Middle East Roundtable: A Ceasefire By Any Other Name

Kyle: staff writer here at Warframes. Evan Moloney: I feel like we say this every week now, but it has been a busy dynamic action-packed week in the Middle East. We have Israel firing on Iran. We have America firing on Iran. We have Apache helicopters falling into the Strait of Hormuz. It is a difficult week and…

Kyle: So this really started to kick off over the weekend or…

This serves to embolden those who think that Iran will not stand up for its allies in Lebanon, specifically Hezbollah, not the Lebanese country itself.

So when it comes to the more recent developments, I think this is a far more clear-minded approach, even though of course we do not wish to see these strikes happening, it is at least a consistent enforcement of Iran's red lines.

Kyle: So if they say that striking Beirut is a red line, striking Lebanon to this extent is a red line and then Israel does it anyway and Iran does not respond, this is inherently emboldening Israel to continue its operations there.

But by responding to this, they are setting a much more strategically-minded, I would say, red line that and are showing that they are willing to enforce it. I'm curious as to what your guys' thoughts are on all that.

Wilfred W.: I think the idea of a red line in international diplomacy felt, what's the right word for it? It felt like something that's not real, especially after Obama's famous blunder with the red line. It was one of those moments where I just sat back and looked at it and felt extremely, extremely insane.

So seeing a country enforce its red lines because we haven't really been in a situation where a country has to enforce its lines to that degree. So seeing Iran enforce its red lines and actively push back against Israeli interests for me is interesting, specifically for one thing.

What that means for the relationship between the US and Israel because for Israel, its security is paramount.

Wilfred W.: But right now the US wants to get a deal and as long as Iran is enforcing its red lines and Israel is crossing those red lines, the prospect of getting a deal becomes further and further apart.

It becomes a lot more difficult to get a deal if the US feels that Israel, which is supposed to be its ally, is jeopardizing the deal and Iran in its view is just defending its allies. So again, it's a situation that will have ramifications far beyond this wall.

Kyle: And I have a feeling we're going to get deep into the US-Israel stuff in just a moment. But on that red line, I think that part of the instability in the region has been to your point the lack of consistently enforced red lines across the board. So in terms of what is the point of a red line that is there?

So beyond just what Obama may have said that one time, if a country sets a red line and another country violates it, they either respond or they do not. So if you are to establish the precedent where countries' red lines can routinely be violated in ways that will not receive responses, then this emboldens whatever country may be. Yeah.

I'm not even talking real-world stuff right now. I'm just talking on a more abstract level.

Kyle: So the lack of enforcement we've seen on various red lines throughout the Middle East, I would argue, has led to growing instability in the region.

Now again, I certainly do not welcome any strikes going out by Iran here, but I do think that it sets a more clear precedent as to what it actually means for them to have their red lines established on foreign policy. Whereas in previous years it has been very, very vague. So they have allies in Hezbollah. How much will they back them up?

It's sort of a question mark, and that has absolutely led to a sense in Israel that they can sort of just go in and take care of business. Now again, from the Israeli security perspective, this is an absolute necessity because Hezbollah has been launching into Israel.

Kyle: But once again, and of itself is a red line that was violated because the Hezbollah threat was always there as an emergency fallback. So it was supposed to be there in case Israel outright launches attacks on Iran. Hezbollah was launching into Israel since October 2023.

They were willing to go into war on behalf of Hamas with very little afterthought as to what this would actually mean for themselves. Kyle: and they tried to keep it at a low-grade level or lower grade.

It wasn't all-out launching across the board, but they had to evacuate some I think it was 60,000 residents from northern Israel on account of these missiles flying in. So overall, we've just seen this sort of precedent where you can sort of do these squishy steps to steadily encroach on other countries' red lines.

And I think that that has led to the sort of mess that we're in today.

Wilfred W.: I know this isn't the Russia round table, but I feel like a lot of the blame on that ability to just trample over other countries' red lines without any sort of consequence falls at the feet of Russia.

It is constantly pushing the boundary on what a country can do on what constitutes aggressive foreign policy, just under that threshold that requires retaliation, so I feel like a lot of the blame needs to fall on Russia's feet for that, but back to the Middle East and back to Iran, Israel and Lebanon, I feel that there's something you said earlier.

Wilfred W.: Kyle, the idea that the axis of resistance … not to get too Shakespearean on us, but Iran has the axis to serve its interests and the axis realised that. I think that's why Hezbollah was so willing to support Hamas after the October 7th attacks and Iran was very reticent.

Wilfred W.: We didn't see the kind of support that I expected to see coming from Iran for one of its main proxies after an attack as devastating as October 7th, which, if you're an Iranian war gamer, presented an interesting opportunity to attack Israel when all of its attention was focused on Hamas. But that's neither here nor there.

