The Tucker Carlson Show - The Global War on Christianity Just Got a Whole Lot Worse, and Ted Cruz Doesn’t Care

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00:00:59.940 Thanks so much for doing this. Armenia is famous, to the extent it's famous, Armenians are famous

00:01:07.880 for, well, being successful in business and quite cohesive as a community and very sincerely

00:01:13.660 Christian, observant. But probably they're most famous for being exterminated by the Ottoman Turks 0.83

00:01:20.880 at the end of the First World War, the Armenian Genocide. And I think most people don't fully

00:01:27.520 appreciate the extent to which that was religious persecution. That was a religious genocide and

00:01:33.720 they were murdered because they were Christians. 0.77

00:01:35.480 Tell us how we know that. Yeah. At the end of the rule of Ottoman Empire, the

00:02:03.360 after the Balkan Wars, Ottoman Turks saw that some Balkan countries like

00:02:08.480 Bulgari and part of Greece became independent and the Christian countries in the Balkans became

00:02:16.640 independent. After that, they felt some, you know, big risk in Christian population of Ottoman Empire,

00:02:31.760 like Armenians, Pontus Greeks became independent and they started to persecute the Christian population 1.00

00:02:40.560 of Ottoman Empire or to convert them to Islam. How it went on? When the war started between Antanta

00:02:51.200 and Ottoman Empire and Ottoman Empire, Germany and Austria-Hungary, Hungary, the Ottoman army came to all

00:03:00.240 villages of Armenians in Ottoman Empire and asked two questions, just the villagers or the people who lived

00:03:08.560 in towns. The first question was, will you convert to Islam? Like 98% of the population, Armenian population of

00:03:19.360 Ottoman Empire denied. Said no. Said no. And the second question is, if you don't convert to Islam, you will go

00:03:30.240 from here to desert of Deir-Zor. It's like 800 kilometers, 600 kilometers from Armenian highlands and all the men 1.00

00:03:41.040 were killed and all the women were taken with children to desert of Deir-Zor and will have lost the 70% of the population

00:03:51.760 of our nation because everyone, one and half million people, said no to converting to another religion.

00:04:02.160 We want everyone to know about this story, not just about the dark side of the history. It has a

00:04:13.040 bright message too that Christians in the 20th century were very, you know, they went in a way of Christ and they were

00:04:24.480 were sacrificed and we hope that all this sacrificial will bring the Christians of our days to more faith

00:04:36.560 to that what we have, the biggest and most humanistic religion that we accept and we must live with it.

00:04:45.360 So I didn't, I did not understand until we just had breakfast that the, the victims of the Armenian 0.99

00:04:53.520 genocide who've been talked about a lot. There's been a debate in the Congress for many years, whether

00:04:57.760 we can call it a genocide, whether that's somehow trademarked, but it was a genocide, but I didn't

00:05:03.760 understand that they were Christian martyrs. They died not because of their ethnicity, but because of

00:05:08.640 their religious faith.

00:05:09.600 There were no any problem with ethnicity. There were Armenians, like 2% of Armenians in Ottoman Empire were

00:05:16.640 Muslim. And just this 2% are living till now in the north of Ottoman Empire without any trouble.

00:05:24.000 Interesting.

00:05:25.200 The other 98%, every Christian Armenian who were asked this question, who answered that he will not convert to Islam,

00:05:36.400 were killed.

00:05:36.960 That's amazing. And so that, that kind of defines 20th century, 21st century Armenian culture. You know, we,

00:05:47.600 we stood steadfast in our faith and were murdered for it. So Christianity is at the center of Armenian 1.00

00:05:53.760 culture. Is that fair to say?

00:05:55.040 You know, it's the first nation who has ever converted to Christian in 301 was an Armenian kingdom.

00:06:03.440 So in 301, before Constantine, before the Roman Empire, 11 years before Constantine,

00:06:10.560 before Medellin Edict. It was 312, I guess. Armenia, like 11 years before.

00:06:19.040 He, the Armenian king, the third, converted to Christian religion and convert all our population to Christian religion.

00:06:30.800 And we are the oldest, oldest Christian nation in the world. That's why our church and our identity are so

00:06:41.200 already, it's the same thing, you know, the 80% or 70% of our identity comes from Christian values and our church,

00:06:49.600 values of our church.

00:06:52.880 Well, that's fascinating. And it's, I mean, the state of California where I'm originally from, you know,

00:06:58.800 the Armenian community is very extremely successful, but very cohesive. Like they, they have a sense of themselves

00:07:06.640 in a great way, I think. And that's why, obviously. So over the past 30 years, Armenia has been involved in

00:07:14.480 a number of conflicts, really a sort of long-running sporadic war with Azerbaijan, which is an Islamic country.

00:07:21.920 How many Armenians were killed in that war?

00:07:25.200 Almost 20,000 people were killed for defending a Christian population of Nagorno-Karabakh.

00:07:31.040 Yeah.

00:07:31.760 And at the end of the war, the last war, the Christian population of Nagorno-Karabakh exited,

00:07:38.480 like we, they, everyone came to Armenia. And now after 2,000 years of living in this region,

00:07:46.480 there is no any Christian in region of Nagorno-Karabakh. So...

00:07:51.200 There are none?

00:07:51.680 There is no any.

00:07:53.040 What I don't understand is why nobody said anything as that was going on.

00:07:59.520 Um, and why Christian leaders in the West didn't say anything while that was going on that I heard.

00:08:06.720 I think it's a matter of real politics, you know, real politics. We have a very, we have allies with,

00:08:14.480 um, like we have a very close relationship with Greek nation, with Greece.

00:08:19.440 We have close relationship with Cyprus. But even from there, we felt that we had support, but not,

00:08:31.120 you know, the support was just with words, not any actions. Uh, I know that real politics and the

00:08:39.600 help of Turkey to Azerbaijan, uh, make the many countries that were allies with us or were

00:08:49.440 in a good relationship with us to avoid.

00:08:52.080 Yes. They didn't want to get crossways with power, powerful countries like Turkey.

00:08:56.720 I understand that.

00:08:57.440 And this is what we have. Like, this is, uh, the problem we face all over our history because

00:09:05.520 the Armenian nation is in the center of a region where like Turkey, Azerbaijan, Iran,

00:09:11.520 and the only religious, only Christian nation of this, uh, from these three countries.

00:09:20.160 And always we had this oppression from the empires like Ottoman Empire, there is Kajar Empire and other

00:09:28.480 empires. And the only thing made us to be unite and, um, to save our culture was the church and

00:09:38.080 education from the church. Yes.

00:09:39.920 The schools, that church was built all over the country to educate us to be Christian and to be

00:09:47.840 an Armenian Christian.

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00:12:04.320 I was and remain confused by the role of Israel in this, in this war, Azerbaijan, Islamic nation versus

00:12:14.640 Armenia, Christian nation, and the cleansing of Christians for Nagorno-Karnebakh that the region

00:12:20.320 you just mentioned. Israel took a very aggressive position on the side of Azerbaijan against the

00:12:27.440 Christians using American tax dollars to do it. So Israel was a participant in this war? 0.78

00:12:32.000 The participation in Israel was the support of Azerbaijan by weapon. And it was a part of real 0.96

00:12:38.880 politics. But you know the problem? What kind of weapons?

00:12:43.120 Drones, like aircraft, aircraft and other. It's like not just defense and attack.

00:12:56.560 But offensive weapons Azerbaijan received from Israel. And the drones, many of drones and many of the 0.53

00:13:04.080 drones that were operated by, as we have read in media, by operators from these companies of Israeli companies.

00:13:15.840 So, wow. So you think there were Israeli drone operators?

00:13:19.840 Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because as many media told, like it was in many magazines and that...

00:13:26.960 So that would mean that Israelis were killing Christians in this war with U.S. tax dollars.

00:13:33.440 I mean, because the Israeli defense sector is supported billions and billions a year by the United States.

00:13:39.680 You know, the issue is about the real politics. They were, they are getting gas from Azerbaijan.

00:13:45.760 Gasoline. Gasoline. They buy gasoline.

