Speaker 1: I want to welcome everyone back to the Pekana Show
for the first time. We've been on streams before together,
but out on this show. Hunger the Die Merchant.
Speaker 2: How are you doing, Hunger, I'm doing great, man, It's
a great pleasure to be on the show for the
first time.
Speaker 1: Well, thank you for coming on, and I apologize for
asking you to come on and discuss a subject for
your first appearance that is so.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, I'm sure people can look at the title of
this and know that this is, uh, this is going
to be one of those talks.
Speaker 3: It's going to be.
Speaker 1: Very personal to you. So well, let's for people who
don't know you, why don't you explain why this is
a personal discussion to here?
Speaker 2: Right, So, if anybody doesn't hasn't seen me on OGC,
Pony Express Radio or other streams, I've been a guest on.
My name's Hunger. I am a Elebanese American born and
raised in the States, but descendants of two elibanies p parents.
My father escaped the Liberty Civil War in the seventies,
so that's how he got here. My mother stayed for
the entirety of the war there and then married my
dad came to came to America. But yeah, as as
everyone who follows the news and our favorite democracy in
the Middle East knows, there's a big there's a big
conflict going on, and I haven't I have the interesting
experience of I've i've I've lived in the Middle East.
I wasn't born there, but I lived in the Middle
East as a teenager for about eight years, you know,
very very long time, very formative experience, and so I
know the region pretty well and I met and I've
met a lot of people at that time, like I've
met I've met Palestinians whose grandparents or great grandparents were
kicked out of Palestine. I've met you know, Syrians who
left during the Civil War in Syria like this. This
is a very complicated, you know, tense political region. But
I mean it's a very it's always a very interesting
part of the world that most people don't know a
lot about, except you know, outside of you know, the
g WA and oil.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's unfortunate that when most people hear about this
part of the world, it's uh, it's happening to do
with America's greatest ally, you know, saying, hey, they they
hate us because you know of who we are, and
they're they just they exist to kill us. And yeah,
I guess we've seen a lot of that lately. So
how have you have you been handling what's been going on?
Speaker 2: Personally? I I really try not to. I really try
to keep my you know, geopaul hat on when you know,
thinking thinking about like what's happening, thinking about the wider
trends in the war and what is the situation. But
I mean, obviously I have friends and family, a significant
amount of friends and family still there who are struggling. Thankfully,
you know, people have reached out to me personally and asked. Thankfully,
I have nobody in my personal you know circles that
is close to the border with Israel. You know, Lebanon
is very diverse, you know, spread out country. It's very
mountainous country actually, so I personally do not know anybody
that's that lives very close to the border with Israel. However,
in Beirut, the capital city, the capital is being bombed obviously,
but again it's only being bombed and specifically not only
stuff definitely not only, but majority bombed in site areas
which Husbala is a Shite organization so seite areas are
getting the bront Yeah, getting most of the brunts of
the bombings. So my family is safe. I don't know
anybody who's died personally. The big thing that's happening there
is actually the refugee crisis because a lot of site
Lebany are you know, heading up north and going into
different areas of Lebanon to escape the bombing and to
escape the violence. So in my in my family village,
you know, back home, a lot of people have opened
up their doors to refugees from the South. I should
also mention I'm an Orthodox Christian. Lebanon has a very
significant percentage of Christians. It's the heighest in the Middle
East by percentage, and it's about you know, a quarter
to thirty percent of the country as Christian, whether that's Catholic, Orthodox,
a little bit of Protestant, you know a lot of
other mixes in between. So that's kind of that's kind
of what's happening immediately in my circle. It's like, yeah,
there's a huge refugee crisis, and people are trying to
be very charitable and open up their doors and you know,
spread resources around to help people in this time of need.
Speaker 1: Can you explain, I mean, just a overview of what
the what why this beef?
Speaker 3: I mean, we know that.
Speaker 1: Hezbollah and the idea of clash before we know I
think a lot of us know about the nineteen eighties,
the bombings of Beirut, the blowing up of the marine
barracks there for no reason at all. I mean, the
Marines were there as peacekeepers, right, you know, it's just yeah,
I mean, I don't even get that. Obviously, that's being
very sarcastic. I actually have a friend who he knows
people who were stationed there. He knows people who were there,
and they've told them about the stories of what they
were doing there. And if anybody thinks that they were peacekeepers,
they they yeah.
Speaker 2: And I don't mean, I don't mean to share on
anybody who who served, you know, I totally, I totally understand.
I nobody I know has any beef personally with any
American they mets, whether they're in the military or civilian
or not. It's really the anti americanism in the Middle East.
It's not personal. It's extremely how do I It's extremely political.
It's extremely like, as a result of government policy, you
do America and I don't mean you that. That's not
not you personally America or us G. I like I
like to say us G because that's not it has
nothing to do with what we're doing. Because we're both American.
We don't agree with anything that our government is doing.
What USG has done in the Middle East is create
ship show after ship show after a ship show that's
caused enormous amounts of backlash.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, and in many such cases around around the
whole region. What different and just talking about Libya all night?
But all right, let's let's stick let's tax to Elebanon.
You want me to put that map up? I think
right now it's a good time. Yeah, talk about talk
about the you know this, the Sheite what looks to
be a Shehite stronghold.
Speaker 3: Where where are we here? The terrorist state? Yeah, it's
terrorist state. All right, here we go.
Speaker 1: All right, let me see if I can blow this
up just a little bit without making it at a screen.
It's not going to blow up, so all right, so
you have it on your end and you can just
explain what we're seeing here, because when you look at
this graph and you see basically how this is, it
shows by color where there's Shia, where Shia, Sunni, jruz
Ala Wai, Maronite, Greek Catholic, Greek Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox, and Catholic.
I mean, this is like a patchwork quilt that you
would find in a thrift store in the South that
somebody's grandma made from a leftover yarn that she had.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, oh basically yeah, So if for anybody interested,
the red, yellow, and orange are all Christian groups, which
is not an insignificant part of the country, and there's
also a lot of people who live there. That's the red, yellow,
and orange sections are all either Marrinite Orthodox or Eastern
Greek or Greek Catholic, which is you know, like it's like,
how do I say it's the Greek Catholics are their
eastern righte Catholics basically, and so it's a very diverse country.
As you can see, the green are the Sunni areas,
and the purple are the Sheites areas, which is of
big concern for us because of the current conflict with Israel,
and the blue area is our Drews. And in all honesty,
nobody freaking knows what the Drews are. They don't understand
what they are themselves. I don't know, they're religious leaders,
like their clerics don't tell them their religion. It's actually
like a incredibly well kept secret, like they're not allowed
to know what the tenets of their own religion are.
