Juno News - January 29, 2021


Iran, Biden and Canada – Why the Middle East matters


Episode Stats

Length

5 minutes

Words per Minute

209.63564

Word Count

1,214

Sentence Count

23

Hate Speech Sentences

3


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 So last week I spoke about Israel's vaccine rollout and what Canada might be able to learn
00:00:09.360 from their experience but I actually want to stay on the Middle East for a little bit because I
00:00:13.680 think there's a lot we can really unpack there and things that affect Canada that we don't always
00:00:18.240 necessarily think about. Now the first area I want to talk about is the energy sector and I know that
00:00:24.120 traditionally you know oil prices or what goes on in the Middle East affects oil prices and so that
00:00:28.440 has a huge effect on what goes on in Canada but I want to start in Washington actually before we
00:00:33.660 jump to the Middle East because President Biden not only cancelled Keystone XL but is really cracking
00:00:38.880 down on fracking and so American energy independence is possibly being threatened but why does that have
00:00:45.020 a huge effect on the Canadian economy and what does that have to do with the Middle East? Well
00:00:48.340 it has to do with the Middle East because President Trump as you may recall pulled out of the Iran deal
00:00:52.660 and some news reports basically say that the U.S. will return to the nuclear court as long as Iran
00:00:58.340 is complying. Now what does that mean? That means that Iran may not face sanctions. That means that
00:01:04.100 their economy might do better. That means that they may be able to refund some of the organizations
00:01:08.840 and cause trouble for their neighbors such as Israel, the UAE, Saudi Arabia. There's an ongoing
00:01:13.360 conflict in Yemen which most Canadians are not necessarily aware of because it really hasn't
00:01:17.460 been covered a lot in the mainstream media and I think it's really an underspoken about issue there
00:01:24.240 but the issue is again getting close to Iran might embolden the regime, might give them new funds and
00:01:31.680 reduce some of the sanctions which will free them up to be able to cause trouble. Iran is one of the
00:01:36.160 world's largest if not the largest state sponsor of terror and has a number of sort of covert operations
00:01:42.640 trying to stabilize its neighbors. You know in the WikiLeaks cable a lot of people thought that Israel was
00:01:47.740 pushing hard for America to bomb Iran and there's actually Saudi Arabia one of the countries pushing the
00:01:52.720 hardest for America to deal tough with Iran. So there's an entire coalition of surrounding countries
00:01:58.480 and this is what in many ways also pushed some of the peace deals was the fear of sort of Iranian
00:02:03.360 hegemony, Iranian overreach in that region and so that pushed a lot of the countries together.
00:02:08.300 President Biden also cancelled the F-35 or at the very least put it on hold but possibly cancelled
00:02:12.640 the F-35 deal to the UAE that was apparently part of the Israel peace deal between Israel and the UAE
00:02:19.060 that they would be having access to buy F-35 which we don't even have yet, we may never get but that
00:02:25.700 again this all really overshadows the energy sector and it's not just again important because of oil
00:02:30.920 prices but it's important because the energy independence to the United States and our exports
00:02:36.540 to the United States which are now very limited except by rail and our own energy independence because
00:02:41.480 we also tend to import a number of oil from a number of countries especially in eastern Canada. So
00:02:47.440 that is going to have a huge huge effect on what goes on in this country and that is really tied into
00:02:52.760 what goes on in the Middle East. Now the second area which is tied into the first is actually
00:02:57.860 relating to this story here and this story is about underground banks and underground money exchanges
00:03:06.020 that are really funded and pushed by the Iranian regime. Now this money laundering is basically using
00:03:12.740 money to finance terror and finance the drug trade and this is very concerning because this is happening
00:03:17.760 here in Canada. Now I'm very concerned not only because they are using our country for you know
00:03:24.180 nefarious purposes but also because of this and I'll explain why. This story here liberal writing
00:03:29.460 association accepted donation from accused Iranian money launderer. Now someone who CISA suspected of
00:03:35.360 laundering money for the Iranian regime made a $240 donation to a liberal writing association. Now
00:03:40.240 why am I concerned about this? Now you may think it's because the $240 donation you know maybe
00:03:45.780 buying some access or that that kind of thing. Now I don't think $240 buys you access but I think
00:03:51.120 what this does show is that the road from money laundering to political interference is actually
00:03:55.440 very short and possibly easily driven because when you have a lot of dirty money lying around it's
00:04:00.960 very easy to find purposes and things to do with that money especially since you've got to get rid of
00:04:05.020 it somehow and you know might as well buy some political favor while you're at it if you have to dump
00:04:09.720 some cash. So a couple things out of the Middle East that are very concerning. Now overall I think
00:04:15.400 you know the Middle East is is it's a different world than Canada in in many ways and I think we
00:04:20.960 can safely say that if Eastern Canada has a different culture than Western Canada or you know Toronto
00:04:26.920 has a very different culture than Western Canada or than Quebec I think it's very safe to say that the
00:04:32.360 Middle East has a very different culture than Canada and so I really think it is worth reading about
00:04:38.140 worth exploring but also remembering that things work very differently in that part of the world
00:04:43.320 and I think a lot of times people tend to get caught up in uh in sort of the preconceptions that we have
00:04:48.340 here. Now I not only have a background in the Middle East but I've also studied the Middle East extensively
00:04:52.720 and so I hope to bring you some of that information that we can unpack about why that is relevant to
00:04:57.620 Canadians but I think it is very important to remember that our already beleaguered energy
00:05:01.500 sector can be greatly affected by what goes on in the Middle East and not just because of oil prices
00:05:06.460 but greatly affected about the uh ongoing uh issues in the Middle East and uh also that the
00:05:13.720 Canadian government is not necessarily immune from foreign interference especially from
00:05:18.300 interference actors such as the Iranian regime so again as always a lot of stuff to think about
00:05:23.560 still trying to work on a Middle East explainer video for you just really trying to find that
00:05:27.480 format that place to really uh you know push that out and under what context but definitely still
00:05:32.200 working on things like that as I know a lot of you have requested it in the comments but
00:05:35.280 as always for True North I am Sam Ashkenazi thank you so so much for watching this video hope you
00:05:39.800 learned something about the Middle East don't forget to subscribe and hit that notification bell
00:05:42.840 so you can stay up to date with all the latest and greatest from True North thank you so much for
00:05:46.560 watching and have a good one