00:13:47.920 I think the 70% of Israel gasoline is coming from Azerbaijan. And they have some type of economic ally.

00:13:56.720 They are allies economically. The main issue is today, real politics sometimes is like,

00:14:07.840 make a big problem for the nations who wants to defend themselves alone. In the regions, we are minority.

00:14:15.440 Yeah. I mean, of course. And that's how the world works. I just suppose from an American perspective,

00:14:21.040 it's like, why are my tax dollars being used to murder Christians around the world? Cleanse the 1.00

00:14:25.200 Christians from Iraq. Cleanse the Christians from Nagorno-Karabakh. Murder Armenian Christians. 1.00

00:14:30.240 Like, why am I paying for this? It is a problem. It is a problem. 0.99

00:14:33.440 Problem for me. Yeah.

00:14:34.480 So now you have a lull in the fighting with Azerbaijan, but you have a prime minister of Armenia,

00:14:45.040 who seems to be intent on destroying traditional Christianity or the church. Tell me what this is.

00:14:51.120 Yeah. After like last two, three years after losing the war in Nagorno-Karabakh and after making like all the people,

00:15:01.120 Christians from Nagorno-Karabakh have moved to Armenia, our new prime minister decides to 0.94

00:15:08.480 have a better relationship with Azerbaijan. Better relationship with everyone is always welcomed

00:15:17.840 by Armenian society. We are okay with this. But what we feel, we feel that Turkey or Azerbaijan had a

00:15:25.680 mission like made him to change the narratives of the church. And he wants to change the narratives of

00:15:32.800 the church. Forget the issue of genocide. Forget our history. And our prime minister, six months ago,

00:15:41.680 he started attack Armenian church and head of Armenian church. He wants to dethrone him. And he wants to

00:15:48.560 dethrone, to change the structure of Armenian church that is like 1700 years old. Because of taking control of 0.98

00:15:57.040 the church, the church is the main institution in our country, like 90%, 95% of our population are the members

00:16:05.440 of Armenian Apostolic Church. And when he started to attack against the church, our society was shocked

00:16:15.280 because nobody had done it before him, even, you know, just at Ottoman time. And many people in Armenian

00:16:25.600 society, they were against them, against it, but they couldn't say anything. Why? Because they were

00:16:32.160 afraid of some oppression from government side, you know. Armenia is a democratic country. It's, I think,

00:16:39.680 it's one of the last democratic countries in this region. In the last 30 years, we have elections, we have new

00:16:46.000 leaders. It's not an authoritarian country. But this prime minister evolves from democratic leader. Every

00:16:56.320 year we see he's changing to more authoritarian style of ruling because of a decreasing of his reputation in

00:17:05.840 Armenia. And now he attacked the church. He took to prison three archbishops.

00:17:13.280 He put archbishops in prison?

00:17:15.440 Yeah. Archbishop, for you to understand, it's not shock. We were, why? The one of archbishop which took to

00:17:23.520 prison because four years ago, in an interview, he said that this prime minister must be changed. The

00:17:30.320 second archbishop was in prison, was taken to prison because of like three years ago or five years ago,

00:17:39.440 he went into a protest against the, the prime minister. And it's, you know, and nobody like

00:17:47.680 from influential part of Armenian society, everyone were afraid of to talk about this.

00:17:53.200 Yeah.

00:17:53.600 The, you know, the city, everyone could talk who hadn't a business, who hadn't the influence, but

00:18:01.360 influential part didn't want to do it. And the one man who started to talk about this was my uncle,

00:18:08.080 Samuel Karapitian. He is one of the wealthiest Armenian in the world. So, and biggest Armenian philanthropist

00:18:19.360 of last 15 years. 15 years, he is the biggest philanthropist in Armenia. So, very many hospitals,

00:18:27.680 kindergartens, schools. And when he came to Armenia, he lives out of Armenia. He came to Armenia 0.89

00:18:35.360 and at the 40 days of his father's grave, you know, and we have a tradition to go to church at

00:18:43.040 at liturgy in 40 days of someone's grave.

00:18:44.960 Good for you. So, when someone dies, an Armenian dies, the family mourns for 40 days. 1.00

00:18:50.960 Yeah, yeah, yeah. And goes to liturgy. And when he came to Armenia and he was in liturgy, after liturgy,

00:18:58.240 after mass in the church, the journalists came to him and say, what do you think about the attacks

00:19:05.440 from the side of government, attacks against the church? And he said, like, it was 37 seconds.

00:19:14.560 What can I think? If a small group of people forgetting Armenian history, forgetting history of our church,

00:19:22.640 is attacking Armenian church and Armenian people. If the politician will not handle the situation,

00:19:30.960 we will take part of handling it by ourselves, our way.

00:19:35.840 Good.

00:19:36.240 It was 37 seconds. Do you know what's going on after it?

00:19:40.800 What happened?

00:19:41.920 What happened?

00:19:43.040 Like, after 30 minutes of this interview, our prime minister posted in Facebook that this

00:19:51.920 philanthropist must shut his mouth. After three hours, he sent police special forces to a residence

00:20:00.480 of Samuel Karapitian, who is the most famous philanthropist of the country, you know.

00:20:06.160 And everyone was shocked. We were shocked too. And these police forces came to his residence without

00:20:13.360 a judge order. Armenia is a democratic country. We never saw something like this. And everything was going

00:20:21.280 on was like cameras showed everything. So everyone knows that he said it 37 seconds. Then the prime minister was in

00:20:32.880 parliament. He posted something like this in Facebook and policemen came to the residence of

00:20:39.760 Samuel Karapitian. But what happened then? The demonstrators came to the residence of Samuel Karapitian to

00:20:47.920 defend him. Thousands of people came to his house to defend him from police.

00:20:57.600 And that day, usually when police come, like it's five minutes to take someone to jail,

00:21:05.760 you know, to police station. It was 14 hour. Demonstrators didn't want to let him to go to police station.

00:21:14.960 And they were like, bring order of judge. We'll let. The demonstrators told the policemen. And then, like, he decided,

00:21:28.480 he decided to go himself to police station to not cause a clash between policemen and demonstrators.

00:21:34.640 And after that, he was arrested. And I was arrested too. And my father, his brother was arrested.

00:21:44.880 What were you arrested for?

00:21:46.080 I don't know. And with the...

00:21:48.160 Just being his nephew?

00:21:49.040 Just being there. I don't know. And I remember we were in police station, eight hour, and they were

00:21:56.240 looking for an article to charge because there is no article in 37 seconds. I remember an investigator,

00:22:04.880 came to the room and said, oh, I phoned one article. And then the other said, no, it doesn't work.

00:22:11.040 And after seven hours, they phoned an article and charged it that he said that the prime minister must be dethroned.

00:22:20.480 But in this 37 second interview, you can watch it in YouTube. It's... everyone can do it.

00:22:28.480 There were no any word about non-prime minister and no anything. And he is now in jail.

00:22:34.640 Still?

00:22:35.040 They took him to jail five months. And the jail name, do you know what is the jail name?

00:22:40.240 No.

00:22:40.800 KGB basement. So there is that old Soviet time, communist time, prison, where the communists

00:22:48.800 like sent the people who were not agree with communist ideas. And he's there in 12 square meters

00:22:55.680 for defending the church and for this 37 second.

00:23:01.120 He's still in jail.

00:23:02.000 He's still in jail.

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00:26:22.720 Tucker for 25% off your first order. Highly recommended. Thank you. So this prime minister, who's clearly

00:26:30.000 authoritarian by definition, is against the church. So the idea is to break the back

00:26:37.600 of Orthodox Christianity and of traditional Christianity in Armenia and to use the police

00:26:44.960 to do it. Is this popular? Do people like this? It's very unpopular. Like 90% of the population is

00:26:53.920 against that. And our society doesn't understand why he is doing that. So his agenda, he's...

00:27:04.880 So Armenia is a traditional country. Traditional families predominate. I noticed that the prime

00:27:11.120 minister's wife was interviewed and said something to the effect that women in traditional families

00:27:16.880 are all unhappy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's, you know, he wants to change the society, but with power,

00:27:25.680 not with soft power. But the way he wants to change the society is very familiar to Americans. He

00:27:32.000 is focusing on transgenderism as a good thing, LGBTQ agenda, whatever that is.