I think back to the idea of red lines as long as Hezbollah continues to violate Israel's red lines and we have a piece in last week's briefing room talking about Hezbollah's advanced drone technology with the implementation of fibre optic cables and night vision sensors, they are a lot more dangerous than previously, as long as Hezbollah continues to violate

The red lines set in place by Israel.

We're looking at a situation that can get kinetic at any minute.

Kyle: Yeah, very well said there. Kyle: I think we have a growing sort of crisis up until I think this war has sort of brought the red lines back to the front of the international scene, if you will, because as of right now, it's sort of becoming more clear as to what is and is not something that's going to trigger outright kinetic action.

That's in part because of a normalisation of bombing. I mean, a few months ago, if we had been discussing the possibility of Israel bombing Beirut, is Iran launching on Israel, the US bombing Iran, I mean, this would be massive stories, and now it's sort of just like another day in the Middle East. So, it's a blessing and a curse there.

But I do think we have a greater clarity, if you will.

Kyle: And that's what I ultimately think from the last decade or so, we have had a problem where it's been increasingly vague as to just how far each side can push without pulling the other one over the top. And I think that has been a sort of recurring theme of instability. Evan, I see you want to jump in here.

Kyle: I think overall that is starting to become the status quo if you will. But I also think that again I know this is slightly contrarian despite the fact that once again I want to clarify we are not endorsing this as a good in and of itself. I think that a certain clarity here can be useful though.

I think that more restraint will be shown if this sort of dynamic where there's a clarity that if certain actors do certain things in the region, there will be consequences for it. It's this ability to get away with stuff that really emboldens different actors.

Kyle: So to Wilfrid's point with Russia, Russia is the king of this. they'll sort of launch these small drone attacks or whatever initially and see how much they can get away with and if the countries don't respond and they can do even more and whatnot. Turkey is the perfect counterpoint here.

It's not every day I'm praising Erdogan here, but he did a commendable job with this; they shot down a Russian jet that was over their airspace and they haven't had any problems with Russian jets since then.

Wilfred W.: There's something that someone said a while back, I don't remember who it was, either the two of you or someone else entirely, that Russia is a bully that needs to get kicked in the teeth once and they'll stop.

So the fact that one jet getting blown up ended that incursion in general is emblematic of the idea that if Russia gets some pushback they'll stop. But again this isn't the Russia round table no matter how much I'd want us to have one.

Wilfred W.: But again, the idea of red lines and crossing them is what I keep coming back to and just how much impact that's having on the peace process. I want to take us to a report that came out a little before we got onto this call at about 9:45 Eastern.

President Trump, I believe this is CBS News or whatever other outlet, that Iran has taken too long to negotiate a deal and will pay the price for that delay. And he also told Fox News that he could order further strikes as the ceasefire between the countries appears to crumble with an exchange of fire sparked by the downing of the Apache helicopter. 00:20:00

Wilfred W.: So the idea that Iran taking too long is purely predicated on Israel breaching its red lines and Iran trying to enforce that and now America Trump is saying that Iran will pay the price.

So again, we're looking at a rather volatile situation and this also just in 10 minutes ago, Israeli air strikes hit the centre of the city of Sidon in Lebanon on Wednesday today and Israel is persisting with its attacks across the south of the country.

Kyle: Yeah, for sure. Kyle: So, beyond any Iranian short-term projects to attempt to get Israel to stop launching on Iran, the approach by the Lebanese government has absolutely resolutely rejected any Iranian influence over the country.

In particular, Iran is furious with the Lebanese government that they're negotiating with Israel in Washington because this may lead to a peace deal or normalisation being much further down the road than anything else. But overall, right now, they have been consistent that Iran does not negotiate on its behalf.

Joseph last week sat down with CNN's Christian Amanpor and did not mince words here. Kyle: He said, quote, "It's our obligation. It's not your job to interfere. I reject Iran's statements totally because our people are being killed. Our houses are being destroyed. They're using Lebanon as a bargaining chip." And it's completely true.

This conflict with Lebanon was not something that Israel just announced and decided to roll into it. It started once again because Hezbollah started launching big time on Israel. This was supposed to have led up after the 2024 war with Israel between Hezbollah and them.

Kyle: But ultimately once again after the bomb started falling in Thran things kicked off again and the country has been massively suffering ever since. A fifth of the entire country, 20% plus, have been displaced.

It's got to be more than that because we've seen that figure for over a month now and Israel has steadily been expanding its evacuation orders including in the city of Tier which is one of the oldest inhabited cities on earth. Something like 4,800 years.

