Latest / After Maghrib 🌙 / Syria's Media vs Truth (Ft. Eisa)

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Syria's Media vs Truth (Ft. Eisa) · After Maghrib 🌙

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It's finally here, the debut live aftermath rib event.
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Big names, huge event all coming together to celebrate the
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leadership of the giant Imam Ali.
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Ali, Saddam. Jump in guys.
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Maghrib. Go and grab your tickets for
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Timeless Resilience now. Bismillah Rahman, Raheem Salaam
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Alaikum Rahat to live in a car to one sisters.
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Welcome back to your favorite podcast after Maghrib.
0:53
Over the last few days, we have seen the situation unfold in
0:57
Syria. A lot of tensions rising,
0:59
escalating aggression and violence sweeping across
1:02
different regions in Syria. And this plays a role in the
1:05
wider geopolitical situation across the Middle East.
1:08
And of course, it affects a lot of us in the Western states as
1:12
well. So we want to continue our
1:13
discussion talking about the situation in the Middle East and
1:16
the ways, the way it's affecting people who are oppressed and
1:19
ultimately the role that we and our governments play in these
1:23
situations as well as, you know, brothers, sisters, we are
1:26
primarily a religiously focused podcast, but at times like this,
1:30
it's incumbent upon us to discuss the geopolitical and the
1:33
ways in which we have an active role to play.
1:36
So we're going to talk about Syria today, what to expect,
1:39
what's happened so far and where to go from here.
1:42
But before we introduce our special guest, it gives me great
1:45
pleasure to introduce the man who goes by the name of Said.
1:49
I need other ways. Now.
2:02
I know. How's it going?
2:03
You made me sound holier than that.
2:04
Hamdallah. I'm good.
2:06
Can't complain. How are you?
2:07
Yeah, I'm OK at Hamdallah we of course these are the days the
2:11
third narration of Fatimiya. So we are commemorating as we
2:15
speak. At the same time, of course,
2:16
we're seeing over the last few days, as I mentioned the the
2:18
situation unfolding particularly since last week Wednesday in
2:23
Aleppo and kind of the the movement from anti government
2:28
rebel forces in Syria, which is I think paved the way for a lot
2:31
of conversation and a lot of very interesting dynamics.
2:36
Frightening. And also at the same time, I
2:38
think eye opening for those who may may not have been old enough
2:42
to remember what took place 13 years ago when the Arab Spring
2:46
happened and the original kind of civil war took place in
2:50
Syria. So it's a good opportunity for
2:51
us to discuss this now, I think while it's still early days and
2:55
I think we have the right person on.
2:57
We're very honoured to be joined by political commentator,
3:01
journalists, I think someone we've all looked up to for many
3:04
years by the ESA, Alisa Ali Kumar.
3:06
How's it going? Good, thank you.
3:07
So. Much for joining us.
3:09
Thank. You.
3:10
Thank you. Thank you so much for coming,
3:14
Sir. Thanks for having me.
3:15
Yeah, good, Hamdullah. I can't imagine for someone in
3:18
your, in your kind of, you know, in your field with your
3:22
interests, the amount of hours of sleep you lose on a daily
3:25
basis, especially the last 14 months.
3:27
Yeah, it's, it's been tough. Fourteen months.
3:31
It has, as you say, many sleepless nights and yeah, you
3:35
know, constantly trying to get updates on the situation.
3:39
And unfortunately, it just seems to be expanding to different
3:43
arenas and lots of, you know, things to worry about like Rasul
3:49
Allah Sallallahu Alaihi said the the Muslim Ummah is like a body.
3:52
When one part is in pain, the whole body aches.
3:55
And it seems at the moment that much of the body is is in pain.
3:58
Where the genocide in Gaza began then, you know, earlier this
4:03
year we saw the, I guess the escalation in the genocide or
4:09
entities attacks on Lebanon. And since then, as you say, we
4:13
are going to discuss Syria as well.
4:16
So yes, a lot to keep up. With it's interesting because a
4:18
lot of people, I think for those who are not, wouldn't consider
4:20
themselves activists or maybe just general members of the, of
4:24
society would look at the situation now in Syria and, and
4:28
see it perhaps as a separate entity, an unrelated cause, a
4:31
different phenomena which is taking place.
