Ambassador, thank you so much for joining me. I want to ask you to walk us through what happened with Iraq. They were on side, now they’re off. So, it’s a long it’s a long story and it’s a it’s a great example of things that we should never do again. Okay. So if you if you think about just where we are, $3 trillion or so invested, 20 year disastrous history, few hundred,000 lives lost and we left with nothing. Forget about the political ramifications of what that was and a Sunni, Shia, Kurd, the usual dilemma that we’re facing in the Middle East. But what happens is we tap out and say we can’t solve this problem. So what we’ll do is we’ll create a kind of a republic and this kind of republic will look like Baghdad being federalism but we have the Kurds on the other side which is where the oil was and they don’t want to be part of this thing. So we’ll create another kind of Kurdish autonomous state. Right? We did the same thing in Syria. So SDF with a kind of YPG or PKK and we’ll let them deal with each other. Why? Because it’s it’s easier and it looks fine. They can be autonomous. They have their own culture. They have their own language. They can have their own schools. They can even have their own local military. The problem is it becomes bulcanized just like it happened in Yugoslavia. We did the same thing. So we can’t agree as to one federalized model. So let’s divide it into seven. That lasts for about a nancond. Yeah. And then they start waring with each other. That’s what happened in Iraq. In Iran, which was always the Shia crescent or the f the the crescent that we were always waging a dilemma with, then steps up and fills the void because we create this crazy structure in which the militias, the Iranian militias actually have power over the parliament. So you have a very good prime minister Sudani who gets elected but has no power zero power because he can’t form a coalition of this parliament because the other components the PMF all of the representatives in this parliament are blocking the stage. My boss, both bosses, Secretary Rubio, who’s also the national security adviser, by the way, who is sensational and that model is the best thing that ever happened since Henry Kissinger did it in 1973, have said no more, no more boots on the ground. We’re not funding the billions of dollars. We have a gigantic embassy in Baghdad. We have another consulate in Reveal. Mhm. So we have an $800 million continent in veto. We have a two billion embassy in Baghdad doing what? And yet first they’re declaring Hezbollah a terror organization. Then they’re not. You were just there. What what happened? Chaos. Absolute chaos. So the the influence is the disruptive enemy combatants in the entire region prey off of any decision anywhere. So, it’s exactly what’s happening in Iraq. It’s what’s trying to happen in Syria, what they’re fending off. The new Syrian al-Shar regime is doing a very good job of trying to balance it. It’s what’s happening in Lebanon. It’s it’s what’s happening across the realm in Egypt again. So, all of the little factions and remember what America is doing is saying we’re there for counterterrorism. It’s really our only goal. This president said, “No more boots on the ground, no more money. It’s a regional problem. We have humanitarian interest in balance, but we’re not going to risk American lives in a formula that’s never worked for the last hundred years. So Iraq is in chaos and the Iranian fight for Iraq is immense. Now remember, it was it was actually Sunni control. So the whole Saddam who same scenario is not different than Libya. We did the same thing with with Gaddafi and Libya and we did the same solution. So we’ll divide it into two. So let’s have federalization. It’s never worked. It just didn’t work. This Iraqi government as a friend to the United States and its interests a thousand%. It has to be. It has to be. It’s so important. And yet they’re they’re playing both side. Well, it’s not there. It’s the factions and the way that the government was ordained. Just like in Lebanon, the Lebanese, the Lebanese, the the president, the prime minister, and the speaker of Lebanon are good people. They’re good, solid people. The parliament is organized, so everybody’s paralyzed. Nobody can make a decision without the other confessional agreeing. It’s the same in Iraq. But Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Turkey, if you take those borders with Iran, it’s the essential ingredient. But Iran knows that. So it’s not going to let Iraq go easily. They’ve just been pushed back with Hezel and they’ve been pushed back with Hamas. They’ve been pushed back with the Houthis. They were attacked on their own ground after the 12-day war. They are making a big stand for Iraq. But Iraq has to all they’ve got left. A thousand%. Tell me this. Witterborn on the back foot. Is it time now to get a deal done when it comes to peace? Look, I think our president has been clear. He’s open to real discussions. He’s not open to senseless kicking the can down the road. And he knows the program. If the Iranians want to listen to what this administration is saying on enrichment, on stopping funding of the proxies, it’s the answer, right? Nobody wants any more sensus kill. America doesn’t want to kill Hezbollah. It doesn’t want to kill Hamas. It doesn’t want to kill anybody. If you can make a deal with Iran, but remember, our president is rolling in to the second year of his regime. Iran has a 50-year perspective. Our president is smart enough to know that baiting him just to get in dialogue and continue this senseless killing through surrogates is not going to happen. So I think 100% he’s available to her. We have to hope Iran is available to it. And by the way, it’s the fastest road to the solution in this region. Tell me this, what’s