They've also included in the old city there, they had the Christian quarter which had long served as sort of a magnet for refugees throughout the south who didn't have anywhere to go because when you're evacuating a fifth of a country that's already smaller than the state of New Jersey, you start running out of places to put everybody.

And now they're evacuating that quarter as well.

Kyle: So it really just gets to this idea that this was a huge mistake and the entire country is paying the cost. Wilfred W.: So I want to update the figures that Kyle has just mentioned, we've been getting that 1 million figure for weeks now. According to Al Jazeera and this is an article that was published on the 8th of June.

So basically 2 days before we recorded this podcast, 1.2 million people, that's the number that's displaced right now, which still falls into that over 20% displacement category. And among them are about 400,000 children. So the country is in a really bad spot because Iran has presented itself as protector of Lebanon.

And as Kyle has rightly said, it's not a position that the Lebanese people are accepting, at least not the government. 00:25:00

Wilfred W.: It's a position that is causing immense suffering just the worst scenes I have seen while covering war. So again it's just a bad situational drought. Kyle: And exactly the problem here being that…

Kyle: if Iran had not green lit Hezbollah to attack Israel, then the war simply would not be going on there. So, it's one thing for Iran now to stand up and say, " we are Lebanon's ally. We are defending them." But they're defending them, air quotes being used there after being responsible for the war breaking out there in the first place.

So, it's really just the government there is between Iraq and a hard place. Israel has been not particularly willing to work with them either.

And my concern here being that this is setting all the wrong standards and sending all the wrong messages to the region because this is the first time in my lifetime that a Lebanese government has been openly willing to negotiate with Israel and try to find a long-term lasting way to both disarm Hezbollah and establish peace in the region.

Kyle: And if this is the government that Israel refuses to work with, there's going to be no incentive for future Lebanese governments to follow in their footsteps.

If it's a Lebanese sovereigntist government that has that results in essentially a long-term, outright annexation of broad parts of the Lebanese South, that's going to just kill the sovereigntist movement to begin with, or at least severely diminish its credibility with the Lebanese people, which to me would be a tragedy.

Wilfred W.: It would be a tragedy to me as well. And I think to everyone who believes in the idea that the Lebanese people and the Israeli people both deserve to have safety, both deserve a life where bombs are not falling on their heads and their country isn't being annexed, because a terrorist group has set camp there. Evan

Kyle: It may have the ability to impact some of Israeli policy on this via the United States, which increasingly seems willing and eager to make a deal. In particular, the US has been far more of a friend to the Lebanese government than Israel has been.

The Lebanese ambassador to the United States has been working with both Secretary Rubio, President she has even very smartly, I may add, in front of Donald Trump asked for his help to make Lebanon great again. Trump was all smiles. It's not that hard to get this guy on your side.

In my opinion, if you can flatter him a bit and use these terms, he'll love you. She used it. And he's been pushing at least to some extent to get Israel to back off on Lebanon ever since. 00:30:00

Kyle: I think that this stuff does have influence on him, but that can be a conversation for another day. But overall, these two states here, Iran and the United States seem to have the Lebanese future in their hands. So, we're going to have to see how it plays out, how much pressure they're willing and…

Kyle: able to put on Israel, obviously via very different mechanisms. That goes without saying, but overall, we will have to see where that all goes. Evan Moloney: Let's talk…

Then of course we have the US headed right back into the fray with the downing of this helicopter, which I do want to talk about separately. But before we get there, how do you see this dynamic shifting over the last week between the two sides? Do you still see Israel as kind of in the driver's seat here?

Evan Moloney: Do you see Iran more in the driver's seat, kind of with the ability to leverage its offensive potency to keep both countries engaged, or where are we on this?

Wilfred W.: There was a story early in the war, that Israel had dragged Trump into the war, that they had managed to convince him that this would be a relatively short war, that once they had conducted their decapitation strikes of the Iranian leadership, the Iranian people would rise up and overthrow their government.

This has obviously not happened, and the war has progressed much longer than I think President Trump has an appetite for. He normally does not have an appetite for war, and the fact that this has gone on as long as it has just goes against everything he believes in. He isn't one for long wars.

Wilfred W.: He wants things like the Maduro raid, where he can brag that he had Maduro captured in just a matter of hours, and he would have liked to say the same thing about Iran, that he overthrew their regime within a matter of hours.

But the fact that that hasn't happened, and the war is progressing, is just a testament to how differently both sides – by that I mean Israel and the US – understood the situation. For Israel, this is a war that they've wanted to wage for a really long time.

They've wanted to eliminate one of the greatest threats to their existence in Iran since the Iranian revolution happened. And doing that will require this war to extend a lot longer than it has.