4:33
But perhaps that's not the case. It definitely, most definitely
4:36
isn't the case when you look deeper into it.
4:39
I I think a key signal for that is seeing a day after Netanyahu
4:43
announced the ceasefire is when obviously the offense that took
4:46
place. Is there a coincidence there?
4:48
And and for those who perhaps don't have a backing with of
4:52
knowledge on Syria, is it safe to say that these are two events
4:58
which aren't mutually exclusive and are intertwined?
5:01
Yeah, I think that the first thing to note is that many
5:04
people treat this, I guess advance of these Takriri groups,
5:10
these rebel fighters, whatever people want to call them, these
5:14
NATO backed Zionist backed rebels or fighters is really
5:17
what they are. And in 2011, if anybody wanted
5:21
to have, you know, give some leeway to people for not
5:24
understanding the issue, I think it's so clear now what's going
5:28
on here. The main thing is that this
5:30
conflict never really ended. So as you've seen over the last
5:34
few days, you've had the expansion of HTS Hayat Tahrir
5:39
Shan, which we'll go into I'm sure later, the rebranding of
5:44
who they actually are from Aleppo, sorry, to Aleppo from
5:49
Idlib, which is where they've been kind of stewing for the
5:52
last half a decade. Having been defeated by the
5:56
Syrian government and it's allies, mainly Russia and the
6:01
Islamic Republic of Iran, which both of those nations extended
6:05
much support to Syria in its war against these rebels who had
6:10
received huge backing from regional powers and Western
6:13
powers. That war never really ended.
6:16
They weren't definitively defeated.
6:18
And these rebels were in Italy, protected by mainly the Turkish
6:22
states as a result of the Astana peace process, which was, I
6:26
guess, the process between Russia, Iran and Turkey to bring
6:29
the civil war or the war on Syria to an end IS.
6:33
That the one that's been happening for the last four
6:35
years. Yeah, so, so that's been going
6:36
on for a few years now. It's clearly in tatters now.
6:39
But as you mentioned, it's, you know, you, you look at the
6:45
context of why this is happening now.
6:48
And, you know, we don't want to, let's say, go over the whole
6:51
history because I'm sure the viewers are aware of it.
6:53
But for the last two, 2 1/2 months, we've seen the Zionist
6:58
entity expanding and escalating its attack on Lebanon, beginning
7:03
with the assassination of some senior commanders, then we have
7:06
the pager attacks and then the assassination of the secretary
7:11
general of the Lebanese Hezbollah.
7:14
And as a result of that, what you've seen is a ground
7:18
incursion which has, you know, not succeeded to how the, you
7:24
know, the Israelis assumed they'd just stroll up to the
7:26
Detani. They haven't.
7:27
They took casualties. The resistance there fought
7:32
bravely, objectively fought them to a somewhat of a standstill.
7:37
But of course, the Israelis have that aerial superiority and
7:40
bombed huge, vast civilian areas in the Vahir suburbs of Beirut,
7:46
huge parts of the South of Lebanon.
7:49
And so when the ceasefire was called or brought, brought to
7:53
the table, sure, you know, the the the forces of the resistance
7:57
were keen to ease some of that pressure on their own people
8:00
that you had hundreds of thousands, if not millions of
8:03
people living on the streets, sleeping in schools because
8:06
they've been displaced in an already small country, which
8:09
Lebanon is struggling from a financial crisis as it is.
8:13
And since that ceasefire, obviously Israel violated it
8:17
multiple times every single day. Yeah.
8:19
But it's no coincidence as you mentioned, that the very next
8:23
day this explosion coming out of Idlib took place.
8:28
And the main reason for it is to stop the resistance from being
8:31
able to recover, recuperate, resupply and not just to hit the
8:37
supply lines, but then to distract them.
8:38
Now they have to put resources towards stopping these Takfiri
8:42
groups who are genocide one hell bent on, as they say in their
8:47
own words, killing the Awafid, killing the Shias and killing
8:49
and oppressing the minorities and the other groups in Syria.
