00:00This is, of course, a war that never should have happened.
00:04It's even too dignified to call it a war of choice.
00:08I would call it a war of whim, because this was not a war that was necessary, advisable,
00:19thought through, planned, or supported inside the United States.
00:28To put it bluntly, Israel has wanted the United States to wage this war for decades.
00:39I shouldn't say Israel, I should say Mr. Netanyahu, who is the Prime Minister of Israel.
00:44When the war started, he said in a tweet, he wrote in a tweet, this is my dream of 40
00:52years.
00:52And I had to apologize to many people, because I had been saying that it was his dream for
00:5930 years, which I knew because he became Prime Minister 30 years ago.
01:06But I didn't know the pre-Prime Ministerial passion for war with Iran.
01:12This is something that has been in Netanyahu's head for a long time.
01:19It's a disastrous idea.
01:22Donald Trump bragged, if I could put it in quotation marks, that while the other preceding
01:30six presidents had said no, he stood up and said yes.
01:34But I think what we could say is the six preceding presidents had the good sense not to do this,
01:41even though Israel was urging it, and Donald Trump did not have the good sense to avoid this disaster.
01:48We have a pretty good account, as I'm sure everybody here knows, of how the decision was made.
01:55There was a meeting of Netanyahu and the head of Mossad with Trump and his team, as it were,
02:06his Secretary of Defense, rechristened Secretary of War, Mr. Hegseth, his son-in-law, Mr. Kushner,
02:16his friend and fellow real estate advisor, and now our leading special envoy, Mr. Witkoff,
02:26the head of the CIA and the head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and his chief of staff, Susan
02:35Wiles.
02:35Not many other people. And Netanyahu came and said, this is a sure thing. One day,
02:46take out the leadership, people will rise in the streets, and the next day you'll be in charge, Mr. President.
02:55And Trump could not resist an appeal like that. What we're told in the news is that everyone else in
03:04the room either said, this is farcical, this is absurd, or grumbled under their breath.
03:12Nobody spoke in favor of it with the possible, I think Hegseth probably did speak in favor of it.
03:20But nobody else did. Others said, including the Vice President, I disagree,
03:27but I will support you, Mr. President. And this was the general sentiment in this small meeting.
03:36And Trump has eliminated any kind of systematic interagency analysis, feedback, or deliberation.
03:49We're in a deinstitutionalized environment in the United States. We don't have rational decision
03:57making. And normally, under our Constitution also, but normally, a president would also consult with
04:06senior congressional leaders, even as a political precaution, but also to get advice. And Trump
04:14did not do that either. So I think the starting point in asking how do we get out is to
04:21understand
04:22how we got in. We got in on a completely flimsy, indeed, as somebody said, farcical rendition of
04:33what would happen, which is that you would kill the leadership that was meeting,
04:43apparently to discuss the next phase of negotiation with the United States, which was ongoing, and where
04:53the Omani mediator had said, great progress was made, and we will meet in Vienna the next week.
05:02So they were meeting precisely about negotiations that were now to be bombed rather than to be pursued.
05:11And the decision was taken by one person. I regard a lot of what the Trump administration does as
05:20illegal, as unwise, as unconstitutional. As I said about the tariffs last year repeatedly,
05:29and the Supreme Court finally validated that, I would say the same with this decision. So getting out is,
05:39well, in a way, it can be as easy as getting in. The United States should just stop what it's
05:47doing,
05:48which is threatening Iran and blockading, at least partially, the Gulf region and Iranian ships,
06:03and just stop what was a disastrous, mistaken, illegal, unwise operation that never should have occurred.
06:17And the United States could certainly say to Israel, we're stopping, you're stopping, period. Because
06:26Israel can't do anything without the United States. And the idea that Israel commands the United States
06:34to do things is not right, although behaviorally, it looks like that. Because the United States at any
06:41moment could tell the Israeli leadership, no, we're not doing it, and you're not doing it. And that would
06:49be the end of it. I don't think that this should wait for any kind of negotiated outcome between the
06:57United States and Iran. I don't see that as in the works, nor do I see it as necessary. What
07:05I do believe
07:06is that the United States should end the blockade and go home. And Trump can say it was a great
07:14victory.
07:15He can say whatever he wants.
