The Podcast of the Lotus Eaters - PREVIEW： Realpolitik #4 ｜ The Errors of Analysts

00:00:00.480 hello welcome to this the third episode of realpolitik i am your host firas modad

00:00:06.640 in the previous episode we had gone over some of the history of the state of israel

00:00:11.040 reaching i think up to the oslo accords maybe before we begin we can do a quick little recap

00:00:17.280 on where we were so the state of israel was founded in 1948 the intention behind it was for

00:00:23.520 britain to have a foothold in the middle east close to the suez canal and that could separate

00:00:29.440 egypt and syria and prevent the emergence of a unified arab state that could become a threat

00:00:36.480 in the mediterranean there was a long list of wars 1956 1967 1973 uh the arabs pretty much lost all 0.92

00:00:47.200 of these wars and what this led to was the rise of palestinian militancy uh through leftist groups

00:00:55.040 as well as secular groups that were trying to basically find a way to force the israelis to

00:01:02.960 recognize the palestinians and to find a way to end the state of israel um in 1979 the egyptians

00:01:13.120 figured that they couldn't beat israel and that their economy couldn't continue with endless wars

00:01:18.880 so they signed a peace treaty with israel and the result of that was the assassination of the

00:01:24.640 president who had signed the peace treaty in 1981 but the egyptian military continued with its uh plan

00:01:33.840 to make peace and exit the arab israeli conflict and this led israel to return the sinai peninsula

00:01:42.400 to egypt and it led to the um peace treaty that we still have today the camp david peace accords

00:01:51.120 that still govern the relationship between egypt and israel now in 1978 because the palestinians

00:02:00.080 had been in lebanon since 1970 after their expulsion from jordan and because they were launching a series

00:02:07.520 of attacks on israel the israelis decided to invade south lebanon and they took a small strip of

00:02:14.240 territory and then after a series of attacks uh ariel sharon the defense minister of israel at the time

00:02:23.680 decided to launch a full-scale invasion of lebanon that reached the capital beirut this succeeded in

00:02:31.360 forcing the palestinians out of lebanon they went into exile in tunisia and it seemed that the avenues 0.99

00:02:39.280 for palestinian militancy were closed then two things happened first there was the palestinian intifada

00:02:46.800 in 1987 where essentially protesters within the 1967 occupied territories began throwing stones at israeli

00:02:56.720 soldiers uh launching strikes doing their best to find a way of objecting to uh israeli military

00:03:05.360 government over their territory or what they believe is their territory the territory that they'd inhabited

00:03:10.880 for hundreds of years in some cases uh two thousand years two thousand plus years remember the palestinians

00:03:17.920 themselves are not just arab invaders there is arab blood mixed into them but they're also genetically

00:03:25.360 quite jewish and quite canaanite in addition to having that arab influence and in addition to

00:03:31.040 having converted to islam over the hundreds of years of islamic occupation of the holy land so there 1.00

00:03:38.800 was this palestinian tifada um that really became a problem for israel that really embarrassed israel

00:03:45.920 politically and the view from the israeli side was that it would be better for the palestinians to return 0.95

00:03:51.360 to militancy because that would help justify the israeli position better in 1990 iraq decides to

00:04:00.640 invade kuwait and the leader of the palestinians at the time yasser arafat decides that he's going to

00:04:06.720 back iraq because he believed this was the last arab country that would support him um the syrians

00:04:14.000 he'd had terrible relations with since the lebanese civil war and um his position there was untenable

00:04:20.800 iraq was seen as the last state that he could bargain on and it also helped that the iraqis 1.00

00:04:27.280 paid him 50 million dollars in exchange for his support for their invasion of kuwait this backfired 0.97

00:04:32.640 spectacularly in 1991 the americans just decimated the iraqi army and kicked out the iraqis from kuwait

00:04:40.400 and arafat found himself with zero backers then the soviet union had collapsed and he was completely

00:04:47.280 isolated so what did he do he made peace uh the palestinians and the israelis negotiated a peace

00:04:54.320 agreement that was supposed to lead to the establishment of a palestinian state in the west

00:05:00.720 bank and gaza the territories that had most meaning for the israelis particularly the west bank because