00:27:38.720 Antitraditionalism. So not to the traditional families, like you mustn't care about your son. He

00:27:46.880 must decide like what to do, but if you want to... What to do, whether to become a woman or have sex 0.96

00:27:52.880 with a man or whatever. No, he hadn't said something like this, but mostly he's against the traditional

00:27:59.760 values. So everyone knows that he has an idea of changing our society, but with...

00:28:06.960 To make it less Christian. To make it less Christian. Yeah. Yeah. I guess. Yes. 0.95

00:28:12.000 Who's supporting him in this? This has happened in every country in the West, almost every country in

00:28:18.160 the, every country in the West with varying degrees of success. But who is, who's behind that? Who's

00:28:24.560 pushing this? Who's behind that in every country in the West? Yeah. That's a good question.

00:28:29.440 Is the, is the same people who is doing it in Armenia, they are doing it here too, I guess.

00:28:36.560 Oh, and they've been extremely successful. I mean, they've destroyed, uh, you know, our social fabric

00:28:41.600 with this. Uh, but who are those people who is, let's just stick with Armenia. Who's,

00:28:46.720 who's supporting this prime minister? The population doesn't support him. Who is?

00:28:50.640 You know, uh, I think the main issue, uh, when we thought why he's doing it against the church,

00:28:59.840 uh, we think that he gets some, uh, information from Turkey and Azerbaijan that you must change the

00:29:10.960 narrative of the church to forget the genocide, uh, uh, and to have a new head of church for being,

00:29:19.760 for going to a peace deal between Armenia and Azerbaijan and Azerbaijan. And we feel that he

00:29:28.480 wants to change the head of church to change, uh, then he will change the narrative of the church and

00:29:34.640 to make our people to forget all our like ancestors have done for our Christian religion and for being

00:29:43.840 an Armenian. And this is the, uh, thing that we must, you know, show our societies that this is the way

00:29:55.440 they work. They want to destroy all the historical truth for some reasons. The reason is to be in peace,

00:30:05.680 but we can't, we are very welcome to be in peace. But these people, one and a half million people

00:30:13.440 were killed already. They were killed for their religion. We must, the Ottoman Empire must accept it. 1.00

00:30:19.760 The Ottoman Turks or Turks must accept it because after that we will live in a more peaceful region. 0.99

00:30:30.160 Anyone who's forcing you to lie about history is your enemy. And of course, the purpose is always

00:30:34.880 to maintain power, right? Yeah. Right. Whoever controls the story, the past controls the future,

00:30:42.240 of course. That's why Wikipedia exists to, to lie to us about the past. So, um, last question that,

00:30:50.400 this is, I mean, by any definition, a grotesque human rights violation, you're arresting Christian 1.00

00:30:57.040 clergy because you don't like their theological views and you don't like their views of history.

00:31:03.200 So you throw them in prison. How many Christian churches in the West have weighed in on this,

00:31:10.320 have supported the clergy under arrest, have put pressure on the Armenian prime minister to stop

00:31:16.960 arresting Christian clergy? Like how much support are you getting from the West?

00:31:20.480 We are getting support from the West, from the churches.

00:31:23.600 You are?

00:31:24.240 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. There is a huge support and we are appreciate for, for this.

00:31:30.880 And I want to tell you, um, one more thing, like why these people are brave when they are going

00:31:41.040 like against the government's ideas. So my uncle, Samuel Karabitian and the clergy,

00:31:47.920 they could be realized, like tomorrow, if they say that they will not defend the church.

00:31:56.080 It's always the same story, isn't it?

00:31:57.840 Yeah.

00:31:58.400 So my uncle, we had like, they wanted, want to confiscate his businesses in Armenia. He knows it,

00:32:06.240 but he is, he wants to defend the church after that too. So he's continuing to defend the church.

00:32:15.840 And this is the idea. These are the persons with whom we must, I think we must learn something because

00:32:26.480 it's like in the first, it's like in 20th century when these Armenians, our ancestors were

00:32:33.760 sacrificed in Ottoman Empire for their religion. I am proud that Samuel Karabitian is, he can be free,

00:32:44.400 he can be with his business, but he doesn't do this for his religion because religion and faith

00:32:51.680 matters, you know, for it's important. Like the first Christian in first century, they were oppressed,

00:33:00.160 but they fought for their religion. And this is the case, uh, Samuel Karabitian faces now.

00:33:08.080 It's, it's inspiring to watch. It's, it's upsetting to watch at the same time. So Godspeed.

00:33:13.360 Thank you for telling us that story. Too few people know, and it's, it's not just about Armenia,

00:33:18.160 of course, it's a, it's a global push against this one specific religion against Jesus. So

00:33:24.560 that's what they hate. Thank you very much. Thank you for doing this. I appreciate it.

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00:37:05.980 I will say. Bob Amsterdam, as always, one of the people that I talk to most off camera about

00:37:14.940 what is happening to the Christian population of the world. It's kind of amazing. Thank you for

00:37:20.460 doing this. So, the situation in Armenia, the government of Armenia persecuting the church,

00:37:28.380 how is this happening without more international comment? Look, Tucker, as you and I have discussed,

00:37:34.340 I do not understand the evangelical movement, the Christian movement in the United States.

00:37:40.040 One thing I want to say, and I won't make many friends by saying it, in the United States,

00:37:46.940 Christianity has been subsumed by the State Department. The U.S. government decides what

00:37:53.220 Christians we support and what Christians we don't. So, in Armenia, there is going to be a prayer 0.98

00:38:00.180 breakfast. And I want you to understand, there's going to be a prayer breakfast while my client,

00:38:05.540 Samuel Karapetian, is in jail. Archbishops have been jailed. Clerics have been jailed. The leader of 0.75

00:38:15.580 the country is trying to split the church by going to services of a defrocked priest, a man who has said

00:38:22.080 he is going to remove the leader of the church. This man is being feted by American Christians 0.88

00:38:29.600 in Yerevan, Armenia, a man who calls clerics prostitutes, a man who uses language that, 0.60

00:38:39.540 at my advanced age, I've never heard a leader use against leaders of the church. And yet,

00:38:47.540 shockingly, this prayer breakfast is going to go on. And I call it a reputation laundering breakfast. 0.98

00:38:54.560 The U.S. government allows this to go on. What connection is there between the U.S. State

00:39:01.680 Department and the prayer breakfast? Look, I can't exactly tell you. I'm not privy to the

00:39:08.260 arrangements. But as I've seen in representing the Ukrainian church, the prayer breakfast and

00:39:14.920 religious freedom all seem to follow a script outlined by the State Department. And you know,

00:39:23.140 there's a lot of pressure from the administration on peace in terms of Armenia and Azerbaijan, which,

00:39:30.380 of course, all of us welcome. But it's happened at a tremendous cost to the people of Armenia.

00:39:38.120 There's tremendous cultural and church relics that are being lost and defiled. There's 120,000 who have

00:39:47.080 been cleansed from Azerbaijan. And no thought has been given to this. We have 23 Christian hostages 0.99

00:39:54.060 in Baku. And the prime minister of Armenia did not even speak of them when he was with President Trump.

00:40:04.960 President Trump raised them. I mean, it is shocking how Armenia has a prime minister who seems to

00:40:12.080 resent his own history as an Armenian. They've taken Mount Ararat off stamps. They don't talk about

00:40:22.220 the genocide. They attack the church. The leader of the country wants to remove and appoint the

00:40:28.480 Catholicos. Well, of course, he doesn't understand what an apostolic church is. To be an apostolic church,

00:40:35.280 listen to this Jew tell you about apostolic churches, you have to have a connection to the 0.75

00:40:41.740 first apostles, which means your election must be sanctified by bishops, by leaders of the church,

00:40:48.920 not a political figure. He is shockingly ignorant of his own religion. 0.98

00:40:55.720 It sounds like it's not his religion. I mean, it sounds like he's not a believer. 1.00

00:40:58.220 Well, I never will say that about someone. I agree. I don't know him. But what I will tell you is our

00:41:06.060 State Department has lost the meaning of faith. They have instrumentalized religion as a tool of

00:41:15.560 foreign policy, exactly what we accuse the Russians of doing. We have done it. Thank God our people don't 1.00

00:41:22.220 bless tanks the way Bishop Kirill did in Russia. But this support of governments, and we're seeing

00:41:32.700 it in this prayer breakfast, traveling to a country like Armenia with top leaders of the Christian

00:41:40.600 religion in particular, and doing all of this while we have clerics and I have a client in jail. And I feel

00:41:49.100 very personal about this because I was able to defend this client in an Armenian court. I want to thank

00:41:56.640 the Armenian bar for allowing me to actually speak in defense of the client directly with an interpreter.

