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[PODCAST] Call Me Back with Dan Senor: The US-Iran Deal Israel Fears - with Jonathan Schanzer
Seven years after President Trump scrapped the Iranian nuclear deal, the U.S. is now engaged in direct negotiations with the Islamic Republic of Iran to try to reach a new deal. Yet the talks in Oman have so far raised more questions than answers, especially as Steve Witkoff has just clarified the administration's objective with regard to Iran’s nuclear program, and as new reporting emerges of possible U.S.-Israel deliberations over military options.
Joining us is Jonathan Schanzer, Executive Director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Jonathan has been closely monitoring the negotiations and been in contact with relevant U.S. and Israeli officials.
Watch
Visegrád 24, an X account that serves as a news aggregator and has been a reliable source of accurate information for the past 560 days, interviews a Muslim IDF solider consisting only of questions asked by X followers. It is worth the watch.
Joe Rogan’s debate between Dave Smith and Douglas Murray has dominated online discourse for days, with supporters spinning for both sides as if it was a presidential election debate. Even President Trump himself seemingly picked a team, when he posted a glowing endorsement of Murray’s new book the very next day. Watch John Spencer, executive director of the Urban Warfare Institute and one of the most respected experts on modern warfare, join Piers Morgan for a follow-up debate with Smith himself. As Spencer writes:
I came to debate facts about Israel's operations in Gaza viewed from global shared constructs for understanding and judging war. Dave didn't want to do that, he wanted to discuss anti-war philosophy. He wanted to debate the morality of all war, all killing is wrong "something very basic philosophical concept of morality and intentionality."
Israel/Middle East Related Articles
[WSJ EXCLUSIVE] A Depleted Hamas Is So Low on Cash That It Can’t Pay Its Fighters: Israel has disrupted the Gaza militant group’s sources of cash and ability to distribute it. By Summer Said, Carrie Keller-Lynn, and Benoit Faucon in the WSJ.
Hamas is facing a new problem in Gaza: coming up with the cash it needs to pay its rank and file.
In recent weeks, the Israeli military has said it killed a money changer who was key to what it called terrorist financing for Hamas
Salary payments to many Gaza government employees have ceased, while many senior Hamas fighters and political staff began receiving only about half of their pay midway through last month’s Ramadan holy period, the intelligence officials said. Rank-and-file Hamas fighters’ pay had been averaging around $200 to $300 a month, they said.
The shortfalls are creating hardship across Hamas’s ranks in Gaza’s cash economy and signal a deepening organizational dysfunction in the militant group as it also contends with a more aggressive Israeli military strategy.
Hamas, which controls Gaza’s civilian government, got monthly cash transfers of $15 million from Qatar before the war. It also has raised funds from places including western Africa, South Asia and the U.K., building up a stockpile of some $500 million, much of it in Turkey, according to Western and Arab officials.
Hamas used the flow of humanitarian and commercial goods to build new income streams, according to Arab, Israeli and Western officials. This has included charging taxes on merchants, collecting customs on trucks at checkpoints, and commandeering goods for resale.
…Hamas was nearing a liquidity crisis before the January cease-fire brought an influx of aid into Gaza, giving the group a chance to refill its coffers, the Israeli and Western officials said. Those pathways closed when Israel sealed Gaza’s borders to humanitarian supplies in March.
Hamas’s ability to generate income via aid has been so significant that Israel is re-evaluating its screening process for future shipments. In the past, it focused on blocking goods it thought presented security risks. Now, the military is considering added scrutiny even for permitted goods if they could have high economic value to Hamas, an Israeli official said.
The reduced payments are making it harder for Hamas to bring in new recruits and maintain cohesion as Israel seizes more land and Gazans mount a rare spate of protests against Hamas for failing to end the war.
Israel’s central bank routinely refreshed Gaza’s supply of physical shekels ahead of the war, but Gaza hasn’t received an injection of new bills since the fighting began 18 months ago. Many of Gaza’s 56 bank branches and 91 ATMs have been destroyed or rendered out of service over the course of the war.