00:05:11.200 the setting of the bible is mostly jerusalem and the west bank places like rachel stoom places places

00:05:20.240 like jericho places like hebron these have enormous spiritual meaning for jews and for muslims with islam

00:05:31.920 claiming um to be the true heir of judaism and this became a problem and let's watch this quick video

00:05:40.720 about the uh oslo peace accords and help sort of put them in context

00:05:49.120 for what he called an historic and honorable compromise 30 years ago a hopeful moment in

00:05:55.040 the conflict between israelis and palestinians it's a day for optimism two sworn enemies arrived at the 1.00

00:06:00.880 white house to sign a peace agreement the deal was struck in secret by the principle israeli prime minister

00:06:06.080 yitzhak rabin a former general represented israel have now agreed to lay down their guns representing

00:06:12.480 the palestinians yasser arafat the chairman of the palestine liberation organization

00:06:19.520 this is historic breakthrough between israel and the plo two national movements competing for the same

00:06:24.640 space and for the first time they're prepared to recognize each other known as the oslo accords

00:06:29.920 supported by president bill clinton it was designed to end years of violence by laying out a peace

00:06:35.840 process a deal that could give palestinians their own state and land captured by israel in the 1967

00:06:43.600 arab-israeli war president clinton felt this was his baby it charts a course toward reconciliation

00:06:50.640 between two peoples who have both known the bitterness of exile on the white house lawn the tensions were

00:06:57.440 visible to the last minute there were issues rabin is insisting that our fat can't come in a

00:07:03.360 you know anything that looks like a uniform we're telling our fat don't even you can't come with a

00:07:08.800 you you don't bring a weapon you know he's always always had a pissy you don't bring a weapon to the 0.63

00:07:12.800 white house then at a point the president looks at rabin and he says you're going to have to shake his hand

00:07:20.080 and rabin looked like someone had punched him in the stomach and he stood there for a moment this is

00:07:30.160 man he considered a terrorist all his life and then the handshake

00:07:40.480 an image that would become iconic

00:07:42.480 this is the oslo accord it was meant

00:08:10.320 to give the palestinians a state and for it's akrabin the israeli prime minister

00:08:17.040 and defense minister who had been responsible for the signing of this accord the aim was to create

00:08:24.640 a state that was 80 jewish for the israelis the big fear was this they wanted control over the west

00:08:32.000 bank for religious purposes and for strategic purposes if you look at a map of israel it's an

00:08:39.680 extremely tiny narrow country with no strategic depth and its strategic depth comes from holding

00:08:47.040 the west bank the problem is that the west bank came with an enormous number of israel of palestinians 0.99

00:08:55.920 and these palestinians pretty much wanted always to end the state of israel this was the

00:09:03.920 objective of the whole palestinian uh militant movement and indeed a lot of the political movements

00:09:12.240 that animated the palestinians so if we look at a map here you see that this is the west bank and the

00:09:19.840 border of the west bank is somewhat here and this leaves israel at its narrowest space at its narrowest

00:09:27.040 place with around eight kilometers of territory so strategically unless the palestinian state was

00:09:33.920 fully disarmed and was truly subservient to israel there was no prospect that the israelis would accept

00:09:40.800 it because it meant that the minute that there was a invasion eight kilometers is absolutely nothing

00:09:48.320 um the israelis would be overwhelmed their country would be cut in half and they would be defeated

00:09:54.720 so this was the thinking at the time and it obviously caused division within the israeli society

00:10:01.040 and within the palestinian society now on the uh palestinian side the reaction was for the most part

00:10:09.760 terrorism and so we saw a pretty long series of attacks you can see some of them here uh from 1993

00:10:19.920 when the peace accords were signed through 1994 through 95 through 96 onwards until an israeli prime

00:10:30.160 minister ariel sharon the same guy who'd invaded uh lebanon in 1982 built a separation wall that

00:10:37.920 completely put the two populations apart and that prevented the palestinians from being able to 1.00

00:10:44.080 access israel before that the borders were between the west bank and israel were largely open it's

00:10:51.040 just that the west bank was subject to israeli military rule and uh israel proper was subject to

00:10:57.840 civilian rule and so we see here one of you know the aftermath of one of these attacks it was

00:11:05.520 criminal it was horrific it mainly targeted civilians if you look at the areas that were hit it was