00:42:03.500 I was able to deal with the court myself, and I thought effectively portray the absolute farce that

00:42:10.280 this trial was, and that these charges were with respect to Samuel Karpetian, who is an absolutely

00:42:18.400 unbelievably principled Christian, who is now sitting in his fifth month in jail, innocent of 1.00

00:42:26.680 everything other than praising God. And that's why he's in jail.

00:42:32.480 I just, I know I've asked you this before, maybe not as poignantly as I will now, but how did this

00:42:36.620 fall to you? How did you, I think, grew up pretty liberal or left-wing Jewish guy, wind up being like 0.89

00:42:43.640 the world's, one of the world's foremost defenders of persecuted Christians? Like, how did that happen?

00:42:50.360 Well, firstly, as a Jew, I am an inclusive person. If somebody has faith in God, almost any God,

00:43:00.020 I respect that. I feel the same way. And I was raised by a family that was deeply impacted by the

00:43:09.620 Holocaust. I have traveled all my life. I have sought refuge during riots or whatnot, whether it

00:43:17.760 be in churches or mosques. I just never feel proprietary and feel that all men of faith have

00:43:26.480 a commonality to it. I've been involved with the Orthodox Church since I was a young man.

00:43:33.620 We did a case against the Soviet Union, which a colleague of mine, Reg McLean, did most of the

00:43:41.600 work on. But Dean Peroff and I were young lawyers together, and he was a member of the Macedono-Bulgarian 1.00

00:43:48.500 Orthodox Church. And I took on that case 45 years ago, trying to fight a Soviet attempt at taking

00:43:57.700 control of a church. And since that time, I've always had an interest in these issues. And when, as you know,

00:44:04.360 I was approached by the Ukrainian church, and now by Karapetyan in the Armenian church context, it just seems

00:44:12.360 very natural as a Jew to defend children of Christ.

00:44:17.140 So it's just an amazing story. Thank you, by the way, for doing it.

00:44:20.880 So what is the latest? You have been the defender of the church in Ukraine, the Orthodox Church in

00:44:29.540 Ukraine, which is under almost unbelievable persecution by the government with the help

00:44:34.940 of the United States. Where are we now? You know, I want to be very clear, Tucker. When you say

00:44:40.680 persecution, that doesn't sum it up. I'm talking about torture. I'm talking about the theft of

00:44:48.340 churches. I'm talking about- This is not just we're cutting off funding.

00:44:51.800 No, no, no. I have pictures. I have videos. There's a trial going on in England where the

00:44:58.560 Ukrainians are trying to ship back a former member of parliament of Ukraine whose crime was to speak

00:45:07.260 out for the church. On the day they passed this horrendous bill to ban the Ukrainian Orthodox Church,

00:45:16.660 a bill that I would say has no comparison in Europe since the Nuremberg laws.

00:45:24.940 When they passed this bill to ban this church, this man had the courage to stand up in the

00:45:31.220 RADA, in their parliament, to denounce it. For that, Zelensky and Euromack pulled his security,

00:45:39.460 knowing that his statements would be highly controversial and perhaps deadly.

00:45:43.380 He realized that there was basically a death warrant. He fled the country on foot through a

00:45:50.960 forest, made it to the UK. Within 14 days of arrival in the UK, they were trying to extradite him

00:45:59.520 back to Ukraine for some hooliganism charge. And fortunate for him, I knew him. I knew when I had 1.00

00:46:08.620 met him in Ukraine when I had been there, that he had evidence of torture. We're now taking that

00:46:14.420 evidence of torture to the courts. Ukraine is a one-party, one-person, autocratic state

00:46:21.640 that has no comparison to any democratic values. Rather, today is a mirror of the old Soviet Union.

00:46:32.340 The man in charge of religious affairs is an apparatchik who wrote an anti-Jewish screed 20

00:46:41.980 years ago. He's the head of religious affairs. And by the way-

00:46:44.820 Sorry to laugh, this is so crazy.

00:46:46.240 By the way, hold on. Let me go a step crazier. He was a keynote speaker at the Religious Freedom

00:46:52.900 Conference held in Washington.

00:46:55.260 What?

00:46:55.500 Yes, his name is Yelensky. He was a keynote speaker. This is a man who spends his life

00:47:02.140 trying to destroy the Orthodox Church and transfer it into what is essentially the OCU, a state church.

00:47:09.720 He's a keynote speaker at a religious freedom conference in Washington, where there is a

00:47:16.800 happy hour sponsored by the Ukrainian government, where there are men in Ukrainian army uniforms

00:47:23.520 walking around. This happened in Washington, D.C.?

00:47:26.660 Yes, a number of times. And this is all going on while I, on behalf of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church,

00:47:33.820 we can't get an interview in any press in the United States. Censorship exists in this country.

00:47:39.200 Yes.

00:47:39.940 And when we got any coverage, it wasn't to cover the outrage in Ukraine. It was to taint me as some

00:47:47.600 form of Russian agent, a guy who was arrested by Putin, whose friends were murdered by Putin.

00:47:53.240 I am tainted as some Russian agent for speaking out against this criminalization of Christianity

00:48:00.460 that's going on in Ukraine. And by the way, supported by pastors who are very close to the

00:48:05.360 White House. And I don't fault them.

00:48:07.740 Wait, it's supported by American pastors?

00:48:10.280 Yes.

00:48:10.740 How?

00:48:11.100 They don't know. I mean, essentially, the Ukrainians are masters of disinformation, 1.00

00:48:17.920 absolute masters. They have their own sort of captive cells of religious leaders who are told,

00:48:25.600 essentially, look, we have black PR against you if you don't follow what's going on and you don't

00:48:32.420 support us, we'll take you down. I mean, the former president of Ukraine is under indictment for

00:48:39.980 treason. Nowinski, who you've interviewed, under indictment for treason, they've done nothing

00:48:46.420 treasonous. They just represent alternative areas of independent thinking. In Nowinski's case,

00:48:53.740 a religious man who supported the church. But they have sanctioned him. They have tried to destroy him.

00:49:00.240 And of course, they are within a hair's breadth of taking down the church, a thousand-year-old

00:49:08.080 church, destroying it, taking the priests out of it, removing all the churches, transferring it to 1.00

00:49:14.480 the state church of the OCU, which essentially is a cutout of the presidential administration.

00:49:22.040 This is, it's hard to, so we first spoke maybe two years ago.

00:49:27.420 Yes.

00:49:28.720 And I was shocked by what you said at the time, which is the government of Zelensky

00:49:32.980 is trying to eliminate traditional Christianity, the traditional church of Ukraine. And I thought,

00:49:39.480 boy, you know, when people find out about this, because whatever you think of Zelensky or Putin,

00:49:43.640 certainly Putin, you can hate Putin and still be appalled by this, of course. I thought,

00:49:47.940 wow, it's going to stop like that. Once people know, but it, it just kept accelerating. And I

00:49:53.560 still haven't heard a single, I'm sure there have been, but I haven't heard any American Christian

00:49:58.200 leaders say anything about this. Look, what is that? I will tell you that J.D. Vance,

00:50:05.100 when he was a senator and no one frankly knew him from Oshkosh, gave a statement in the Senate for

00:50:13.160 which I thank him every day in my prayers, that has kept, I think it's one of the key things. I

00:50:18.900 think you, J.D. Vance, and there are two young members of the Young Republicans, Catherine Whitford,

00:50:30.120 who is a co-chair of the National Young Republicans and is Orthodox, is actually leading a day of action.