Aid organizations have provided tens of millions of dollars in cash assistance to Palestinians since the war began, disbursing funds through popular electronic-payment applications, according to the Arab intelligence officials. Gazans also get remittances from family and friends abroad. But to turn that into cash, Palestinians need to pay money exchangers commissions in excess of 20%, a senior Palestinian financial official said.
No one knows exactly how much physical cash remains in Gaza, but analysts such as Ofer estimate there may be $3 billion in bills in circulation.
Link: A Depleted Hamas Is So Low on Cash That It Can’t Pay Its Fighters
[MUST READ] Why Israel’s War Against Hamas Is Necessary by John Spencer and Arsen Ostrovsky
Following Hamas's barbaric October 7th massacre—which killed over 1,200 people in Israel, most of them civilians, including women, children, and the elderly, with over 250 taken hostage—Israel launched a large-scale military campaign in Gaza. The scope and intensity of the response were unprecedented, but so too was the attack that prompted it.
Since then, there has been no shortage of uninformed actors, like comedian Dave Smith, or malign parties weaponizing international law to question whether Israel’s military actions in Gaza have been proportionate, lawful, and ultimately—whether even necessary. At the heart of that last question lies a critical misunderstanding. "Necessity" in war has two distinct meanings and conflating them—morally and legally—leads to flawed assessments and misleading narratives.
Moral Necessity – The Just War Tradition
War must be a last resort, undertaken only after all nonviolent alternatives—diplomacy, deterrence, sanctions, international mediation—have been exhausted.
On October 7th, Hamas made its intentions unmistakable. It crossed the border not to challenge Israeli soldiers, but to massacre civilians. It filmed the atrocities and vowed to do it again. In that context, the claim that Israel’s military response lacked moral necessity ignores the facts and defies common sense.
Legal Necessity – The Law of Armed Conflict
Military necessity permits only those actions required to achieve a legitimate military objective.
This principle—codified in the Geneva Conventions, Hague Regulations, and customary international law—does not allow destruction for its own sake. It does not excuse harm to civilians unless it is incidental to a lawful strike. And it certainly does not override the obligations to distinguish between military and civilian targets or to avoid disproportionate attacks.
To strike lawfully, the target must provide a concrete and direct military advantage, and every feasible precaution must be taken to mitigate civilian harm.
Target selection, weapon choice, timing of attack, and warning mechanisms are scrutinized in real time. The IDF not only operates under legal necessity—it documents and reviews its actions at a level few modern militaries do, particularly when fighting a terrorist group embedded in a civilian population.
Was the war morally necessary?
After October 7th—following the deliberate massacre of civilians, the kidnapping of hostages, and Hamas’s declared intention to repeat those atrocities—the answer is unequivocally yes.
Are Israel’s military operations legally necessary?
While each strike must meet specific legal thresholds, the IDF operates under one of the most stringent legal and ethical frameworks in modern warfare. It is bound by the law of armed conflict and has demonstrated an unprecedented commitment to minimizing harm, even while engaging an enemy that hides among civilians and violates every rule of war.
Anyone asking whether Israel’s war was necessary should first understand what they are really asking—and then recognize that the answer, by every standard that matters, is yes.
Houthi Expansion to the Horn of Africa: Understanding the Nature of the Threat by Ari Heistein with JISS
Since 2016, evidence has shown that the Houthi‑Somali maritime corridor is a key channel in the illicit weapons trade… Iranian arms are delivered piecemeal by dhows, often unloaded in Somalia before being re‑shipped to Yemen. Shipments are either funneled through smuggling networks along the coastline or left at remote locations for later retrieval by the Houthis.
What began as a transactional arrangement between smugglers on both sides of the Gulf of Aden now appears to be expanding. The Houthis are increasingly cultivating ties with the Somali terrorist group al‑Shabaab… Recent UN findings point to a more structured and expanding collaboration between the Houthis and a specific Somali terror group.
