Rebel News Podcast - EZRA LEVANT ｜ Syria's new leader served Al-Qaeda, ISIS, before toppling Assad regime

00:00:00.000 Hello, my friends. I just can't even believe what's happening in Syria. It's happening so

00:00:03.660 quickly and so dramatically. I'm trying to wrap my head around it. I'll share with you my thoughts

00:00:08.340 today and some images. Just astonishing. Let me invite you to get the video version of this

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00:01:25.080 Tonight, who's better as the leader of Syria? The Stalinist Bashar Assad or the terrorist who

00:01:36.720 just took over? It's December 9th and this is the Ezra LeVant Show.

00:01:41.540 Shame on you, you censorious bug.

00:01:55.080 Sometimes nothing happens for decades. Sometimes decades happen in a matter of weeks. I think 0.74

00:02:02.400 that's where we are right now. Who would have thunk it? Bashar Assad crumbling before terrorist

00:02:09.200 rebels in a matter of days taking over the country, driving Assad out. He's reportedly in Moscow seeking

00:02:18.260 asylum, although there's no independent footage verifying that. There was an allegation that as he

00:02:24.980 attempted to escape, his Russian airplane was shot down. That's quite a possibility. It was incredible how

00:02:33.280 quickly the end came. Of course, Assad was strengthened in power for years by Russia, which deployed its air 0.77

00:02:41.620 power in Syria unopposed by the rebels. The rebels did do brutal damage, but Russia was able to hold

00:02:49.100 them off. Russia also using Syria as a port for the naval vessels. Well, they pulled out in a hurry,

00:02:56.280 taking their military equipment with them. They weren't foolish enough like Joe Biden was to leave 0.99

00:03:02.140 billions of dollars worth of equipment behind for the terrorists. And when I say terrorists, that's 0.99

00:03:08.200 exactly what I mean. The new leader of Syria, if you can call a warlord a leader, is named al-Julani.

00:03:16.320 That's not his real name. That's an Arabic way of saying the Golan Heights, Julani, Golani. That's the

00:03:24.260 mountain range between Syria, Lebanon, and Israel. And it was the site of a major battle in 1973 between

00:03:33.980 Syria and Israel. And Israel, the fact that this terrorist has named himself after those border

00:03:39.540 mountains is somewhat disconcerting, suggesting he has bigger ambitions than just conquering and ruling

00:03:46.040 Syria. I should tell you that he has a resume that would be the star of any al-Qaeda LinkedIn. In fact, 0.60

00:03:55.740 he was a deputy in al-Qaeda. He was a deputy in ISIS. He worked for al-Baghdadi, the leader of ISIS,

00:04:04.480 before Trump killed him. In fact, here's a picture published by the U.S. diplomatic corps a few years

00:04:13.760 ago, offering $10 million for the capture of al-Julani. Now we're supposed to take him as a world 1.00

00:04:23.380 leader. He is a terrorist who perhaps will turn Syria into even more of a terrorist state. It 0.94

00:04:30.280 reminds me of this astonishing newspaper article that praised Osama bin Laden as a man who was taking

00:04:39.720 his army and dedicating them to peace. This was after Osama bin Laden's war against the Soviets in

00:04:45.380 Afghanistan. Little did they know that he would go on to become the mastermind of 9-11. 0.89

00:04:50.780 I can understand why there was jubilation, though, that someone, anyone at all, had dethroned Bashar

00:04:59.000 Assad and his family. Bashar Assad took over from his father, Hafez Assad, both of them brutal. In the 0.71

00:05:05.880 case of his father, Hafez, there was the story of the city of Hama, not to be confused with Hamas,

00:05:11.680 but a city called Hama, where rebels once gathered. Hafez Assad, the father, sealed off the city,

00:05:20.240 and for days and days just fired artillery into the place, killing an estimated 40,000 of his own

00:05:28.720 citizens. And of course, the United Nations had nothing to say about that. Bashar learned his 0.97