8:54
But also playing this function as foot soldiers for what the
8:57
IDF couldn't achieve on the ground when they were fighting
9:00
Hezbollah. And it it has to be said, it's
9:04
I'm surprised they didn't at least give it a week.
9:06
They did it the very next day that Netanyahu, not just the
9:09
ceasefire, but he by name mentioned the Syrian President,
9:13
Bashar al-Assad, and said you're playing with fire.
9:14
Yes, yes, yes. Considers them part of these
9:18
cursed nations. It's interesting you mentioned
9:19
all this. You know, yesterday I was
9:20
speaking to a friend and we were actually discussing, like,
9:23
what's our take on this? And we're not political
9:25
commentators. We're not really experts in this
9:27
field. We're not well versed on the
9:29
subject matter, by the way we understand it as normal human
9:32
beings, as normal Muslims. Is that Israel's facing defeat
9:35
by the Lebanese resistance? They said, you know what, how
9:38
are we going to weaken and thin the support of the Lebanese
9:42
resistance is by distracting them, is by weakening them and
9:45
making them busy elsewhere. And then we can come at a later
9:47
date, perhaps try it once again to weaken them even further.
9:51
And is there a plague? Yeah, and to heighten sectarian
9:53
tensions as well, right. So it's unfortunate that from an
9:58
Omar of 2 billion Muslims, the majority have not moved a muscle
10:02
to help Kresda while this ongoing genocide takes place.
10:05
And one of the key lines that the Zionists have been trying to
10:09
pursue has been how can we exacerbate sectarian
10:12
differences, which this aims to do.
10:15
And how successful they'll be remains to be seen.
10:18
You have all these influencers and others who are pushing the
10:21
lines and, and so on. And, you know, we can get into
10:24
specifically who they are, but there are also many who are
10:29
questioning as well from different denominations.
10:32
So needs to share also saying this isn't a coincidence.
10:36
So how successful it will be is down to us as well.
10:40
You know, getting getting the message out there that there is
10:43
one enemy and that is the enemy which has consistently committed
10:47
genocide against the people of West Asia since its founding,
10:50
even before 1948, what people would call Israel, the Israeli
10:55
regime. And it goes beyond sect and it
10:58
goes beyond even religion. As we know, Palestinian
11:02
Christians have been huge victims of Zionism.
11:04
So I think that's key. The other thing is like, you
11:07
know, I said that the war, the rebels had never really been
11:09
defeated. The war in Syria never ended
11:11
either. Throughout this whole time, the
11:14
Americans have been occupying mainly the North East of the
11:17
country where the oil fields are to stop Syria being able to fund
11:21
its recovery. The Zionists have been
11:23
consistently launching air strikes, mainly into Damascus,
11:27
targeting what they say are, you know, resistance forces
11:32
belonging to either Lebanese Hezbollah or.
11:35
Iran. So you're saying there's
11:35
actually US personnel in Syria? They have to happen.
11:38
Yeah, yeah. U.S. forces have been occupying
11:42
literally the oil. Stationed there.
11:43
And I think even Donald Trump said it as bluntly as that, as
11:46
we're there to protect the oil, so they're there.
11:49
And the purpose of this is obviously to stunt Syria's
11:52
ability to recover from the war, to leave it in the state it's in
11:55
now where it doesn't have the capability, it seems, to defend
12:00
its industrial city, Aleppo. It's the second city of the
12:02
country. Yeah, I think with a few
12:05
interesting things to note. And, and obviously we it spans
12:07
back to as we said 2011 and that period up until maybe 2014 or so
12:14
where you had the, the, the rising in the growth of the of
12:17
the rebel groups which are being armed and obviously had their
12:21
opposition to the government and the clashes that happened
12:22
domestically. Then of course the growth of
12:25
ISIS between 20/14/2017 ish, which is obviously quelled very
12:29
fast. And obviously the, the, the
12:31
ceasefire, which in 2020 or so had left maybe 60% of Syria
12:37
under the control of Bashar. And I said, and of course you
12:39
have then different factions. You've got the, the Kurdish
12:42
freedom fighters, you've got the Turkish interests in the north,
12:46
you've got the pro government and then obviously the rebel
12:49
groups as well. And until as recently as last
12:53
week, if I'm not mistaken, you had Putin and Erdogan
12:58
expressing, well, Erdogan expressing somewhat of an intent
13:01
or desire to, to rekindle a relationship or even a line of
13:04
communication with Michelle. I said, who he's not spoken to
13:06
in over a decade, if I'm not mistaken.