Wilfred W.: That's Israel's main perspective with this. They want to completely neuter any threat to their existence. That's why they were very aggressive against Hamas. That's why they're very aggressive against Hezbollah. And that's why we're seeing them being still very aggressive against Iran.

And that's why when Netanyahu had his little spot with Trump, there was backlash within the Israeli right because fundamentally they want this Iranian regime gone. Trump, on the other hand, wants the nuclear dust gone. That's his big concern. Anything else? Not so much. He already believes the Iranian regime has changed.

He already believes it's not as big of a threat militarily to the Gulf countries as it once was, and he doesn't consider it to be as big an issue as it was at one point.

Wilfred W.: So that's the main divergence – the fact that they have different needs that led them into this war. So as long as those continue to be the case, the gulf between the US and Israel will continue to widen.

But I don't think it will reach the point where, at least not with this administration, there's a significant break in the relationship because again, both men have tied themselves too closely – by that I mean Trump and Netanyahu have tied themselves too closely, and they're too closely linked for them to ever decouple.

Kyle: I actually think we may see more of a decoupling than others may seem likely. Kyle: And I know I'm a bit of an outlier here on this, but hear me out.

So to begin with, I think part of the confusion when this launched was to what extent is Israel and the United States on the same page, because Israel's position was relatively easy to figure out – they're no fan of the Islamic Republic. Donald Trump, granted not exactly the biggest fan of long-term warfare.

Again, that's not necessarily the most shocking thing, but overall, he also was a long-term Iran hawk. So, he was not somebody who just people may have made him out to be this hardcore isolationist who thought just put up America's walls and then tune out the world.

Kyle: I mean, this was the guy who took out Kasam Solommani in his first term. He withdrew from the JCPOA wanting to get a much more hardline deal. Kyle: To begin with, so overall, he's been a long-term Iran hawk, I would say.

So, it wasn't entirely surprising to me when he launched this, but this divergence has really started to show itself more recently because as this has gone on and as everything has just sort of been compounding, today's inflation data, by the way, just came out at 4.2%. So, this is really starting to creep up.

Whether or not this continues to go up or if this is just sort of the baked-in piece here remains to be seen, to be honest. Where prices are right now, especially in terms of fuel, I could see it going up a little bit more, but I don't see it going back to 2022 levels where it was almost 9% I believe or slightly higher.

Kyle: I don't see it getting anywhere near that if we're able to keep oil prices where they are today.

But it's nevertheless causing political issues for Trump himself because upcoming midterm elections and whatnot. The war has gone from basically being what I would describe as soft unpopular to an increasingly unpopular situation. So especially when it first kicked off, the Americans are broadly speaking sort of numb to kinetic action.

So it's relatively common where you wake up and see for the average American that the US is bombing Syria or the US is bombing targets in Iraq or something. So there's a sort of numbing effect. Obviously, this was a totally different campaign in terms of scale. Kyle: But overall, it was a similar thing. It's okay, we're doing this again.

It'll be over in a few weeks. So once that sort of faded away and the long-term reality started to set in, it's become harder to sell that narrative.

Overall, Trump needs this war to end or would like this war to end to help him politically, while Netanyahu needs this war to continue or outright win it to stay alive politically, which creates a very interesting dynamic where the Islamic Republic essentially just by doing nothing, just by staying around and staying in existence, is able to force the two of

These guys further and further apart.

Kyle: And so if it's able to bear the brunt of Washington's blockade and the economic impact having overall, it's able to actually further diverge the two.

And we've started to see this in recent days where Trump is saying that, or I believe it was Vance who's openly admitting that the US and Israeli positions are diverging and there's just a lot of daylight between the two both on Iran as well as on Lebanon.

Overall, I honestly think Trump might be more popular domestically if he just lost this thing and called it a day, just wrap it up. And now I don't think that that's a smart decision in terms of the grander geopolitical decision-making process, but in terms of domestic public polling, I do think that

Kyle: If this just wound up and the US pulled out, it may actually be more popular. Israel is the complete antithesis of this. If that happens, it's game over for Netanyahu. And he knows that. Wilfred W.: I think you might be right in the sense that it will be good for Trump politically. 00:40:00

Wilfred W.: Trump's personality does not allow him to accept any kind of loss. We've seen that with the 2020 election. Trump recently walked out of an interview with Meet the Press over the weekend when a reporter pushed back on this idea that the 2020 elections were stolen from him. So Trump's personality does not allow him to accept any kind of defeat.

