Transcription
Welcome everybody. I'm Lyanna Petrova with a new episode of World Affairs and Context. Today I'm very pleased to welcome Elijah McNair to the program. Elijah is a political analyst and a veteran war zone correspondent with over 35 years of experience covering the Middle East and North Africa. Elijah's in-depth knowledge of Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, and Syria make his writings absolutely mandatory reading for those wishing to understand complicated affairs that are routinely misrepresented in the Western media. Be sure to check out Elijah's site, ejagne.com, for daily updates on the Middle East and beyond. I will link it in the description below.
Elijah, welcome back to the program. Thank you so much for joining me today.
>> It's my pleasure. Thank you for having me.
>> It's great to have you as always. Um, so there a lot of things are going on and uh let's start with the visit to Pakistan by the Iranian foreign minister Abbas Arachi. He spent several hours in Islamabad and he met with high level Pakistani officials. According to Iranian officials post on X, I gathered that no meetings with the US representatives were planned or took place. However, President Trump says that there are talks taking place this weekend. Um, he sent his son-in-law Jared Kushner and his longtime business partner Steve Whitkov to Islamabad. So, what is your interpretation of where the US and Iran are in terms of the US Iran negotiations right now?
>> Well, first of all, as you said, I'm going to take it from there. He sent his son-in-law and longtime partners. This these are not diplomats facing someone like the Iranian foreign minister Abbasarji who started at the age of 21 45 years in the diplomacy and in understanding the dynamic of the world and the negotiations and in fact the problem is not even Donald Trump is not a negotiator he's not a politician he's a dealmakers or he is a businessman man where the world affair is not run uh as a business trade in particular the complex of the Middle East and West Asia. What we are facing today is a huge gap between Iran and the United States. Donald Trump wants to defeat Barack Obama's deal in 2015 known as the JCPOA. That's a nuclear deal. A deal that John Kerry said the foreign the former foreign minister was approved by all these intelligence services in the west. All the analysts, all the think tankers, uh all the advisers, those who are expert in nuclear issues and in Iran and they said this is the best deal. Well, Donald Trump thought he can have a better deal. In 2018, he pulled out and then he said, "I'm waiting by the phone for the Iranians to call." And they never called. This is exactly the same way he's dealing with the Iranians today. He went, he sent um Vice President Vance to Islam Abbad because Kushner and Witkov told him that the actually the Iranians can make an 11 bombs. What is true is 60% enriched Ukra uranium cannot make nuclear bombs. They need to go to 90% and test that. However, Iran had 8 months between the last war in June 2025 until the end of February 2026 to make these 11 bombs or even one bomb. But in their ideology they do not believe in making nuclear bombs with the previous and the former late granite ali. We don't know what his son is going to bring into Iran now. However, we have not seen a sign saying otherwise. So what Trump wants is zero enrichment. This is against the law because Iran is signary of the NPT, the non-prololiferation treaty and has the right to enrich uranium to 3.6 3.75 for energy and research. That is its right as it is the right of every single country around the world. As long as there are UN inspectors to monitor this um production of the enrichment uranium, they the monitoring the centrifuge, the type of centrifuge, the primitive one, the normal one and the most modern and advanced one that Iran has and put installed only after the uh the Donald Trump sanctions and after the assassination of the head of the nuclear um Fak Zad in 2021 and then went to 60% nuclear because the Mossad and the CIA sabotaged the Natan's uh enrichment facility. So they were a reaction to what the Americans and the Israelis did. Now Donald Trump wants zero enrichment. It is impossible. It goes against the pride of Iran, the right, the legal right of Iran. However, Iran can suspend the enrichment uranium because Iran has enough enriched uranium. It can even put the 60% enriched uranium of 441 kilogram under the monitoring of the United Nations or the IAEA. uh Rafael Gi who used to send his men to monitor that Iran is the most inspected country in the world and that can be uh achieved. So if the Americans are afraid of Iran having a nuclear bomb, they need to stop the sanctions, allow Iran uh particularly the Iranian people because sanctions hurt people, not leaders, to survive and live a normal life. Monitor their enrichment uranium and make sure that Iran is abiding by the law when the