13:08
And then obviously this incursion takes place.
13:12
There are just as you said very clearly, there's very much two
13:16
sides to this. You have AUS backed, UAE backed
13:21
group and even the Turkish factions.
13:24
There's a report which came out and I think it was tweeted by
13:27
Max Blumenthal saying that no, yeah, it was USUAE discussed
13:33
lifting asset sanctions in exchange for break with Iran.
13:37
It's just obviously very politicized when we talk about
13:40
the regional desires here, the regional incentives and the
13:43
different actors which are taking place.
13:46
What I'm curious to know is and I think for people who want to
13:49
know how this directly effects, so you, you briefly touched on
13:52
it, the distraction element. The the fact that Hezbollah have
13:56
maybe in, in light of the ceasefire in Syria over the last
14:01
four years have been able to give more attention now to, to
14:04
defending Lebanon and Gaza, but now are split in two ways.
14:08
I think the question arises is, are they a weakened group
14:12
already after the like the ongoing aggression that they've
14:18
faced from the scientist entity over the last few months?
14:21
And do they have the capacity to fight on both fronts in Syria?
14:25
And then obviously once the ceasefire ends and obviously as
14:29
you said, they've they've broken the ceasefire.
14:32
As you go to press, it looks. Like, exactly.
14:33
Yeah. So how are they going to cope
14:35
Firstly and and secondly is is there hope for for ultimate
14:39
peace? But just to go, you know, to how
14:42
you kind of framed what was happening.
14:44
I think there's a key story, I think from 2017 in the LA Times,
14:49
which highlights exactly the extent of NATO and and Zionist
14:53
support for the so-called rebel factions.
14:57
Where there's a story in the LA Times in 2017, people can search
15:00
it where it says that a faction that's funded and armed and
15:05
trained by the CIA was at war with the faction that was armed
15:08
and trained and funded by the Pentagon.
15:11
So you had the United States's own proxies in this region
15:16
fighting each other and I think they were called the Knights of
15:20
the Righteous or something, the the CIA backed group.
15:24
Now that should highlight exactly the extent of which the
15:28
amount of arms and money were flowing in.
15:30
And as you said, you mentioned the UAE.
15:33
Now what's interesting here is that slightly less the UAE, but
15:37
the other, you know, countries of the Gulf at the time were
15:39
heavily supporting the rebels, in particular Qatar, Saudi,
15:43
Jordan, even in the South. Now none of them are out of
15:47
concern for their own, perhaps fear of it spilling over.
15:51
The UAE in particular has a deep hostility towards any Muslim
15:55
groups, whether it's the Muslim Brotherhood or anyone else.
15:58
But also, as you mentioned that article, they are now reaching
16:02
out to Bashar with a fig leaf of funding, with an olive branch of
16:07
funding and to essentially say to him, look, we can make all
16:11
this go away, fund your reconstruction, get Trump to
16:14
drop the sanctions, just leave the axis of resistance, which is
16:18
a deal he's turned down so far. Because, you know, Syria is key
16:22
to the axis of resistance. It is key to the supply of arms
16:26
to the Lebanese resistance to Reza before that, and even even
16:31
on a humanitarian level, the ability of getting aid.
16:34
So you see, like you look at us just being starved to death.
16:37
It's impossible at this point to do that because you have Syria
16:40
there, which is like a pathway, oxygen breath for people to get
16:44
food and other aid into the country.
16:46
Even leaving aside the, you know, the the military support
16:49
for Lebanon. And this is what the Zionists
16:52
are trying to cut off. So they do want to weaken
16:54
Hezbollah so that they may be able to defeat them in the
16:57
future again more easily. And can they fight two fronts?
17:04
I don't think in Syria the burden will be put on Hezbollah
17:09
purely. I think there are other factors
17:11
and players there. I think the Russians have
17:14
signalled with their air strikes and with some of the diplomatic
17:17
noises that they're not going to let Bashar fall.
