About this transcript: This is a full AI-generated transcript of FULL Josh Hammer VS Dave Smith Debate on Israel from Charlie Kirk, published June 25, 2026. The transcript contains 16,063 words with timestamps and was generated using Whisper AI.
"all right everybody how we all doing so first where were you a year ago today i bet you remember exactly where you were a year ago today donald trump was in butler pennsylvania a year ago today our republic was probably saved by just a couple of centimeters a year ago today by the grace of god and..."
[0:02] all right everybody how we all doing so first where were you a year ago today i bet you remember
[0:14] exactly where you were a year ago today donald trump was in butler pennsylvania a year ago today
[0:24] our republic was probably saved by just a couple of centimeters a year ago today by the grace of
[0:31] god and a turn of the head tilt a bullet whizzed by donald trump's face and barely scraped his ear
[0:39] and as we're closing out this conference i think we just need to just remember how far our nation has
[0:45] come in the span of one year of how much has changed and thanks to the goodness and glory of god
[0:54] that donald trump turned his head at that very moment i'll never forget where i was with my
[1:00] daughter all of a sudden i saw that we were in some workout area and all of a sudden on screen
[1:05] donald trump shot you all remember where you were when you first heard the news
[1:09] and then what a sigh of relief when we saw him rise up and he said fight fight fight one year
[1:14] ago to this day but the reason i wanted to start with this is that we also lost one of our own
[1:18] patriots that day corey compitore and we should just do a moment of silence for 10 seconds to remember
[1:25] corey compitore that lost his life a year ago today thank you and i know that so many of you have been
[1:35] to mega rallies he died a hero's death he put his body in the way and saved his daughter's lives
[1:44] that they may live for the men out there that is the best of mega masculinity and corey we remember
[1:52] you today here in tampa florida our last bit of programming here is going to be a debate as many
[2:03] of you guys know i speak a lot about this on college campuses i get so many questions about
[2:07] this topic on college campuses some of my best memories ever i've been going to israel traveling
[2:12] to israel seeing where jesus rose from the dead jesus walked on water spoke in the garden of
[2:16] gasenemy gave the sermon uh mount beatitudes abraham isaac and jacob in hebron and some of my
[2:22] greatest experiences have been in holy the holy land and defending israel but as you know this is a
[2:27] very hot topic on campus and increasingly a hot topic in conservative circles and i thought hey let's
[2:35] lean in to that disagreement let's lean into that debate let's have two people that don't agree on this
[2:40] topic that are some of the best defenders of the position when it comes to israel when it comes to the
[2:45] 12-day war when it comes to um whether or not we should be supporting or sending aid to israel
[2:52] because we as conservatives we want to have this debate we don't want to just all of a sudden say
[2:56] oh you're not allowed to say that no we want to foster an environment where we get to the truth
[3:01] we want to find the best ideas and have the best ideas win and so we are thrilled to have uh two men
[3:09] and they know what they're talking about i'm going to be moderating this we're going to make sure that
[3:12] this remains mostly peaceful so give it up for josh hammer and dave smith everybody so uh josh and dave
[3:48] welcome to turning point usa welcome to tampa and give it up for both these men again it's so we have
[3:56] a clock here we can blow through that if this is going well and respectful and spirited i first wanted
[4:01] to start by introducing both these men um josh hammer uh newsweek josh hammer show uh josh is a very
[4:08] passionate and eloquent defender of israel and also is a great friend and someone that we talk about
[4:14] a lot of other issues as well so josh welcome great to have you great to be here charlie also dave
[4:18] smith um dave is comedian a lot of fans of yours here in the audience dave and also a libertarian
[4:27] and we're not going to talk much about that but we were talking about how much we agreed backstage on
[4:32] certain things and uh dave means a lot that you made work here you took a awful flight to get here
[4:38] from halfway across the country and so dave you could plug your stuff as well um because i don't
[4:43] know the name of your show and stuff but i want to start with this i want to start with opening
[4:46] statements if you will there are three big things that i want to cover and we just did a focus group
[4:50] with some of our students here um earlier the three big things we want to cover we want to cover
[4:54] the 12-day war between israel and iran what do we think of that good bad how did trump handle it
[4:59] number two we want to talk about the appeared uh the fake or the real amount of israeli influence
[5:06] in american politics um from apac to how congressmen are involved and kind of have our discussion
[5:11] debate and then finally it's one thing to be against stuff everybody you can always you know
[5:16] i don't like this i don't like that i want both of these men to present what they their solution is
[5:22] their proposition of how what they are proposing so with that though dave i thought it would be helpful
[5:27] this is your first turning point event some people aren't familiar with your work introduce yourself
[5:31] make an introductory statement and the floor is yours my friend oh well thank you very much and
[5:36] thank you guys for for having me uh yeah as uh as as charlie mentioned i took a flight here oh so i'm
[5:45] going on no sleep so if if josh wins it doesn't count um but i i'm a stand-up comedian and i'm also a
[5:53] libertarian i'm i'm really a follower of uh the greatest congressman who's ever lived who is dr ron paul
[6:00] who is uh turning 90 years old uh happy birthday to him um and as far as look i would say i think that
[6:08] american foreign policy for my entire life has been insane and like criminally insane we've launched
[6:17] war after war we've talked about peace through strength the whole time but all we've gotten is
[6:22] permanent militarism and forever wars against countries that pose no threat to us and a huge
[6:28] part of the reason why we've embarked on this is because the neoconservatives hijacked our foreign
[6:33] policy and they were in power after 9 11. and the neoconservatives as everybody who's followed it
[6:39] knows were joined at the hip with the lukud party that's just a fact they all admitted in their own
[6:45] words and you can go back and you can read the clean break memo you can read the companion piece
[6:50] coping with crumbling states this was written by david wormser uh and richard pearl and they laid out their
[6:56] plan now their plan was that in to help israel the clean break is a break from the peace process
[7:03] a break from oslo which was designed to give the palestinians their own state and these neoconservative
[7:09] geniuses decided that instead of the israelis making peace with the palestinians they could just have
[7:15] the u.s overthrow all of the surrounding governments that were giving israel a hard time and this is where
[7:21] four-star general wesley clark says that he saw the plans right after 9 11 to overthrow seven countries
[7:28] in the next five years and what was the last country on that list it was iran okay this is a big
[7:34] part of what the whole conflict is about now the neoconservatives neoconservative has kind of become
[7:39] like a pejorative for war hawks these days and don't get me wrong i support that keep calling them neocons
[7:46] but the actual neoconservatives the self-identified neoconservatives aren't really in power anymore
[7:52] but benjamin netanyahu is still in power in israel and the lakud party is still pushing for this i
[7:58] want very quickly i'll try to not go too long here about okay they actually did focus group testing back
[8:04] in the 90s before the first uh gulf war in iraq and you know americans weren't really moved by we
[8:12] have to reinstall the king of kuwait but they were moved by the nuclear threat now if you go read
[8:17] coping with crumbling states or the clean break memo in the 90s when the neocons admitted they
[8:22] wanted to overthrow saddam hussein they never said it was because he had nuclear weapons they said he
[8:27] was a problem for israel in the region they only made up that lie after 9 11 because they knew that's
[8:33] what would sell you or maybe not you you're too young but sell your moms and dads on going and fighting
[8:38] this war and by the way when they talked about wanting to overthrow iran it was the same thing
[8:43] never had nothing to do with a nuclear threat that's just the thing they use now as the excuse
[8:48] so yes there is tremendous influence by israel in our government that doesn't mean i'm subscribing to
[8:53] some crazy conspiracy or telling you to hate jewish people i'm jewish i'm just saying they have
[8:58] influence they've used it in a very negative way and we should reject this insane foreign policy
[9:03] and embrace the foreign policy that dr ron paul advocated which is the foreign policy
[9:08] of the founding fathers stay out of entangling alliances stay out of unnecessary wars be friends
[9:14] with the world and trade with the world that's the key to prosperity thank you dave josh opening
[9:21] statement feel free to respond and then we'll we'll proceed as we go so about that was about three
[9:26] and a half four minutes so same amount of time all right so it's really great to be here thank you
[9:30] charlie for having me thank you turn point for having me back it's really wonderful to be at this
[9:33] amazing conference you know dave joked that he didn't get any sleep last night today's actually also a
[9:37] fast day on the jewish calendar i'm not eating or even drinking water so we're all we're all on
[9:41] the same page here we're all just totally screwed so you can kind of get get off the same start start
[9:46] starting place there um look there's a lot of substance to respond to i'll just really briefly
[9:51] do that and then we'll talk about what i actually want to talk about in my opening remarks
[9:54] um dave mentioned this alleged coronation between the neoconservatives which i presume he means
[10:00] bush era foreign policy and the lakut party i presume half of you probably don't even know what
[10:04] the lakut party is it's referring to the israeli right it's very instructive and dave always
[10:09] conveniently neglects to inform the audience of this that the actual leader of the israeli right
[10:14] back in 2002 a man by the name of ariel sharon vehemently opposed the bush administration going
[10:19] into iraq so this whole notion that that israel is talking america into foreign wars is total nonsense
[10:25] actually in 20 in 2011 when the when the obama administration toppled momar gaddafi in libya
[10:30] it's actually well known that libya actually sent secret diplomatic envoys to israel trying to tell
[10:36] them to then talk to the united states and france to talk nato off of that attack there so this whole
[10:42] narrative is totally backwards there but i want to kind of dumb things down a little bit here i see a