00:05:34.540 cruelty at his father's hand, his father's side. Although Bashar had cultivated a Western image of

00:05:41.640 sophistication and he wore Western clothing and he attended school in the UK, he became an

00:05:47.960 ophthalmologist. His wife was in a vogue fashion spread. He was normalized. Here's a picture of John

00:05:56.240 Kerry meeting with him. Here's a picture of Nancy Pelosi meeting with him. He was the delight of the

00:06:03.480 Democrats, which is odd because they now accuse the Republican Tulsi Gabbard of being a Russian agent

00:06:10.200 for having similar ideas that perhaps Assad could be turned towards the West. If I had to compare

00:06:18.720 Assad to other leaders in the region, I would compare him to two other leaders that were deposed

00:06:25.320 by Western-backed forces. Saddam Hussein of Iraq, who was deposed directly by the United States,

00:06:33.040 and Muammar Gaddafi of Libya, who was deposed by rebels. In both cases, in all three cases, that is,

00:06:40.660 the men were butchers, absolutely brutal. We're seeing images now of some prisons, including

00:06:46.120 underground prisons, where people were kept in atrocious conditions, some of them born in the

00:06:52.900 prisons and never having let out of it, absolute atrocities, crimes against humanity, absolutely

00:07:00.740 Saddam Hussein with his rape rooms, Gaddafi. But all three of those tyrants did have something to 0.90

00:07:09.540 offer, I suppose, which is they were a gate barred against the sheer chaos and brutality that was to

00:07:17.740 come. What happened with the deposing of Gaddafi was the growth of the Islamic State and the re-emergence 0.99

00:07:27.760 of open-air slave markets and the mass migration from North Africa and the Middle East into Europe.

00:07:36.740 Muammar Gaddafi was an awful man, but actually towards the end of his career, he attempted to make 0.96

00:07:42.920 amends, paying more than a billion dollars to victims of his own terrorism, giving up his weapons

00:07:49.500 of mass destruction program, and pledging to become part of the West. It was Hillary Clinton 1.00

00:07:54.980 who had him killed and then joked about it. Remember this?

00:08:00.660 Unconfirmed.

00:08:01.660 Unconfirmed.

00:08:02.580 Yeah.

00:08:04.100 No.

00:08:06.180 Unconfirmed reports about Gaddafi being captured.

00:08:08.640 Unconfirmed.

00:08:09.640 Unconfirmed.

00:08:10.640 Unconfirmed.

00:08:11.640 Yeah. We've had too many. We've had a bunch of those before. We've had, you know,

00:08:15.760 have had him captured a couple of times.

00:08:17.760 Unconfirmed.

00:08:18.760 Yes. We came. We saw. He died.

00:08:21.880 Did it have anything to do with your visit?

00:08:25.160 No. I'm sure it did.

00:08:26.640 Saddam Hussein was awful as well, but he kept a lid on things on Iraq. Now it is mayhem,

00:08:34.880 a colony of Iran, and all sorts of Islamists. Bashar Assad held back things we don't quite yet 0.89

00:08:42.300 know what they'll come. There is a Christian population in Syria. It's obviously been in

00:08:48.080 decline as the Christian population throughout the Arab world is. Lebanon used to be majority

00:08:53.800 Christian. Christians have been fleeing that country. Even places like Iraq used to have a 1.00

00:08:59.220 significant Christian population. There is no safe place in the Middle East for Christians. 1.00

00:09:04.160 They despise Jews, but they don't have much time for Christians either. There's a slow ethnic 1.00

00:09:09.920 cleansing. You might find it hard to believe, but Egypt was once a fully Christian country. Now less 0.90

00:09:17.360 than 10% of it is Christian, and the Coptic Christians are under constant pressure. Will this 0.67

00:09:25.200 Al-Julani be an anti-Christian terrorist, as so many of his colleagues are? The astonishingly macabre,

00:09:34.080 there are snuff videos of ISIS terrorists beheading Christians when they found them. We'll find out