17:20
But it's also key to note that obviously, you know, Bashar is
17:24
just one character in this. And, you know, you look at Iran,
17:29
for example, if he was to betray them or to take that deal or to
17:34
leave them, sure, fine. Well, we'll just have to find
17:37
somebody else who can fulfill that role because what's the
17:40
most important thing here is ensuring that the resistance
17:42
stays intact. No one is wedded to any one
17:45
person in that process. And, you know, Syria is key.
17:50
Without Syria, Lebanon. Do you mind if I sorry to cut
17:54
you off, but if you think of it from like from bird's eye view,
17:57
you've got Iran, of course, which has a lot of pressure on
18:01
itself, is at war with Israel, already has had IRGC commanders
18:08
and key influential figures targeted in Syria prior to this,
18:13
the beginning of this recent conflict.
18:15
You've got Russia who in the last few days has increased its
18:19
national budget, its defence budget to over 1/4, which is
18:24
nuts when you think about it like in terms of a national
18:26
budget to spend that much on defence is, is a huge amount.
18:29
And then obviously the ongoing situation with Ukraine, which is
18:32
burdensome on Russia as is. And then of course, you've got
18:36
the the sudden and unexpected hit which is taking place in
18:41
Aleppo. Now, when you look at it from
18:43
the outside, it may look like the the, the allies of the
18:47
Syrian government are weakened. And I don't know if that's a
18:51
fair analysis, but it's something which we're hearing a
18:53
lot in kind of Western media that, that the, the different
18:56
factors, the different actors at play here is, is it's, it's
19:01
maybe pointing to the fact that it's, there's a possibility of
19:04
collapse in Syria, which obviously they meant that may
19:08
lead to the obstruction and annihilation of Lebanon because
19:13
that falls within the Israeli goals.
19:16
Well, I've, I look, if we're, if we're to learn anything from the
19:19
past and from 20, late 2011, early 2012 onwards, it is that
19:26
just to take the Iranians, for example, yeah, they committed
19:31
everything to ensure Syria didn't fall And because they
19:34
understood it's existential, it's existential to the
19:37
resistance axis. It's existential to the Islamic
19:40
Republic as a as an idea, as a concept, just what they stand
19:44
for the values of opposing the Zionist entity and the Islamic
19:49
revolution itself. And let's not forget Syria under
19:53
half as al-Assad was one of the very few countries which
19:55
supported Iran during the war, the imposed war in the 80s when
19:59
Saddam invaded Iran. So I think you'll see a similar
20:03
level of commitment. Like I said, maybe not to
20:05
Bashar, maybe to somebody else, but they will not let the idea
20:08
of Syria being a part of the resistance axis fall easily.
20:11
As for Russia, you know, they have their own key interests in
20:15
the region, which includes, you know, the port in the
20:18
Mediterranean, which they won't let.
20:20
I don't think they'll they'll let it go.
20:22
I don't. I mean, I was seeing talk.
20:24
Yesterday of people saying, oh, maybe they'll support an aloe
20:27
aloe enclave around the, around the West of the country.
20:31
I don't think they'll do that. I think they'll fight to
20:33
preserve Syria's integrity. It's territorial integrity and
20:36
sovereignty. And if you know, you talk about
20:41
Russia's budget, military budget, and I think it's a good
20:44
sign. I think they understand what's
20:45
coming. And the rest of the Axis should
20:48
also understand what's coming because on January the 20th,
20:50
you're going to have the most Zionist hostile U.S.
20:55
President in history coming back to power.
20:57
And we saw what Donald Trump did last time he assassinated
21:02
Haqqasim Soleimani. He threatened essentially to
21:06
bomb hundreds of heritage and cultural sites, cultural sites
21:12
in Iran. And I don't know if that even
21:14
included religious sites as well, which which, you know,
21:18
would have been a big aim, to say the least.
21:22
Yeah, it would have been game on.
21:24
Now he's going to be back. And there are different opinions
21:28
as to what that means, but I think his cabinet picks should
21:32
leave no room for doubt. Unhinged.
21:34
Well, unhinged, but also perfectly logical.