Growing Houthi‑AQAP (Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula) cooperation is driven by strategy rather than ideology… After years of prioritizing attacks against Houthi forces, AQAP shifted its focus by 2022 to target the anti‑Houthi coalition… AQAP facilitated Houthi collaboration with other AQ affiliates beyond Yemen. Al‑Shabaab, AQ’s branch in the Horn of Africa, was a natural partner.
Practical, logistical, and financial incentives likely drove the Houthis to expand their collaboration to include al‑Shabaab… Yemen’s economy continues to deteriorate—making the Somali arms market especially attractive… Al‑Shabaab, with annual revenues exceeding $100 million, could become a significant customer for Houthi weapons and services
There are currently no clear indications that the Houthis have supplied al‑Shabaab with advanced weapons such as attack drones or anti‑ship missiles… Nevertheless, monitoring, exposing, and disrupting this emerging alliance remains crucial to regional security and counter‑terrorism efforts.
The existing terrorism threats in Africa could become more dangerous and sophisticated if groups like al‑Shabaab gain access to advanced weaponry provided by the Houthis… Other destabilizing factors, like piracy, may also intensify as the Houthi‑al‑Shabaab relationship improves.
Al‑Shabaab could become the Houthis’ first major partner outside of the Iran‑backed axis of resistance. If this model proves successful, it could be replicated with terrorist groups and criminal cartels throughout the region, and potentially beyond.
Link: Houthi Expansion to the Horn of Africa: Understanding the Nature of the Threat
David Adesnik: Hamas's quiet removal of 1,850 people from death count another red flag by David Adesnik with National Post
In March, the ministry published a list that includes 50,021 names, but… analysts… spotted the gap: 1,852 individuals it had listed as dead last October no longer appear on its official list of victims.
Prof. Lewi Stone… examined 1,792 entries that appeared in the August 2024 list, but not the following one from October. He finds that 79 per cent of those missing entries belong to women, children and the elderly.
Zaher al‑Wahidi, head of the ministry’s statistical unit, acknowledged that 97 percent of the deleted names came from family‑filed reports — some submitted to claim death benefits. He also blamed ‘mislabelling of natural deaths’ for the errors.
Previously, Wahidi insisted that Gaza authorities carefully vetted family reports… Clearly, this process broke down or was not sound in the first place. … the majority of names that were de‑listed between August and October… came from hospitals.
The ministry recorded around 15,000 deaths on the basis of what it described as ‘reliable media sources.’ It never identified those sources, and then Wahidi began denying that the ministry ever relied on them… the ministry appears to have gradually replaced those entries with more reliable records.
There’s no question that journalists around the world need to reconsider their habitual reliance on the Health Ministry’s numbers… The United Nations should also revisit its reliance… Israel has never mounted a serious public challenge to the credibility of the ministry’s figures.
Link: David Adesnik: Hamas's quiet removal of 1,850 people from death count another red flag
How Bibi Buggered On to Victory, by Edward N. Luttwak in Tablet Magazine
When you’ve worked long enough in the field of strategy, you eventually come to the depressing realization that victory in any major war is not won by some brilliant strategy… Rather, it’s won by sheer tenacity.
With a remarkable array of forces, external and internal, bearing down on him, Netanyahu’s tenacity was the only thing that mattered.
Netanyahu enjoyed ample support on the Hill but faced an American administration determined to cut Israel down to size and to remove him from power… key U.S. officials encouraged domestic uproar against Netanyahu and worked to constrain him and even collapse his government.
Almost from the get‑go, Netanyahu had to overcome calls and protests… incessantly demanding a cease‑fire, not as a pause, but as an end to the war… several of Israel’s retired and barely retired generals threw their weight behind the cease‑fire push.