[10:45] lot of people wearing 47 hats i vote for president trump multiple times i love our president you guys
[10:50] love our president right you love president trump okay this this this is this is turning point freaking
[10:56] usa charlie god bless you have built the largest maga grassroots army in the country seriously my
[11:01] friend you you deserve this you all are car carrying members of it we here are part of that the good
[11:06] news is that while no one should be afraid of debate and this debate is a nice thing here the maga
[11:11] movement is actually quite unified believe it or not all the talk to the contrary when it comes to
[11:16] these issues an overwhelming majority of self-identified mag republicans support close us's relations
[11:22] according to a cbs news poll moreover after the recent operation midnight hammer b2 bombers in iran
[11:29] ninety four percent ninety four percent of self-identified maga republicans supported president
[11:36] trump's dropping those b2 bombs on four donatans and the other irani facilities there this is a wildly
[11:41] wildly popular policy there what what did dave smith say about this he re-upped his now years-long
[11:48] crusade to call for donald trump's impeachment you all probably don't know that about dave smith do he's
[11:52] now called for dave smith for donald trump to be impeached multiple times but dave you know look
[11:57] i mean i don't like when people misquote me either you probably don't like when people misquote you
[12:00] so i actually have a little bit of a highlight reel here of dave smith's tweets over the years dave smith
[12:06] march 19 2024. donald trump is responsible for around 500 000 deaths in yemen in between the weapons
[12:13] to ukraine and the abraham accords jerusalem embassy he is at least partially responsible for the two
[12:18] worst humanitarian crises in the world he's a war criminal who should spend his life in prison
[12:23] he is calling donald trump a war criminal who should spend his life in prison you should be
[12:29] livid at that i am living that as a trump supporter donald trump dave smith june 16 2025. trump allegedly
[12:36] had full prior knowledge of israel's attacks and gave it his blessing while pretending to be
[12:40] negotiating with the iranians as a cover if this is true trump is the most impotent
[12:44] bitch of a leader imaginable he's calling our president the greatest president in my lifetime
[12:50] an impotent bitch are you kidding me june 21st 2025. donald trump has now launched an illegal war of
[12:58] aggression against iran the risk of an absolute catastrophe is very high and the benefits are
[13:04] non-existent dave smith june 21st dead wrong this notion that world war three would start not a single
[13:10] american casualty we should be celebrating that donald trump fulfilled multiple
[13:15] he fulfilled multiple campaign promises the escalator speech in 2015 at trump tower he
[13:21] literally said i'm not going to let iran get a nuclear weapon and guess what i also he said i
[13:25] oppose neoconservative foreign policy he did both of those things with iran he deprived the irani
[13:31] regime of nuclear weapon while not losing a single american sailor soldier marine while depriving them
[13:36] of nuclear weapons and finally trial island on this dave smith july 8 2025 in the last month
[13:41] donald trump has launched a war of aggression on behalf of a foreign government exploded the debt
[13:45] announced that he's continuing the biden policy of army ukraine and covered up a giant child rape
[13:50] operation so according to my interlocutor donald trump is not just engaging in wars on behalf of
[13:54] a foreign government he is also covering up the world's giant pedophilic child sex trafficking ring
[13:59] allegedly i presume on behalf of a foreign government as well so i'm disgusted frankly that this man is
[14:03] on stage but i'll end it up there okay well got it so you can see peace is hard i'm trying to keep the peace
[14:13] now dave i want to give you an opportunity about four minutes to respond to that but also i do want
[14:19] to now that we had the opening salvos and the tomahawk missiles launched let's let's respond as you see
[14:25] fit no and then bring us to the 12-day war because that let's stay focused on that yeah we can well the
[14:30] thing charlie defend yourself sure well the thing is charlie as you may have noticed that may some of
[14:34] you may have seen some of my other debates every single time i come up here to debate issues and they
[14:40] come up here to debate me and my character it's all they have every single time because they can't
[14:45] because they can't actually take on any of the arguments and so the most pathetic low-hanging fruit
[14:50] of you guys like trump this guy said bad things about trump listen guys i'm i'm a free american i
[14:56] supported donald trump in this last election yes he did just actively cover up a giant child rapist ring
[15:03] and i'm going to criticize him for that okay and i'm sorry after all these years of us right-wingers
[15:09] saying protect the children come on that's bad for your soul if you don't you speak up about that
[15:15] it's horrible what he's doing and you know as far as the actual substance of what josh said here which
[15:20] there really wasn't much but i already pointed this out the last time we debated his topic about how
[15:24] sharon was against the war in iraq is total nonsense sharon's envoy initially opposed it when
[15:31] he found out that bush was going to invade iraq not because he didn't want saddam hussein to be
[15:36] overthrown but because he wanted regime change in iran first and then when the george w bush
[15:41] administration assured him that iran would come next they got on board with it and they started
[15:46] pumping out all types of propaganda about how saddam hussein's nuclear secret sites that didn't exist
[15:52] and benjamin netanyahu the longest serving prime minister in israeli history that year in 2002 came
[16:00] to congress and testified under you know a congressional testimony that anybody can go watch and advocated
[16:07] not that you the u.s let israel do it but that the u.s overthrow saddam hussein i believe his words were
[16:14] i guarantee that peace will spread through the region and he also advocated that we overthrow momar
[16:20] qaddafi and the mullahs and around so that's just you're just wrong about it that's not true and yes
[16:27] it uh have i been critical of donald trump when i think he gets things wrong yeah i mean i think
[16:32] that's what we should do this is america you criticize the government when they get things wrong
[16:38] and so i don't even know war criminal josh wait one sec josh i got to keep the peace here dave about
[16:43] a minute ish okay no i'm taking your time i'm just look as far as far as about a minute and a half and
[16:49] try to do the 12-day war thing yeah sure as far as the 12-day war goes i mean look i'll be honest it
[16:54] donald trump it might be the greatest thing he's ever done in his life that at the end of the 12-day
[16:59] war he he after the iranian response was as weak as it was and they gave us advanced warning
[17:05] so there were no american casualties he started pushing for a ceasefire and and that was great
[17:10] that he did that but the point is that the war never needed to be launched to begin with iran did
[17:15] not have nuclear weapons iran according to all of the according to all of the intelligence including
[17:22] our director of national intelligence until a day after israel bombed them and she changed her mind
[17:29] go read the annual threat assessment from earlier this year iran had not made the political decision
[17:34] to acquire a nuclear weapon and they were in negotiations with donald trump at the time
[17:39] to bring their enrichment down there was just no need other than the fact that benjamin netanyahu
[17:44] wants that regime overthrew josh feel free to respond thank you yeah i'd be curious if dave
[17:48] smith also believes in the tooth fairy and pink unicorns um i mean what lie does dave smith not
[17:54] believe frankly um look the the the recent 12-day war is literally the encapsulation of the trump
[18:01] doctrine of foreign policy donald trump ran against neoconservatism he is not a neoconservative that's
[18:07] good because neoconservatism is actually really really bad i actually have a whole chapter in my
[18:12] book israel and civilization talking about how bad neoconservatism is it's chapter seven if you
[18:17] haven't read you should go ahead and pick up a copy so it's really good that donald trump opposes
[18:21] moralistic nation-building boondoggles guess what donald trump is also not and never has been
[18:26] since day one he's never been a hardcore isolationist he can he is a foreign policy nationalist and
[18:33] realist we would say that he is a jacksonian he is in the mold of andrew jackson one of his favorite
[18:38] presidents of all time because he believes in generally following the very wise advice of george
[18:43] washington in his farewell address that you should beware of foreign entanglements but when you are
[18:48] attacked you are going to punch back three times as hard how many times has trump said that in a
[18:53] debate there when he's punched he's going to punch back really really really hard what happened in the
[18:57] 12-day war was you had a close ally israel that through their wonderful control of the skies and
[19:04] they're taking out the missile launchers and and the irgc command there essentially paved a very clean runway
[19:10] through that and they're neutralizing hezbollah last year in 2024 that then allowed the united
[19:15] states to come in with the b-2 bombers and the death blow it was a perfect alley-oop for you
[19:19] basketball fans it was kind of like kobe bryant tossing it to shaquille o'neil back in the way it
[19:23] was a perfect tag team operation to neutralize and set back by many years the threat of a regime that
[19:30] whether or not we care to admit it has actually been at war with the united states at least since the 1983
[19:35] beirut lebanon hezbollah barracks bombings that slaughtered 241 marines arguably since the 1979
[19:41] hostage crisis as well again donald trump fulfilled multiple campaign promises he set back the nuclear
[19:47] program not a single american soldier sailor or marine died it was a brilliant brilliant move of
[19:53] statesmanship a fantastical move frankly it's a borderline mount rushmore worthy accomplishment i would
[19:58] say so here's what i'm going to do i'm going to insert myself because i don't want us to talk past
[20:01] each other because these conversations have a tendency to do that so i'm going to try to i'm going to
[20:05] ask both of you a critical question that both of you guys already launched josh to you first dave's
[20:10] contention and dave you can correct me i'm wrong is that the nuclear program was not a threat correct
[20:15] that it was a intel push would you even say that what make i'm strong manning your argument steel
[20:21] manning it josh what do you have to say to that to the veracity of the claim that there was an imminent
[20:27] threat of iran getting a nuclear bomb that that is a core point of dave's argument then dave i'm going
[20:31] to throw back uh an equally difficult question for you josh okay so i profess agnosticism as to
[20:37] the imminent nature charlie because i have not seen the reports neither have you neither as dave