But it's basically like an ethno sectarian, esoteric like patchwork
of like Muslim and Christian beliefs.
Speaker 3: Basically.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but asking Drews what what is what is Drusism?
Like they have no fucking idea.
Speaker 3: What that sounds like? Alohite too, ALOI is is kind
of odd.
Speaker 1: I've asked that before people and you always get the
same kind of very mystical kind of answer to that.
Speaker 2: The only answer I ever get from the Allo whites
is we're Muslim, but we're allowed to drink alcohol.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And then you look at us, then you look
at someone like Asad who is an Alo White, and
you're like, that kind of looks like a white guy.
Speaker 3: But yeah, all right, no, definitely.
Speaker 2: I mean.
Speaker 3: So on this map, just just.
Speaker 2: Just on that point of like the the whiteness of
just on that point, like the whiteness of the Meds.
I just call myself Mediterranean. When people think of Arabs,
they think of like you know, sand and words, which
is not entirely inaccurate, but the Mediterranean basin has been
a petri dish for four thousand years. Like, we have
natural blondes and redheads. I have red heads in my
own family who are pale. You know they if you
didn't know they were from this area of the world,
you would assume they were like Irish or something, or British.
You would have no idea except for the accent. Just
on that point, just wanted to say.
Speaker 1: That, I mean, Europe is weird too. I mean I
have Eastern European and Southern European and my family and
I'm brown hair, brown eyes. My brother I have a brother,
my youngest brother's blonde hair.
Speaker 3: Blue eyes.
Speaker 1: So it's just odd oddness all around, all right. So
looking at this map, yeah, okay, so the IDF has
been making incursions into Lebanon. Where on the map have
they been making the incursions?
Speaker 2: And so you're going to get a kick out of this.
The incursions that are happening are obviously in you know,
the furthest south where the entire purple is down there.
But surprise, surprise, the Israelis have not gotten passed two
three kilometers into the entire country, which is absolutely nothing.
It's that it was. It's been a worse performance on
the ground at least compared to two thousand and six
and two thousand and six they took like ten fifteen
kilometers of territory and before the invasion even started, the
Israelis said We're going to invade ten to fifteen kilometers
inland and create a Cordon Sanitaire buffer zone so that
HUSBLA rockets are out of reach of Israel. Total failure, total, absolute,
total failure. This is not the best map to go into.
But like I can show you on a Google map
of Lebanon, like how far they've gone into It's like
two kilometers or less, which is like nothing. So yeah,
on the ground at least, the military campaign has been
a failure. By air, you know, I mean by air,
they're causing huge amounts of destruction all over the country.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I was on one of the telegram channels this morning,
it's we're Remnouvarum and they're basically saying.
Speaker 3: That the IDF was pulling out today. The IDF was.
Speaker 1: Pulling out a southern Lebanon because they I saw one
report where they had taken seven hundred casualties and sixty dead.
And yeah, like the report was saying, is they can't
make it. They can't get into five kilometers in So
what I don't see what their point is of even
trying to make trying to do this incursion. I mean,
unless it's to punish, unless it's to punish the population
that's there.
Speaker 2: I mean, there's it's definitely that. But it's like I
have a hard time and even though even though these
people are you know, neighbors and eternal enemies, like I
have a genuinely hard time understanding their level of you know,
paranoia and you know other psychological ticks they have. But
it's like they knew what were they expecting to happen?
Were they expecting to drive all the way to be route,
which is like sixty seventy kilometers north of the border, Like,
were they expecting to take over half the country? What
about the other she had areas that are like all
the way in the north, all the way in the northeast,
Like those areas are Husbala areas as well. Do you
are are you going to invade two thirds of the
entire country? I mean, I genuinely don't know what they
were trying to do. It's like the same thing with
the same thing with ten seven, Like same thing with
October seven, which which we've talked a lot about and
everyone has been talking a lot about for the past year.
It's like did why did they do what they did?
They knew this was not going to end the way
they thought it would and these people aren't just going
to go away. And it's not for lack of trying.
The Israelis have tried everything they had they could to
wreck Gaza and displace two million people out of Gaza.
That didn't work. That didn't work at all. I mean
they're still over a million Palestinians in Gaza. The ethnic cleansing,
I mean they killed you know, almost one hundred thousand people,
between fifty and one hundred thousand people, but there's still
a million Palastinians still there. They haven't been ethnically displaced,
which is which was israel stated goal. Israel wanted to
resettle Gaza with you know, exclusively Israeli Jews, which didn't work,
and then they launched us. They opened the second front.
I mean, Husabela is the one that opens the second front,
and people ask me this as well. It's like, what
is what is the goal of Husbola? And I keep
saying this because this is like you have to take
these people at their word. Hasbela's goal is not to
destroy Israel in this campaign. They're they're wider objective is
to destroy Israel. But in this campaign itself, their objective
was to stop the war in Gaza by opening up
a second front, and the war in Gaza did not start.
But by boxing Israel in on two sides, you know,
they they've caused absolute panic and chaos and Israel on
top of the also the Iranian support and MISSIF strikes
that have been happening as well. Like, Israel is in
a completely fucked situation and it's all of their own
doing it. It's all of their own making. And I
can't reason my way into thinking why would why would
you put yourself in this situation?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm looking on that telegram page. It was eight
thirty eight a m. This morning Central time. Israeli Defense
Force so be going to slow withdrawal from southern Lebanon.
Speaker 2: All right, So there's two but so yeah, and in
these two areas, in these two areas, in these two areas.
There's so there's four brigades or or four divisions that
are active on the front line. I heard two of
those divisions being withdrawn. The other two I'm not so
sure about, but that that was the information I heard.
Speaker 3: Okay, okay, all right, So.
Speaker 1: Looking at the map now, you said from from the
border down at the bottom by how's that is that
pronounced bail?
Speaker 2: So it's it's okay, don't bj right. So in two
thousand and six, vintaje Bed was taken over by the Israelis.
The town was captured by israel in two thousand and six.
It's been over a month since the starts of the
Israeli campaign. They have they are, they have not taken
the city. They are still in the outskirts. There's a
there's a very famous town a kilometer south of bentaje
Bed called Marjayoun, and that even that town has not
been taken over by the Israelis, which is literally, you know,
eight hundred meters from the border. I mean that that's
nothing like you're eight hundred meters away from home base
and you can't take this one town of like five
thousand people. When it was taken over in two thousand
and six. Actually, so this is a much worse performance
than even I expected compared to the first war that
happened in two thousand and six.
Speaker 1: Okay, if I look up to Beyrout, let's go to
bea route, because that's where when this all started, the bombings,
the massive bombings by the by the Israelis happened. If
I look at the colors on beay Root, it looks
like it's almost all sunny with just a couple little
stripes of Shia.