Having withstood this unrelenting pressure over the course of a year, Netanyahu had maneuvered into a position where… Israel was able to turn the tables and reshape the entire geopolitical picture… the Mossad and the IDF brilliantly wrecked Hezbollah… Iran’s Syrian vassal, Bashar al‑Assad, found himself defenseless… giving Israel its most conclusive victory since 1949.
Israel’s astounding technical prowess and the fighting spirit of its military are, of course, integral to this victory. But none of the above could have happened had Netanyahu not held out against an unfriendly American administration and an accompanying assortment of authoritative figures and institutions…
Netanyahu still faces a major test… Iran itself still stands, now on the verge of machining fissile material… Netanyahu has no option but to keep buggering on.
Antisemitism
Whose Freedom? by Seth Mandel with Commentary Magazine
The Trump administration is seeking to make the federal funds conditional on the school’s commitment to rooting out anti-Semitism on campus. Harvard’s defenders say the very survival of academic freedom is at stake. The truth is more complicated once we take a look at the central arguments in the case.
Harvard has employed several disingenuous arguments on its behalf, but it has two legitimate reasons for objecting to Trump’s latest demands. The first is that in January the university settled a lawsuit brought by Jewish students … As part of the settlement, Harvard agreed to… adopt the [IHRA] definition of anti‑Semitism for use in its anti‑harassment student‑conduct regulations.
The second argument is an extension of the first: Harvard is being treated more harshly than even Columbia University, which has done nothing material to change its campus culture. Trump’s demands include the establishment of a third party to ‘audit the student body, faculty, staff, and leadership for viewpoint diversity,’ among others that are not directly tied to fighting anti‑Semitism and would be difficult to comply with.
However much good those research projects do, they do not exempt universities from following the law. The Trump administration must abide by its legal contracts and obligations but so must Harvard and the rest of the taxpayer‑funded country clubs masquerading as educational institutions.
The status quo is one in which Jews on campus do not have the same level of academic freedom as others… The defenders of these institutions are merely demanding that Trump let them go back to the status quo of having academic freedom for some but not for others.
These institutions also take money from authoritarian, anti‑American regimes such as Qatar… Does Harvard abhor the deleterious effects of government funding on academic freedom? Or does Harvard abhor the effects of U.S. government funding while ignoring the effects of cash infusions from anti‑democratic regimes?
These institutions and their defenders would likely find more sympathy in dealing with the Trump administration’s overreach had they ever defended academic freedom, freedom of speech and expression, and true independence from government when it mattered.
Link: Whose Freedom?
Harvard Had It Coming. That Doesn’t Mean Trump Is Right by Charles Lane with The Free Press
Faced with Trump administration threats to cut billions in federal funding unless it allowed sweeping new government supervision of its operations, Harvard University had a two‑letter answer: ‘No.’ … the university finds itself facing the loss of $2.2 billion in support and a potentially open‑ended conflict with a president who, for the moment at least, exercises total control over the levers of power in Washington.
There was no way, consistent with academic freedom, for Harvard to accept the administration’s demand to ‘audit the student body, faculty, staff, and leadership for viewpoint diversity, such that each department, field, or teaching unit must be individually viewpoint diverse.’ … Harvard’s president, Alan Garber, correctly described it as an attempt ‘to control teaching and learning at Harvard and to dictate how we operate.’
And yet any sympathy for Harvard has to be tempered by the knowledge that the school—and others like it—brought much of their current predicament on themselves… This is the university that… tried to strong‑arm students into abolishing single‑sex clubs, and still hasn’t produced final recommendations from an antisemitism task force.
Under Title VI the government is required to formally document allegations … and to cut funding only to the specific programs that have been found to discriminate. The Trump administration has yet to do that. Harvard stands a good chance of winning this struggle in the courts of law, but a not as good one in the court of public opinion.
The post‑World War II system that channeled billions of dollars into higher education rested on… a broad consensus that colleges… are reliably competent and public‑spirited. That consensus is gone. Gallup now shows confidence in higher ed split evenly; the Ivy League is the least popular.