[20:40] literally no one in this room has actually seen the report so i do not know literally what the
[20:46] exactly imminent nature of the threat was it would be impossible for me to say i'm not going to
[20:50] bullshit you and pretend like i know because i simply don't know what i can say is the following
[20:54] iran has transparently and obviously been trying to acquire a nuclear weapon for two and a half three
[20:59] decades we know this for approximately one to two million different reasons among them that we can
[21:04] point to is that the iaea the international atomic energy administration which is essentially the
[21:10] nuclear watchdog for the united nations they have been sounding the alarm about this and and they have
[21:15] said very loudly and clearly that iran has blocked their inspectors from going to inspect their enriched
[21:21] uranium and that they have concluded over the over recent years especially including recent months
[21:26] that iran is enriching uranium at a much quicker rate into a much higher percentage and rate of
[21:32] enrichment than any civilian program would ever justify by the way the notion that iran even needs
[21:37] a civilian program in the first place i think is kind of bonkers is one of the most petroleum
[21:40] oil and gas rich countries in the world so that's kind of a bit of a red herring in and of itself but
[21:45] we know from a million different international organizations that they have been doing this and
[21:48] charlie more to the point again you know dave likes to say oh they just chant death to america which
[21:53] they do they literally chant it every single day in their potemkin parliament but they actually do
[21:57] act on it they killed hundreds and hundreds of american soldiers on the roadside of fallujah
[22:02] al-ambar province during iraq with qasem sulalani supplied ieds they have killed americans going back
[22:07] to the 241 marines in beiru lebanon by the way the hezbollah jihadists who organized that operation
[22:13] to slaughter those marines in beiru lebanon in 1983 was a man by the name of fuhad shakur the u.s state
[22:21] department had a five million dollar bounty on his head following the 1983 slaughter of the marines
[22:26] there in beirut he went alive for 41 years you know who killed him last year the idf israel took
[22:33] out this guy that the state department had a five million dollar bounty on for 41 years for killing
[22:38] 241 of our boys back in 1983 in beirut so i'm going to now ask i'm going to a really tough follow-up
[22:44] for you you do not want iran to get a nuclear weapon bad would you if it ever took if it required
[22:50] u.s troops on the ground would that be worth iran not getting a nuclear weapon i i charlie with
[22:55] with respect i reject the premise like i i simply do not think it does actually i know it's a
[23:00] hypothetical but it's worth thinking about okay dave i got to ask you tough questions now yeah i
[23:06] want to respond to some of this stuff because all you will you will hold on i i i i don't want us to
[23:11] talk past each other else we're going to spend all this time on prime ministers in 2002 that the
[23:15] audience doesn't know about no but if he's if he's making claims about like something that's just
[23:20] not i want you to get something i want to just ask a very simple question from your perspective
[23:24] because i just asked the tough one to josh is are you okay or do you think we should do anything to
[23:30] prevent iran from getting a nuclear bomb uh i i'm anything sure yeah there's lots of things i think
[23:36] we should do is military action ever justified well again this is a yes there are times when military
[23:42] action is justified but if you're saying what we could do to prevent around from getting a nuclear
[23:46] weapon what we were doing donald trump was in negotiations with them and i think he should have
[23:50] continued those and the truth is that the the big problem with the jcpoa uh that that obama got us
[23:56] into was that there were sunset provisions um they opened up a whole new inspections regime it is not
[24:02] true that the iaea is saying that iran was about to get a nuclear weapon anybody you want it's all it's
[24:07] published online you can go read the conclusion of their last report where they explicitly said iran does
[24:12] not have nuclear weapons and is not trying to develop them they are enriching at 60 percent and they
[24:17] were in negotiations to maybe bring that down but you know when you bring up when you bring up the
[24:21] fact of the marines getting killed in 1983 it's actually an interesting if uh ronald reagan who was
[24:27] president at the time he wrote about this in his memoir now if you don't if you know what ronald reagan
[24:31] did was he pulled out after that he turned tail and run and he said in his memoir he said i i underestimated
[24:38] the irrationality of middle eastern politics and we never should have gotten involved in that now if you
[24:44] want to say that iran backed them okay couple years after that charlie there was a scandal in the reagan
[24:50] administration it was the something contra iran country that's right ronald reagan was selling
[24:56] weapons to the iranians a couple years after this happened so to come back now 40 plus years later
[25:03] and use that as the excuse why we got to go to war with iran i mean just think about how crazy this is
[25:08] and the stuff he said about the roadside bombs in iraq is just not true it's been debunked it's more war
[25:13] propaganda that's been debunked i highly recommend anyone can read the book enough already have you
[25:17] spoken to a josh josh it's one second i highly recommend people read the book enough already it
[25:22] is the best book that's been written about the terror wars by scott horton he has all the footnotes in
[25:27] there you can go through it yourself it's completely debunked those roadside bombs were built by shiites
[25:33] in iraq now i'm not now some of them did have relationships with iran but the majority of iraq is
[25:39] shiite so yes we invaded the next door country and we got into some fights with the shiite groups
[25:44] there but to say that's a reason why we now have to invade iran or we have to bomb them or something
[25:48] it just doesn't make any sense i just so one or two really quick chris follows and then we'll do this
[25:54] both sides need to get under good cross-examination do you think it would be bad if iran got a nuclear
[25:59] bomb yes i think i think it's bad and i think we can all agree on that that is a moral i don't think
[26:04] anybody should be allowed to have nuclear weapons secretly right and so how about that i will ask
[26:11] josh about that because that's a not so subtle dig at israel however hold on are you suggesting that
[26:15] israel has nuclear weapons i don't know actually they probably do yeah you do i don't know the
[26:19] intelligence i'm not that of dni but i mean they probably do but let me ask you dave now another
[26:24] question what what is your now let's just say criticism no u.s troops were killed it required no
[26:32] use troops on the ground there was no war it lasted 12 days fordo was pretty eliminated and
[26:38] even the iranians say it so looking at it now 12 days later what is your problem with what seems to
[26:44] be a master class in 12 days in out no problem no u.s troops we've kind of moved on what what would
[26:52] your problem with that be you know i think and i do think there's something really sick and poisoning
[26:58] about this is that our country has become so addicted to war that if we launch a war and you
[27:04] go well hey it wasn't a complete catastrophe i mean a million people didn't die in this one like in
[27:09] in iraq or hundreds of thousands didn't die in this one like in afghanistan or libya or syria
[27:15] it's like okay look people died in this war okay there were both iranian civilians and israeli
[27:20] civilians who died in this war it was a terrible thing for them and their families this was a catastrophe
[27:25] and my point is that the war never needed to be launched to begin with but there's no reason why
[27:30] we even have to be enemies with iran they oppose no this is a third world country in the middle east
[27:35] that does not have nuclear weapons does not have intercontinental ballistic missiles does not have
[27:39] an air force capable of hitting us with anything this is israel's problem we don't need to be involved
[27:46] in this sorry we got our own issues here and and look again i'll give donald trump credit that okay it
[27:54] didn't turn into a catastrophe he took the off-ramp when he had the the chance but look a lot of that
[27:59] was out of donald trump's control the risk of this war like a lot of people love to like josh likes to
[28:05] read my tweets when i was saying this could turn into a catastrophe because you were dead wrong he
[28:09] looks stupid josh josh don't say no let's de-escalate this no actually what josh is saying is the lowest
[28:19] iq argument that anyone can make i'm warning i was warning that there's a risk of a catastrophe
[28:26] and he's saying you're stupid because there wasn't a catastrophe this is on the level of playing russian
[28:31] roulette and if the bullet doesn't go off you go see dummy you were warning that could go bad
[28:36] that doesn't prove anything listen for all you guys you talking about how big and bad the iranians
[28:42] are and what a scary threat they are what if they hadn't given us advanced notice what if what if
[28:47] iran was actually as suicidal as people like josh pretend they are and what if their response had
[28:52] killed a few hundred americans in the region which by all military assessments they are capable of
[28:58] doing what would donald trump have had to do then charlie was he what would he i'm asking i'm not i'm
[29:03] the moderator no no no okay sorry like come on david it was a rhetorical question i know but i
[29:08] both sides are getting tough questions the point is donald trump would have had to respond even harder
[29:14] how many would have could have are we going to have let's let's give josh a chance to respond
[29:18] but first it didn't happen it's a counterfactual one second you hadn't have had when when people
[29:24] talk over each other they don't like listening to that so that's why i'm here josh i want you to
[29:29] respond to that but to dave's point do you think israel has a secret nuclear program and is that a
[29:34] problem yeah i think it's not particularly disputed that israel has a nuclear program we know exactly where
[29:40] it is based this is uh this is not a particularly hidden thing there i mean it's so well known in
[29:45] fact charlie that i don't know exactly why it's officially a secret unofficially it's not much of
[29:49] a secret i'm non-israeli i have no idea why the exact policy is the way it is i don't particularly
[29:55] have a program with it as i said is one of the world's worst kept secrets it kind of just just
[29:58] just is what it is but more generally speaking i i don't understand why we're going so far down this
[30:03] rabbit hole of would have could have should have the people look let's say something very simple here
[30:07] the people who said that donald trump's involvement in the 37-hour operation of the b2 bombers flying
[30:14] from missouri to iran and back with not a single shot fired at our boys by the way as i said that