Speaker 3: Is that correct?
Speaker 1: Uh?
Speaker 2: Not? Not really? So, I mean if if you look
at the tippy if you look at the tippy top,
Beirut is huge. Beirut takes up like a much wider circle.
So that purple right south of Beirut is the southern suburbs,
which is where all the sites are, and the eastern
suburbs are vastly like ninety percent Christian suburbs. So yeah,
at the tip, at the tip of Beirut is mostly
Sundy's West West Beirut is a Sunni district, East Beirut
is a Christian district, and South beir Roots is a
Shiite district. And that's just how the demographics played out
because of migration and economics and you know history. So
in south and South Beirut, the southern SUBURBSS is taking
an absolute beating by the Israeli Air force. Like I
don't I don't even have to show you. You can just
look this up anywhere. You'll see buildings. You'll see like
twelve story apartment buildings just collapse from you know, a
bomb striking the base of the base of the apartment building.
And during the during during this the assassination of the
Husbelo leader, Hassan no Sorella, there was a six, there
was a six. There, there was an apartment complex of
six buildings where the Israelis dropped one hundred and sixty
thousand tons of explosives on this six building, on the
six building complex which was housing the tunnels where Husbela
was meeting where the Husbitlo leader was meeting some Iranian officials.
And I mean those buildings are completely gone. And there's
a giant, you know, fifty foot crater in the middle
of the city where that building once was, well.
Speaker 3: Were the building.
Speaker 1: Did the residents of the building have time to get
out or they warned to get out? I mean, are here,
here's here's question. Here's a better question. Do the residents
of those buildings know that those tunnels are there?
Speaker 3: And who meets there?
Speaker 2: Yes and no? I mean yes, yes and no. So
it's hard to if you're not site, it's very hard
to get this kind of information. And even if you
are she Hite, it's very hard to get this information
if you're not directly associated with Husbola. Because for for
all the for all the recent events, Husbula has extremely
good side, has extremely good op sect. I mean, there's
a reason why they're winning the war in the south.
They're winning the war in the South is because they
have extremely good OPSEC and they have a lot of
room to maneuver. But in Beirut, which is a very
concentrated city, you're just gonna have like there's spies running
all over the place and Husbola, it's it's hard, it's
hard to get around that there is there is a
huge network of tunnels. I mean, everyone knows this, but
no one confirmed, No one ever saw it themselves that
I know of. Everyone knows there's a there's a huge
tunnel network under beir roots, under the southern suburbs. This
was known for decades because that's what Husbaba does, because
the Husbula leaders very rarely go above ground because at
any one time they can be assassinated by Israel and
they know this and this is how they live their lives,
and the people around them close to them know this
as well. But like there's not like a hidden civilian
population living in these tunnels. This is military infrastructure for
Husbudlah for the purpose of, you know, defending themselves against
assassination attempts by Israel.
Speaker 3: What's your opinion of Hesbela.
Speaker 2: That is a very complicated question. Uh, well, of course
I believe the State Department saying that they're a terrorist organization.
But uh, I have as a Lebanese Christian, I have
no beef with Husbolo because Husbola are not my enemy
and Husbela has never done anything to the Christian community
in my opinion that deserves any you know, backlash. A
lot of other Lebanese Christians disagree. They don't like Husbola,
not because their pro is reel, but because they want
to open up to the West. They want to, they
want they want to they they want to give the
State Department a blowjob basically, and it's like they know that.
It's like, oh, Husbela are Muslim, their reactionary, they're allied
with Iran. We wanna, we wanna, we want to be
open and European and see the world and have business
and do banking with you know, the rest of the
the with the West, or the or the gay whatever
whatever you want to call it. And there's a lot
of Christians who genuinely believe that. And I know where
they're coming from, and I understand why they think the
way they think because they were Western educated, they have
family in the West. I mean, I live in the West,
so I want to complain. But they're wrong in the
sense that it's like you're you're pissing off your neighbors,
your Muslim neighbors who don't like those governments and what
they're doing, and you're inviting in the foreign influence of
very very bad actors. Which is not to say the
other air states are bad actors. I mean Syria, Syria
is Syria has done many bad things in Lebanon. Syria
is the Also Syria is also the only thing keeping
Lebanon kind of staple at any one point in time.
They've done a lot of bad things in Lebanon. I
can tell you, I can tell you the things the
Syrians did to my family during the war. But at
the same time, we need Syria. Like this is not
a it's not about my personal desire. It's like, this
is the geopolitical reality, like we have to be we
have to have extremely close ties to Syria. They are
they are our only Arab neighbor. This is a very
tough neighborhood to be and we are a very small country.
The goal of a very small state is to survive,
and the goal of a minority, the goal of a
religious minority or any ethnic minority, is to survive and
not piss off your neighbors. And that's that's that's what't
Israel has never learned.
Speaker 1: You make it seem like the Shia or not in
Lebanon or not the enemy of Christians are the Sunnis
in Lebanon the enemy of Christians.
Speaker 2: The Sunnis don't like anybody. But first of all, the
Soonis think the Sites are yeah, the Soonies think the
Shiites are heretics, and they tolerate the Christians. But I mean,
if a certain I mean there's been a lot of
radical Sunni groups who have come up in Lebanon, and
they don't like the Christians either. I mean, Hasbola was
the one kicking Isis's ass in Syria, and who are
Isis massacring in Syria? They were massacring the Alloites and
the Christians and all the minorities, and so they were,
We're no friend of Isis, absolutely fucking not. I mean,
the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Husbola has never,
you know, has never done anything to attack the Christian
community as far as I know, or at least outside
of the civil War where everyone was fighting everybody. It
was nothing absolutely unique to Husbulah. And you know, defending
the regime of Bashar Assad and protecting the Christians is
kind of the most important thing in my opinion, and
they've never the Christians. The Christians are very very politically
divided in Lebanon, very much fifty to fifty. Actually, the
Sites and the Sunnies are basically one political block who
oppose each other. But the Christians are actually divided fifty
to fifty. Half of them to half of them want
to be open to the West, and that also means
being an ally of the Saudis, the Qataris, the Amortis
and all the Gulf State puppets of America. Basically that
half of Christians support that siding with Saudi Arabia and
the Gulf States and the West. The other half of
Christians side with Hasabella and Syria because it is in
their best interest of their survival to do so. Because
we're in a very tough region. This is we don't
get to choose who our neighbors are. You know, you
have to make compromises, you have to you know, have
to have you have to have it back and forth
with these people, like you can't ignore who your neighbors are,
and you want to have good relationships with your neighbors.