Americans will abide by the law. But Donald Trump doesn't want that. He wants the Israeli agenda, zero enrichment and then uh he's sometime talking also about the range of missiles that can reach only the Arab state but not Israel. So Araji went to Pakistan in response to the visit of the chief of the army, the Pakistani chief of the army who brought a proposal. are actually went back and agree on something that Donald Trump already disagree saying that we can open the straight of hormones partially in exchange of the Americans partially lifting the blockade. But Donald Trump told us that he is the one who imposed the blockade even if Iran lifted the blockade and say we open it and then he said no. And then when he was confronted by the harm that is caused to the American people, he said well for a while it means he acknowledged how much he is harming the American people, how much he's arming the Iranians, the Asian population, Europe and the rest of the world because the straight of hormones is this is where 20% of the world uh energy and oil is comes from and we're talking about not only oil, talking about gas, fertilizer, anything that comes from uh oil and all the other products that are essential for so many other areas. So basically Donald Trump said I am not sending now Kushner and Witkov because he wants 100% as he said he said I don't want 90% I don't want 95 I want 100%. Well it's easy to ask for 100 when you are victorious when you are the winner. Well Iran did not raise the white flag. How can you say these are my terms and I want the Iranians to abide by it. This is why Aragi left Pakistan.
>> Absolutely. And thank you so much for walking us through those very important points because I think they're very often missed or deliberately misinterpreted. And this certainly helps put things in perspective and truly understand what the, you know, what the real goals of Iran are and where the Trump administration stands. I thought it was really interesting when French President Macron said this week and I quote, he said, "Nobody is totally sure if this ally, the United States, is reliable." So if America's allies cannot trust Washington, how can Iran trust the US administration? It is fair to say that the United States has completely discredited itself in terms of diplomacy as an honest broker by beginning to wage a war of aggression twice during high level negotiation. So if I were Iran, I would likely expect them, the Trump administration, to violate their own words the third time any minute. So, what would it take for Iran to actually see that the US administration under Trump is negotiating or is willing to negotiate in good faith?
>> There is no guarantee. One form of guarantee could be that the Iranians will deliver the uh 60% enrich uranium that Iran doesn't know what to do with. It's because it's only a leverage against the sanctions. They have nothing against the Americans to deliver it to a third country on the condition that they would be there in custody and this third country will give it back to Iran the day the Americans violate the deal. That's a possibility that the Americans refused. They want the 60% in America. It doesn't work because as you rightly said they the Americans attacked the Iranians twice dur during negotiations. There's no way any any enemy or friend of the Americans would trust them ever because we've seen how they increased the tariff against the European and their allies including the Canadian, the Japanese, the French, the German, the UK, even the UK, the traditional Anglo-Saxon alliances that they ruin the world. They saying, "Well, this is not our war and we're not going to help you." To Donald Trump. I mean, Trump is saying, "I don't want I am thinking of pulling out of NATO." Well, that will be a feast in Europe. Actually, this is not something that Trump can threaten Europe with NATO because NATO has dozens of bases in so many European countries. And these countries are kind of occupied because these NATO bases have soldiers that can come and go anytime they want without any supervision, any control. they can bring weapons and uh depart from these uh bases as they are doing during the war in Iran making every single European country complicit according to United Nation article 3314 that they are using that these territory European territory to attack Iran. So this is not something that Europeans would like to have uh at home as being accused of contributing to an unlawful war. So who trust you uh Trump? Nobody.
>> Iranian foreign minister Abbas Arachi is also engaging in bilateral talks with Iran's strategic allies uh Russia and China as well as Oman. Oman was of course a mediator during the first round I believe of talks that the Trump the Trump administration used as a ruse uh because it did plan and uh subsequently carried out its initial attacks back in February. What is the nature of the consultations with Russia and China over the weekend?