00:50:38.720 And she has a colleague as well, who, who is, who is leading this. Those young people

00:50:45.260 have been, uh, along with, with our vice president now, the only sources of, of, uh, support we've had.

00:50:54.600 What about Franklin Graham?

00:50:56.400 He is speaking in Yerevan.

00:50:58.620 What does that mean?

00:50:59.820 He is the keynote at the prayer breakfast in Yerevan, Armenia.

00:51:03.560 With the prime minister who's putting clergy in jail?

00:51:08.520 Yes.

00:51:09.260 How does that work?

00:51:10.560 I, listen, I am, it may surprise you to know I am not working in evangelical circles. I have no idea.

00:51:17.980 I'm not either, but I'm very sympathetic to the, you know, to evangelical people, great people,

00:51:22.580 and I'm not against Franklin Graham, but I'm just shocked that Franklin Graham would.

00:51:26.840 I don't know, you know, having, having certainly being aware of him, I, I, I have no idea if he

00:51:31.560 knows. I, I think, um, because our government has decided, as has the EU, frankly, uh, that,

00:51:39.920 uh, they are going to go with the SOB they know. Um, I, I think the silence of the government,

00:51:47.020 uh, is something that everybody takes as permission. And I'm sure Franklin Graham is not aware that

00:51:53.800 well, has Franklin, I mean, you would think, and I don't mean to focus on Franklin Graham,

00:51:57.420 I'm sure he's a nice person, or I don't really don't know what he's like, but I'm not against

00:52:02.000 him. But has he said anything about what Zelensky is doing to the church in Ukraine that you're aware

00:52:06.700 of?

00:52:06.980 No, no, no. I, I, I honestly am in shock at the silence of the media in the United States and the

00:52:16.920 silence of, of the Christian community to what's happened. I mean, uh, thanks to Candy Stroud, 0.67

00:52:24.960 who you and I both know.

00:52:26.320 Great person.

00:52:27.040 I'm, uh, I'm, I've been on radio everywhere I can, but, um, you know, the Ukrainian effort

00:52:36.000 in Washington and with media is masterful. They have their own people in key media who continued

00:52:43.660 to write puffy articles about them. Um, never a criticism. The first time it ever came up that I

00:52:51.600 saw was the protests over corruption a few weeks ago, which led people here to scratch their head

00:52:59.860 and say, well, Christ, if, if Zelensky is so, uh, clean, how could he be trying to wipe out the

00:53:06.940 anti-corruption, uh, independence? And, and that was an eye opener to some, but, uh, you know, in the UK,

00:53:15.380 we wrote to the government to say, why aren't you doing something about the church? And they wrote

00:53:22.580 back and said, everything's great.

00:53:24.720 Everything's great.

00:53:25.720 Everything's great. I mean, the UK government is, is more hard line about Ukraine than Ukraine.

00:53:32.080 I, I, they, uh, the reaction of Europeans understand Germany is imploding because of, of this war.

00:53:41.280 I know. Um, it was obvious that it would four years ago. It was obvious. The second it started

00:53:47.140 to say, this is going to destroy Germany, which is really the economy of Europe.

00:53:51.940 And let's say something else. It's going to radicalize Germany. 0.91

00:53:55.400 Well, that is, that is deep.

00:53:56.920 And that is scary.

00:53:58.180 That is, it's coming.

00:53:59.240 And, and, and, and as a Jew, that is a very scary thing to witness, but it's, it's inevitable. 0.78

00:54:05.040 It's going to radicalize all of Europe. I mean, how could it not? Like, yeah.

00:54:09.500 And, and, and, and I will say to you that the, um, the behavior of the press has been the most

00:54:16.800 disappointing to me because I've worked with the press when I was fighting Putin in the early

00:54:23.260 2000s, uh, on behalf of, uh, one of his key opponents, uh, I had the press with me and we

00:54:30.340 would do interviews. It would, it was constant, but now that, um, St. Zelensky, um, is starting

00:54:39.780 to show a few cracks in the visage. There's still nothing about this ongoing torture and use

00:54:48.380 of secret police to destroy a church. Nothing.

00:54:53.640 What is that exactly? Like why most Americans, including certainly most reporters, most people

00:55:00.300 in the media had never heard of Zelensky until this war started. They know it, they couldn't

00:55:04.720 identify him. And immediately after it started, the loyalty to him, you know, blinded them to his

00:55:12.320 faults, induced them to lie to the public in America about what was happening. I mean, they just

00:55:17.300 became shills for Zelensky in like one day. How, why, what is that?

00:55:21.920 What's interesting? Cause we did a study. We looked at media in the United States because one

00:55:27.840 of the things that's frightening about the churches that are being taken in Ukraine is that very often

00:55:34.620 the people who take them and beat up parishioners and, and break the heads of priests, those people

00:55:42.140 have swastikas on their arms. Yeah, I noticed. So we found out that the New York times and other

00:55:49.920 papers had been profiling the rise of the right in Ukraine right up until the war. Now the Azov

00:55:58.500 battalion, which is basically a neo-Nazi battalion has almost taken over command and control in the

00:56:05.580 Ukraine. Uh, and you know, this is an ultra nationalist government right now that is pushing

00:56:15.860 a very radical line, but no one is covering it. But do you have any guesses as to, and I should say

00:56:24.820 you've been in and out of that region for over 50 years, you know, well, you know, I mean, I just

00:56:29.580 for, I could go on about your background, but I would just ask viewers to look you up or to take

00:56:34.700 my word for it. You know what you're talking about and what you're saying is true, but why would the

00:56:42.880 media again do that? Why are they defending actual Nazis? Like what, that's how deep their commitment

00:56:50.300 is to Zelensky. So what is that? What does that come in? Where does it come from? Well, you know,

00:56:54.620 it's funny because, um, Zelensky made all his money in Russia. Yeah, I know. And yet he's in charge of a

00:57:01.860 government that's debasing any guarantees of, of, uh, language rights for Russian speakers inside

00:57:08.300 Ukraine. Um, and the, the sanctification of him relates in my mind to two things. One, we have a,

00:57:19.600 a total breakdown in elite politics in, in Europe and to some extent, uh, in the United States. Yes.

00:57:28.860 Um, and, and secondly, I, you know, I stopped playing the market when I was 21, but I certainly

00:57:38.680 remember, you know, making a bet and watching it crash and then think I've got to double down to,

00:57:46.520 to lower my cost in. Exactly. And I think that's what's kind of happened here. I understand the

00:57:53.320 first one or the second one. I think you're exactly right. Like I was all in for the beginning. I can't

00:57:58.740 check it out now. Yes. Double down. And I sort of understand what you mean about the degradation of

00:58:04.380 elite politics, but can you put a finer point on that? Well, you know, look at the UK. I mean,

00:58:11.460 I love the UK. Yes. We have a government that is wildly incompetent. They even know they're

00:58:19.260 incompetent. Uh, we're going to have a budget that's going to destroy what's left of the middle

00:58:23.740 class. Uh, look at France, complete chaos right now, complete loss of direction. Um,

00:58:32.320 Italy struggling, struggling, but with Maloney, there's, there's some sort of strength there,

00:58:38.840 but many of the other countries, of course, Spain, Spain is now, uh, you may not be aware I'm,

00:58:46.520 I'm fighting Spain in a big way against their tax administration. We just outed in a press conference

00:58:53.140 last week. The fact that Spain is using Huawei computers to store tax information for Americans.

00:59:00.000 Not really. Yes. And not only are they doing that, but they have this discriminatory policy

00:59:05.840 towards Americans. They have 50,000 Americans. They have hundreds of thousands of foreigners.

00:59:10.960 They're doing discriminatory tax audits and basically stealing, stealing the money from foreigners

00:59:17.060 to try to subsidize a government that is the most corrupt government I've seen since Papa Doc

00:59:23.840 Duvalier. I think something like 21 indictments, the prime minister's wife, his brother, the general

00:59:31.820 prosecutor. I mean, what's going on in Spain is, is unexplored territory in the United States

00:59:37.080 and people don't seem to have any interest in finding him. No, zero, zero. It's a vacation spot.