Just like just like Ukraine and Russia, Ukraine Russia could
have gone, could have gone along very well. And Syria
and Lebanon is very similar to Ukraine and Russia in
many many ways. So I mean there's a lot of
people in Ukraine who are pro Russian and who maybe
they don't want to be a part of Russia, but
they at least want to be friendly to Russia and
not be an enemy of Russia. I have no reason
to be an enemy of Syria. That would not be
good for my people to be an enemy of Ceria.
Speaker 1: All right, So I have an important question to come
back to you, but I want to ask you this
one before before we jump into that, because that'll probably
lead us into a new subject.
Speaker 3: Have you been to Israel?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 1: Okay, so you haven't been. You haven't been to Gaza, okay,
but you said that you had.
Speaker 2: Sorry, in interesting story, my grandmother when before Israel was
when Israel was Palestin. My grandmother went to Jerusalem for
a Christian pilgrimage and she had a tattoo of a cross.
She got that in nineteen forty six actually, and then
two years later as Past nine became Israel. I just
just personal, interesting tidbit.
Speaker 1: You did say that you've you've known people in Goza,
right or from Goz or people who've been So I'm
asking I'm gonna ask you secondhand information here, But you
do know people who've been there.
Speaker 2: Right, I know people who have family in Gaza.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 1: So I want to ask the same question about Gaza
that that I asked about Lebanon. How are the Christians,
the Christians that are left there? I mean, I think
they used to be thirty percent Christian and now it's
down into low single digits.
Speaker 3: How are they treated there?
Speaker 2: I mean, like, I mean the Christians, the Christians in Gaza,
who they're not nothing, but they're they're they're a negligible
portion of the kind of the society. It's like there
are too minion people in Gaza. There's maybe eight ten
thousand Christians. I mean the I mean they no one,
no one really bothers them. No one really bothers the
Christians for being Christian, even though there are radical Sunni groups,
But no one bothers the Christians in Gaza because they're
they're struggling under the same occupation as everyone else. Like
life is not better for the Christians because they're Christians.
They don't have more access to the West because they're Christian.
They're they're living in an open air prison, just like
the other two million Muslims around them. And they have
their own churches and they have their own they have
their own little community. But they're Palestinian. Their culture is Palestinian,
their culture, their food is their food is arab their
food is Mediterranean, and they're they're just like everybody else,
except they don't wear the he job.
Speaker 1: All right, So you said some things before that could
lead people down a path.
Speaker 3: You say.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Basically, if you're Lebanese, you live in a rough neighborhood,
you're surrounded by Yeah.
Speaker 3: You're surrounded by trouble bullies.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: The way what we're.
Speaker 1: Taught here is that Israel is there to try to
stabilize that, that they're the stabilizing force that before Israel,
before the Jews went to Israel and decided that they
were going to buy.
Speaker 3: Up all the land.
Speaker 1: I think we know anyone who knows the real story
that that's bullshit, but that they they're the only stabilizing
force there, that if they weren't there, this would just
be an eruption of Sunni and Shia killing each other
and killing Christians and YadA, YadA. So how does that,
How does that narrative play for you?
Speaker 2: It's on its face, it's wrong. But I'll just say,
I'll just say this one thing that the grain of
truth in that statement. It has nothing to do with
the Jews. Okay, the immigrants to Palestine have caused nothing
but more destabilization, more massacres, more terrorism, more. You know,
I don't even have to mention it. You've gone through
this on your show dozens of times. Everyone knows what
happened in Palestine in the thirties and forties with the terrorism,
the bombings and all that stuff, and the consequences thereafter.
Speaker 1: The grain of truth and you're like, you're talking about
you're talking about Jewish terrorism.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, o fact, and.
Speaker 2: And and what the State of Israel has done since,
and all the things the state of the Visual has
done since the Lavon affair, the assassination attempts, the Six
Wars that started because of the creation of Israel. But
the grain of truth in that statement is that, Okay, yeah,
the Middle East was not pretty beforehand. There were ethnic tensions,
there were religious tensions, There were you know, Muslim Christian massacres,
but those things, it's not that those events were a
consequence of the Ottoman Empire, the weakness of the Ottoman Empire,
the failure of the Ottoman Empire, and you know, uppity
nationalist movements trying to you know, take over their neighbors,
which is not Again, this is a rough neighborhood. It's
been a rough neighborhood ever since the collapse of the
Ottoman Empire. So you have to kind of make compromises
to keep the peace and not get Like Lebanon used
to be a majority of Christian state. Okay, in nineteen
thirty two, the population was fifty five percent Christian. Now
it's twenty five thirty percent, which is significant. You know,
that's almost a million and a half people out of
five but we're we're no longer the majority. You know.
To survive as a community, you have to make interesting friends.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that a lot of people would hear
that about the Ottoman Empire, and they would think that
really the best way for to keep peace in this
area is to have a strong overlord, Like if the
Ottoman Empire, you know, demanded order was very on the ground.
I mean, and we can go back in history and
we can talk about Rome, and we can talk about
you know, Alexander and oh a whole host of people
who attempted this.
Speaker 3: But it would seem to me it.
Speaker 2: Wasn't it wasn't even that, it wasn't even that long ago.
I mean, the the Ottoman Empire lasted in the Middle
East for five hundred years, and only in the last
sixty years of those five hundred were their significant blood
feuds and ethnic you know, massacres. Those four hundred, those
other four hundred and forty years were very strong, stable
central governments.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so all right, well let's talk about the uh, well,
let's talk about our greatest ally, Israel. How how did
it start with the tension between Israel and Lebanon? Where
had where does the genesis of that come from?
Speaker 2: Well, the story of Israeli Benese tensions, I mean first
of all, First of all, it goes back to nineteen
forty eight. It goes back to the creation of Israel.
So when Israel was founded and the Nakba, which is
Arabic for the catastrophe, the displacement of almost a million
Palestinian refugees, the displacement, the displacements of Palestinians from Palestine
into the surrounding territories. Lebanon got a. Lebanon received a
significant portion of those Palestinian refugees because it's literally on
the border of Palestine, not surprising, and so from nineteen
forty eight onwards there has been a significant Palestinian refugee
population in Lebanon.
Speaker 3: And with the.
Speaker 2: Creation of the PLO, the Palestinian Liberation Organization and Yasadatafat
in the sixties, Palestinians started conducting cross border raids into Israel,
you know, for a very noble cause to reclaim their homeland,
which everybody understands. But this caused Israel to retaliate in
Lebanon and it led to Lebanese casualties. It led to
Lebanese people being caught in the crossfire between the Palestinians
and Lebanon and the Israelis, and a lot of people
died in the sixties and seventies because of Israel attacking
Palestinians in Lebanon and against civilians getting caught in the
cost fire. This caused a huge backlash to you know,
both sides. The Shiites, as you can see on the map,
which is the entire proper area down south is where
all that is where a huge number of the Palestinians
were based out of to attack Israel. And so it
was almost eighty to eighty percent Sheites getting killed as
as collateral damage in the Palestinian you know, Israeli skirmishes.