>> First of all, Oman has played a very positive role and the foreign minister of Oman was very surprised to see the Americans uh attacking Iran by saying we have managed a breakthrough and there was a a British expert from the foreign office present who is an expert also on nuclear issue who said we have never believed Iran can give so many concessions and the deal was just made on the table. So, Omani took a side now and say I don't want to deal with it because there is no trust in the Americans. The Russian and the Chinese have the same problem. However, they can be players to guarantee if ever Iran decides to uh entrust the nuclear the excess of nuclear with 60% of the excess of the 20% even because Iran has so many tons of 20% and it happened in the past that they gave it to the Russians and Russian are also present at the Busher nuclear compound but now they've left more than 600 of them because they feel the threat of the Americans and that this war is far from over. The Americans are still building up a huge military power in the Middle East while pretending to negotiate, but they're not negotiating. They dictating take it or leave it. So, at the end of the day, they might try to go to a war. So the American the this is the position of the American the Iranians they have the Caspian Sea with um Russia and they have the railway uh with China through Usbakistan. Therefore, the relationship with these two main countries particularly Russia um supports Iran's economically and vice versa and China is the main buyer of cheap Iranian oil because the price of oil that comes from Iran to China is the cheapest that China can get in the world. We're talking about at least 20 to $30 minus of the market price. And for that, China doesn't really want to start using its reserves and wants to continue benefiting from the Iranian oil. However, with the blockade of the Americans, this is becoming a bit of a nuisance to China and the uh Iranians are trying to think with the Chinese what they can suggest or what do they have as a solution to ease the situation because Iran is not ready to surrender. But they trying to find a way uh to reason Donald Trump who is really taking it as a challenge to Obama, Barack Obama, but not as a way to for the world to feed safer. He said he destroyed the nuclear program. He said he destroyed the nuclear enrichment facilities. He said Iran doesn't have any more nuclear. and he said, "I am in this war to prevent Iran from having nuclear uh bombs." We don't understand what this guy wants.
>> Absolutely. I think nobody does. I think when when it comes to uh to his statements, uh it's it's become unfortunately I I don't want to be too sort of direct, but uh I think it used to be taken, you know, seriously when the White House issues a statement. Well, nowadays there's there's just so much flip-flopping and uh reversing um their opinion and their statements that uh even the markets I think don't really react as strongly as they used to to Trump's statements. And so of course it it's fair to say that a foreign actor wouldn't even know how to interpret his uh his uh words. But uh clearly um this has become noise rather than meaningful um communication or meaningful messaging. You mentioned that there is a possibility of a new escalation and I remember seeing uh recent reports that indicate that 25 US refueling and transport aircraft landed at Benurion airport near Tel Aviv. My understanding is that this is of course a very significant number of aircraft and this is precisely what we observed days before the United States and Israel illegally attacked Iran in February. So Elijah, would you say that there are indications that the United States may indeed strike Iran during the ceasefire extension that the Trump uh himself um announced days ago?