happening at Lebanon right now? Because at the end of the day, um civilian talks between Israel and Lebanon. Where are we? So, I mean, Lebanon is very confusing. I have emotional attachment since I I’m Lebanese. You love the place. You’ve been so influential there. We all wanted to win. And it’s it’s the the last comma of Christianity in a very difficult novel. So, it holds a very special place. The Lebanese hate it when I say this, but it’s a totally failed state. It has a $180 billion of debt, more or less. It has a central bank with a very good central banker who’s struggling to try and get efficacy, but it doesn’t work. You have a correspondent banking system that doesn’t operate. It operates with Hales and Wish and PayPal and Western Union of a corrupt environment that had to be corrupt to survive. Not that the leaders are correct. You now have a new president, a new prime minister, and an existing legacy speaker who I think are all at the point of saying we want this over. We don’t want another civil war. So the idea of Hezbollah is complicated because America says Hezblah is a foreign terrorist organization and Lebanon, as you know better than anybody else, it’s a political organization. The Shia have 27 28 parliamentary seats. Hezilla has five. The government cannot move if if the Shia are not on side. So you have Amal and Hezbollah as a big push. The Lebanese army is not going to forcibly mortally disarm a big segment of the Lebanese population. They tried this in 82 83. It was a disaster. Nobody wants that happen. Are Israel and Lebanon talk? Yes, they have. They have talked, but they’ve talked in the past through a thing called the mechanism. Yes, they’re starting now a dialogue. You’ve seen I’ve been criticized for telling the good news is we have a new ambassador who’s very good. Ambassador Issa who’s starting a new dialogue and the dialogue has to be Lebanon, you have to talk to Israel directly, not through this crazy mechanism, not through a pentata ladder, not through militaries. You have a disc. You want Lebanon to withdraw. They have this cessation of hostilities agreement which was November 2025. There’s no agreement with anybody. It was the US and France saying, “You won’t talk to Israel. Israel won’t talk to Hezbollah. Hezbollah doesn’t really want to talk to the Lebanese government. So, we’ll create this artificial facade.” And then the next day, it doesn’t work. So, the good news is everybody’s starting to say, “Let’s have a conversation.” that the conversation has to include a solution for the Shia and Hezbollah. It’s not about disarming them. It’s about how do you get them not to use the arms. This is this is the difference. That is a real agreement between Israel and Lebanon and something that satisfies the Shia of saying if Iran has to be distanced and we talked about it before, the Gulf Arabs have invested billions and billions of dollars trying to solve this problem in the past. But as long as Iran wants them as a proxy, it’s very difficult. But I’m encouraged and hopeful. I think our new ambassador is going to do a great job at ushering them towards a civilian conversation. And if we can get Lebanon and Syria at the same time to a border and deconliction agreement with Israel, this is a major step. Then you have Turkey, the eight countries around it, Israel, Lebanon. You have to decide what do you do with Iran. Hopefully Iran will come to their senses. Tell me this. How close are we to getting a deal done between Syria and Israel? So I can answer part of the from the Syrian side. Close. There’s they’re just about to celebrate their oneyear anniversary. This this young group ending 50 years of atrocities. Not just 15, but 50. Yeah. And in our opinion, they’re doing a good job of driving forward in a very difficult situation. They know that part of the solution is a deal with Israel. Yeah. They have so many enemy combatants trying to disrupt this. You see that they just signed on the deis coalition which was huge for them. Everybody criticizes them coming out of, you know, al-Nusra, a jihadist, a fundamentalist. How can this Alshara come to power? I’m my personal belief is they’re all in on the right track and their attitude with us has been totally cooperative. Everything we’ve asked them to do and dragging them towards Israel, they’re doing Israel is not trusting yet. So, it’s a little slower. My personal view on the president’s desire is we’ll get a deal done starting with the security and border agreement, the utilization of zones, moving towards a normalization, but it has to be the answer and I think Israel wants that too. I don’t believe in the greater Israel conspiracy. Yeah. Now that the dust has somewhat settled on the events of the last couple of years, why in your mind do you think that Israel didn’t take out Hezbollah? Why did they stop? Because they clearly don’t care about world opinion. Look, there’s there’s there’s lots of theories. Uh regime change actually has never worked. So if you take from 1946 forward, anytime that the US has been involved, we’ve had about 93 coups or regime changes, everyone has failed. So my bosses, Secretary Ruvio and President Trump are not into regime change. They’re into regional solution left to the region itself. So that issue is Israel’s. It wasn’t America. What President Trump did to step in in that 12-day war ending was historic. It was amazing. But for him then to be imputed with regime change. We’ve had two regime changes in Iran already. Neither one worked. So I think wisely leaving this to the region to solve. Why did Israel not want to finish the job? I don’t think the story is over. You’re on chapter five. We have another five chapters to go. Mr. Ambassador, it’s always great to see you. Thank you so much for joining me. Great to be with you. Thanks.