This caused a huge resentment in the Shiite community and
so a lot of them started traveling up north. That
is why the southern suburbs of Beirut received a huge
influx of sites because in the sixties and seventies when
the conflict was going on, a lot of sites left
the south to move to Beirut to escape, you know,
Israeli attacks as a result of Palestinian attacks. That's kind
of the animus, that's kind that's kind of the the
that's kind of the starting point of how Husaboba came
into being. In the sixties and seventies, Shiites were getting
killed by being in the middle of Pastinians and Israelis,
and so the sites started founding their own militias to
protect theirs, to protect themselves, and this happened in the seventies.
To think about the Palestinians in Lebanon, they I sympathized
with them very much so, but they also wrecked my country.
I mean, unronically, the Palestinians started the Lebanese Civil War
because the past Indians were majority Sunni. There was Christian
Palastinians who fled, but because ninety plus percent of the
Pastinians were Suni, it upset the entire sectarian demographic balance
in Lebanon and we received hundreds of thousands of these
radicalized Sunni fighters who you know, were interested in conflict
and having a war with Israel. This caused a huge
backlash in the Christian community, and the Christian community started
forming militias as well to protect themselves from the past
Indians because the Pastinians were trying to take over Lebanon
to be the permanent base of attacks on Israel. And yeah, surprise, surprise,
the locals did not like being the basis of attack
and getting caught in the middle of these two groups.
So this led to the Lebanty Civil War of nineteen
seventy five. It lasted for fifteen years. It was a
Christian Muslim civil war, but it was actually it was
mostly a Christian Pastinian war, with the Saites and the
Drus and the Sundies also committing massacres against everybody. Like
the Sahites committed massacres against the Palestinians, the Drus committed
massacres against the Christians. The Christians committed massacres against the Palestinians.
The Sundies, you were, the Lebanese Sunnies used the Palestinians
as their you know, their strong right arm to further
their Sunni political interests. And Yasad Adafetz, the leader of
the PLO, this his attacks on Israel eventually caused a
backlash in Israel, which led to two invasions of Lebanon.
The first ones in the first one in nineteen seventy eight, Yeah,
so Israel occupied like maybe again ten fifteen kilometers of
southern Lebanon, which caused more site refugees to flee north
and radicalize the Sahites even more because their land was
occupied by Israel now. And in eight nineteen eighty two,
which was the big invasion, they occupied half of They
occupied half of Lebanon, half of Beiruts, and they got
into a war with the Syrians over eastern Lebanon. And
this was a huge part of the conflict. The Syrians,
after the beginning of the Lebanese Civil War invaded to
re establish security. Not really, they just chose side. They
from one year to the next, the Syrians would play
both sides of the conflict and try to get the
most out of both sides. Like one year they would
support the Christians and try to stabilize the country. The
next year they would support the Sunnis and destabilize the country.
Given the fluctuating, you know, events that Syria was very
much a part of. And so in eighty two, the
Israelis and the Syrians, you know, crossed arms and it
was pretty much I would say it was a stalemate.
But I think the Israelis won that exchange in eighty two,
but I mean it was very bloody. It was a
very bloody exchange as well. The Syrians have always been
the best. Ians have always had the best track record
of all the Arab states when it comes to fighting
the Israelis. So eventually people, eventually the conflict settles down.
In nineteen ninety, there is a peace agreement in nineteen
ninety between all the militia groups of all of all
religions and they agree to have a more for they
agreed to a new power sharing arrangement where power shifted
from the Christians to the Sunnis and sites because again,
like I said, when Lebanon was created, it was a
majority Christian country and the Christians had majority political power.
The Civil War changed that. The Civil War caused the
Christians to lose political power in exchange for peace with
the Sunnis and with the Sundis basically and the past Indians.
The Pastinian Liberation Organization was actually kicked out of Lebanon
by Israel and they fled to Tunisia or or somewhere
along that lines until out of fact comes back to
make peace with Israel. So the Palesinians come in, screw
Lebanon up, screw up the demographics, provoke an invasion by
Israel twice and cause everyone in the country to fight them.
So in the middle of this, because of the nineteen
eighty two invasion, all of southern Lebanon is occupied by Israel.
A one specific Site militia splits off from the other
Shiite militias and gets This is because this is nineteen
eighty two, they get foreign funding from the Islamic Republic
of Iran. This group becomes Hezbollah and they are radicalized
by They are raticalized by the Iranian Revolution. Actually, the
Lebanese contributed very much to the Iranian Revolution happening in
the first place, but that's a more complicated story. So
the Celebanese Chites and the Iranian Sites radicalize each other
in exchange, and eventually, after nineteen eighty two, Sites and
Lebanon formed Hesbela and Hesbela's main goal is not to
fight the Palestinians, not to fight the Christians. It is
to drive Israel out of Lebanon and retake the site
lands that were now occupied by Israel. And Israel occupied
southern Lebanon from nineteen seventy eight till the year two thousand,
So yeah, twenty two years the south was occupied and
that was the Rizondetra of Hesbela. And so after the
Israelis left Lebanon in the year two thousand, they left unilatterally.
But throughout that entire time, even post civil war, Hezebela
and the Israelis were fighting each other in the nineties
and southern Lebanon and a lot of again civilians died.
Even though the country was at peace because the civil
war was over, the country was still at war with Israel,
and Hezabela was the main force fighting Israel in the
south because Israel occupied Chiite territory. There was a very
famous incident. Actually, if you look at that little orange
speck in the middle of the purple, like right in
the center of the purple in the south, there's an
orange speck that is actually a very famous town. You
might have heard of it in the Bible. It's called
Kina or Kana. That is the village where Jesus turned
the water into wine. At the wedding. And in nineteen
ninety six, Israel was launching a military operation in this
region of the south and a lot of civilians fled
to a United Nations compound here looking for safety from
Israeli shelling. This is a nineteen ninety six and Israel
shelled that UN compound and you know, over one hundred thousand,
over a sorry, over one hundred civilians were massacred. It
was called it was called the Kana massacre nineteen ninety six,
and that caused a huge backlash because you went, peacekeepers
were there, they were some of them were killed as well.
And yeah, there's there's there's I can go down all
list of things that have happened like that, but that
was a big one. Israel leaves in the year two thousand.