00:11:12.880 markets it was buses it was um civilian areas the logic behind it was simply to say to the israelis

00:11:22.480 absolutely no we don't accept peace and from the israeli right um their reaction was not terrorism for

00:11:31.040 the most part their reaction was political obviously because they had a functioning state and a functioning

00:11:37.440 democracy and there was growing opposition to the idea of giving this extremely valuable territory to

00:11:46.400 palestinians who would never actually accept the state of israel as being legitimate and indeed the way

00:11:55.040 that the uh plo and fatah the organizations that represented the palestinians the way that they tried to

00:12:02.080 sort of sell this was we failed militarily for now we have to accept the two-state solution the subtext

00:12:09.360 being one day we will overwhelm the jews and we will be able to defeat them this always was part of the 1.00

00:12:17.520 thinking of the palestinians even some of those in the so-called palestinian peace camp which was

00:12:24.080 you know a bit of a misnomer um as these attacks on civilians by organizations like hamas and the islamic

00:12:33.840 jihad uh increased in israel it became harder and harder to justify the idea of a peace agreement then

00:12:43.680 something cataclysmic happened in 1995 um an israeli gunman at 11 10 p.m as an outcome of murderous

00:12:58.480 criminal assassination attempt the prime minister of israel and the minister of defense mr nishak

00:13:06.560 rabin passed away he was hit by three bullets in his chest and his abdomen so the israeli prime minister

00:13:15.760 itzhak rabin who had signed the oslo peace accords and tried to figure out a way to end this conflict

00:13:22.240 with the palestinians um under the illusions of the liberal moment that we could all live in peace 0.99

00:13:27.440 together he was shot and he was shot by an israeli who thought that rabin was a traitor for agreeing to

00:13:36.480 cede the west bank and perhaps parts of jerusalem to the palestinians it wasn't a palestinian who

00:13:43.120 killed him it was an israeli and uh eventually the israeli right won the elections in 1996

00:13:52.800 there was a back and forth with a bunch of different elections and then in 2000 ariel sharon uh the

00:14:00.000 gentleman that i had mentioned uh as as the guy who invaded lebanon he becomes prime minister

00:14:05.760 and he becomes prime minister after going to the holiest place for jews and for muslims

00:14:15.040 in jerusalem and by doing so the palestinians believed that he had uh desecrated the temple mount

00:14:25.360 or the dome of the rock or the al-aqsa mosque uh obviously the original mount is name is the temple

00:14:31.840 mount i mean the palestinians call it something different but the actual name this is where

00:14:37.760 solomon's temple is supposed to have stood this is the original holy of holies for the jewish people

00:14:44.400 since the muslims occupied jerusalem they built two mosques there and they claim it as theirs and when the 0.57

00:14:52.240 jews enter this space the palestinians simply go wild and ariel sharon knew that and as part of his 1.00

00:15:02.240 election campaign in the year 2000 he went there and it triggered a mass uprising by the palestinians

00:15:08.640 a second intifada but unlike the first intifada this was absolutely not peaceful this was an insurgency

00:15:17.120 in the west bank uh mixed with a bunch of terrorist attacks inside israel and the objective was to

00:15:24.800 make the peace process fail and this is an objective that was shared with the new prime minister of

00:15:30.720 israel ariel sharon so we end up in this situation where the two sides have tried war from military to

00:15:38.400 military and they've gotten pretty much nowhere and the two sides have tried militancy in lebanon it had

00:15:47.200 succeeded because although israel occupied lebanon from 1978 in the year 2000 it was forced to withdraw

00:15:55.520 without signing any kind of peace agreement and for the palestinians this became the new template 0.83

00:16:01.920 they became convinced that just as uh the militancy of the lebanese of hezbollah backed by iran had led to

00:16:11.440 the expulsion of israel from lebanon something similar could be done against the israelis and this is

00:16:19.760 what animated hamas which has had a pretty long and deep relationship with israel for a very long time

00:16:28.560 this is what convinced them that the way forward was more militancy and they've been committed to

00:16:35.760 this path since then in 2005 ariel sharon the same prime minister who had helped trigger the al-aqsa

00:16:45.840 intifada or the second intifada or whatever you want to call it in 2000 decided that he was going