>> Well, this is a very strong possibility. However, we the ceasefire is questionable because how can it be a ceasefire when there is a blockade on Iran and the blockade actually on the world economy because this is stopping the whole world and is um really uh touching upon our own pocket because at the end of the day the end consumer is going to pay the price. uh and the differences of the prices uh due to the um to this war. We see Lufanza for example cut down 20,000 flights that's enormous because the lack of uh fuel for the jets and that is due to the straight of the war that Iran is subject to. So to gather forces that is true. These are militarily speaking an indication of a preparation for a war and refilling the Israeli interception missile system that also it's an indication of a war coming. However, again what Donald Trump can do that he did not do in the last 40 days of war. what the Israelis can do that cannot do that can destroy Iran and force it to a table. So they've destroyed what they had in their bank of objectives, all the military targets and military assets and this is all what they know because then they move to bridges, they move to schools, they move to hospitals, to to universities, to media uh centers, target assassination. Uh the Israelis targeted the depot of oil in Thran. uh they uh hit some electricity desalination. So they hit so many civilian targets. The only thing that can be achieved now is what Donald Trump said which is quite shameful that he's going to destroy the Iranian civilization. And that brought all the Iranians around the world who are against the Iranian government and with the Iranian government all around their nation and they say we stand with our country. We don't want you to be destroyed. But they do not stand against the government because they are grateful this government is facing someone who's saying I want to wipe out your civilization. I mean saying this word is really severe. You can't wipe civilization un unless you want to use a nuclear weapon. And even if you use a nuclear weapon against 1,648,000 kilm that this is the surface of Iran, you need so many other nuclear weapon that the United States has. So it is not one of like Hiroshima or Nakazaki but many nuclear weapons to wipe out a civilization. This is what Donald Trump want to do because otherwise Iran is resilient and it is conducting a war of attrition and can absorb the hit. Iran is not fighting to win is fighting not to lose to defend itself is Trump and Israel and Benjamin Netanyahu are fighting to win and they fail to achieve their objectives with the solidarity of the Iranian people around their leaders. So what they can achieve with more war, I don't see anything really it that is achievable. But we know that Donald Trump would contradict himself seven times in one sentence. So what is he thinking is very hard to tell and think what is really the ultimate plan because at the end of the day he is moved by Benjamin Netanyahu's plan. This is what Marco Rubio told us. Because the Israelis wanted to attack Iran, so we came to support Israel and we started this war because Israel wanted to attack Iran. As simple as that.
>> Absolutely. And that's exactly what Marco Rubio told us. And then the following day, he tried to sort of backtrack because he must have realized just how open and honest he was the previous day. But certainly he uh left no doubts about the true beneficiary of this war. Um and that is not the United States clearly. Um let's turn our attention to the Strait of Hormuz. It appears that sanctioned vessels do continue to pass through the strait. Um previously Iran fired at vessels. The United States seized two Iranian vessels or more. But uh what is the point of Trump blockading the global economy as you just said which is a direct obstacle to moving forward with negotiations as has been communicated by the Iranian officials multiple times. Iran says stop the blockade. The blockade is effectively a violation of of our agreement and then we will feel that we can move forward in negotiations. Why is Trump waging this blockade against Iran while also saying the United States wants to negotiate?
>> Well, the United States doesn't want to negotiate. The United States want to dictate. Vice President Vance came out and said the Iranians did not accept our terms. As simple as that. He's talking about American terms. He's not talking about negotiation. A negotiation is a place where people find common ground and then they accept on certain common ground and then they move forward. It took the Americans more than 13 years to negotiate a nuclear deal with Iran. Donald Trump wants it in two sessions. It is impossible. There are so many details unless he is stubborn enough to say zero enrichment and that's it. The Iranians said no. Very simple to that demand and these terms only. The Iranians said no. The Iranian are proposing other terms. Are you afraid of so for us to give you the security that you're looking for? I want all your enrichment uranium that you have at home in the United States of America. It's not going to happen. We don't trust you. This is why deals are made because two sides are enemies and they don't trust one another. So they make a deal where there are other people, other countries who can supervise this deal and make sure that this functioning well. Well, Donald Trump doesn't want that. So it is it's really a vicious circle because the gap is too big. Donald Trump doesn't want to negotiate. He wants to dictate. This is why he came up today with the sentence. I am not sending Kushner and Witkov. That's it. It's one man decision. It is not someone willing to negotiate because he just want to hear one sentence zero enrichment. He's not going to hear it because also it's a question of pride in the in Iran. Not only their legal right, but it is also pride. You did not win for us to be submitted to your dictate.
>> I'd love to turn to your recent article that you published on your site and uh for our viewers I will link the article in the description below. Uh in the article you write, "The United States maintains that the ceasefire remains in place while simultaneously insisting that Israel retains the right to defend itself against Hezbollah. This formation provides Israel with operational latitude. It allows Washington to claim that diplomacy is functioning even as military activity continues on a near daily basis." Elijah, could you expand on this and uh help us understand what role Hezbollah, a Libanese resistance group, plays in the US Iran war?