It's the antithesis of his personality to borrow a phrase from you. Wilfred W.: So while it might be good for him domestically and as you've said rightfully bad geopolitically, it's not something that he would in any world be willing to accept. Kyle: I agree. I don't think I was just more commenting from a purely political polling perspective.

Again, I don't think that it would be wise at this point to just pull out either after doing all this and just give Iran massive concessions. I think that would set very problematic standards for diplomacy going forward.

But it speaks to the diverging domestic interests of the US and Israeli electorates because while the Israeli domestic scene is pushing hard on Netanyahu to keep going at it to go harder, Netanyahu is being portrayed as being too weak. Naftali Bennett of the Israeli opposition is saying that Netanyahu has normalised attacks on Israel.

Kyle: So that's what the scene there looks like, but it's just a completely different one. Back in the US.

It doesn't seem to compute with me for a president…

Kyle: I think that it's almost impossible to see a world in which the US does not respond to something like this. It may be that the helicopter is a very small potatoes in terms of total US military hardware in the region. I mean, this is not huge by any means. Both pilots survived, by the way. They were pulled out of the air alive and in good shape.

But overall, I mean, per the Rubio doctrine that he announced the other day, which gets to the heart of the way Washington thinks on this, only stupid countries don't shoot back when they're shot at. So, if they think that Iran shot at this helicopter, they're going to shoot back.

Now, to the Redline thesis, whatever you may think of the Rubio doctrine, aside from that, by the way, I'm coining that as the Rubio doctrine. That's trademarked now. So, you have to attribute this to Kyle over at Warfronts if you use that term for any of our listeners.

Kyle: But overall, the general approach here on red lines has been to the points we were making earlier, that sort of steady progression where okay, how much can you get away with before you see retaliation.

I think that if the US had not responded to this, that would be setting a dangerous precedent where these red lines are simply not enforced, where you may be able to shoot down a helicopter, but it's just one helicopter. It's just an Apache. The pilots survived. So, as long as they survive, maybe it's just one. Okay. Next time maybe it's two.

Maybe there are serious injuries. At what point do you start retaliating? And just to wrap this up real quick, these strikes were quite limited. This was not targeting any oil infrastructure or anything like that. It was mostly on just military hardware, in terms of surveillance equipment and…

00:45:00

Kyle: all that type of stuff. So overall, I think this was a pretty reasonable response on Washington's part. Evan Moloney: So that all makes sense and…

Kyle: So, to your point there, Evan, I think that overall, in terms of if you look at the broader scheme of things, if the US sets the precedent where these sort of limited actions will go unresponded to, that will only embolden further ones to take place.

Or, the Islamic Republic, though, is not actively trying to trap Washington in a kinetic warfare campaign, because what they want to do, as far as I can tell, is draw this out diplomatically.

Kyle: So, to the points we were talking about earlier, where it's diverging US and Israeli policies, by just sort of waiting this out and seeing how long these guys can stay at it. It's not in Iran's interest either to have any form of all-out war.

But if it starts getting the sense that Washington is so desperate for a deal that it will just allow these strikes to take place, then that would be sending all sorts of wrong messages. Wilfred, I'll pass this over to you here.

Wilfred W.: I think, from my understanding of the Iranian perspective, Iran wants to draw this out, at the very least, until the midterms, because that is the point where American negotiators will begin to get very desperate. They will want to get a deal as much as possible to stem the bleeding that will happen in Congress and the Senate for the GOP.

We've said this a million times on this podcast and in our individual writings for Warfronts and all our other media properties, but a president's party performs poorly at the midterms. That's always expected.

The degree to which that party will perform poorly is contingent on a number of things, and for the Trump administration, this Iran war is one of the biggest headaches that they have right now.

So, this is from Breitbart, so source not the best source, but still the numbers are accurate: inflation rose to 2% in May.

Trump was elected on the back of his promise that lower prices, he would fight inflation and so far that hasn't been happening. When he was told about the exorbitant ticket prices of the Knicks game, he said, 'watching it on TV is semi-semiree' and that's just the way life goes.

Wilfred W.: Those are not the statements that a president who was elected on the promise of affordability and bringing costs down should make. Those are not the statements that such a president makes and it's all compounded by the Iran war, which is making gas prices more expensive and everything else more expensive.

So from Iran's point of view, they want this cycle to just extend. As long as the violence doesn't pass a certain threshold, for them it's in their best interest. And American officials obviously realise this.

Wilfred W.: In an interview with the Guardian, one official said that the US was not seeking a return to full-scale war with Iran because they realise they'll be caught in an even greater escalation trap.