[30:20] was partially due to the fact that the idf had so neutralized the iranian air force and their defenses
[30:26] there so the fact that he was able to accomplish that so amazingly there we should have seen that
[30:32] coming because it was actually pretty easily foreseeable and the people who did not see that coming are
[30:37] the people who have lost credibility to comment frankly on these affairs people who warned about
[30:41] thousands and thousands and thousands of dead american lives who said that china and russia
[30:44] would swoop in and that this would be world war iii well you know what god bless you all because you
[30:49] apparently survived world war iii it was the shortest world war iii of all of our lifetimes but i didn't say
[30:54] any of that so what are you dave i restrain josh josh keep going again this is the donald trump
[30:59] foreign policy doctrine in action it is quick surgical strikes roger stone was talking about earlier it's
[31:05] exactly right he is not a neocon neoconservatism bad isolationism also naive and stupid donald trump
[31:12] agrees with both those things the nationalist realist maga america first approach to foreign
[31:17] policy is to have strong nationalist allies that are generally capable of securing and patrolling
[31:23] their own regions in a way that were downs not merely to the allies national interest but also to
[31:28] the american national interest that is exactly what israel has been doing for 40 50 years as they have
[31:33] taken out islamists and sharia supremacist thugs in gaza in yemen hezbollah i mentioned fuad shakur
[31:39] the hezbollah jihadi who killed 241 marines in in beirut lebanon 1983 there's a million examples there
[31:44] that is the definition of an america first ally and what just happened in the 12-day war is an
[31:49] encapsulation of the america first trump doctrine that in this case this tag team between the us and
[31:53] israel against the mutual threat of iran in action okay so i want to now move because it's important but
[31:58] it's connected so i think we have on full display a difference of opinion on the 12-day war now let's
[32:03] go to the next one it's inferred in both of these points but you only get answered as yes or no one
[32:07] at the time is israel an ally of the united states yes of course no okay so now we have disagreement
[32:13] we're going to now figure that out and then i want to then indicated in that is is israel influencing
[32:21] american politics so i'm going to start with josh and then we'll go back to dave you say israel is an ally
[32:26] spend a minute on that and then address how some people have concerns that israel is is
[32:32] influenced in the u.s government and then i'll allow dave to have some time josh all right there
[32:36] there's multiple reasons why why israel is an ally first and foremost you know i think most people in
[32:41] this room are are believers of some stripe right i am jewish most of you most of you are probably
[32:46] christians and god bless you for that if you have any attachment whatsoever to the holy sites if you
[32:51] have any attachment whatsoever to this narrow strip of land between the river and the sea as the hamas
[32:57] propagandists call it then you're going to have some reason to care about this particular sliver
[33:02] of land that that's point number one let's just kind of get it out there especially if you understand
[33:07] that we in western civilization are fundamentally at war with barbarism barbarism being best represented
[33:13] by the islamists and sharia supremacists when you when you understand the western civilization really
[33:17] just is the bible there is a special calling to have an ally with a certain part of of the middle
[33:23] east that's point one point two is just the islamist deterrent point charlie which is that america
[33:28] has faced jihadism time and time again going back for 40 50 years 9 11 obviously the most tragic example
[33:35] we just saw it again on the streets of bourbon street in new orleans on january 1st just a few
[33:38] months ago there if you care about deterring islamism from conquering western civilization a point that
[33:43] you have very astutely been talking about a lot recently on your tv hits on social media a
[33:47] very very important point if you care about defending western civilization from the barbarians
[33:52] you absolutely have to place a special premium on this particular relationship and then third is
[33:57] that if you actually care as i do you know you know paradoxically i actually care a lot about china
[34:03] in fact i think that america's by far number one biggest threat this century is china if you care
[34:07] about effectuating this broader pivot to the indo-pacific as american foreign policy people have been
[34:12] talking about for 20 30 years now you have to have some way of stabilizing the middle east
[34:17] the way to do that is not just adopt the stupid and asinine barack obama foreign policy of appeasing
[34:23] america's enemies and the way to do that is to embolden your allies again that is the trump doctrine
[34:30] so we didn't get to the second part of the question so do you want to start on the ally and then we'll
[34:33] do yeah you can incorporate both dave he had two answers in a row so take three to four minutes well
[34:38] look this this idea that the great battle of our time is us versus the islamists us versus these
[34:44] barbarians you know america that's really the problem here in the united states of america lebanon
[34:50] that's what you got to worry about listen i think everyone here all you guys should know this at this
[34:55] point our problem in america is the deep state of the united states of america okay they're the ones
[35:03] they're the ones who framed donald trump for treason his own intelligence agencies frame the sitting
[35:09] u.s president and you know what that deep state wants by the way permanent war that's what they
[35:14] always want that's how they and their friends make their money and so all of this talk is just so
[35:20] ridiculous man i mean this talk about how like if you care about the holy sites in israel like okay sure
[35:26] obviously christians and jews and and muslims have a connection to that land but that doesn't mean
[35:34] we have to bomb around for israel that doesn't well we just bombed around that was the first topic
[35:42] okay okay anyway um it doesn't mean that we have to support israel slaughtering people in gaza none of
[35:49] that has anything to do with the holy sites and in fact a lot of sites get destroyed uh when there's
[35:54] bombs flying but listen the real the real problem for america if you want to even talk about like the
[36:00] islam islam taking over america or taking over europe well how did that happen that happened because
[36:06] we completely destabilized the region fighting war after war after war that did nothing but slaughter
[36:12] hundreds of thousands of people and then our western governments had the most insane open immigration
[36:19] policy that was basically suicidal we're doing this to ourselves we're 37 trillion dollars in debt
[36:27] and we're looking for another enemy to go fight since the collapse of the soviet union we've spent 20
[36:33] trillion dollars on empire and wars and and you know what we can't tax enough money to pay for it we
[36:42] can't borrow enough money to pay for it so what do we do we print the money and now you guys are coming
[36:48] out into the world and you're wondering why you're six figures in debt from college and you're getting a
[36:54] job at doordash and the average house goes for 800 grand because we've destroyed the currency chasing
[36:59] these monsters that were never any threat to our country so so listen one one quick point adolf hitler
[37:07] and the nazis couldn't bring down america joseph stalin and the commies couldn't bring down america
[37:13] the british empire couldn't bring down america but you think the hezbollah in lebanon are a threat to us
[37:20] they're a problem for israel to deal with we got our own families of the beirut barracks bombing in
[37:25] 1983. seriously say that to them hey have you spoken to the families of the people who have
[37:32] been killed in 1983 in beirut lebanon the people who have been killed by those ieds in iraq that
[37:37] you're just casually dismissing have you actually spoken to any of these families first of all yes i
[37:41] have the 9 11 families any of them yes i have uh are you aware of iran's bombing 9 11. yeah okay
[37:46] so you're just asking me questions guys let's let's just stupid this is why i'm here so why don't
[37:56] we both just take a deep breath because they want to see a debate where they can make their mind up
[38:01] they don't want to see interruptive stuff okay that's why this is going to be a different type
[38:07] of discussion so let me both steel man you're both arguments you have to answer to me okay so josh
[38:15] well actually to dave first and then to josh josh is saying what about all of the islamist
[38:22] um death that they're responsible for beirut bombings you mentioned the shiite that's basically
[38:27] the essence of your argument right josh by saying did you talk to he's saying why are you minimizing
[38:32] this that would be josh's contention is that fair josh 9 11 there's so many examples right dave respond
[38:38] to that and then i will throw it back to josh well i i certainly don't think i in any way minimized
[38:44] any of those deaths i i've made the point that around that ronald reagan still sold weapons to
[38:49] iran a couple years after that and i made the point that those roadside weapons were built in
[38:53] iraq by shiites there that's not minimizing it this is a huge part of the reason why we never
[38:57] should have invaded iraq to begin with because we get our bravest young boys killed it's ten you
[39:02] know tens of thousands of them have have committed suicide in the last few years and that doesn't
[39:08] seem to stop anyone from wanting to pursue the next attack so the point is right that i think if we
[39:14] want to really understand this stuff it's it's wise to look at what some of the motivating factors
[39:20] for these for the hatred against us is all you got to do is listen yes i have talked actually to families
[39:26] of people who have died uh in iraq you know what overwhelmingly they're non-interventionist anti-war
[39:31] people now in fact did you know that in 2008 and in 2012 dr ron paul got more money from active
[39:39] duty military than all the other candidates combined including barack obama because the
[39:45] the active duty military are actually the ones who are the most hardcore anti-war now
[39:50] don't don't invoke them let's try to sell another thought but dave i'm going to follow up with a
[39:54] tough question i want i want you to make the case because i don't i don't want to have you be able to
[40:00] get past this you say israel is not an ally that that that is not an opinion that people hear a lot
[40:06] why is that look all i'm saying is israel has at every turn and look again when i say israel i'm
[40:14] talking about the government of israel i'm not talking about the people there and i'm specifically
[40:18] talking about benjamin netanyahu and the likud party who have been in control for most of this time uh
[40:24] for most of my lifetime yeah and right most of the 21st century and so when i say they have been
[40:31] constantly pushing america toward more aggressive policies toward getting in more fights and just