>> This is a very good question, but is not easy to answer very quickly. So, please forgive me if I take some time. From the third beginning, Hezbollah launched six rockets on Israel in 15 months where Israel violated the ceasefire according to the United Nation uh forces called UNIFIL 10,000 times according to the Lebanese government 15,000 times. We're not going to dwell on which one is right. Let's go to the most conservatives. So, Israel violated the ceasefire 10,000 times and killed a bit less than 500 between 450 and 500 Lebanese. Hezbollah did not retaliate. It has retaliated on the last day when the war started against Iran. And here I'm going to share something that people did not hear before. In June 2025, Iran asked Hezbollah saying, "If you want to join the war, come in because I can support you and you will impose a new rule of engagement and stop the Israeli violation of the ceasefire because Israel was violating the ceasefire and Hezbollah was not." And Hezbollah responded in June, I am not ready. And Iran said, okay, I respect that. This time Hezbollah said, I want to join in. So people who are putting in doubt what I'm saying, we can look at facts. The intervention of Hezbollah in this war was not beneficial or damaging to Iran. That front between Hezbollah and Israel did not divert the attention of the US and Iran from their war against Iran. So Israel and the United States continue the war with the same intensity regardless what Hezbollah was doing on the borders with the Israelis. For Hezbollah, the situation of the 15 month was intolerable and it was important to impose on the Israelis a ceasefire that they do not respect. So the Lebanese government during these 15 months believe that Hezbollah has become too weak to continue the struggle against Israel. Therefore, they order Hezbollah to leave the south of the Litana River. according to the United Nations Security Council resolution 1701 which Hezbollah respected and left delivered all the weapons to the Lebanese army that was forced to destroy all these weapons by the Americans. So the Americans didn't want the Lebanese army to have these weapons because they represent a danger against Israel because the Americans want the Lebanese army to remain weak in front of Israel but strong enough for a civil war in Lebanon. And these are not my word. These are the word of the US special envoy Thomas Barak who said we don't want to arm the Lebanese army to fight against Israel but to fight against Hezbollah. So they want the Lebanese army to turn the guns against Hezbollah. So Hezbollah said okay I'm not going to have an internal fight or a civil war. The Lebanese government consider Hezbollah military branch as an outlaw and Hezbollah did not react. And then what happened? Israel said, "I am moving into Lebanon." The Lebanese president ordered the Lebanese army to withdraw from all the Leitani uh all the south of Lebanon until south of the Leani River to the limit of the south of the Litani River which is north of the Litani River. Abandoning the area that was completely disarmed, no Hezbollah free for grab for the Israelis. Hezbollah reacted immediately and send men just to engage with the Israelis. So they don't think they're going on a prominad. They're just walking in without any resistance. And this is where Hezbollah started and will not stop. Even if the war with Iran stops, even if Iran reached an agreement, which Iran insist of not reaching an agreement without including the entire Middle East peace, but will not stop if Israel continue violating this ceasefire and Israel do continue is still is still violating ceasefire. Today they carry out five uh jet strike against different areas. yesterday. The same areas beyond the Nitani River, beyond the yellow line that Benjamin Netanyahu designed, covering 61 villages in the south of Lebanon that Israel did not occupy, but saying anyone who enter all these villages, I'm going to fire on them. So the ceasefire that uh Donald Trump managed to pull out from Israel related to the south of Lebanon actually is on paper because the Israelis are saying, "Oh, we're not going to fire against the Lebanese government." But the Lebanese government has never been at war with Israel. But we're going to fire against Hezbollah only and against anyone of the inhabitant of the south of Lebanon who return to their homes. So where is a ceasefire? There's no ceasefire. So the agreement was just a shad and it reminds me because I am old enough and covered the war the invasion in 1982 of Israel to Lebanon when Donald when uh Ronald Reagan received the Lebanese president at the end of 1982 and in twice in 1983 only to discuss about the signing of a deal of peace deal with Israel but note about the Israeli occupation of Lebanon that lasted 18 years from 1982 to the year 2000. Israel is today occupying part of Lebanon and will not withdraw with a deal or without a deal. But the Israelis taught us that when they take a land, they don't let go of it. The only exception happened in the year 2000 during uh Ehud Barak as a prime minister was harshly criticized by Benjamin Netanyahu who was not a prime minister at that time but now he is a prime minister and he's not going to let go on the contrary he's taking only also part of the sea of the Lebanese sea that includes oil and gas uh areas. So this is where we are at. That is the c that is called by Donald Trump as a ceasefire.