Harvard tempered its defiance… Garber’s first letter said Harvard ‘will not negotiate’; a second version vowed only that it ‘will not surrender’ its rights. That tweak hints the university isn’t ruling out the path other institutions chose: a deal with Donald J. Trump, for the money.
Link: Harvard Had It Coming. That Doesn’t Mean Trump Is Right.
Murray vs. Smith: Dispatches from Podcastistan by Konstantin Kisin
Prepare for the unprecedented: I am about to admit I was wrong.
For years, I have celebrated the rise of new media and its impact on our ability to seek truth, challenge false narratives peddled by legacy institutions, and transform the way we conduct our public debate. The rationale behind my thought process seemed solid. After all, "the medium is the message".
Curious, open-minded, inquisitive podcasters, unrestrained by the need to comply with corporate media message discipline and social media censorship, were finally able to speak freely, seek the truth and debate controversial ideas in good faith in front of grateful audiences of millions. So far, so wonderful. After all, what could go wrong with "democratising information"? Well, as it turns out, quite a lot.
This difference was perfectly illustrated in the recent debate between journalist and author Douglas Murray and comedian and podcaster Dave Smith on The Joe Rogan Experience, the world’s biggest podcast.
The much more interesting fault lines were exposed on the fringes of the debate. The conversation began with a discussion of Rogan's decision to host Darryl Cooper, a man described by Tucker Carlson as "America's most important popular historian". Cooper himself has the self-awareness not to own the label of historian, instead describing himself as a "storyteller".
Because Murray is educated on this issue, he assumes that everyone else, including Smith, is too. Exasperated, he tries to explain that, far from being revolutionary, these ideas have been pushed by discredited historians like David Irving for decades.
Unlike his opponents, Murray clearly understands that the term "Nazi apologist" has a defined meaning, and the fact that most Nazi apologists are anti-Semitic does not mean that you have to be anti-Semitic to fit that description. The Grok definition of a Nazi apologist is “someone who defends, justifies, or minimizes the actions, ideology, or atrocities committed by the Nazi regime, often by excusing Nazi policies or promoting revisionist narratives that distort historical facts”. Since Cooper does precisely this in several appearances on major podcasts how his series on Palestine would change this reality is clearly as confusing to Murray who hasn’t listened to it as it is to me who has.
The central critique of Murray here is that he is arguing from authority, which is what mainstream media has done for years to gaslight the public about everything from transgenderism to COVID to war. Smith and his supporters argue that the concept of expertise has been so discredited that he (and anyone else for that matter) is entitled to express any views about any issue they want.
The audience, they say, can judge these views themselves. Murray’s attempt to dismiss such views on the basis that they don’t align with expert opinion is seen as an ineffective argument at best and an attempt at credentialism at worst. There is a sliver of truth to this criticism: engaging the argument someone is making directly is a much more powerful approach. But to suggest that arguments from authority are entirely invalid is silly.
Smith and Rogan are irked when Murray expresses his befuddlement that Smith has become a prominent voice in the debate about Israel and Palestine without ever having visited the Middle East. The shock at the idea that someone ought to see things with their own eyes before commenting on them is palpable. Indeed, in the aftermath of the debate, Smith promoted a popular video in which Murray’s statements to this effect are contrasted with his previous ridicule of the concept of “lived experience”.
This is very low quality thinking. If you do not see things with your own eyes, your opinions are, by definition, not your own. They are an agglomeration of opinions and facts you have gathered from other sources whose veracity you cannot properly evaluate. That doesn’t necessarily make them wrong. Indeed, most of our opinions about most things are not our own. You know why? Because we get them from people we consider to be authoritative on the subject in question. You might call them “experts”.
The great trick being deployed here is to allege that experts can’t be trusted while relying on a different set of experts.
This is where Smith obtains the arguments he makes about countries he has never visited: from other people. And the arguments are then judged not on whether they are true, something Smith does not have the expertise to assess, but on whether they sound true.