[40:39] like i always say if you went out to the bar every single night with your friend and every night your
[40:43] friend's trying to convince you to get into a fight and while you're beating a lot of people up you're
[40:47] also taking a lot of wounds and you're going to jail and you're getting in trouble you got to stop
[40:51] hanging out with that friend and so i think that i my position i don't i don't i don't believe in in
[40:59] in wars of aggression and wars of choice i don't believe in sanctions i don't believe that we should
[41:05] be friends with israel we should trade with israel and have a good relationship with them but you know
[41:09] what i also don't believe in welfare and they shouldn't get another dime of u.s taxpayer money
[41:13] and they should not so hold on their lobby their lobby should register as a foreign that's a good
[41:20] segue finish and they should stop blackmailing our politics got it so back to josh back to josh
[41:28] dave had some uninterrupted time there let's now address that because you know again there's a
[41:32] text chain i have all the text to prove it everyone knew where this debate was going right dave there's
[41:36] been no surprises josh you knew that there are some concerns and dave mentioned it such as you i think
[41:42] you're saying aipac is that correct well the broader israel lobby but that's certainly part of it can
[41:47] you address this josh because this is a question people are confused about take take two to three
[41:52] minutes on this and then build out the ally israel at the end of it but josh davis making a point i'd
[41:58] like you to respond to okay so first of all i'm not a fan of a pack um i i have i donated once to
[42:06] a pack 54 like a decade ago and i basically got swindled into doing it so i i'm not a fan of a pack
[42:12] but a pack is not this nefarious boogeyman that dave spent people make it out to be it stands for
[42:17] america israel political action committee it is a group of americans who place a premium on the
[42:22] u.s israel relationship the same way that the nra is group of americans who place a premium
[42:27] on the second amendment i do too i'm a concealed carry kind of guy myself same way that there are
[42:31] any number of other lobby groups that support any number of other things by the way there's also
[42:36] similar groups similar to a pack for american citizens to support u.s relations with other
[42:41] foreign countries funny how these other groups never get brought up in this debate for instance
[42:45] anyone who's been to glendale california probably heard folks in anka that's the armenian
[42:49] national committee of america a very loud active group in washington dc perhaps more nefariously
[42:54] there is the niac the national iranian american council it's funny how in these debates when you
[42:59] talk about various american citizens who get involved to lobby or to express their political opinion as
[43:05] the first amendment gives you the right to do because they think that the u.s national interest is
[43:10] served by ally with a certain country it's funny and perhaps a little worse than funny how the whole
[43:15] registrar is a foreign agent talking point comes up only in one context in one context only which
[43:21] is apac look the notion charlie that apac which again i'm not a fan of i i have i have i have literally
[43:27] i'm not a fan of apac why are you not a fan of yeah i'm not a fan of apac for the reason that i'm
[43:31] just about to give actually which is that apac exists the raison d'etre their entire purpose for
[43:36] existing is to secure large-scale annual appropriations currently about 3.8 billion dollars annually
[43:43] in u.s aid to israel i'm not a big i'm not a particularly big fan of foreign aid in general
[43:47] and i've been arguing for literally a decade that the u.s should wind down foreign aid to israel
[43:52] in particular i think it actually is a bad idea for both countries do we have agreement on that
[43:58] yeah if you want to wind it down to zero tomorrow we have agreement on that it can't be tomorrow
[44:02] because i'd support what we have so we have agreement on an end point yes sure okay keep going josh yeah so
[44:08] you obviously yeah oh you guys are good people they just cheered for agreement i like this crowd
[44:14] that's that's the point we're not here just to hurl insults if you could do that online this is here
[44:18] to actually have some sort of we're a nation these are our fellow citizens we got to figure this stuff
[44:24] out josh keep going yeah so you obviously can't do it tomorrow because that would be to betray an ally
[44:28] in the middle of a hot war that would send a terrible signal to other allies saudis emiratis
[44:33] you name it so you can't do it tomorrow but i do agree that you should have a game plan
[44:36] five ten twenty years whatever it is i don't really care honestly get a game plan in place
[44:40] to phase out this aid it's not good for the united states it's crony capitalism eisenhower defense
[44:45] industrial complex bowing north of grumman all of that is totally true and then from israel's
[44:49] perspective it's also bad for them too because it makes them overly reliant it actually ends up
[44:53] undermining the entire notion of zionism the notion that the jews should control their own
[44:58] right to their own existence in their own homeland undermines zionism in the long run itself so it's
[45:02] actually bad for for both countries but charlie this notion that apac is this big powerful lobby
[45:07] can be dispelled with literally one anecdote and i i only need one anecdote to dispel this this off
[45:13] repeated notion which is the entire 2014 to 2015 barack obama iran nuclear debate the fact that the jcpoa
[45:20] barack obama's joint comprehensive plan of action nuclear deal passed is literally the singular data
[45:25] point that disproves the entire alleged existence of the nefarious israel lobby that controls all all
[45:31] politicians there they failed epically to to get that passed but i do have a question charlie for
[45:37] dave there which is i will translate it okay well charlie i will be very very curious based on dave's
[45:43] recent tweets about donald trump doing xyz things whether it's covering up for a pedophile ring or
[45:48] engaging in foreign wars all on behest of a foreign power does dave actually think that donald trump jd
[45:54] vans the entire trump administration are literally bought off by the jews is that actually your your
[45:58] honest answer okay so what josh is asking um yeah well it's always uh look all of this i mean
[46:06] i do have a tough follow-up for you no but i'm sorry but just like everything you just said like
[46:09] all of it i just find to be like the cheapest debate tactics first off i never said anyone's
[46:14] bought off by the jews we're both jewish and that's a dirty little trick you play when i'm talking
[46:19] about the only non-jewish guy i'm talking about a foreign yeah i'm talking about a foreign government
[46:25] and then you kind of imply and no i again this is all just straw man it's this whole thing of like
[46:30] dave dave saying apac is this big bad monster that controls everything you just said foreign
[46:36] hold on therefore if i have one data point of where a policy that apac didn't want gets through that
[46:41] disproves the whole narrative and then this distraction with talking about the armenian lobby
[46:46] or the it's like yeah well if we were having a discussion about that maybe that would come up
[46:50] but we're talking about this and to compare apac to uh the nra um who by the way are kind of sellouts
[46:57] and don't go nearly far enough but uh like i'm a hardcore gun rights uh guy we got more agreement
[47:04] we love our guns don't we everybody yeah no you know the nra guys who always go the key is to enforce
[47:12] existing gun laws no the key is to repeal every last one of the existing gun there should be one law
[47:19] one law the second amendment that's the law um okay but all that no it is totally different to
[47:25] have a group of americans advocating on it for a constitutionally protected natural right for american
[47:32] citizens than to have a group of americans advocating for a foreign government in conjunction
[47:37] with that foreign government that's a different thing and to even let me finish josh and to even
[47:42] compare them is ridiculous and listen by the way i'll just say this every single person in this room
[47:48] you have to hate apac you don't even have a choice you're here at turning point usa
[47:53] apac contributes millions of dollars to woke progressive democrats if they support israel
[48:00] in other words it's okay to destroy our country as long as that helps israel so i'm i'm sorry i don't
[48:06] know turning point usa real this is my first time here quick question are we allowed to support groups
[48:12] that contribute millions of dollars to woke progressive democrats because i thought the answer was no
[48:17] so so josh and then dave i'm gonna have a tough follow-up for you so take a drink of water josh
[48:23] what would you say to that because look i i wouldn't some people would would ask the question
[48:30] okay does apac have more power than like your traditional like armenian lobby and but more broadly
[48:38] let's just take it more broadly like is there any concern that or how would you address the concern let
[48:44] me put it this way how would you address the concern that some people have that a foreign government
[48:50] tends to have an outsized amount of platform in the u.s government charlie i i i think that there are
[48:57] tens if not hundreds of millions of americans who care a lot about u.s relations with the state of
[49:04] israel for for understandable reasons this literally goes back by the way those of you who are familiar
[49:09] with your american history this literally goes back to the american founding the the american founders were
[49:14] extremely extremely eloquent and outspoken about this from george washington to john adams to
[49:20] hamilton to abraham lincoln's famous february 1861 speech referring to americans as an almost chosen
[49:25] people they quoted the hebrew bible over and over and over again they understood that the christianity
[49:31] upon which america is predicated is not exclusively but has a lot of old testament hebrew bible emphasis
[49:39] therein and that's been part of our constitution part of our legal code part of our moral code
[49:43] since day one so it is completely reasonable for people in the year 2025 to look at that to look
[49:50] at all the other things we talked about when it comes to deterring islamism and sharia supremacism
[49:54] when it comes to trying to achieve this abraham accord style nationalist realist foreign policy
[49:59] when it comes to deterring the irani regime and their various proxies it's very very understandable
[50:04] for american citizens again americans to look at that and to conclude that we have important reasons
[50:10] for ally with israel they are not doing so on behalf of a foreign government this framing is absurd it's
[50:16] utterly absurd they are doing so because they are patriotic americans and they feel it is their
[50:21] subjective sense that as patriotic americans that this alliance is furthered and they are u.s
[50:25] passport holders some people think that they're strictly foreign nationals is that correct yes and