00:09:42.160 quite quickly what Al-Julani is like. What's been interesting from a political point of view is how

00:09:48.400 quickly it all happened, and how quickly Iran's plans in the region have become undone. A year and a half

00:09:56.400 ago, before the attack on Israel by Hamas, Iran seemed to be strong. But then with the Hamas attack

00:10:04.720 on Israel, it unleashed an Israeli response that has decimated Gaza and Hamas. Israel then set its

00:10:12.720 sights on Hezbollah in Lebanon. And with the fall of Bashar Assad, it seems like Iran's power in the region 0.90

00:10:20.880 has been clipped, and Russia's too. I saw a video of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu standing

00:10:30.080 in the northern border with Syria exuberant. Here's a clip of how that looked.

00:10:36.640 This is a historic day for the Middle East. The collapse of the Assad regime, the tyranny in Damascus, 0.80

00:10:43.360 offers great opportunity, but also is fraught with significant dangers. This collapse

00:10:49.680 is a direct result of our forceful action against Hezbollah in Iran, Assad's main supporters.

00:10:56.000 It set off a chain reaction of all those who want to free themselves from this tyranny

00:11:00.080 and its oppression. But it also means we have to take action against possible threats. One of them

00:11:05.680 is the collapse of the Separation of Forces Agreement from 1974 between Israel and Syria. This

00:11:11.600 agreement held for 50 years. Last night, it collapsed. The Syrian army abandoned its positions.

00:11:18.000 We gave the Israeli army the order to take over these positions to ensure that no hostile force embeds

00:11:25.920 itself right next to the border of Israel. This is a temporary defensive position until a suitable

00:11:30.800 arrangement is found. Equally, we send a hand of peace to all those beyond our border in Syria,

00:11:38.240 to the Jews, to the Kurds, to the Christians, and to the Muslims who want to live in peace with Israel.

00:11:45.280 We're going to follow events very carefully. If we can establish neighborly relations and a peaceful

00:11:51.520 relations with the new forces emerging in Syria, that's our desire. But if we do not, we'll do whatever

00:11:58.240 it takes to defend the state of Israel and the border of Israel. I suppose it's true that Iran has long 1.00

00:12:04.720 been the greatest strategic threat to Israel in the region. And so having Iran knocked down to size a bit 0.72

00:12:12.000 would be exhilarating for any Israeli leader. But I wonder if what is to come is even more dangerous.

00:12:19.920 Israel has taken Mount Hermon inside Syria to stop any terrorists from setting up too close to the

00:12:28.240 border. I don't know how long that will be able to continue for Israel to have a presence in a buffer 0.80

00:12:34.640 zone in Syria. I don't know the outcome here. I put it to you that Netanyahu's exhilaration is premature

00:12:42.640 and will not be long lasting. I'm worried about what's to come, but the Syrians who migrated en 1.00

00:12:50.960 mass to the west, they seem to be cheering, whether it's in Europe or even in Canada.

00:12:58.000 Syrian migrants, Syrian refugees are thrilled with the news. Again, I understand their hatred for Bashar

00:13:05.280 Assad and his father. For more than 50 years that family terrorized them. And you can understand that

00:13:11.760 they're delighted that he's fallen. But I fear that some of the cheers is for the Islamic extremist 1.00

00:13:17.440 nature of those who have taken over. I see news that a number of European countries have announced

00:13:23.840 they will no longer process asylum claims for people from Syria. The United Kingdom, Sweden, Germany,

00:13:32.160 and Austria have all announced they will take no more migrants from Syria claiming to be refugees.

00:13:38.800 And France is considering the same. My fear is that Justin Trudeau, perhaps the stupidest leader in the 1.00

00:13:45.520 Western world, will do the opposite. He'll take even more Syrian migrants. Truth we'll find out soon 1.00

00:13:53.280 enough. I can't help but notice the curious timing of this and so many other things between when Donald

00:14:00.080 Trump won the election in early November, but before he takes office on January 20th.