So it might be in Iran's best interest just to draw this out as long as possible, withstand the strikes that they'll retaliate when they have to retaliate, and just draw it out. 00:50:00

Kyle: I just think that conflates two different things…

Kyle: Though because I don't see this pertaining to withdrawing or a deal at all. I think overall they're going to continue to and trust me, Trump will continue to use this language where he's variously a day away from a deal for the next six months perhaps, and on the days that he'll be on the verge of launching all-out total destruction of the country.

So, we will continue to see this. I have no doubt. But overall, I just see this as a relatively minor thing. If in the next week's Middle East round table, I would be shocked if we're still discussing this because it was one helicopter that got shot down then the US responded in a relatively restrained way.

Kyle: There were two other options there to respond in a much stronger way which I don't think would make sense from Washington's perspective because that would risk him kicking off another round of much bigger kinetic action or not respond at all which I think would be only emboldening the hardliners in the Islamic Republic.

So overall I think this made sense. And I think that now that peace seems to be, again, knock on wood here, very shakily holding in the region,

Kyle: We're starting to get back on track where this actually goes though. That's the bigger question. But I just don't see the Apache helicopter being shot down and the response to it as being too determinative in terms of any of that. Wilfred W.: Kyle,…

Wilfred W.: I think you're right that we won't be talking about this in next week's episode of the Middle East round table because you in the grand scheme of things, it isn't really the biggest story. But there is something I want to highlight that we haven't highlighted in this episode.

So a US official who spoke to the Associated Press said that the helicopter went down after colliding with an Iranian drone. We know up to that point, but it wasn't clear whether the collision was intentional.

Wilfred W.: I think that and of itself speaks just to the mindset in Washington. I think by saying that this attack wasn't intentional, the downing of the Apache wasn't intentional. Whether it was or not, that's beside the point. They're trying to avoid just being drawn into the conflict even more.

It's them trying to extricate themselves as much as possible. Kyle: Yeah, I broadly agree. I think that's why they kept it pretty minimal. Although just adds some detail on this because the Iran situation is just so crazy sometimes. You are right.

It may have been more of an accidental collision, but that's a little less well-spirited than just that pure description may sound. The reason that it was launched in the first place is because they were launching on commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, which was trying to transit without authorisation because they didn't pay tolls.

So even if they weren't intentionally launching on US helicopters, they were launching on civilian energy targets as well. So it's not exactly kosher if we want to put it that way. 00:55:00

Kyle: So when we talk about from the earliest days the storming of the US embassy and the kidnapping of the entire diplomatic service, this poisoned Islamic Republic's relationship with the US in ways they were never going to be friendly to begin with. But that is possibly the worst way to make first impressions after a new government takes office.

Not just with the United States either, but with broader international communities overall who in the aftermath of that, especially with US allied countries, is going to say yes, let's set up shop in Tyrrhenia. I hear that they're very welcoming to foreigners if you're coming from a US allied country. That's not exactly a great signal to send up.

And ever since then it's been a similar process of international semi-pariah status.

Kyle: So Turkey has really been able to differentiate itself there and I think long term we're only going to see that accelerate because they're going to continue their modernisation campaign which is going to be very much aimed at being a bulwark against Israel itself.

Wilfred W.: So, I'd like to speak to that idea of the expanded military capabilities of Turkey being a bulwark against Israel. A little while ago, this is on the 28th of May, Jonathan Pollard, a name most people will be familiar with if you're there interested in espionage.

He is an American-born individual who spied for Israel, was jailed for life, got paroled and immigrated to Israel. He was speaking at a podcast for the news outlet Arutz Sheva. I'm very sure I'm butchering that pronunciation. He said, and I quote, "We have to be prepared for the next war, which will probably be against Turkey and Egypt. The storm is coming."

Wilfred W.: I'm not so sure we will have as easy a time with attacks as we've had with the Iranians. So what Poland is describing here is a general feeling among a lot of observers that Israel's next war will be with Turkey. And it's a feeling that has you heated up in the past few days.

It's not just with Adoan statements that are leading people to ask that question. While we were on the air, the Jerusalem Post published an article titled, "Could a war of words between Turkey and Israel escalate towards a new crisis?"

So, I'd like to read from it very briefly. Turkey and Israel appear to be heading in increasing chances of a confrontation in the region. Wilfred W.: This confrontation has so far played itself out primarily as a war of words. For instance, Turkey's interior minister Mustafa Sifti said he hoped to see the liberation of Jerusalem.

He compared this to recent conflicts between Armenian and Azerbaijan and in Syria where areas had been liberated from adversaries.

On the 7th of June, Israel's defence minister, Israel Katz, wrote on social media to the Turkish interior minister who dreams of administering Jerusalem and his threats, I say this, Jerusalem is not Constantinople and the state of Israel is not a crumbling crusader empire.