[50:30] that's that's just simply just not true now again i say that by the way someone who's been very
[50:33] critical of apac but it's just simply not true we're using that as a filler term so now dave for you
[50:38] two two quick ones do you think that the council for american islamic relations should register as
[50:44] a foreign agent yeah i don't think there should be any like any groups advocating on behalf of foreign
[50:49] governments you're being consistent yeah that's right secondly though and and josh did not say this but
[50:54] he laced it in through one of the salvos that was he said you know dave you're accusing them of being
[50:59] bought by the jews now dave there is a rise of i just think some disgusting stuff online i'm not blaming
[51:05] you for this i'm not one of those people right but what do you have to say that there's this like
[51:11] dark jew hate out there and you see it and i see it i hate it it's it's not good yeah and everyone in
[51:17] this audience guys don't get yourself involved in that i'm telling you will rot your brain it's bad for
[51:21] your soul it's bad it's evil i think it's demonic and so dave though what how do you navigate being
[51:31] critical of a foreign government while also like some people say well your fans hate juice you're
[51:36] not responsible your fans that is dumb that is terrible i don't believe that the same time though
[51:40] dave you have a big responsibility on your shoulders right because you're saying something that is
[51:45] heterodox not in popular opinion that some people are trying to use to push a much more sinister agenda
[51:51] yeah well i i think there's a lot of truth to that and i think that the the fact is that the
[51:58] policies that america the u.s government is pursuing are almost guaranteed to create this and and look
[52:06] i think there's a lot of factors here i don't have nearly enough time to kind of give all of my thoughts
[52:10] on this but i think as you as you young people know right even though kind of over the last year with
[52:15] trump's victory we like wokeism has been receding um at least to some degree it really can't be
[52:22] overstated how much every institution in american life bought into racialism over the last 15 years
[52:30] and it's like these young kids came up in an environment where that was just considered normal
[52:34] like you judge people by their race and make racialist arguments and yes now that has also been
[52:40] embraced by some people on the right um i will say that i think what i think the best thing to always
[52:47] do in these situations is tell the truth try to be a good person try to be uh deliver your message
[52:53] in the most compelling way and let the chips fall where they may but i do think that the level of
[52:59] israeli control over our politics is frankly pretty undeniable as much as people try to look just think
[53:06] one example right of this so donald trump you remember at the end of the 12-day war when donald trump
[53:11] starts pushing for a ceasefire and then what does israel do they come in and start bombing
[53:16] regime targets not nuclear sites they come in and start bump and then donald trump was furious
[53:22] with with netanyahu obviously he had his most angry moment toward netanyahu when he said they both don't
[53:26] know what the f they're doing i kind of love that moment for the record i love it i love that moment too
[53:33] but then the next day he's right back to just advocating that they drop the charges against netanyahu
[53:38] he's still going to continue funding netanyahu unconditionally that you know anyone else donald trump
[53:44] would have come up with a nickname for him already and just been smashing him
[53:48] all over the place he was trying to lure america into a war that donald trump didn't want to get
[53:53] into but then he said he did because he literally chose to get involved like that was donald trump's
[53:58] decision right but it was also his decision he's had a backup right right but it was also his decision
[54:02] to push for a ceasefire and to try to end the thing and israel agreed immediately no no they bombed the
[54:06] crap out of him immediately that's why trump was so upset simple question i i want to phase out usa to
[54:12] israel okay i established that allegedly prime minister netanyahu is now getting on board with
[54:16] that as well certainly a lot of people in his coalition too i'll believe that when i say that
[54:20] well he's basically said that so you should believe it but what is that a politician saying
[54:24] so josh finish his question you should believe let josh finish his question if the if the israeli
[54:28] government were to agree that that is the best policy and if the united states were to do that then
[54:34] what in god's name is your actual problem well i'm sorry so if america was not propping up israel
[54:40] and america was not if we wind down the foreign aid then what is your issue uh well there's other
[54:44] military intervention obviously so i'm not sure i'd follow i'd be very happy to wind down the
[54:48] foreign aid but other than that what is my listen i'm a non-interventionist so i'm not saying america
[54:54] should get involved but no i mean i do think objectively what israel's doing to gaza is horrible
[54:59] i think and i want to talk about gaza couldn't do it without us so make that case they were i would
[55:03] still be against that we have to go fast because people have flights and stuff but i want to get to this
[55:07] right and we still haven't gotten to the final conclusion so let's talk gaza because first i
[55:12] want to go josh on october 7th because i want you to remind people what happened on october 7th and dave
[55:17] i'll be honest i think your portion of the debate your portion of your your community could do a
[55:20] better job of remembering the horror on october 7th i'm just going to be honest that's my i'm not
[55:24] putting that on you i'm saying just your community i want but i'm gonna have that's just i want you just
[55:29] to think because i think we kind of forget because there was something unique and terrible josh
[55:32] i want you to talk about that and then i want you to make the best case you can because every human
[55:37] being is made in the image of god i don't like seeing dead kids anywhere i don't like seeing
[55:40] dead kids in gaza i don't like it so we we're christians here so josh i want you to kind of
[55:45] walk us through the series events because it can't be lost on us talk about gaza talk about the horror
[55:49] of october 7th then dave i want you to talk about your criticism about gaza and then i'm going to ask
[55:53] you a follow-up dave about something that happened from the joe rogan show josh you first i i'm just
[55:59] curious has anyone just put your hand up and make some noise have you been any of you to the parts of
[56:04] israel that were slaughtered by hamas anyone all right a few people okay um so i was also there a
[56:10] few months after it happened if you haven't been there it's very difficult to describe what what you
[56:15] see you you see these kibbutzim these small villages by the way these were typically left-wingers these
[56:21] were peaceniks that were establishing their their villages on the border to try to engage in pen pal
[56:27] diplomacy if you will with the arabs of gaza these are very kind of left-wing peacenik people and you see
[56:33] just kitchenware throughout the streets teddy bears everywhere blood-stained walls bullet holes as
[56:40] far as the eye can see it it's very difficult to describe the only time that i had that similar
[56:45] feeling walking around places like kafaraza was when i was in treblinka the nazi concentration camp
[56:49] camp itself so look in total and there's a brand new report talking about the extent of the mass
[56:54] raping and sexual violence that hamas committed on october 7th combines you're looking at roughly 1200
[57:01] people slaughtered by the way not all israeli nationals dozens of americans were either murdered
[57:06] or taken hostage in gaza as well in total something like 40 to 50 different nationalities were represented
[57:12] of those who were slaughtered on october 7th in fact just looking at it from a very strictly narrowly
[57:18] american perspective october 7th amounted on its own terms to the largest american-only hostage crisis
[57:25] since tehran in 1979 because of all the american citizens who were then taken hostage into god so it
[57:30] was an unspeakable atrocity we don't really have all the answers to the to this day as to how it
[57:34] happened perhaps we never will i i certainly hope to get some clarity at some point there but it was
[57:39] the single deadliest day for for the jewish people since world war ii and and given israel's small size
[57:45] it's roughly the equivalent of 45 to 50 911s if you can possibly contextualize that so that that was
[57:52] what precipitated this war and it was a war that israel charlie did not want as you know hamas took over
[57:58] in 2007 israel repeatedly time and time again decided not to try to topple hamas under the idea
[58:05] that you could potentially have an even worse alternative better to deal with the devil that
[58:09] you know and so forth there october 7th i think extremely reasonably given the sheer level of
[58:14] carnage and terror and just just outright satanic demonic evil that happened they quite reasonably
[58:21] concluded that that policy simply had to end and what's happened in gaza for the past year and a
[58:25] half almost two years now has been a protracted war in one of the most condensed urban environments
[58:30] in the world it is very very very very difficult war fighting conditions i would like to remind you
[58:36] just of at least one or two very simple facts one is that let's not forget that hamas who israel is at
[58:43] war against in gaza is a u.s recognized foreign terrorist organization they are indistinguishable in that
[58:48] respect from al-qaeda or isis or any of these other foreign terrorist organizations they are in a rabid
[58:54] jihadist network that like all these other jihadis and sharia supremacists also wants to kill not
[58:59] merely jews but christians and all infidels they say that very clearly in the 1987 founding charter
[59:04] that is point number one point number two charlie you mentioned that this is a very christian audience
[59:09] i i am jewish we happen to share most of the bible and i am a firm believer in genesis 127 that we are
[59:15] all made in god's image that is one of my foundational beliefs in everything i write about this i write about
[59:21] this at great length in my book israel and civilization to me that's a single foundational
[59:26] ethical imperative of all western civilization it informs my pro-life views and so much else
[59:31] so i like you and like so many others also weep whenever innocent people are dead there are two
[59:36] points to make i'll make them very briefly because i know i'm sensitive at the time one is that we know
[59:42] because we actually have people like john spencer the head of urban warfare studies at west point who
[59:46] have actually been able to crunch numbers we know that when you actually look at the civilian to combatant
[59:51] death ratios in gaza it is the most humane civilian to to combat in death ratio in the entire history
[59:58] of urban warfare john spencer was there by the way in 2016 2017 in fallujah iraq during the trump-led