Finally Lebanon has no Syrian troops or Israeli troops on
its territory. It's fully independent, you know, for the first
time and basically its entire history, and I mean politically,
shit just hits the fan. America and the West are
trying to tear Lebanon away from the Syrian and Iranian
sphere of influence. The Syrian and Iranians push back trying
to keep Lebanon in their sphere of influence, and we
become basically Ukraine using using their client groups in Lebanon
to further you know, foreign backers. To tell me, tell
me if you want me to stop, or if I can,
or if I should keep going, because I I've been
rambling for some time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, now I have a question. It seems to me
that the smart thing that would have would have happened
is if as soon as the palace, as soon as
it becomes clear that the Palestinians who were in Lebanon
are you know, troublemakers. They should either be ejected somewhere
or dealt with.
Speaker 3: They were.
Speaker 2: So the reason they the reason the past, the reason
the plow is in Lebanon is because they were. They
were ejected from Jordan. Beforehand, the Palestenians tried to overthrow
the overthrow the King of Jordan, and the Arabs got
together and schemed like, okay, we can't kill yas he's
too important. We can't kill the leader of the Pastadene
national movement. However, he tried to overthrow the king of Jordan.
Where do we put him. We'll put him in Lebanon.
Why Lebanon. We were too weak to stop it. We
were two weeks to stop it. We have no leverage.
We are a tiny country. Syria, the Palestinians wanted to
go to Syria. Syria said hell, no, you're troublemakers. We're
putting you in Lebanon where we can keep an eye
on you. And because Lebanon borders Israel so that they
can all they all had an interest in keeping out
of facts alive and putting him in a place where
he could cause trouble for Israel but not them, And
so Lebanon was pretty much the ideal destination.
Speaker 1: So it seems to me that the Palestinians, if you're
if I'm listening hearing this right, wherever they go, they're
causing trouble.
Speaker 3: Is that pretty much? Yeah?
Speaker 1: And you know people will say, well, you know, if
they're in Gaza, they're causing trouble.
Speaker 3: If they're on the.
Speaker 1: How many Palestinians are on the West Bank I'm trying
to remember, is.
Speaker 2: I think it's like I think it's like two three million, Yeah, yeah, okay,
three million.
Speaker 1: But let's concentrate on Gaza. Then it's like, well, if
they're in Gaza, then they're going to be causing problems everywhere,
it seems. I've heard the argument that the Palestinians, no
matter where they go, they cause problems.
Speaker 3: And you know, and I've always joked that.
Speaker 1: Uh, doctor Schlomo sand And and Sheldon Richmond, you know,
hold to the theory that the Palestinians are actually like
the real Jews, that they have Jewish DNA that they
converted over the centuries and everything. I would say, well,
they sure do. They sure do sound subversive, so there
could there could be some evidence there, but it sounds
like they're just fucking troublemakers wherever they go. So I mean,
I think that.
Speaker 2: It would be just on that good, just on that
one point. I mean, if you were kicked out of
your ancestral homeland where your grand where you're not even
your grandparents, you're great great great parents started build a
house or a farm or a factory that goes back
to three hundred years or even further. You know, these
people have been indigenous to the land since the time
of Christ basically, and these upstart Eastern European migrants come
in and because they have guns and you don't, your
your property is now their property because right of conquest.
You don't think people are going to have a problem
with that.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, somebody maker, you know, somebody with
Spanish lineage who understands the history of Spain and knows
that the reconquista there took over seven hundred years, that
you know, never forget and just keep taking back as
much of the property as possible. Yeah, I mean I
get it, Yeah, I get it. And you know, but
it's also you know, Europe and these are different people.
You're europe is your Europeans or Europeans, and people from
this place are different cultures, different different ways. And so
all right, let's let's go back to Israel. So what
is Israel's purpose? Is Israel's purpose to just basically take
all of this land because the Old Testament says it's theirs? Yeah,
and I know that they're not religious most of the
you know, Benjamin, I don't think Benjamin and Yahoo is
a is a religious person. But that doesn't mean that
you're not going to take a Bible and take the
Bible look at as a history book and go or
you just rationalize, well, as it says here that God, whoever,
this person, whoever, this guy is said that this is
ours and it's in this book, and a bunch of
Christians all around the world and especially in the United
States have been brain Washington believe in that we're these people,
then why don't we use this book?
Speaker 3: Is that?
Speaker 1: Is that what their goal is is to take from
the take back from the river to the sea.
Speaker 2: I mean that's yeah, that's basically it. I mean, when
when Zionism started in Europe, I mean there was a
religious and secular aspect of Zionism which still which still
exists to this day. I mean, like, like you said,
not every Israeli is religious, but there are a lot
who are, and there are a lot who quote Scripture
to justify their current holding of the land. The secultors
really don't think that, don't believe that at all. The
secutors really believe, oh, this is a safe place for Jews.
You know, this is this is a safe place for
my people. Why where? Why would I be anywhere else?
The goal, basically, the first goal of the state of
Israel is the survival and continuation of the Jewish race.
Take it, take it early, that's it. That that is
their sole reason for existence. Israel is the last homeland
for Jews all over the world, that whatever happens, whatever
happens post you know, Nuremberg, there will always be a
safe place for Jews, run by Jews, controlled by Jews.
That is the purpose of Israel. That that's what we
all know it to be. Now within that project, there
are a lot of different opinions. A lot of them
are expansionists. They took the Golden Heights from Syria, and
Donald Trump, when he was president, recognized the Golden Heights
as a part of Israel. Israel is the only country
in the world that doesn't declare its own borders. Why
because if it declared its own borders, it would have
to demarket where it's where it would stop expanding. But
there are lucky pople in Israel who don't, who want
to continue expanding. Southern Lebanon has a lot of water resources.
It's very hilly, it's a very nice area, beautiful mountains, rivers, everything.
It would supply a lot of water to Israel, which
is still majority of desert. That's one I mean. They
want to take the Sinai as well, because the Sinai
is very important to the Jewish religion. These are all
things that happened, and Israel had to make compromises, giving
back the Sinai to Egypt, for example, in exchange for peace.
But at its heart, it's about the survival of the
Jewish race, and within that project the expansion of the
Jewish state to the natural borders of former Israel.
Speaker 1: Right, So anybody who people need to understand that, to
understand that who've bought into the narrative that Israel is
just trying to live there peacefully and everybody around them
is trying to kill them. As I know, they seek
to expand out and go into territories that people already exisit,
people already live there, have lived there for thousands of years,
just like they did by starting to come there in
the in the early nineteen hundreds. Is their goal is
to take this back, and not only the land that
they have now, but to move beyond that. And it
seems that they anyone who's standing in the way of that.