00:16:53.440 to give up on gaza and decided that there were too many palestinians in gaza so the israelis had to

00:16:59.360 separate from them and this was a policy that was pursued both in gaza and to a lesser extent in the

00:17:04.480 west bank so here's what had happened even as the israelis and the palestinians were officially bound

00:17:11.360 by a peace treaty that would lead to a palestinian state in the west bank more and more israelis

00:17:18.080 especially religious jews moved to the west bank and tried to establish settlements there both legal

00:17:24.880 and illegal now under international law these are seen as illegal but in reality this is simply the

00:17:31.120 right of conquest the problem with the united nations and all of the resolutions of the united nations

00:17:37.120 is that they don't recognize the basic reality that we are a conquering species and that part of what

00:17:44.480 we do is go and occupy land and colonize it and build it up for our children and that involves kicking

00:17:52.800 out the children of others this is part of our nature uh we've decided since the second world war to 0.55

00:18:00.080 stop recognizing that this is a part of our nature but i find that to be extremely naive and extremely

00:18:06.640 reckless so anyway the israelis were focused given that they couldn't fully control all of the west

00:18:12.800 bank and that they couldn't fully control gaza they were focused on controlling as much territory as

00:18:20.320 possible that would give them security and that would protect them against both the palestinians and 1.00

00:18:27.840 other arab groups and that would uh enable them to solve the problems that they face militarily

00:18:35.680 because after the experience with the wave of suicide attacks targeting israel they didn't actually

00:18:42.400 believe that a peaceful resolution was possible they believed that the only way to govern was through

00:18:49.280 strength and that the only way they could um keep their state was basically by imposing their uh military

00:19:01.760 dominance on everybody in the region this is in a sense also a little bit idealistic because although we

00:19:11.840 are a conquering species for us to function there must be some basis for peace that involves a level of trust

00:19:21.280 and a level of a mutual legitimacy um i accept that this land isn't is land that perhaps i covet

00:19:30.320 and that one day i would like to take but that right now it's occupied by someone else and i have to

00:19:37.760 face reality and do some business with them while accepting that they covet my land and i covet theirs

00:19:44.720 so in a way the oslo peace accords were too idealistic but the israeli position was too militaristic

00:19:55.520 and the reason that it played out this way was because of the mutually exclusive claims of the two sides

00:20:04.400 either these holy places are given by god to the jews or they are given by god to the muslims

00:20:11.440 this is what underpins this conflict there's a national element in that the palestinians claim to be

00:20:17.680 a separate nation from the other arabs i find that a bit questionable um they are civilizationly arabs 1.00

00:20:27.440 regardless of the details of their ethnicity they are civilizationally muslim more importantly uh the

00:20:35.600 difference between them and the jordanians and the syrians and the muslim lebanese isn't really

00:20:42.320 substantial um so there is this national element but underneath it all is the religious element and for

00:20:50.880 the israelis one of the paradoxes of israel is this as i said in the last episode israel was founded as

00:20:57.840 a secular project it was meant to be a national homeland for the jewish people uh not a religious

00:21:08.240 return project but as jews lived in the land in ever greater numbers due to the peculiarities of israeli 0.96

00:21:16.560 politics and due to the fact that more and more religious jews migrated to israel and due to the

00:21:22.720 fact that religious jews have a much higher birth rate than secular jews the importance of religion

00:21:30.560 in this conflict in this conflict to the jews increased very dramatically so in a way it's akrabin the

00:21:36.720 guy who signed the peace agreement with the palestinians and his foreign minister shimon perez

00:21:44.960 they were the last of the israeli secular generation that saw israel purely in nationalistic terms

00:21:53.920 and over time the thinking of the jewish population of israel changed and they began to see the country

00:22:03.600 in much more religious terms so for somebody who is a secular jew like rabin it was conceivable to give

00:22:14.640 the holiest territories in israel to a hostile religion and a hostile national identity like the

00:22:23.280 palestinians if you enjoyed this piece of premium content from the lotus eaters head to our website

00:22:28.480 where you can find more

The Podcast of the Lotus Eaters - July 14, 2025

PREVIEW： Realpolitik #4 ｜ The Errors of Analysts

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