>> Lebanon is of course central to the US Iran talks and recently Donald Trump extended the ceasefire with Lebanon for three more weeks uh excluding Hezbollah. So based on what we're seeing, effectively Israel has Washington's permission to continue striking southern Lebanon with impunity, killing civilians, killing women and children. There are multiple videos showing the massacres that are being carried out in southern Lebanon. What is how how does the Lebanese government justify the killing of the Lebanese civilians in these in these areas? And how how can it effectively continue negotiating with Israel while Israel is is carrying out these massacres against villages, effectively annihilating whole villages?
>> Don't laugh. This is reality. The Libanese foreign minister Raji was asked, "How are you going to negotiate with the Israelis without leverage?" These are his words. He said, "Normally, you have a military or economic leverages. We have none of these. What we have is we friend with the Americans. We go and cry a little bit and then they will look after us and help us against Israel." These are not my word. You just can Google this online. And then his boss, the right-wing Lebanese forces, Samir Jaja was asked the same question. And they asked him, "What are you going to be faced with when the Israelis are going to say, "What are you offering? What is your leverage?" He thought about it and he said, "France loves us." That is the Lebanese government negotiations tools. It's laughable, but it's it's a it's really dramatic when you have a government knowing that it has no leverage but the local resistance and saying, "I don't want you to fight Israel, but I am not going to fight Israel." And saying to Iran, I don't want you to negotiate on my behalf. I am going to negotiate, but I can only cry to the Americans. And then France loves us. Well, these are the Lebanese government's tools. Well, fortunately, the Arab countries stopped the enthusiasm of the president who represent a very small part of the population because he was elected because he was uh supported by the US and Saudi Arabia. And then the Saudis in particular with Turkey ask him to stop. You can't go and shake hands with Benjamin Netanyahu and make a peace with a nice fugitive for war crime when he is occupying your country and you have no means for him to withdraw because the Americans actually like Israel above everybody in the Middle East including the Arab and the Gulf country who paid $3 trillion to Donald Trump when he arrived and he did not even consult them when he went to war against Iran and he did not defend them. They have to they had to pay for the interception missile system. They have to pay for the damage and these damages are we're talking about dozens of billions of dollars. Qatar on its own only one site that cost 26 billions receive a damage of 20 billions. So we're talking about Kuwait, Bahrain, the Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and uh all these countries and Iraq. All these countries have suffered because Donald Trump did not bother to consult them. he's going to prefer Lebanon because they can cry or because the French love them when the Israeli ambassador in Washington who is negotiating with the Lebanese ambassador said there's no place for France in the negotiation here. We don't want France. So the leverage of the Lebanese uh government is none. And we're talking about Lebanese government when the US presidential envoy Thomas Barak said this is a failed state. This is not a state. These are his words not mine. So this is the situation we are faced with. And Benjamin Netanyahu is saying I have the permission and I have the liberty and the freedom to defend myself and to continue hammering. Well, actually, he had this freedom in November 2024 when the war stopped and the UN Security Council 1701 was due to be respected. And when Thomas Barak went to see Don went to see Benjamin Netanyahu, he returned to Lebanon and said, "Well, in fact, Netanyahu doesn't believe in borders anymore and doesn't believe in any security council resolution uh anymore." and the 1701 is behind us.