00:59:41.400 And the, the king is flying to China because Sanchez is all in with China. Of course. And Venezuela. So,

00:59:52.120 uh, it's, it's astounding. And the rule of law is under such attack there that the EU is quietly

01:00:00.280 sending a commission to investigate in January, because everybody in Europe knows rule of law is

01:00:07.020 dead in Spain. So it's, it's frightening what's going on there. And, and this is what I mean about

01:00:13.280 the sort of calcification of the ruling elite. So, but what is that? Is that just a, now I'm asking you,

01:00:19.840 I'm luring you into philosophy, but I'm very interested in, I agree with everything you've said,

01:00:24.840 it's observable, it's provable, but where does it come from? Is it a natural cycle?

01:00:30.280 Or is it something else? You know, um, the cost of being a politician are so high. The reputational

01:00:39.820 costs, um, are so high and the, uh, materialistic nature of, of all of us now, uh, the loss of

01:00:51.340 ideology, the loss of principles, the loss of faith. Um, this leads to a, a loss in terms of the quality

01:01:00.160 of people entering politics. That's right. And, and you have a chaotic world situation,

01:01:06.600 which, uh, you know, there's a lot of fear. Um, and it, it leads to a completely transactional

01:01:16.640 foreign policy and more and more states are engaging in this transactional policies,

01:01:22.760 as opposed to following any form of ideological policy.

01:01:28.920 So it, it sounds like a part of a cycle then just as politics becomes less productive,

01:01:35.540 therefore more reviled by the population. These are supposedly democratic countries or not really,

01:01:40.620 but they still have the skin suit and people are mad at the political class. So that means that only 0.51

01:01:46.620 the worst people join the political class. Right. And yet fascinating what I'm seeing in, in watching,

01:01:54.020 um, the Orthodox community, the, the Christian Orthodox community and the Jewish community,

01:02:02.460 the Jewish community as a result of this horrible growth of antisemitism, the Orthodox community as a

01:02:09.640 result of the woke nature of many Christian churches is that those who are fundamental in their faith

01:02:18.700 are growing. Orthodox Christianity is growing at a massive rate. Oh yeah. Massive. I'm sure Orthodox 0.99

01:02:27.100 Judaism is too. Yeah. Because people are clinging to real values. That's right. And, and in Europe,

01:02:34.420 you know, quite frankly, uh, it's very, very hard to find inspiration in the United States. We have a

01:02:43.100 president, by the way, I think probably the most effective president in foreign affairs that we may

01:02:50.300 have had since Nixon. Um, I think he's incredibly consequential in foreign affairs, uh, on domestic policy,

01:02:59.980 on legal issues. I think the rule of law is in trouble, but I won't go into that. I've noticed.

01:03:05.580 No, I agree. But, uh, foreign policy wise, uh, he's, he's moved incredible mountains and I'm not,

01:03:12.440 I'm not just talking about the, the recent activities with the hostages. I'm talking about

01:03:17.240 as, as a lawyer engaged in Africa, the man has done more to, um, open up, uh, our eyes to the

01:03:26.820 opportunities in parts of Africa. He's made it much less risky to go into Africa as, as an American

01:03:35.640 in Africa over the last decades. You don't know how frustrating it is when the department of justice

01:03:41.400 opens up investigations. The minute, uh, American companies want to venture into, into Africa or

01:03:48.400 into Latin America. And now that's not happening. And now come American companies are going into

01:03:54.000 some of the wild West countries in Africa and Latin America. And I say more power to them. Why,

01:04:01.200 why would we just hand this to China? So, uh, Congo, most obviously, but others. Yes. Speaking of

01:04:09.700 African countries, um, all of a sudden, uh, not defending Nigeria. I don't have strong views in

01:04:16.020 Nigeria, but Nigeria has become famous in the last week as a country in which there's Christian

01:04:20.720 persecution going on. I think that's been, there's been a lot of conflict between Muslims and

01:04:25.960 Christians in Nigeria for, you know, my whole life. But all of a sudden it's a kind of centerpiece

01:04:33.000 of the conversation. How did the, what, what is the truth? You've been in and out of Nigeria for

01:04:36.760 how long? 50 years. 50 years. 1975. Is that correct? Yes. It's a long time. So you know,

01:04:43.420 Nigeria pretty well. I do. What is the truth about what's going on? Well, I ask, cause you've got 1.00

01:04:49.660 credibility, you know, the country and you're spending the rest of your life defending Christians

01:04:53.280 around the world. Tell me what the actual truth of Christian persecution in Nigeria is.

01:04:57.560 Let's be very clear that, um, the Nigerian government is populated by Christians and Muslims.

01:05:04.700 Um, I have represented, uh, in his earlier life, the national security advisor of Nigeria when he was

01:05:12.960 a young man. And, uh, he's, he's a lovely individual, um, and, and caring and, and, and, uh, universally,

01:05:23.060 uh, respected in terms of religious issues, devout Muslim, but universally respected. Um,

01:05:31.040 in, in my adopted family in Lagos, the Odesanya family sort of adopted me when I was a very,

01:05:37.900 very young man and, and living there. Um, I sort of have a half brother there, Dapo Odesanya.

01:05:45.840 That family is a totally integrated family, Muslim, Christian. Um, I was always teased that I was a

01:05:53.580 Joruba, which is a Jewish Yoruba. But I mean, um, there have always been tribal conflict.

01:06:01.040 I spoke to the foreign minister before I came here because I wanted to get clarity on

01:06:05.380 the government's position. Absolutely. Let's be clear. President Tanubo's wife is a Christian

01:06:12.740 pastor. This is not targeted at Christians. There are probably an equal or more number of Muslim deaths.

01:06:21.280 I am grateful to president Trump for identifying this Christian, these attacks on Christians.

01:06:29.980 Believe it or not, you can blame some of this on the French who had this. I do. I know nothing 1.00

01:06:35.560 about it, but I believe you anyway. They had a massive force in the Sahel. They armed the Toregs, 1.00

01:06:42.820 which are a notorious, notoriously, uh, aggressive, uh, tribal group that has, that arming has led to

01:06:52.780 mass killings of Christians. The, um, fact that when Libya blew apart, a massive amount of arms went

01:07:01.500 down to Boko Haram, uh, can't be denied by anyone. Nigeria wants to consult with the United States.

01:07:10.820 Nigeria wants assistance in protecting Christians and Muslims, protecting their populations. Nigeria

01:07:18.980 feels it has not had a fair shake from Washington. And I'm not, uh, you know, I don't work for

01:07:25.780 Nigeria. I'm not going to go on and on. The foreign minister is a close friend who I respect deeply,

01:07:30.840 but I can tell you from my work, I was privileged to represent one of the Nigerian states

01:07:36.560 years ago at Kwaibom. We, we won a case actually for them. Um, the, the Nigerians would welcome

01:07:45.560 American assistance with open arms. So this is, this is unlike Ukraine, which is destroying its church 1.00

01:07:52.040 or Armenia, which is destroying its church. Here you have a government that wants to protect

01:07:57.940 its populace, doesn't have the resources. Nobody's going to deny Nigeria has been wracked by corruption

01:08:05.320 all the years I've known it, but they want a new deal, a new relationship with Washington

01:08:11.180 and in part to assist them in protecting Christians. So when I read some of what I've been reading,

01:08:18.320 um, you know, I'm, I'm never going to say, uh, that Ted Cruz isn't a brilliant man,

01:08:24.700 but I'm going to say I, I might have a little more time in Nigeria than he does.

01:08:30.200 And I would, would welcome him to speak to the foreign minister or others because one thing America

01:08:36.860 doesn't need are more enemies. Africa is the future. I have said it time and time again, 1.00

01:08:44.680 I'm privileged to be counsel to the democratic Republic of the Congo.