[1:00:05] isis counter-insurgency the united states army god bless them did not even do quite as well as the idf in
[1:00:10] terms of civilian to combat death ratio according to john spencer of west point point number two which
[1:00:16] is a very simple point that dave smith and his friends always like to look over is that when you're just
[1:00:20] trying to ascribe moral culpability to every single tragic death in gaza charlie you made this point
[1:00:25] so so well in your recent debates over in england against these highfalutin british foe intellectuals
[1:00:30] at cambridge and oxford when you said that the moral culpability comes to people who are using human
[1:00:35] shields that is just how it works that is the law of war that is the law of combat that is just basic
[1:00:40] morality and logic 101 so that is essentially how i see gaza i know dave has plenty to say in response to
[1:00:45] that so dave take two minutes and then i have a crisp follow-up yeah um i mean geez there's a lot there
[1:00:52] first of all look if you support what israel's doing in gaza right now i would just like my advice
[1:00:58] to you guys is just know that you never have a leg to stand on claiming to be pro-life for the rest of
[1:01:03] your life just saying that if you oh it's so so it's okay to support let's not boo our speaker it's okay to
[1:01:10] support a policy that is killing babies all of a sudden killing babies is negotiable all right fine just i'm just
[1:01:15] just beating the room so dave why don't you i'm not talking about hold on hold on hold on back up
[1:01:20] hold on back up dave why don't i just let you go on this whole long i know i'm going to actually help
[1:01:23] you out here dave okay what i'm doing i want you to tell the audience what's going on in gaza because
[1:01:29] some people in the audience don't know what's going on so don't assume they know and let's not get back
[1:01:33] oh okay well i did i did assume that most people know that lots of babies are being killed in gaza but
[1:01:38] maybe i shouldn't have assumed that don't don't be sarcastic about it dave instead i mean this
[1:01:43] no i meant that literally i did association loop where they're on social media all the time okay so
[1:01:47] walk through numbers walk through what animates you to say something like that well okay well let me
[1:01:51] respond to a few of the things that that josh claimed i mean if you want to go there was just a
[1:01:55] major report a couple weeks ago in haretz the israeli newspaper where they had a bunch of idf soldiers
[1:02:00] they actually had one who went on record uh who was saying that they were ordered to shoot at crowds
[1:02:06] of people who were going into all right left-wing filth by the way gosh i let you talk let's please let
[1:02:11] dave make his case well is the idf soldier who went on the record also filth probably okay all
[1:02:16] right there you go so there see you're whatever that's when you'll criticize the idf look josh is
[1:02:21] just lying when he says that israel supported hamas for all those years because they feared there might
[1:02:27] be a worse alternative it's just not true and this has been so widely reported you don't have to rely
[1:02:32] on haretz you can rely on all types of reporting or you can just look at all of the leaders in their
[1:02:36] own words what they said they chose netanyahu and this was very controversial in israel there
[1:02:40] were lots of critics of this netanyahu thought he had this brilliant idea which is that he would
[1:02:45] prop up hamas and keep them in power his exact quote was we can control the height of the flame
[1:02:52] so he was like we'll keep these terrorists in power and that way we can tell the entire
[1:02:57] international community that look we have no partner for peace we have no one to deal with here
[1:03:02] and that way we never have to negotiate with the palestinians this was the game that he played
[1:03:06] and it blew up in his face and really blew up in the israeli people's face on october 7th and i've
[1:03:12] never downplayed october 7th i know i'm i know but i'm just making the point that i never have thank
[1:03:17] you it was a horrific day it doesn't you don't have to downplay any of that and in fact i've criticized
[1:03:23] many other critics of israel who have downplayed that it was a horrible day uh awful atrocious acts were
[1:03:30] committed by hamas terrorists but at the same time benjamin netanyahu was propping those guys up in
[1:03:36] fact according to the israeli former defense secretary he sent the head of the massad to uh
[1:03:42] um to qatar to quote beg them to continue shipping the money in all the meanwhile they had a blockade
[1:03:50] around gaza they wouldn't let sugar they wouldn't let potatoes in because they claim that's dual use
[1:03:56] that could be used to build uh rockets so the kids can't get you know food yet hundreds of millions
[1:04:03] of dollars in cash directly to hamas i guess money doesn't have a dual use so you know the whole
[1:04:11] mission of this of this what you can't even really call a war because it's not a war it's the
[1:04:16] destruction of a captive people gaza's been occupied since 1967 by the israelis and they're now just
[1:04:23] slaughtering the people there under that's a fact and it's under the the supposed goal that they want
[1:04:30] to eliminate hamas and they want to retrieve the hostages and yet they've hamas is not being
[1:04:38] eliminated they claim the israeli government is claiming that they've killed 20 000 of their fighters
[1:04:43] and yet there's still as many as there were let me ask you the follow-up that i wish that i had an
[1:04:49] answer to when you were on the joe rogan show but that thing descended into a mess right it was madness
[1:04:53] so i'm going to try to do it here this was the best point that i think that you that whatever
[1:04:58] reason it wasn't answered how then should israel have responded to october 7th be specific i i i know
[1:05:04] you might say well don't kill kids but hold on how would you say you would be okay for israel to respond
[1:05:09] because it would be a defensive war at that time 1300 of their own kids and women were killed and raped
[1:05:15] so please just answer how then would you be okay with israel responding to october 7th yeah well i
[1:05:21] certainly look i'm not saying that israel was going to respond with zero violence from after october
[1:05:28] 7th but i think the important thing to remember here is that first of all for the entire history of
[1:05:34] israel's existence they've been dealing with this terrorism problem i would argue that the palestinians
[1:05:39] have been dealing with the terrorism problem from israel as well but this is and they've never until
[1:05:44] netanyahu they never treated it as a problem for the regular old military it was always targeted
[1:05:51] assassinations and special ops and and look the truth is this this is the fact right when you have
[1:05:56] been occupying a group of people since 1967 you israel has completely controlled gaza he withdrew in 20
[1:06:04] years ago yes okay and if you want to go back and look at this you can read sharon's top advisor in his
[1:06:10] own words said the disengagement was to put we're running out of time i know but okay i won't be
[1:06:15] able to go through all of this but it's not true israel continued to to occupy the whole time and when
[1:06:20] people broke out literally dug out their own section okay no keep going dave okay so when people break
[1:06:27] out of gaza and just start ran just slaughtering civilians in israel there yes it was a horrible day
[1:06:33] and the world feels for those civilians but at the same time you have to know if you're israel that the way
[1:06:38] that you respond to this is going to be how you're characterized in the international community and
[1:06:44] so you would at least make some effort to not kill so many civilians you can't dude uh smotrich the
[1:06:52] finance minister was bragging for three months that not one ounce of grain would get into gaza well hamas
[1:06:59] has all the firing markets from hamas has all the dude you interrupt every two seconds dude hamas has all
[1:07:05] the food they need this is a war on the civilian population and then as is reported admitted by idea
[1:07:12] by the way this is admitted by the israeli government you can say whatever you want about haretz they admit
[1:07:16] they denied that they gave the orders but they admitted that it was the idf who was shooting at
[1:07:20] those people then after you deny the civilians food for three months then you start shooting at the
[1:07:26] people who are desperately trying to get some food for them and their kids so no listen i'm sorry and i
[1:07:31] guess i am partly rejecting the premise of your question but it's it well let me just say it like
[1:07:35] this charlie if you're if you're pro-life and you say i just stupid argument you should not buy
[1:07:41] this guys let let dave finish his sentence shut up bro it's not it's a stupid argument it's a stupid
[1:07:47] argument you haven't heard the argument what's the argument that's stupid babe you're not pro-life
[1:07:51] guys no what's the argument it's hamas that is not what's the argument you just called stupid
[1:07:56] babe what's the argument this is what hold on one second charlie no people don't like the argument
[1:07:59] that you're not enjoyable to watch what's the argument that you called why don't you finish it
[1:08:03] josh let him even know what it is he interrupted me before i even said it what okay here's the
[1:08:07] argument if you're pro-life it's not incumbent on you to have a plan for what the mother ought to do
[1:08:15] with the baby like you don't have to have a plan for daycare and college funds and all that you just
[1:08:21] say hey i think this option should be off the table i don't think you have the right to murder the
[1:08:25] baby while it's inside of you likewise i'm not saying i have to have the perfect plan if we had
[1:08:30] more time i could expand on what i think they should have done but how about don't deny one ounce of
[1:08:35] grain for three months and then shoot at the poor people who are trying to get food josh how about you
[1:08:40] take that option off the table is that argument stupid josh dave okay gosh the party in gaza that
[1:08:47] is not pro-life is hamas agree hamas is the jihadist u.s recognized foreign terrorist organization
[1:08:54] that in their founding charter by the way they were founded simply as the palestinian arab
[1:08:59] offshoot of the muslim brotherhood we all agree hamas is bad well no i'm not going to sit here
[1:09:02] while he interrupts me every time i speak respectfully you are criticizing him for interrupting so
[1:09:08] don't do that so just let's let's have an uninterrupted narrow just thank you okay hamas calls in their
[1:09:17] founding charter for the death not merely of every israeli not merely every jew but of every infidel which
[1:09:23] they identify as not merely all christians but also all muslims who unsubscribe to their idiosyncratic
[1:09:28] form of sunni sharia supremacism so the the the group in hamas assuming the group in gaza that is
[1:09:34] not pro-life is hamas and hamas has the unequivocal and i would argue sole moral culpability for the
[1:09:41] human shield induced deaths of all the women civilians and babies when they are indiscriminately firing
[1:09:47] rockets mortars and missiles from mosques from the united nations schools and on that is where the