>> So when he doesn't believe in borders and you have another Lebanese minister of industry who is also part of the Lebanese forces. So the ministry um the minister of industry and the minister of uh the foreign minister they all part of the same party. He said actually it's fake to say that Israel is working on greater Israel when Benjamin Netanya came out and say yes I am working on greater Israel. So that's the Lebanese government. This is a fascinating topic and uh I think um it it warrants a separate conversation about the rebirth of the accesses resistance as you and I discussed last time and I would love to have you back on the program to focus specifically on this area. But if we turn our attention back to to toran, it does appear that will remain firm in its demand that the United States naval blockade be lifted as a condition to move forward. And if that happens, a formal second round of high level direct talks may happen. And if it doesn't happen, um, and if there's a new escalation, a card that Yemen will likely play is of course closing Babal Mandab because the strategy is to make the cost of the war unbearable since militarily, of course, Iran is is weaker than the United States. We know that the US is a nuclear power. So um the economic sort of aspect of the war is central to Iran's strategy. U a disruption in the bubble mandab would of course cause nearly 50% of global shipping to come to a halt and it would be truly catastrophic for the global economy including the United States including Europe everybody. How likely is Ansarah and Iran to play this card to close Babal Mandab if no meaningful progress is made toward diplomacy in the next week or so?
>> If the war starts again, Babel Mandeb will be the first guard used by the Ansarah in Yemen. And this is where the word economy is going to suffer. We know now that Saudi Arabia is still exporting around 3.5 million barrels of oil compensating through the Yambo uh terminal on the Red Sea because the closure of the Babel of the Straight of Homers but in case of war again Babel Mand will be shut down and this is when the world economy will suffer even further. and much more because Donald Trump is saying Iran is losing $500 million per day and this is not true because Iran doesn't uh export more than $1.8 million barrel during an uh peace time. Therefore, it is not true what he's saying that they are losing $500 million. But the whole world is lacking every single day between 13 to 15 million barrels daily. There is no way before 8 to 12 months for this to be compensated with the closure of Babel Mandib. Europe is going to be the first on its knee economically. and Ursula Fondonder the uh European uh commissioner said the only way to counter that is for you people to consume less which means Europe is telling us actually we have no way to counter that. In France, the government said, "We're going to compensate with six billion dollars for the prices, the diesel price, and went from 1.5 to$2.5 uh euro a liter. This is how much we pay here. And we just at the beginning of the crisis and the ripple effect hasn't reach us yet. And if we talking about the gasoline and the diesel which mean transport of everything that will be food and all the other uh essential product and necessities if Babel Mandib closes it's hard to think about the devastating consequences on the world and who is going to put enough pressure on Donald Trump. He has no friends. Who's going to tell him to stop? Nobody can force him to stop because he's so narcissistic that he believes everything he's saying is right. And all the people around him are really making him believe that everything he's doing or saying is correct. And in every discourse is attacking Biden, attacking Obama. This president has done miracle. Suddenly America is surviving only because Donald Trump came to power and with a person like this so inflated thinking about the world economy is the least of his problems. He said we have oil. So this is when he pull out from the climate uh program is because he doesn't care about the climate. He doesn't care about the next generation. What's going to happen to the children and to their children? what kind of word we leaving behind. He doesn't care because he's saying well the people in America will suffer a bit. These are his word will suffer a bit. So suffering a bit or a lot is suffering. He was elected because he said no war and I'm going to bring the prices down. The prices are up and he's engaged in an Israeli war because he adopted it. So with the Babel manded, it's really scary.
>> Absolutely. Elijah, thank you so much for joining us and for such a fascinating conversation. I hope you come back for a new episode soon so we can discuss this topic further. For our viewers, I highly highly recommend following Elijah on X and also checking out his site ejagier.com which I will link in the description below. Um Elijah posts there quite frequently. I see new posts every single if not daily then I think this is multiple times a week and so you always keep your viewers updated. Elijah thank you so much and I look forward to having you on the program again.
>> It's a pleasure. Thank you for having me.