21:38
If your rationale is to go to war with the Islamic Republic of
21:41
Iran, you have a defence secretary who's an open, he
21:45
describes himself as a crusader, an Islamophobe, a man who says
21:48
that Zionism and Americanism are one.
21:52
Because, you know, amongst the Trump base or support, there is
21:55
this Israel First movement, the Christian Evangelical Zionists
21:58
and others and the Jewish Zionists.
21:59
And then you have the America First people, people like Nick
22:02
Fuentes and other influencers and people in the base who say,
22:05
hang on a minute, why are we going to War 4 for the United
22:08
States Now? Trump, clearly, I don't know if
22:11
you've seen the meme, right? So it's Trump as a candidate and
22:13
he's he's like a crusader with a Christian flag.
22:15
And it's Trump as a president. And it's him on a horse with
22:18
like Israel flags all around him.
22:20
And that's what we're looking at.
22:23
His, his his cabinet picks have been heavily influenced, it
22:26
looks like, by Miriam Adelson, who donated over $100 million.
22:29
Her husband Sheldon Adelson is the was he died was the casino
22:34
mafia boss, a multi billionaire who single handedly, I wouldn't
22:39
say single handedly, but heavily funded Trump and called for
22:42
Trump to nuclear on and all the United States to nuclear on.
22:46
And so these are the people that we're dealing with.
22:50
Is the Axis prepared? Do they understand what's
22:53
coming? I believe so.
22:55
But it is time to understand that this is the final war.
22:58
This is it. It's existential now.
23:00
It's not. We're not going to deal our way
23:02
out of this. There's not going to be a
23:03
nuclear deal and everything's going to be OK.
23:06
And I think a more aggressive stance by Iran, frankly
23:09
speaking, has to be the order of the day.
23:11
And that includes nuclear weapons because you learn from
23:14
the example of countries like North Korea where when you have
23:16
nuclear weapons, people tend to leave you alone, whatever that
23:19
means in terms of sanctions and everything else.
23:22
Iran's found a way to deal with that for 45 years.
23:25
You won't be able to deal with an existential war on your
23:27
doorstep unless you have the trappings of a state the first
23:31
and foremost of which is a more aggressive posture, nuclear
23:34
weapons. And you know, we can even
23:35
deterrent deterrence. At the end of the day, look, we
23:38
all know we're all the peaceful people, but you also have to
23:41
make it clear to the world that we're not going to be eliminated
23:45
just, you know, like that. We go, you go.
23:47
Yeah. And I'm actually a believer that
23:49
if everyone had nuclear weapons, there'd be no more war, and all
23:52
because everyone would be a bit more cautious about it.
23:54
But unfortunately, that's where we're at.
23:56
So, yeah, I, I just don't, you know, it can't be stressed
24:00
enough that all of this. There is one argument, sorry to
24:03
say, Like, you know, we saw escalating tensions between
24:07
Ukraine and Russia. There's one argument that's, you
24:10
know, Biden's trying to cause as many problems, Trump on the way
24:13
out to stop him, you know, making a deal with Russia, which
24:17
would probably be at Iran's expense, actually.
24:20
So nothing certain there's some one thing.
24:24
I want to understand, I think maybe you can help me with this
24:28
is that, you know, over the last few days when I scroll on my
24:32
social media, when I speak with friends, even sometimes people
24:34
ask me a question, although I don't even have to answer it.
24:37
Who are these people? Because we see, you know, we
24:39
mentioned certain states involved.
24:41
So there's state actors and non state actors, but this
24:44
predominant group is. HTS.
24:48
HTS, you know, they come out and they make these videos, they
24:51
even make press press videos and they show they're liberating
24:55
land. They're returning, you know,
24:57
people back to their homes and things like this.
25:00
But who are these people? Because I have heard these.
25:05
Well, there is definitely a connection, not just heard, I've
25:08
seen like with evidence, people sharing online and things, but
25:10
there is definitely a connection that this is not like a group
25:13
that is liberating Syria. This is a group that's doing
25:17
dirty work on behalf of state and non state actors but are
25:22
affiliated to a Nusra back in the day are either back in the
25:26
day. Yeah.