00:14:07.520 It's almost like the Pentagon, the CIA, the deep state, the diplomats, and other forces in the world

00:14:14.720 realize they have a very short period of time to do things to set the world up in a way that either

00:14:21.280 Donald Trump can't undo or they give him the least favorable hand possible. I think it may have been

00:14:30.000 plausible that Trump could have come to some sort of understanding with Bashar Assad. It wouldn't

00:14:36.800 surprise me if in the course of time we learned that he was deposed to prevent Trump from having

00:14:43.120 that power. That may sound like a conspiracy theory, but the question is why are so many things happening

00:14:49.680 there and in Georgia and in Romania? Color revolutions everywhere before Trump takes office. I can't

00:14:57.760 believe it's all a coincidence. That said, I am optimistic. I think that Iran, which is a power that hopes to

00:15:08.080 have the atomic bomb and wield it like a terrorist would, I think they are in retreat. And I think

00:15:14.400 even though Trump will have his plate full of problems, he will take off, he will pick up where

00:15:19.680 he left off with the Abraham Accords peace deal still intact despite four years of Joe Biden. I actually

00:15:28.960 am hopeful for peace in the world, not just in the Middle East, but between Russia, Ukraine, and around

00:15:35.920 Taiwan. I think Donald Trump's strength and, frankly, his mean tweets are enough to hold back half of the

00:15:43.600 evil in the world. And I think his plan to reinvigorate the American economy and the American military

00:15:50.160 are enough for the other half. Hopefully some of that will slosh over us up here in Canada. I think

00:15:56.800 that, frankly, it's more dangerous in Canada for Jews, for Canadians who value our liberal freedoms 0.70

00:16:04.960 than it is in many other parts of the world. There haven't been any pro-Hamas rallies in the streets

00:16:10.240 of Saudi Arabia or Dubai out there. Stay with us. An interview with our friend Lindsay Shepard is next.

00:16:17.920 Welcome back. You know, whenever I go into a bookstore, which is not that often these days,

00:16:33.840 I feel like I'm under assault. I feel like the books are designed to antagonize me. I love books. I was a

00:16:40.240 reader at a very early age. I love historical books. I love poetry. And I know that sounds a little bit

00:16:49.040 funny to say, but I do. I love Kipling. I like books that tell it like it is. But these days,

00:16:53.680 I walk into a bookstore and I feel like all I'm getting is a political agenda. If it's not trans this, 1.00

00:17:00.880 it's woke that, it's your inner racist this. And even ancient books that I love, like I've complained to

00:17:07.280 you before about how I go to see a Shakespeare play, a play that I may know and love. And they've

00:17:13.440 altered the words. They've literally changed Shakespeare's play to update it. And of course,

00:17:21.120 they don't say that when they sell you the ticket. It's just, it's an astonishing act of historical

00:17:27.280 vandalism. And if you think it's bad for books for grownups, well, oh my heavens,

00:17:32.000 the books targeting kids are nothing but recruitment tools. So it is a pleasure. It is a rare

00:17:39.040 respite to see a book, to learn of a book that at least is calling it neutrally as opposed to

00:17:46.400 being anti-Canadian propaganda. And I am so delighted to talk to our guest today who has produced a

00:17:54.560 children's book called A Day with Sir John A. And you probably know the author before I even

00:18:02.960 introduce her. Her name is Lindsay Shepard. She's been a reporter for True North until very recently.

00:18:08.960 And years ago, she took a principled stand against cancel culture at Wilfrid Laurier University. A pleasure

00:18:15.600 to have the author join us now via Skype. Great to see you again, Lindsay.

00:18:19.200 Thanks for having me. Well, it's our pleasure. I tell you, even if I didn't like the subject,

00:18:25.680 it would behoove me to give you a platform to talk about your book, because I think

00:18:32.240 in the culture wars, our side is not well represented in the arts, in film, in TV,

00:18:39.280 in documentaries, and certainly not in kids books. Tell me why you made a book called A Day with Sir John A.

