of coexistence in the
air world.

1267
01:49:12,040 --> 01:49:13,940
It's not, it's basically
an unspoken rule that

1268
01:49:13,941 --> 01:49:16,981
people are not trying
to convert each other.

1269
01:49:17,240 --> 01:49:20,660
And for those that are looking for more
information about sectarian welfare

1270
01:49:20,661 --> 01:49:25,400
systems, there's a book called
Compassionate Communism by Melanie Kamen

1271
01:49:25,401 --> 01:49:30,760
at Harvard that goes into the provision of
welfare by Lebanese sectarian parties.

1272
01:49:31,250 --> 01:49:37,300
So to have a kind of a very basic summary
for myself, so Esbullah is not having any

1273
01:49:37,301 --> 01:49:40,520
hidden agenda for the future of the
Lebanese society.

1274
01:49:42,050 --> 01:49:49,800
It is settled within the mosaic of
Lebanese multi-faced and multi-cultural

1275
01:49:52,280 --> 01:49:58,179
and multi-ethnic situation and
has learned and has mastered

1276
01:49:58,180 --> 01:50:02,060
the art of doing politics within
very complicated situation.

1277
01:50:02,820 --> 01:50:03,940
And am I right?

1278
01:50:04,180 --> 01:50:05,600
Did I understand that?

1279
01:50:05,720 --> 01:50:07,320
I think it's a fair characterization.

1280
01:50:07,940 --> 01:50:11,085
I would say that they
do not attempt to, that

1281
01:50:11,086 --> 01:50:14,801
they're very much a
Lebanese party in that sense.

1282
01:50:14,910 --> 01:50:20,200
In the sense that they are operating very
strongly within the sectarian system.

1283
01:50:20,890 --> 01:50:26,880
They're not advocating for in any serious
way of moving beyond that political

1284
01:50:26,881 --> 01:50:32,960
system, which from a secular or the
perspective of the left may not be

1285
01:50:33,610 --> 01:50:35,254
something that we
might want to change, or

1286
01:50:35,255 --> 01:50:38,121
I might want, or other
people might change.

1287
01:50:38,320 --> 01:50:45,780
But that's precisely that absence of
rocking a boat in the sectarian system and

1288
01:50:45,781 --> 01:50:51,540
the political economy of Lebanon is what
has enabled them, the wiggle room,

1289
01:50:52,480 --> 01:51:00,280
in Lebanese politics and state and society
to develop their capacity for resistance

1290
01:51:00,281 --> 01:51:05,800
and to grow their influence within their
own community, but without forcing their

1291
01:51:05,801 --> 01:51:12,360
views of religion and really even politics
up on other communities.

1292
01:51:12,620 --> 01:51:15,800
It's very much a quintessential Lebanese
phenomenon in that way.

1293
01:51:16,440 --> 01:51:16,920
Fantastic.

1294
01:51:17,360 --> 01:51:21,900
So in that sense, there is no possibility
of, well, not only there's no possibility

1295
01:51:21,901 --> 01:51:26,540
of the welfare, but there's no possibility
of this armament of hispola as Israel has

1296
01:51:26,541 --> 01:51:29,649
been consented and part
of the American politicians

1297
01:51:29,650 --> 01:51:32,341
have been asking for
before 7th of October.

1298
01:51:32,620 --> 01:51:36,960
If anything, based on what we got from
this conversation, from 7th of October,

1299
01:51:37,180 --> 01:51:44,940
hispola is even deeper in Lebanese
politics and society, because overall,

1300
01:51:45,420 --> 01:51:51,560
Lebanese people saw the necessity of their
existence to contain, basically,

1301
01:51:52,120 --> 01:51:54,400
to contain Israeli assaults and
aggression.

1302
01:51:54,920 --> 01:51:57,080
Am I right to understand this from your
position?

1303
01:51:59,700 --> 01:52:07,700
I think that is, I think, if it continues
like this, and it has was not eradicated,

1304
01:52:07,920 --> 01:52:11,034
and it doesn't look like
they're going to be, and it's

1305
01:52:11,035 --> 01:52:14,680
basically unimaginable that
they would be in any situation.

1306
01:52:15,920 --> 01:52:22,140
No, they are likely to emerge stronger
from this, and of course, we'll continue

1307
01:52:22,540 --> 01:52:28,180
to be opponents of hispola, but they're
willing to tolerate that, actually.

1308
01:52:28,930 --> 01:52:29,930
I think we can stop here.

1309
01:52:30,140 --> 01:52:31,500
That was a wonderful conversation.

1310
01:52:32,030 --> 01:52:33,060
It was very, very long.

1311
01:52:33,280 --> 01:52:37,820
I mean, there are many things that was
left untouched, especially the role of

1312
01:52:37,821 --> 01:52:43,180
hispola in Syria and the Syrian civil war,
and I would like to know about that in a

1313
01:52:43,181 --> 01:52:47,320
different conversation, but I think we got
a good image of the relationship between

1314
01:52:47,321 --> 01:52:52,520
hispola and other factions in Lebanon,
and that allows us to understand why

1315
01:52:52,720 --> 01:52:58,720
Galant talked about a tyranny in Beirut in
Gaza, into copy-pacing Gaza, into Beirut,

1316
01:52:59,180 --> 01:53:03,640
or force in hispola, to the back of Little
River, the only main defenses,

1317
01:53:03,940 --> 01:53:09,000
because it's much more organic and much
more native to that part.

1318
01:53:09,300 --> 01:53:13,840
So that's what I think we can get from
this conversation.

1319
01:53:14,420 --> 01:53:17,220
Nathan, thank you very much for your time.

1320
01:53:17,380 --> 01:53:21,041
I know you are very, very busy, and I
think I was very informative conversation.

1321
01:53:21,330 --> 01:53:28,040
I hope that this gets watched by as many
as possible people, because it is very

1322
01:53:28,220 --> 01:53:36,220
useful in demystifying what's being spread
around by propaganda and by the media

1323
01:53:36,221 --> 01:53:40,440
warfare and and other things, because you
can be critical of that section,

1324
01:53:41,200 --> 01:53:46,940
but as I showed many of these propaganda
today, spreading propaganda doesn't help

1325
01:53:46,941 --> 01:53:51,400
anyone in the region, whether you are for
resistance or you are against,

1326
01:53:51,580 --> 01:53:54,952
it doesn't matter, but
I think we all have the

1327
01:53:54,953 --> 01:53:57,780
similar responsibility
of stopping propaganda.

1328
01:53:57,940 --> 01:54:01,640
When it comes to resistance, Lebanese
resistance, I mean, we have so much

1329
01:54:01,641 --> 01:54:06,160
propaganda that is almost impossible to
have a conversation, some irrational

1330
01:54:06,161 --> 01:54:10,800
conversation, sometimes, in the Arab world
and among Iranians.

1331
01:54:11,340 --> 01:54:13,500
I hope to see you again in Jedal soon.

1332
01:54:14,000 --> 01:54:17,220
And thanks for all of you for watching
this program.

1333
01:54:17,900 --> 01:54:23,540
Before going away, please like the
program, subscribe to our channel and

1334
01:54:23,740 --> 01:54:26,760
leave a comment and tell us what you
thought about this conversation.

1335
01:54:27,620 --> 01:54:29,380
Goodbye, and until next time.

1336
01:54:30,580 --> 01:54:31,580
Thank you.