00:00Jasmine Al-Gamal joins us from London, political analyst and former Pentagon Middle East advisor.
00:07Jasmine, Iran just said, quote, Israel's strike is a declaration of war.
00:13What do we know?
00:16Look, obviously, this was a devastating, humiliating blow for Iran.
00:22I mean, the fact that so many of its personnel were killed, these nuclear facilities were attacked.
00:27Iran is going to see this as a red line that's been crossed, really, and it's going to have to respond somehow.
00:36The question is, what can Iran do that won't invite even more aggression towards it, either by Israel or the U.S. in defense of Israel,
00:45or if Iran decides to retaliate against American personnel and assets in the region?
00:52So Iran is in a real bind now.
00:55On one hand, if it doesn't retaliate at all, it not only loses face, it's not just a symbolic thing,
01:03but also I think it reveals to Israel, to other actors, that it is, in fact, a paper tiger, that it has no moves,
01:12that it has no ability to retaliate, and that could make it seem really, really weak in front of its adversaries.
01:21So it's in a real bind.
01:23It's going to have to figure out how to respond in a way that allows it to maintain some sort of credibility moving forward in these negotiations,
01:32if it decides to go back to them, without inviting ever more military action against it.
01:39And the U.S. is calling for an urgent de-escalation.
01:43Any diplomacy that can help avoid further escalation here?
01:48Do you think Israel will listen?
01:53Look, I think that Prime Minister Netanyahu sees this as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity
01:59to once and for all decapitate the Iranian regime and its nuclear program.
02:05He has been wanting to do this for years.
02:08He has been saying publicly that he's been wanting to do this for years.
02:12There's a very strong branch, both within the U.S. government, in Congress,
02:17outside, in lobby organizations in the U.S. that supports this.
02:22So I think he sees this as his moment to realize that dream, that vision,
02:28especially since he spent the last year weakening Iran in all other kinds of ways
02:34by going after its proxies, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza and so on.
02:39And so I think it'll be very difficult for the U.S. right now to rein in Netanyahu
02:45when he thinks he is this close to fulfilling that longstanding vision and strategy.
02:52But at the same time, the longer that the U.S. allows this to go on,
02:56the more likely it will be that the U.S. gets dragged into this war,
03:00which we know absolutely, without a doubt, that Donald Trump and the America First camp
03:05of the Republican Party doesn't want.
03:08So I think the next few hours are going to be really critical in shaping
03:12both the U.S. response and the Iranian response in the hours to come.
03:17As you said, it will be hard for the U.S. not to be dragged into this conflict.
03:23How, when, and what ways do you think that the U.S.
03:27could be preparing for a possible Iranian retaliation?
03:30I mean, they're going to be looking at everything right now.
03:35The Department of Defense intelligence officials are going to be providing the president
03:40with as clear of a picture as they can so that he can make decisions in the next few hours.
03:46So some of the things they're going to be looking at, for example,
03:49are trying to assess the extent of the damage inside of Iran,
03:53trying to assess what Iran's response might be,
03:58both against Israel and possibly against the U.S. in the region,
04:03and then quickly preparing military responses for the president in case he needs to use them.
04:10So that's what the defense and intelligence departments are going to be working on,
04:15I imagine, right now,
04:16to try to guess what's going to happen next and prepare the president to respond as necessary.