00:18:44.960 Yeah, so I spend a lot of time at libraries and at bookstores because I have two young children of my

00:18:53.040 own who are five and almost three. And you'll see often that the featured displays for children's

00:19:01.200 books, it's always something to do with gender, race. It's always very bleeding heart. It's always 0.96

00:19:08.560 very ideological and politicized. And like you said, I just wanted to make something neutral,

00:19:15.360 something that you might read in the late 90s or the early 2000s. And so we chose to do a book

00:19:23.760 called A Day with Sir John A. And it's about Sir John A. MacDonald. And it's a picture book. So it's a

00:19:31.440 blend of fiction and nonfiction. And as far as I know, this is actually the only storybook

00:19:39.200 about Sir John A. MacDonald on the market. So imagine you have, you know, Father of Confederation,

00:19:46.880 first Prime Minister of Canada, and there aren't really a lot of books for children. In fact, no storybooks,

00:19:55.360 like I said, about him. Whereas if you think about the states, children are very aware of who their

00:20:02.160 heroes are. They're aware of, you know, Roosevelt, Washington, Lincoln. But it's just not the same

00:20:10.000 over here. And so we wanted to address that gap. Yeah, when you think about it, there's so much of

00:20:16.560 this genre in the US. But I mean, Sir John A., he was stripped off the $10 bill by Trudeau.

00:20:22.400 No. And I think that was a signal of where things were going. I think it's designed to,

00:20:28.880 if you cut off the roots to your past, you're unmoored for the future. And I think that's the

00:20:35.760 point of destroying our national heroes, to demoralize us, to tell us that we believe in

00:20:40.480 nothing. And absolutely, they're targeting kids now. I was looking at some of the pages

00:20:46.240 of the book while you were talking there. And you don't avoid those slurs against McDonald. You

00:20:54.240 sort of deal with them up front. In the storybook, children are saying, well, I heard he was locking

00:21:01.280 kids up in residential schools. I heard he was evil. So you're not even starting from a clean slate. You're

00:21:08.320 starting from the default in 2024, which is hostility to Sir John A. McDonnell, aren't you?

00:21:16.080 It's almost like you're undoing some lies or preparing young kids to hear lies about Sir John A.

00:21:24.640 Exactly. Yeah. So the concept is that there's a young boy who's an elementary school student.

00:21:30.800 His name is Emerson. He's going on a field trip to a fictionalized museum called the Museum of Canada's

00:21:36.640 First Prime Minister. And he starts hearing how all of his classmates and the tour guide at this museum,

00:21:44.160 they all seem to only have negative things to say about Sir John A. McDonnell. And he kind of starts

00:21:51.520 off from the point of, hey, I thought this is the guy who got the railroad bill that went all across

00:21:58.400 the country. You guys think this is so bad. And then throughout the book, he goes on a journey.

00:22:05.360 And like you mentioned, we kind of address significant historical moments without demonizing.

00:22:14.240 Because if there's one thing we want people to take away from the book, children, parents,

00:22:18.960 grandparents alike, anyone who reads it, is we can't demonize our great figures of the past. And we can't

00:22:28.560 look at them through the lens of just the present day and think, oh, you know, we're so enlightened now.

00:22:34.480 Look at how bad they were back then. Well, the fact is, we live in Canada now. And that's thanks to Sir John A.

00:22:43.120 Yeah. And everything we are is as a result of what he and others did before us. And so you can't reject,

00:22:50.160 it would be like rejecting your parents or your grandparents because they had a certain fashion

00:22:54.720 sense or a certain slang. I mean, and there's a hubris to thinking that we are the ultimate in moral evolution,

00:23:03.040 that we've got it absolutely right. I dare say some of the diabolical things being done in our culture

00:23:09.280 will in a generation or less be regarded as abominable. I won't get into those things now,

00:23:15.600 but we could probably come up with a list of them. Now, in addition to writing the book, of course,

00:23:21.360 it's lovely, illustrated by Tatjana Gubic. Who's she and how did you connect with her?