[1:09:53] blame goes the blame goes to hamas once upon a time anyone with any decent functioning moral compass
[1:09:59] or any knowledge of international law 101 would have been able to tell you that so that that that
[1:10:03] is where this goes but again it's just you pivot to blaming hamas and they're the ones who aren't
[1:10:08] pro-life as if i was making the claim that hamas is pro-life i'm criticizing benjamin netanyahu for
[1:10:14] funding and propping up this horrific terrorist organization so but so how are you in one breath
[1:10:18] going to talk about how terrible they are and then completely remove culpability from the guy who
[1:10:22] but i do i am curious got it i'm curious i gotta interrupt what is your response to the human shield
[1:10:28] argument it has been proven yeah it is legit what is your response to a fact we don't know how
[1:10:34] widespread it's done but i think it's rather that hamas uses human shields yeah they certainly have
[1:10:38] at like i'm not denying that but at the same time like it's kind of you know if uh let's say like
[1:10:44] in a domestic criminal situation if there was somebody who killed a bunch of people and then
[1:10:48] they ran into a school and they're like using the kids as human shields they're hiding behind the kids
[1:10:53] and then your local police department came over and said blow up the school and killed all the kids
[1:10:59] you wouldn't go well they have no moral responsibility because they were using them as human shields yeah as
[1:11:04] bill burr said in his special you got to work around that bro and like it hamas is terrible nobody's
[1:11:10] arguing with that but that doesn't mean there's no responsibility for the people dropping the button
[1:11:15] and by the way again as you don't want to talk about how about when they're shooting at people
[1:11:18] trying to get aid there were no human shields there i do look at a picture of gaza the human shields
[1:11:23] does not describe most of what's happened to gaza yes there are certain air instances and by the way
[1:11:30] israel also has a bunch of military targets in civilian areas like i'm just saying that doesn't
[1:11:35] actually mean it's okay to just now you have a moral get out of jail free card to do whatever you
[1:11:41] want to the poor innocent people who as you pointed out are also victims of hamas josh that's what people
[1:11:46] are objecting to josh what is your response to i know there was some pushback online to the shooting
[1:11:51] at the aid site with food is that as dave is telling it charlie honestly i have not spent too much time
[1:11:57] on the details but what i can tell you is this we we know for a fact that at least until the recent
[1:12:02] gaza humanitarian foundation which is this u.s organized ngo distributing aid we know that prior
[1:12:08] to the establishment of this hamas was pilfering and confiscating a shockingly high percentage of
[1:12:13] the aid that entered gaza sometimes well more than than 50 percent because that's what they do they
[1:12:17] have monopoly of use of forests in gaza and they were essentially just artificially inflating the prices
[1:12:22] of of the actual gazans goods and then stealing it all for themselves that's what hamas does it is a
[1:12:27] deeply corrupt kleptocracy in addition to being a a jihadist hellhole now the new aid group the gaza
[1:12:33] humanitarian foundation is a is a noble and righteous effort that guess who opposes it hamas
[1:12:38] hamas are the ones who actually have started indiscriminately shooting even much more so than
[1:12:42] whatever anecdote dave smith is talking about hamas is the one that's actually started indiscriminately
[1:12:46] shooting at this u.s perpetuated this this u.s orchestrated new aid distribution organization
[1:12:52] because hamas doesn't like the fact that the united states under donald trump god bless him
[1:12:56] has found a way to get around the hamas hamas monopoly on aid distribution in gaza we are way
[1:13:01] over time and so now i want to end with what we want okay we both are challenging we're defending
[1:13:08] so we got to go fast um josh i'm going to start with you what are you pushing for what is success what
[1:13:14] is what is the what is the end destination what are you prescribing what are you offering and then
[1:13:19] dave will let you do it and then please don't interrupt charlie great great debate thank you for
[1:13:24] moderating this so i support the trump doctrine of foreign policy i have been a staunch proponent
[1:13:30] of the trump doctrine since the trump doctrine first came into instantiation during the first trump
[1:13:34] presidency the trump doctrine again is neither neoconservative nor isolationist it is a
[1:13:39] nationalist realist america first approach to foreign policy that understands three things one
[1:13:45] america's number one focus this century must be on combating our actual civilizational foe the chinese
[1:13:51] communist party two america has declining resources three the way to deal with both those two is to
[1:13:57] prioritize in non-indo-pacific regions of the world allies who are capable of securing and
[1:14:03] patrolling their neck of the woods in a way there are downs not just to their national interest but
[1:14:08] to the american national interest that in the middle east is israel we've seen that time and time
[1:14:12] again throughout the middle east and again charlie just to drive home this point there the guy who
[1:14:16] understands this better than everyone despite this whole kind of very online debate about what
[1:14:21] maga or america first should think about foreign policy and uses relations the guy who understands
[1:14:25] is the best as he recently reminded us is the guy who literally defined the terms maga and america first
[1:14:31] to donald trump it is completely commonsensical it is utterly logical it flows from first principles
[1:14:37] that to be america first is to necessarily support tight-knit close-knit u.s relations we saw this in the
[1:14:43] u.s iran war we saw the b2 bombers do what they did and god bless them for dropping those bombs in
[1:14:48] that 37-hour interval that would not have been possible were not for the for the israelis laying
[1:14:53] the groundwork with the iranian air defenses and hezbollah the year prior in 2024 it was the trump
[1:14:58] doctrine and u.s israel relations at work so charlie my my vision is for an independent israel where
[1:15:04] we ultimately wind down aid and for israel to be the beacon of protecting and securing american
[1:15:09] interests in the middle east just like other countries can then take responsibility in different
[1:15:12] regions of the world so america can then focus on china um look i think if you guys are being honest
[1:15:22] with yourselves and i do think we should really think about the threats that we really do face
[1:15:27] here at home and i'm talking about the democrats coming back into power forget all these made up
[1:15:33] threats about other countries that really can't mess with us at all i don't know if you guys have
[1:15:37] noticed and you could say it's a very online debate all you want to this hasn't been a good month for
[1:15:41] donald trump his base is really is um is really kind of turning on each other and these are major
[1:15:47] issues that are dividing um his coalition and this is jd vance winning in a few years is not a given
[1:15:55] you know like the democrats are going to come back and offer someone and if we want to have a chance
[1:15:59] to keep progress going and to get our country in a better place what we have to do is reject empire
[1:16:06] and return to being a republic that we were supposed to be the united states of america was never
[1:16:12] supposed to be an empire we were supposed to be a republic a constitutional republic a city on a hill
[1:16:18] that the the world could learn from our example because we do liberty so much better than anybody
[1:16:23] else does and we've gotten so far away from that over the years and like i mentioned at the beginning
[1:16:27] look this is the big point we're going broke we can't afford to do this anymore it shouldn't even be a
[1:16:34] question of whether we should be giving israel money or whether we should be giving ukraine money
[1:16:39] as donald trump's also decided to do this year we don't have it this is like me taking out money on
[1:16:44] a credit card to lend to my friends so i can act like i'm the big shot who's lending them money we
[1:16:50] are destroying our own young people you not me i'm not a young i'm fine i'm in my 40s and i make good
[1:16:56] money your whole generation is getting screwed over by this because we have to devalue our currency in order
[1:17:03] to keep up with the demands for this spending that we cannot afford and so the answer is that we need
[1:17:09] to pull back we need to focus on america that's what america first is supposed to be about sound
[1:17:16] money fiscal sanity and true liberty true free market capitalism not a government that spends seven
[1:17:24] trillion dollars a year and a crazy casino system on wall street with these incredibly low interest
[1:17:30] rates where people are making tens of millions of dollars off just you know speculating on nonsense
[1:17:35] and this is what it's the warfare state that drives it look guys we we have spent 20 trillion
[1:17:42] dollars since the collapse of the soviet union the war in iraq and afghanistan are over and we're
[1:17:48] looking at our biggest defense budget ever this is madness and it will be the death of our country
[1:17:54] no islamist is going to take down our country but drowning in debt and empire will that's how great
[1:18:00] nations fall and the young republicans need to reject that a republic not an empire like the great
[1:18:07] pat buchanan said i want to just summarize this was time well spent both dave and josh agree
[1:18:12] on some plan to wind down u.s israel aid that was an agreement correct my the timeline you could debate
[1:18:18] about number two they both say every human's main image of god and we should not trivialize when
[1:18:24] you know people are killed also i think we all agreed october 7th was awful it was terrible
[1:18:29] and should be talked about more and it needs to be emphasized we also agree this jew hate stuff
[1:18:34] has no place in public discourse period end of story and i don't like it it's disgusting and we
[1:18:40] need to call it out when we see it and finally i think the fifth is that i hope we demonstrated
[1:18:46] and both our participants got a little lively at times that this is a debate worth having that it's
[1:18:51] better to have this out in the open than silence people and censor them and call them names instead
[1:18:57] this is how we solve our problems give it up for josh and dave one last time everybody thank you
[1:19:02] thank you guys thank you did we enjoy that everybody was that great okay i just want to thank you guys for
[1:19:28] a phenomenal event on your way out not too late to start a turning point usa chapter also take the exit
[1:19:34] survey you guys had a survey emailed to you take the survey on the way out and everybody get involved get
[1:19:40] involved get involved we are now honored to announce also amfest coming up in december tickets are
[1:19:46] available get your tickets right now enjoy this trailer for amfest god bless you guys god bless america
[1:19:53] and keep fighting for our country