Israel is a strong and resolute state that has proven its capacity to defend itself against any threat. He went on to note to the Turkish official that Jerusalem has been the capital of the Jewish people for 3,000 years and will remain Israel's capital forever.

You and the Ottoman Empire that Ado and Drimol on the other hand have collapsed and will never return.

Wilfred W.: So there is already an escalating war of words between officials from the two states and it's bound to get worse in the next coming months and with Adawan inserting himself into the Iran, it's definitely something that is worth keeping an eye on.

Wilfred W.: We have to discuss the alleged role that Turkey had in preventing the KDS from helping Israel and the US in their plans against the Iranian regime. So this is from the Daily Sabah. I'm not quite sure about you, it's the leading outlet or any other accuracy levels, and I'm quoting them here.

Wilfred W.: Taki held senior-level talks with top officials in Iraq's Kurdistan regional government to prevent arming cards for a war against Iran and asked the representatives of the region's political dynasties not to fall for the trap which by this I'm assuming they mean Israel and America's Ankara stressed that the KDS will not be supported in any way if

They join the war against Iran and this forced the KDS groups to stand down.

Kyle: So overall the problem here was relying on the Kurds to be any sizable force on what's going on here. The Kurds are very interested in one thing and that would be establishing an autonomous region for themselves. And that's not a hit on them either.

It's just more of a recognition of reality that people have to work around here. But overall the issue of Kurdistan is not going to be anything that Turkey relents on anytime soon. This is going to be something of a red line, if we can borrow a phrase, from earlier, that I see them continuously maintaining.

And given their outsized role both in the region and in NATO, by military hardware, this is going to be something that they have significant influence over. Kyle: even in terms of just being encouraged Washington to take a more sceptical view of the Kurdish forces. It's something that they are not going to be backing down from anytime soon.

Evan Moloney: Absolutely agreed. And I do just want to note that a limited Kurdish offensive might have made some difference here. Just as there might have been ways for the US to better arm Iranian civilians or to take any number of actions that could have shifted the status quo on the ground, ultimately we didn't see any of that.

Evan Moloney: And I do wonder with these new reports coming out, how much of that was Israel ultimately deciding to back down from this intelligence effort with the Kurds rather than to continue pressuring them in order to avoid the potential of a spiralling confrontation with Turkey on top of all of this.

So obviously we don't know too much about Israel's strategic calculus behind the scenes. It does seem that especially in the early days of this war when Israel pushed very hard to make certain things happen they were generally able to do so.

Evan Moloney: So it is telling to me in a way that Israel, although they obviously had concocted this plan with the Kurds, did choose to back down after not too long. Kyle: Overall, I don't think that it was necessarily just Israel wanting to back down on this…

Kyle: Because in general, I'm very sceptical as to the idea that arming any of these ethnically-based separatist groups would be anything but detrimental to Iran long term. I see that as inherently inviting worse – I don't want to use the term civil war but certainly moving in a step towards that direction.

I think the US actually in part based off of Turkish influence but in part just based off of recognition as to the dangers that could present as well as the longer term feasibility of any Kurdish impact on the national scene there would be not particularly realistic, shall we say. 01:10:00

This gives them time to acclimatise to the environment, to scout the pitch, do any kind of monitoring and speaking of monitoring and training, the Iranian team that will be allowed to enter into the US is limited to the players themselves. A lot of the technical staff have not been allowed to go into the US.

And it's not just the Iranian team that's been denied the privilege of entering the US. A lot of African journalists have also been denied this opportunity.

Wilfred W.: And the ones who have been given the chance to be in the US have one-time entry visas, which means that if the country they're covering, for example, Sagal goes to play in Mexico or Canada, these journalists can't follow them to this country because again they won't be allowed to come back to the US.

And it's created a lot of blowback at least online against the US with people accusing it of being a racist country, engaging in racist acts and just in general going against the spirit of the World Cup, the spirit of football which is supposed to be a unifying event that's supposed to bring multiple countries together, the whole world.

01:15:00 Wilfred W.: At least online it feels like the US is becoming something of a pariah state. But again, this could just be online chatter. Kyle: I mean, there's always going to be online chatter that bashes the United States. We are so far away from becoming a pariah state that I'm just going to leave it at that.

The issue with the Iranian team in particular is after the Iranian national women's soccer team performed or played in Australia earlier this year. The issue was that they refused to sing the Iranian national anthem and they were on international television being lip-synced during that and this infuriated the regime.

Okay. Kyle: And so the president announced that they needed to come back and multiple regime officers were talking about calling them wartime traders who must be dealt with more severely. So there was serious inter-consequences here.