If if Iran is helping Hesbalah, I guess here there's
a good place to go. Why do you think Iran
is so intent on helping Hesbealah? And I mean, we
know that Iran has helped the helped Hamas too, which
is you know, Shia helping Sunni. So what's Iran's whole
thing in this? What's their play in this?
Speaker 2: Iran and Hesbalah they just like just like America and Israel,
Iran and Hesbla have a very special relationship. The Lebanese
sites historically have traveled back and forth to Iran to
teach the tenets of site Islam that currently rule Iran today.
Because I'm not I'm definitely not an expert on this,
that's for sure. I am not an expert on Islam.
But the Lebanese and the Iranians have a centuries long relationship.
The Lebanese sites and the Iranians have a centrally long
relationship going back and forth. And the Lebanese sites because
of certain emoms and sheikhs in the sixties and fifties,
radicalized again because of the creation of Israel, because at
this time Iran was pro Israel. Iran was in the
American sphere of orbit, so Iran was pro Israel at
this time when we had the Shah of Iran famously,
so the Libines Sheites became radicalized, you know, having Israel
on their border and being the victims of Israel. They
started talking to their Shiite you know cousins or cousins
or you know, fellows in Iraq and Iran, and that
radicalized them both. And I don't I don't know the
history of Komeni because Kmiani was one of these other people.
I don't know his connection. I don't know his Lebanese
connection exactly, but I wouldn't be surprised if there was
something there of how Komeni was radicalized into into believing.
Speaker 3: What he believed.
Speaker 2: That that's pretty much the best explanation I can tell
you without doing a deep dive. I don't I don't
have the background knowledge on that. There was a very
famous person. His name was Musa al Sud. He was
the first person in Lebanon. He was the first Shiite
imam in Lebanon to start these Sheite militias for the
purpose of defending the communities from both the Palestinians and
the Israelis. Suda was a little troublemaker himself, and while
visiting Libya he was kidnapped, tortured and killed by Momar Gadaffi.
Why and for what reason, I have no idea, but
that was the beginning of SHII radicalization in the sixties
Musa Southern.
Speaker 1: It's interesting that even into the eighties, Iran had had
a relationship with the United States, especially with the quote
unquote Deep State. I mean they're running arms.
Speaker 3: There was Aigan contract.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean people don't realize that. It's like, well,
this this what happened in you know, so many Americans
want to be like, well, you know, they took our
embassy in nineteen seventy nine, and I'm like, kind of
overthrow the government twenty six years earlier.
Speaker 3: And these people don't.
Speaker 1: Have short memories now, they deal with a very low
time preference when it comes to things like that. But
yet still after that and after the hostages are released
on Inauguration Day in nineteen eighty one, the yeah, they're
still doing They're calling them their enemy. And Israel's already
talking about their two weeks. You know, there are two
months from getting a nuclear weapon, and yet they're running
weapons for the for the Contras.
Speaker 2: Interesting tidbit on that Israel was one of the prime
weapons exporters to Iran post revolution. This is eighty one
eighty two. The Israels were sending weapons to Iran and
the Araanians were accepting them from Israel because the Israelis
thought Iraq was the bigger threat than Iran.
Speaker 1: It seems like Israel is just the Israeli leadership is
schizophrenic when it comes to who who their enemies are.
It could be Iraq this week, it could be Iran
the next week, it could be both.
Speaker 2: They have they have, they have no theory of mind.
These people have no theory of mind. They that the
theory of mind is the basis of all empathy, and
to understand other people, you need empathy, and that's just
something these people cannot. I've never seen these people demonstrate
that unless the person they're talking to is also a
fellow member of the tribe.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: And people who want to talk about how oh Israel
deserves this land and everything it was given it was
given to them. Okay, what even granting that? Why would
they want to move here? If they It almost seems
like you're led to believe that these Jews wanted to
take back their ancestral homeland and they thought they would
just be Okay, we might need to. And at first
it wasn't oh, we're going to kill everybody there. You
could read Ben Gurion and Ben Gurion's referring to that, well,
you know, we have people there, there are brothers, We're gonna.
Speaker 3: Have to do something.
Speaker 1: Then all of a sudden, like overnight, it flips like
you're saying like you're saying boom, oh, no, we're gonna
have to kill them all. If you know, and anyone
who knows their history knows the tensions in this area,
why would you move to this area? The only argument
you could make is, well, you know it's God gave
us this. But I mean most of the people who
were who were in stern Gang or in Hagan or Aragon,
these these weren't religious characters. I mean these were these
were basically humanists. These were people who didn't believe in God.
So it's like, don't they get to get some blame
for wanting to take back a land that's surrounded by
people they know we're going to hate them.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's it's not it's not even that. I mean,
the the Ottoman history and the Ottoman Empire, this was
not This was not a very tense part of the world.
Free World War One, This was not a tense part
of the world. Okay, the Ottoman government was very weak.
This did cause ethnic tensions and you know, sectarian rivalries
to flare up, which did happen. There were massacres that
happened in the late nineteenth century that totally happened because
of the failure of the Ottoman Empire and the tension,
the ethnic tension. But like I said, pre World War One,
this was not a very tense area of the world.
There were already Jews in Palestine. The thing was they
were Arab Jews, and the Arab Jews had been there
for three thousand years or two thousand years, where whatever
date post Roman history you want to you wanna call
it this, these people were indigenous to the land. They
were not foreigners. No Christians, Muslims and Jews lived in
Palestine uninterrupted for fifteen hundred.
Speaker 1: Years or they didn't lock the doors on their I
remember reading one diary of a rabbi, European rabbi who
went to Jerusalem and like they was from like seventeen
eighty or seventeen ninety, and he wrote there that on
the Sabbath, they didn't even lock their doors. They didn't
shut their doors. They didn't have a worry that Muslims
were going to come in there and kill them. This
wasn't a everyone, it seemed. And Christians there were Christian
churches there too. No one's locking their doors, No one's
worried about these kind of things. When these kind of
things pop up, they can be hyper political and they
can be cultural. Sure, but there wasn't this problem, and
it wasn't.
Speaker 3: And wasn't.
Speaker 2: There wasn't this problem because politics was out of their hands.
I mean literally out of their hands. You know, these
people were just part of the tapestry. Palestine was a
region of the Ittoman Empire, and Constantinople was where all
government authority was centralized. Okay, there were Yeah, they were
administrative governors. There always are, but it was not. It
was not a mass democracy.
Speaker 3: People.