If Murray had claimed that Smith is unqualified to comment because he is not a Middle Easterner, for example, his critics would have a point. Instead he merely pointed out that Smith might become more informed by visiting the region he opines about with such confidence and regularity.
The world of entertainment is not driven by truth-seeking, and the claim that someone’s ideas are false is no longer an effective critique. Podcastistan is a place where people scold the mainstream media for failing to live up to their standards on honesty and accuracy while having none of their own.
Hostage Update (no change)
There are now currently 58 hostages taken on 10/7 currently in captivity in Gaza (there are 59 hostages remaining in total)
38 hostages were released in the first phase of the 2025 cease fire agreement (including 5 Thai nationals)
24 hostages will remain in captivity after Phase I and have not been declared dead.
5 hostages are Americans: Meet the Five American Hostages Still Held By Hamas: Edan Alexander is assumed to be alive, Itay Chen is assumed to have been killed on 10/7, and Gadi Haggai, Judi Weinstein Haggai, and Omer Neutra have been confirmed to have been killed.
4 are soldiers
7 are residents of the Gaza border communities
11 were abducted from the Nova music festival
2 are foreign workers: Bipin Joshi from Nepal and Pinta Nattapong from Thailand
On October 7th, a total of 251 Israelis were taken hostage.
During the ceasefire deal in November of 2023, 112 hostages were released.
193 hostages in total have been released or rescued
The bodies of 40 hostages have been recovered, including 3 mistakenly killed by the military as they tried to escape their captors.
8 hostages have been heroically rescued by troops alive
Of the 59 hostages still theoretically in Gaza
31 hostages have been confirmed dead and are currently being held in Gaza
Thus, at most, 28 living hostages could still be in Gaza.
Hamas is now holding the body of 1 IDF soldier who was killed in 2014 (Lt. Hadar Goldin’s body remains held in the Gaza Strip)
Casualties (no change)
1,862 Israelis have been killed including 846 IDF soldiers since October 7th (no change since Sunday)
The South: 407 IDF soldiers during the ground operation in Gaza have been killed
The North: 132 Israelis (84 IDF soldiers) have been killed during the war in Northern Israel
The West Bank: 63 Israelis (27 IDF and Israeli security forces)
Additional Information (according to the IDF):
2,600(+4 since Sunday) IDF soldiers have been injured during ground combat in Gaza, including at least 499 (no change since Sunday) who have been severely injured.
5,773 (+5 since Sunday) IDF soldiers have been injured since the beginning of the war, including at least 589 who have been severely injured.
The Gaza Casualty Count:
According to unverified figures from the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry, 50,810 total deaths have been reported, with a civilian/combatant ratio: 1:1.
[MUST READ] Report: Questionable Counting: Analysing the Death Toll from the Hamas-Run Ministry of Health in Gaza by Andrew Fox with The Henry Jackson Society
On October 7th, Ohad Hemo with Channel 12 Israel News – the country’s largest news network, a leading expert on Palestinian and Arab affairs, mentioned an estimate from Hamas: around 80% of those killed in Gaza are members of the organization and their families.”
Read this well documented piece from Tablet published in March: How the Gaza Ministry of Health Fakes Casualty Numbers
The Associated Press, an outlet with a demonstrated anti-Israel bias, conducted an analysis of alleged Gaza death tolls released by the Hamas-controlled "Gaza Health Ministry." The analysis found that "9,940 of the dead – 29% of its April 30 total – were not listed in the data" and that "an additional 1,699 records in the ministry’s April data were incomplete and 22 were duplicates."
The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs publishes official details on every civilian and IDF casualty.
Regular sources include JINSA, FDD, IDF, AIPAC, The Paul Singer Foundation, The Institute for National Security Studies, the Alma Research and Education Center, Yediot, Jerusalem Post, IDF Casualty Count, the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Institute for the Study of War, Tablet Magazine, Mosaic Magazine, The Free Press, and the Times of Israel