01:08:50.360 We, you know, my firm has spent many years. We've just, we're still trying to defend the

01:08:56.220 opposition leader of Tanzania who Tundu Lisu, who's been illegally jailed, uh, a thousand are dead

01:09:03.320 protesting, completely bogus, fraudulent elections. And to the credit of the United States, at least in

01:09:10.360 the Senate, they've spoken out foreign relations committee has spoken out. We need our

01:09:14.380 administration and we certainly need the EU to stop funding this grotesque government in Tanzania, 0.98

01:09:21.100 but we have to stop looking at Africa as a security concern alone. And we have to recognize

01:09:29.080 that between their minerals and between the entrepreneurial spirit, Nigerian lawyers are

01:09:35.740 as good or better than American lawyers or British lawyers. I mean, there is an incredible

01:09:41.140 infrastructure of intelligence in Nigeria that we don't know anything about. All we try to do

01:09:48.100 is sanction and condemn. It is a horrible, horrible part of our policy that we sanction the hell out of

01:09:56.900 everybody. We, we are responsible for the consolidation of power in Moscow under Putin. If we were not

01:10:06.980 sanctioning the hell out of all these people who had moved to Europe, who knows whether Putin would

01:10:12.980 still be in power?

01:10:13.700 Exactly. No, it's, that's the truth. I know it's, it's so counterproductive that it's got to be part

01:10:19.060 of some sort of larger strategy that I'm too dumb to understand because it's, it's achieving the opposite 0.71

01:10:24.580 of the intended result. And let me tell you, um, I'm, I'm working in Iran, in Iraq against Iranian 1.00

01:10:32.740 interests. We have, uh, a woman, Sarah Salim, who is an American citizen, bravely, incredibly bravely

01:10:41.700 defending her interests. And, and those of the Kurdish in the North, and you know, the Kurds are going to 0.98

01:10:47.540 have an election soon. She's defending their interests against a wildly corrupt chief justice 1.00

01:10:54.900 named Zaidan, who is actually an instrument of Iran. And there have been a complete reversal of

01:11:03.540 her fortunes before the courts because of corruption, uh, against a group called the Hanna brothers. And

01:11:10.660 when we've gone to the U S embassy for help, this is an American citizen who, by the way,

01:11:16.580 was kidnapped and tortured 10 years ago, and has been fighting for her redemption and

01:11:23.060 for compensation against Al-Maliki and Zaidan and others. Our embassy pledges neutrality,

01:11:30.820 does not help this brave American citizen. How can they not help an American? Listen,

01:11:36.340 we cannot understand it, especially in a moment where the future of Iraq, which is

01:11:42.980 massively important to the United States is at risk. I mean, there's an election coming up in Iraq as well.

01:11:49.780 And the oil wealth of that country is, is almost unimaginable. And the issue is whether the Iraqi 0.91

01:11:56.340 militia will disarm, whether in fact the government, uh, that we, we not only have spent billions to

01:12:03.460 support, but we lost almost 5,000 lives. Whether that government, uh, will be a government, uh,

01:12:09.780 somewhat free of the corruption, uh, and control of Iran. Yeah. And, and, and our government's been 0.87

01:12:17.860 impotent. There's, there's a few people in Congress who have spoken out and blessed them for doing that,

01:12:23.940 but very few people have paid Iraq any thought at all. And yet we over concentrate

01:12:31.780 on Ukraine to the exclusion of almost everything else. So Ted Cruz is upset about what's happening

01:12:41.780 in Nigeria to Christians. I'm not against him being upset about that. You say it's much more

01:12:46.260 complicated than he's presenting probably more tribal than religious. I, you know, I don't know much

01:12:53.300 about it, but how much has Ted Cruz said about the, the U S funded destruction of the Ukrainian

01:13:00.660 Orthodox church? Nothing, nothing, nothing at all. Nothing, nothing. I mean, how can that be? Listen, 1.00

01:13:06.980 Tucker, nobody, I mean, I, the Washington post did a hit piece on me. A woman I knew quite well did a

01:13:16.580 terrible hit piece, tried to present me as a Russian agent. That was their focus. There was no

01:13:22.180 issue about what's happening to the church. None at all. And, and the funny thing, by the way,

01:13:29.620 is we are not trying to change American policy where you and I disagree as I've always been

01:13:35.780 totally supportive of Ukraine from a military standpoint, because my clients are in the front

01:13:41.380 line, right? Members of the Ukrainian Orthodox church are fighting and dying for Ukraine. Right. 0.96

01:13:47.940 And, you know, I don't know if you remember last time I met you,

01:13:50.740 I showed you a video that we had done of some young men in the army speaking out for the church.

01:13:57.300 Well, one of those young men has just died fighting Russia. And his comment in that video was

01:14:07.300 to the president, how do you, how do you want me to fight when my own church,

01:14:13.380 I can't defend my own church in my town? And, and, and Arsenie, here is a bishop. One of my lawyers

01:14:22.820 went to the jail in the war zone to meet Bishop Arsenie. He has been in jail 17 months.

01:14:33.140 He has no stomach. He has no stomach. He is horribly ill, horribly ill. He is a monk. He is a bishop. He has

01:14:42.500 spent his years devoted to a cathedral. What happens is we think after 17 months, they're going to release

01:14:56.500 this poor man in his sixties, possibly to die. They get him out for a moment and the secret police

01:15:06.820 arrest him again on the trumped up charge that he resisted the Russian invasion. He didn't resist the

01:15:15.620 Russian invasion, some completely bogus charge. And he is incarcerated again. It's a level of cruelty

01:15:23.300 and torture. I cannot express to you. And Cruz has said nothing about it. No,

01:15:29.220 really no one said anything about it. But Cruz specifically, and, but he's all of a sudden,

01:15:33.220 kind of out of nowhere, deeply concerned about the plate of Christians in Nigeria, which I want to 0.88

01:15:38.340 restate. Maybe a totally valid concern. I don't know. But that's weird. What is that? All of a sudden,

01:15:46.420 everybody's concerned about people who clearly have no track record of being interested in Christians

01:15:50.740 at all, including Ted Cruz. What, what is going on? Where, where is this coming from?

01:15:56.340 Well, in fact, what's interesting is they're calling it a genocide and a genocide under international

01:16:02.580 legal terms requires a, an intent. And certainly it's a very strange scenario where you have a

01:16:09.820 government richly populated by Christians, uh, and accusing them of some form of genocide.

01:16:15.700 The president, whose wife's a Christian pastor. So, but I mean, one thing I do understand is

01:16:21.460 coordinated propaganda and this is coordinated propaganda. What, I mean, is it?

01:16:27.700 Look, you know, I, I can tell you that the Nigerians have no idea where this is coming from. They've

01:16:36.260 wanted Washington's attention since the beginning of the Trump administration. There are 230

01:16:45.220 million Nigerians who long for a strong relationship with the United States, who are being cultivated by

01:16:53.300 Russia, cultivated by China, cultivated by India, but want to work with America. And we ignore them 0.97

01:17:01.300 until we condemn them for a genocide that is absolutely not a genocide. Yes, I support President

01:17:09.540 Trump's interest in helping out Christians everywhere. But let's, let's be fair to a 0.59

01:17:16.820 government who is working to try to protect Christians and doesn't have the resources.