Speaker 2: You didn't you had no you had no say over
government policy. You had local religious representatives that's interfaced with
the regional government and then the central government. And you
went to your priest or your rabbi or your imam,
and they interfaced with the government on your behalf to
represent your interests. There was no actually, there was no
mass democracy of like, this is a numbers game, and
if there's more of us, therefore you don't get anything
of what you want. And this was this was a
government people don't understand, like, yes, the government in the
Ottoman government was okay, monarchical, Yes, it was also extremely
consensus based, extremely consensus based, like you had to get
everyone on board or at least piss off the least
amount of people as possible to achieve anything. In the
Ottoman Empire, to achieve anything, you had to piss off
the least number of people, whether it was the merchants,
the Christians, the drus, the military, anybody, the administrator, the administrators,
you had to piss off the least amount of people
possible or they would stop you from from enacting your policy,
even though you were quote unquote the sultan or the emperor.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's it really seems like up until pretty much
anywhere you go in the West and even in this area,
up until the twentieth century, when you had rulers, before
you had democracy, you you.
Speaker 3: Just lived your life.
Speaker 1: You know, some people may be poorer than others, some people,
some people were served, some people were But it really
seems like the twentieth century, this twenty century of democracy,
where World War One is trying to end every monarchy
and then World War two is trying to end every
ethno state that it's after that that when the people
have a say in everything, which means that your government
can be subverted by special interests, and those special interests
are not going to have your best interests at heart,
that everything wants to ship that that we've been dealing
with that now for one hundred fucking years, where it's
just you know, liberalism, oh liberalism, classical liberalism hasn't even
started yet. That's what's going to take us, you know,
that's what's going to defeat Global Hoomo and everything. It's like, no, no, no,
that's what caused it, That's what brought it here. That's
what that's what allows it to even if it doesn't
even if it didn't bring it here, even if it
didn't allow it in, however it got in, it definitely
allows it to thrive. It definitely allow to feed like
a cancer. And yeah, I mean it seems like this
is the same exact thing. Once you have people who
once you have people who are over have a ruler,
even a weak ruler, someone who's like the Ottoman Empire,
who's really not good at what they're supposed to. What
they're supposed to be doing here, you have more peace.
Everybody thinks that. Everybody thinks that before the Jews shut
up there, that there were bombs blowing up and people
were just killing each other and it was just these
mass slaughters and everything. And it's like probably no more
than anywhere else in the world.
Speaker 2: No, absolutely, absolutely, And again the massacres that did happen
were a result of the breakdown in governments, the breakdown
in the Ottoman Empire and the factionalism within the Ottoman
Empire that led to you know, ethnic groups causing trouble
and not to be a libertarian, I know were now
libertarians anymore. But how did how did individuals how did
like normal everyday people, whether they were Muslim or Christian, like,
how did they hold power? Like in the Ottomani government,
they held power through private associations, the private association you're
the merchant guild or you know, the religious community, the church,
or I don't know, you were part of the military
or just anything you were you were you were a
high administrative person in the local council. Like this was
a very communal, very bottom up there. There there was
not there was there was a people thought like all
power was centralized. Not at all the complete the complete
opposite was the case. Power was extremely decentralized, and the
job of the sultan was to keep was to piss
off the least number of these decentralized centers of power
throughout the entire Ottoman Empire, whether it was the merchants,
the military, the administratives, and the various religious sects. The
Sultan was the ruler of millions of people who were
not Sunni Muslim and they had to be governed just
as well as the Sunnia Muslims. And they had their
own they had they had private religious law. Like if
you're a Christian, you followed Christian law, you did not
follow Sunni law. The Suni law was not imposed on
you because you were not Sudni. You followed Christian law
or Jewish law if you were Jewish in Palestine in
the Ottoman Empire, and no one knows it, and no
one knows anything about this, it's not wrong to say
you were a somewhat second class citizen.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 2: Yes, Sunis were privileged the state. The head of the
state was a Sunni Muslim. Yes, that didn't mean you
didn't have you know that didn't mean your life was
that different than anyone else's. And they kept they the
sultan never forced the Sultan never imposed like Christians to
follow Muslim law. Never happened in the entire and then
in the entire history of the Ottoman Empire, the mass
the forced conversions were like in the time of Muhammad,
which was a thousand.
Speaker 1: Years before, sounded a little like Consermahappa there talking about
democracy they got of the field.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you can take you can take the you can
take the libertarianism out of out of the boy, but
you can't take the boy out of libertarianism or opposite.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that was that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's always I mean, there's not bad ideas there.
They're just making it into a religion is the problem.
Making it to its own religion is the problem. So
we've been going, Yeah, we've been going a while. Is
there anything anything you want to conclude with?
Speaker 2: I got, I mean, I could, I could, I could
talk about the subject for hours, but I think I
think we covered pretty much the complicated history. I'm sorry
for going on huge mon about the entire history. It's
it's it's a lot to digest.
Speaker 1: And I have a podcast where I have Thomas seven
seven seven on once a week. It's okay, it's okay
to go on.
Speaker 2: It's yeah, yeah, it's just a lot of information to
digest I have. There's there is one book I do
there's one book I do recommend people read. It's not
specifically about Lebanon, but it's a great book that gives
you a perspective of the Middle East and the history
of the Middle East in the twentieth century. And this
book is called the Chatham House Version. It was actually
recommended to me by a mister Curtis Yarvin. Actually we
met briefly in d c and he recommended me this book,
and it's an excellent book. The author is an Iraqi
Jew who never lived in Israel. He was living in
the UK. He was a British academic and his name
is Ili Kaduri k E d o you are i E.
And the book is called the Chatham House Version. It's
a collection of essays he wrote on the Middle East.
And there's yes he's an Arab Jew, which is actually
kind of like the most interesting perspective on the entire conflict.
But there's there's so many good tidbits of information in
that book. And me and my good friend Hitman have
a series on this book where he reads out he
reads out each chapter and then we have a discussion
on that chapter specifically. It's a great series. If you
want to learn, like if you want to learn a
like a fascinating perspective on twentieth century Middle Eastern history,
definitely pick up that book by Ali Kadouri, the Chatham
House version.
Speaker 1: It's that series on your YouTube channel or something like that.
Speaker 2: Uh no, my friend hit Man, I'll send you a
DM of his channel.
Speaker 1: Yeah, as semi so I can. I can linkwer that
anything else you want to pull.
Speaker 2: Follow me at Twitter at hunger d D y E
And I don't know which day exactly this will be
coming out, but it's those secrets I am. I'm a
member of the Philadelphia chapter of the O g C
and we are very happy to say this Saturday, November two,
we'll be doing an event in Valley Forge and if
you want more information on that, please follow our Twitter
account Philly chap O g C, Philly p h I
L L y chap Philly chap C h A p
O g C and for more information on that event,
Philly
Speaker 1: Chap okay I'll get that in there too, all right, Hunger,
I appreciate it, Thank you very much.