And now Trump actually offered to give them amnesty, a long-term political residency in the United States to assist because they looked like they were under threat from their regime. A few of them took it. Several more went back out of fear for their own families because if they defected to the US, this would be sort of a problem.

Kyle: So naturally, it is going to be with great scepticism that the US admits more people from the Islamic Republic to play in the World Cup. To be honest, I'm surprised that Trump's allowing any of them. But I mean, to call this racist, I just don't even know where to come at that from.

This is very clearly because the United States has been fighting an off-again war with the Islamic Republic and that the issue from Australia was so resolutely problematic for the own players that Trump personally had to get involved.

Wilfred W.: I want to say two things. One, me saying that the US could be a pariah because of this definitely wrong choice of words. Again, the US has some of the strongest soft power. As I wrote in a piece for Home Fronts a couple of weeks ago, but at the same time and number two, America's soft power is declining.

There is a genuine feeling of exhaustion with the US and I want to insist that the claims of racism aren't specifically because of you the actions of America in regards to the Iranian team. It's the cumulative experience of the African officials who are coming to the US a lot of whom are being denied entry.

Wilfred W.: It's the fact that African journalists are facing challenges that journalists from other places are not facing and that African teams are being subjected to 7 hours worth of inspection, something that no other team has reported facing. So again, I'm not saying that the US is a racist country.

We're just reporting on what is happening internationally, what is being said by a large majority of the people I'm seeing online. It's just that there is a feeling of this being one of the most exclusionary World Cups in recent memory.

Kyle: Yeah, I definitely think that the exclusionary factor could play a role here. The US has broadly been moving in a direction that's pendulums in politics sort of swings. So on the one if you have the Biden era as one pendulum towards its furthermost outreaches it's certainly swung back in the opposite direction there.

So there's certainly going to be over overcorrections if you will.

Again, I truly think when we're talking about the State Department being involved in this, I have to imagine a lot of this is perhaps if it's excessive, then it's still based off of concerns about security here that again, if it's Iran as well as various African states, they're all facing these concerns. This is profoundly security-minded to me.

Again, whether this is effective or not is a separate question.

01:20:00

Kyle: So, I'm just a little less willing to throw my hat in the ring of this is in inherently malicious, if you will.

Wilfred W.: I agree. Wilfred W.: I always say when it comes to security questions, you'd rather on the side of caution and risk any accusation rather than failing to catch something and becoming a global spectacle or just an attack that could have been prevented. So, yes, there is definitely an element of the US trying to keep itself safe.

The US is trying to keep its citizens safe. But again, the question is, how do you balance that against the expectations that come with an event as big as the World Cup where people from all over the world are descending on your country. So, questions that we thankfully do not have to answer. Kyle: Why are we hosting this? How did this happen?

Wilfred W.: So, the US bid to host the World Cup, like every other host, the US put in a bid together with Canada and Mexico. Kyle: Who decided to put our hat in this though? Who volunteered for this?

Wilfred W.: When did you guys put in the bid? Okay, just let me confirm this because the bid is usually put in years in advance. We know the World Cup host for the next two tournament years in advance…

Wilfred W.: because they put in a bid to host the World Cup. Evan Moloney: Yeah, I just want to jump in here. Evan Moloney: So, this was a joint bid between the US, Canada, and Mexico, submitted in 2018. So, during the first Trump administration…

Kyle: Yeah, but who in the administration was like, "Yes, let's sign up for this." I'm fascinated. Evan Moloney: I couldn't tell, I know it was between them and Morocco, and ultimately the US ended up winning. Kyle: Can I listen, this is my own personal thoughts.

Don't hate me for this, but if Canada wanted to take this one, I would be more than happy to give it to them. I didn't know we hosted it previously…

Wilfred W.: So, I do want to point out that the US had also bid to host the 2022 World Cup and lost, and the US hosted the 1994 World Cup. Wilfred W.: So, this isn't the first time you guys are bidding to host the tournament. Kyle: But we'll see how it goes, is what I'll say on that. Evan Moloney: All right.

Kyle: Same thing here. I'm going to be watching very closely overall, as hoping the kinetic action between all of these forces can maintain a lull here, with Lebanon being the potential flash point for further escalation.

Evan Moloney: And on that note, everybody who is tuning in and who has gotten to this point in the Middle East round table, thank you so much for your support, either as a premium subscriber to front.co. Again, we could not do this without you.

And for those who have not chosen to sign up yet, we appreciate your support regardless of the form that it comes in. And if you are able to maintain our independence, help us keep on doing what we do, we always greatly appreciate that as well.

This is Evan Moloney from Homefronts Associated Products with Kyle Moran and Wilfred W. signing off until next week. Thank you very much.