00:00Glad to see you are still safe. There's so much going on.
00:03What do we know about the security chief in Iran that was said to be taken out?
00:08I think it would be fair to say that he was the de facto, at least publicly available ruler of
00:15Iran after Israel and the United States in the early hours of this war on February 28th killed the supreme
00:22leader, Khamenei.
00:23As everyone knows, Khamenei was officially succeeded by his son, Moshtaba.
00:28But that man has not been seen in public.
00:31He is rumored to have been injured in an Israeli strike or a U.S. strike.
00:35And indeed, Trump, the U.S. president, has even speculated that he might not be alive.
00:40By contrast, Ali Lurijani, a veteran member of the national security echelon in Iran, was available for interviews.
00:49He made televised statements and even marched in an annual parade or an annual march on Friday in Tehran as
00:57a sign of his defiance.
00:59It's possible that as a result of that public appearance, he enabled the Israelis to tag him and track him
01:05and ultimately kill him overnight.
01:09Dan, obviously it sends a message to the way that Israel and the U.S. view the leaders as they
01:15are right now.
01:16But I'm wondering, with the killings of the top brass in Iran, who is left to actually be the leader
01:25of the country?
01:27Well, if you ask the Israeli or U.S. leaders about this, that would be the Iranian people, the Iranian
01:34public.
01:34They said at the outset of this war that the secondary objective, the initial objective, was to degrade, destroy Iranian
01:43capabilities, namely ballistic missiles, what remains or remained of the nuclear program.
01:48And in the case of the U.S., also the Iranian Navy, in order to enable maritime traffic free of
01:55Iranian harassment in the Gulf, a secondary role or a secondary objective was to create a space, as they put
02:03it, for the Iranian people to take over control of that country.
02:07Israel assesses that 70 to 80 percent of the Iranian populace oppose this regime or have opposed this regime.
02:15And while that is hard to assess objectively, certainly from outside just two months ago, we saw protests sweeping Iran
02:24and a very brutal crackdown by the Iranian state.
02:27So the official line is that the allies are seeking to destroy that regime and embolden to the extent possible
02:35or create the conditions to the extent possible that will enable protesters to come back into the streets and actually
02:43give that regime the final push required to topple it and replace it.
02:47Sam, we're going to talk more about Iran in a segment right after you.
02:51What I want to ask you, though, about in terms of Israel, the foreign minister earlier said the war is
02:56effectively, quote, already won, but vowed to, quote, continue till the point the mission will be completed.
03:02What exactly is Israel's mission?
03:04And I got to ask you, when we talk about backing and what people and citizens want, what do the
03:09people of Israel want?
03:10Are they still backing their prime minister?
03:12Will they still back him after all of these conflicts are over?
03:17Well, that's an excellent question.
03:18I think while the allies, at least at the level of their leaderships, their militaries are very much in sync
03:24about the objectives here, they say they speak repeatedly.
03:27And in fact, the U.S. military has compared or described the Israeli air force as a peer air force
03:34to the U.S. air efforts being brought into the region.
03:38Quite an extraordinary statement for the U.S. power, this dominant power in the world to be speaking about what
03:44is basically a regional power in the form of Israel.
03:47Nevertheless, the Israeli public, to judge by polls, unlike the American public, are broadly in support of this war.
03:54This war has not found popularity among the Americans.
03:57Among Americans, there's a very good reason for this.
04:00One is geographical distance.
04:02Americans are on the other side of the world.
04:04Israelis are in the region, feel directly threatened by Iran, not just by its statements, but its actions, including the
04:10support of proxies such as Hamas, which Israel has been battling for two and a half years, albeit in a
04:16state of ceasefire right now in Gaza.
04:18A fairly fragile ceasefire, but a ceasefire nonetheless.
04:22Hezbollah in Lebanon, where there has been an eruption of violence.
04:26There have been also Iranian-backed militias in Iraq and in the past in Syria and currently in Yemen as
04:31well.
04:32So the Israelis would appear to be seeing this as the crowning battle or the last war of this multi
04:40-front campaign that's really in its third year now.
04:42Dan, 20, 30 seconds.
04:43But do the people of Israel still back their prime minister?
04:46Who was on shake?
04:47That's hard.
04:47Yeah, go ahead.
04:49His approval ratings have improved given his conduct of recent policy issues, I believe, including this war.
04:56There is an election later this year.
04:58I think that's the ultimate plebiscite because no matter his successes, and there have been successes regionally on the battlefield,
05:05they will remember the October 7th attack, which began this multi-front campaign, a disastrous attack for Israel, which happened
05:12on his watch.
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