00:23:26.640 Yeah. So she's our illustrator. She's actually not Canadian. So considering, you know, the very

00:23:33.760 detailed work she had to do with kind of reconstructing Canada in the 1880s, we're really happy with what she

00:23:40.240 was able to do. Um, because there, there was a lot of research that had to go into it. So, um,

00:23:47.440 yeah, we're, we're happy about how the illustrations turned out at the end of the day. We wanted it,

00:23:52.080 we want the book to appeal to children. And so, um, you know, the, the illustrations are vivid

00:23:58.720 and they'll be appealing, but hopefully, um, you know, parents and grandparents and

00:24:04.560 aunts and uncles will also want to buy this book for the children in their lives because it's like,

00:24:11.520 okay, finally, there's a book that will tell an element of Canadian history that won't be

00:24:18.320 over politicized and just an over correction and, and apologetic because that's such a big part of it

00:24:25.120 for me was I, I just hated to see all this apologizing and guilt and shame because when kids

00:24:32.080 go through the K to 12 system, that's all it's going to be right when they do their social studies

00:24:36.960 and humanities courses, it's just going to be, um, those years of apologizing and feeling guilt over

00:24:43.680 the past. Well, here's a book, A Stay with Sir John A., that we're targeting for, that we wrote for ages

00:24:51.120 three to seven. So we want to get in there early and say, you know, this is a father of confederation.

00:24:57.680 These are all the great things he did. He was a man of spirit. Um, he had a progressive worldview.

00:25:03.200 And so we're addressing that actually before a lot of kids will, will learn about McDonald in the school

00:25:10.800 system, in the curriculum. Um, and when they do learn about McDonald or a lot of people, the takeaway

00:25:18.480 has been and will be, oh, this is the guy of residential schools and head tax, Chinese head tax, and that's all

00:25:25.040 they'll retain. So we're hoping that people will retain so much more. Well, I'm excited about it.

00:25:30.720 And, um, you say the market is children ages three to seven. There's a building in the city I'm in,

00:25:37.280 it's called Queens Park. It's the provincial parliament of Ontario. And there used to be a

00:25:43.760 statue of Sir John A. Macdonald right out front. But for years now, that statue has been entombed in a

00:25:50.880 kind of coffin or sarcophagus. They don't have the courage to take it down yet, but they have the

00:25:58.000 cowardice to build a wooden entomb, a tomb around it because they don't dare look Sir John A. in the

00:26:06.160 eye, but they don't dare take him down. And that's in a conservative government like Ontario's. What a

00:26:12.080 crazy day we live in. Lindsay, it's great to see you. The book is called A Day with Sir John A. Where

00:26:17.040 can people get it? I take it Amazon is the best bet. Amazon is the best bet. Yes. Well, it would be

00:26:23.920 wonderful if bookstores actually stocked it, but I think I'm savvy enough to know that would never

00:26:29.520 happen in Canada. Lindsay Shepherd, great to catch up with you. Congratulations on the book.

00:26:33.440 Thanks so much, Ezra. All right. There you have it. Stay with us. More ahead.

00:26:50.080 Well, what do you think? Do you think that the downfall of Bashar Assad will make that region

00:26:55.360 better? It certainly is like the ice breaking up after a thaw. It's been more than 50 years since

00:27:01.920 the Assad family has run that country in a Stalinist way. But I think we've learned that 0.98

00:27:06.960 the Middle East can always get worse. And I fear that is what is to come. If you look at the biography 1.00

00:27:14.000 of Al Jelani, he's one of the worst people in the world. But I suppose for the moment, it feels good

00:27:20.480 to depose a Stalinist. What do you think? Let me know. That's our show for today. Until next time,

00:27:26.720 on behalf of all of us here at Rebel World Headquarters, to you at home, good night,

00:27:31.120 and keep fighting for freedom.

Rebel News Podcast - December 10, 2024

EZRA LEVANT ｜ Syria's new leader served Al-Qaeda, ISIS, before toppling Assad regime

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