01:17:20.820 But right. This is clearly, I'll just say it out loud. It's an effort to draw the attention of

01:17:27.220 faithful Christians in the United States away from longstanding persecution that we have studiously

01:17:32.500 ignored in Ukraine and, and other parts of the world. That is, I mean, it's obvious to me what's

01:17:39.220 going on. Does that sound crazy? No, no, because I don't have another, another way to explain it. And,

01:17:45.620 and one other thing I want to mention on your show is that, that we have this new white paper on

01:17:51.780 Armenia called Pashinian and the Persecution of Samuel Karapetian. And it's, it's available online and

01:18:01.860 it's at freekarapetian.com. And please download it and you will see a, you know, it's 60 or so pages,

01:18:12.900 but it provides the entire history of the persecution. But, you know, as, as you discovered the Armenian

01:18:19.700 genocide from there till now, Armenia has been a brave Christian country in a terrible, terrible 1.00

01:18:29.060 neighborhood. And, you know, I, having been in their court, having been in the jail, having met with

01:18:37.060 Karapetian, I am at a complete loss about the fact that I know they think that, uh, uh, they're going to 1.00

01:18:48.260 have this, uh, prayer breakfast. I believe one of the Trump children is going to Armenia. I'm sure,

01:18:55.700 uh, Donald Trump Jr. again, has no idea of what's actually going on there. Um, it's, it's a terrible

01:19:03.460 situation where, because you can't get into the media to tell them the truth, so many senior people

01:19:10.580 in the United States operate on ignorance and, and reputation launder people like Pashinian. 0.95

01:19:17.540 Well, I, I've been an unwitting participant in that phenomenon myself. So I know, like,

01:19:22.740 you don't really know what's going on. You get used. Um, I've been used. I deeply regret it. I'm

01:19:29.460 not going to happen to me again if I can help it, but I'm sympathetic in general to that. Because,

01:19:34.340 again, I've experienced it. But the Ukraine thing is anyone who wants to know about what's happening 0.87

01:19:41.460 to the church in Ukraine can find out. Like, that's not a secret now. Are there a prayer breakfast for,

01:19:47.620 in, for Ukraine? Yes. Actually? Yes. Does anyone ever bring this up? Uh, they're not. Our church is

01:19:53.940 not invited. To the prayer breakfast? Yes. We're not invited. The biggest church in Ukraine is not

01:19:59.780 invited to the prayer breakfast for Ukraine. In Ukraine? No, no. They're not invited. As you're

01:20:05.540 aware, when I fought to get into the religious freedom conference last time, we had to fight

01:20:14.740 to get a table to put information on. Then when I wanted to speak, they loaded a panel with

01:20:22.820 five or six other people. And I got about two minutes, um, to speak while the man who is in

01:20:32.740 charge of the destruction of the church was a keynote before a large audience. Who organized this?

01:20:37.940 Uh, this is the International Religious Freedom Caucus, I think. And, and, uh, I got a call

01:20:48.100 from Sam Brownback to say, if you do speak, could you be civil?

01:20:52.900 And I said, well, you don't know me, Mr. Brownback, but I don't have any record of incivility.

01:20:59.620 You know, that's not in my nature. Uh, I just want an opportunity to speak out for the people of this

01:21:06.820 church. Sam Brownback, former senator from Kansas. Yes. Um, he was running this? I think he was involved.

01:21:14.580 I have no idea. But I mean, did he speak out against the destruction of the largest church in

01:21:20.660 Ukraine at a religious freedom event? Nobody did. And let me go further. That is so bonkers 0.98

01:21:25.940 to me. Like I can hardly even believe what you're saying. Well, wait a second. What's worse is

01:21:29.860 they brought army folks. The people were in Ukrainian army uniforms walking with OCU priests,

01:21:39.860 that state church priests through the halls of this religious freedom breakfast, or I'm sorry,

01:21:44.980 religious freedom convention or conference. Um, and they had a happy hour, a happy hour 1.00

01:21:52.980 sponsored by Ukraine. That is like absolutely crazy. Are they gonna do this for, do this for 0.99

01:22:00.740 China too? A we, a Uyghur happy hour. Yeah, exactly. Celebrating religious freedom in China.

01:22:06.660 It's all. Okay. So last question, which I do think kind of sums it up. Um, you've been in and out of

01:22:11.700 Ukraine a lot. You've got, you know, of course, a huge Ukrainian client. Can you go to Ukraine?

01:22:16.020 No. Why? I'm under criminal investigation in Ukraine. For what? I don't know. I just know

01:22:25.140 if they've announced that I'm under investigation. Um, but again, it's no idea. It's like with

01:22:32.420 Karapetian, you know, they, they try to find something to get you on. Um, and they invent stuff, 1.00

01:22:40.340 uh, as you know. So it's, it's really, I'm, I'm very tempted to go and I may go again,

01:22:46.980 but I'd have no idea if I go, if I'll get out. And it's, to some extent, it's a bit like that with,

01:22:52.740 with Armenia because in Armenia, they've just arrested not only bishops, but now they've

01:22:58.260 arrested three mayors, uh, who spoke out and who weren't helpful as well as the family of the

01:23:05.460 patriarch, the Catholicos, the, uh, brother and, uh, some other relative, um, on, on again,

01:23:13.780 completely trumped up charges. It feels like we're moving very quickly to just kind of global

01:23:20.260 repression. It seems like liberal democracy has been so discredited. No one's defending it

01:23:26.340 and it's dying before our eyes. That that's kind of the overview from everything you've said.

01:23:30.420 Look, um, the EU has lost its way. There's no question. I think the EU is a tremendous

01:23:40.660 danger if it doesn't get its act together on fundamental values. You know, there's this

01:23:47.140 dialectic going on. Uh, everybody is afraid of Russia, completely afraid, paralyzed. I mean,

01:23:54.260 a Russian drone crosses the border and we're a DEFCON one yet after, I don't know, four plus years,

01:24:05.940 Kiev isn't taken. None, you know, I think there's been a 1% change in territory. So how can Europe

01:24:15.620 be so completely in fear of Russia? And yet at the same time, instrumentalize that fear to destroy

01:24:27.380 their economies, to maintain sanctions, to engage in, in wildly self-destructive behavior and fail to

01:24:37.140 maintain democratic values. You saw them throw out, uh, a candidate in Romania. You saw what they're

01:24:47.140 trying to do in, in Germany. You see what's happened in France. It is a continuous obliteration 0.85

01:24:55.940 of rule of law. And, and we have got to start getting back to first principles with respect to

01:25:03.060 rule of law everywhere, or we will lose it completely everywhere.

01:25:09.940 Bobby Amsterdam, I swear I check the news regularly waiting for an account of your arrest. I hope it

01:25:15.540 never comes, but you are taking actual physical risks, um, on behalf of people who don't have

01:25:20.660 power. So I'm grateful to you for that. Well, thank you for having me. Stay free. Thank you.

01:25:25.780 We've got a new website we hope you will visit. It's called newcommissionnow.com. And it refers to

01:25:40.180 a new 9-11 commission. So we spent months putting together our 9-11 documentary series.

01:25:46.660 And if there's one thing we learned, it's that in fact, there was foreknowledge of the attacks.

01:25:52.900 People knew. The American public deserves to know. We're shocked actually to learn that,

01:25:58.420 to have that confirmed, but it's true. The evidence is overwhelming. The CIA,

01:26:01.380 for example, knew the hijackers were here in the United States. They knew they were planning an act

01:26:05.700 of terror. In his passport is a visa to go to the United States of America. A foreign national was 1.00

01:26:12.260 caught celebrating as the World Trade Center fell and later said he was in New York, quote,

01:26:16.820 to document the event. I didn't know there would be an event to document in the first place,

01:26:21.300 because he had foreknowledge. And maybe most amazingly, somebody, an unknown investor,

01:26:26.980 shorted American Airlines and United Airlines, the companies whose planes the attackers used on 9-11,

01:26:32.820 as well as the banks that were inside the Twin Towers just before the attacks.

01:26:36.900 They made money on the 9-11 attacks because they knew they were coming. Who did that?

01:26:42.260 You have to look at the evidence. The U.S. government learned the name of that investor,

01:26:48.340 but never released it. Maybe there's an instant explanation for all this, but there isn't,

01:26:54.340 actually. And by the way, it doesn't matter whether there is or not. The public deserves to know what

01:26:59.540 the hell that was. How did people know ahead of time why was no one ever punished for it? The 9-11

01:27:05.300 commission, the original one, was a fraud. It was fake. Its conclusions were written before the

01:27:12.260 That's true. And it's outrageous. This country needs a new 9-11 commission, 0.93

01:27:17.780 one that actually tells the truth that tries to get to the bottom of the story. We can't just move

01:27:22.980 on like nothing happened. 9-11 commission is a cover. Something did happen. We need to force a new

01:27:30.980 investigation into 9-11 almost 25 years later. Sorry, justice demands it. And if you want that,

01:27:38.100 go to newcommissionnow.com to add your name to our petition. We're not getting paid for this.

01:27:43.780 We're doing this because we really mean it. Newcommissionnow.com.

The Tucker Carlson Show - November 07, 2025

The Global War on Christianity Just Got a Whole Lot Worse, and Ted Cruz Doesn’t Care

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