25:27
Who are they? So hey, Taher Sham are the, I
25:31
guess the rebel group or coalition of note at the moment?
25:36
Yeah, which as you correctly say, grew out of.
25:39
So what you had at the beginning of these, let's be real, this
25:44
wasn't a civil war, right? Yes, this was a NATO backed
25:48
attempt at regime change, which in the context of the Arab
25:51
Spring, they thought would take a couple weeks.
25:54
We've bribed a lot of Syrian generals.
25:55
We've managed because there were loads of defections in the early
25:58
days. The Syrian army's defecting.
25:59
We have this Free Syrian Army, which is now going to replace
26:03
the Syrian Army. You know, it's going to go the
26:05
way it went with Gaddafi. Now the problem is that Syria
26:08
again had powerful allies. Iran and Russia with the main 2,
26:11
drew the line and said we're not having this.
26:14
And you know, Hezbollah lost a lot of capital because they had
26:17
a lot of support in the Arab world, in the Muslim world.
26:19
Iran did, Russia did, but they had to make that stance and they
26:23
did. So out of that.
26:24
The the Free Syrian Army, you just saw the groups getting more
26:28
and more radicalised and more and more extreme in their
26:32
behaviour, in their language, in their narrative, in their
26:35
threats to minorities, to Shia Muslims in particular.
26:39
And you know, you had groups like I think it was the Nora's
26:42
Nora Dina Zinke Brigades. We beheaded the Palestinian
26:44
child on the back of a truck here, a 14 year old Palestinian
26:48
boy. There's a video of it if people
26:49
don't search it. And this brigade are now
26:51
involved in the fighting, but they're under the umbrella of
26:53
HTS. And as you said, so you had the
26:55
FSA, you then had Al Nusra, you had ISIS growing out of it as
26:59
well, which with fighting between themselves.
27:01
But again, these are not ideological fights.
27:03
These are fights over turf. They all shared a very similar
27:06
ideology of, you know, establishing the Khalafa and
27:10
this and that. They've shed that now in their
27:12
marketing, right? So now you see Jolani, the head
27:15
of the group who used to wear turban and used to be very kind
27:19
of Islamic. Now he's wearing a suit.
27:20
He's become too, and he's holding press conferences
27:23
talking about we're going to protect the minorities and we're
27:25
going to do this and we're going to do that.
27:26
But there are videos coming up the last few days, Yeah, media
27:29
training because, you know, they're backed by all these
27:31
intelligence agencies, but also and Turkey.
27:34
But also he, you know, the last few days we've seen these HTS
27:39
fighters who were a rebrand of Al Nusra, al Qaeda essentially
27:43
going house to house, finding Rafa, the Shia, torturing them,
27:49
killing them. We're not talking about
27:50
competence here, by the way. We're just talking about
27:52
ordinary people living in their lives, going into mosques and
27:54
husseinias and desecrating them and so on.
27:56
So there is that public rebranding because there's an
28:00
understanding that we have to speak to a different audience
28:03
now. But it's interesting again, that
28:06
it seems like none of the countries in the region really
28:08
buy it. No, none.
28:10
None of the same type of Arab countries who backed the rebels
28:14
last time buy it this time or feel comfortable with it.
28:19
There's an argument to say maybe Erdogan has overstretched and
28:22
overplayed his hand, may find himself isolated.
28:24
I don't know. We'll have we'll have to wait
28:26
and see. But The thing is, it's it's
28:28
material realities. And as long as they're making
28:31
games on the battlefield that that will affect how, how, how,
28:35
how this goes politically as well.
28:37
I mean, we've seen, I mean, Jacob Sullivan, who's now the US
28:40
National Security Advisor in 2011 emailed Hillary Clinton
28:44
saying Al Qaeda are our allies in Syria, which is just, you
28:47
know, phenomenal. And of course that got leaked by
28:50
WikiLeaks. And you know, today it's just
28:53
evident when we see the interests still at hand and and
28:56
it's just remained as is. You mentioned Turkey as well and
28:59
Turkey who have rebranded their so-called like nationalist army,
29:06
you know, to be seen as freedom fighters with like very autumn
29:09
and heavy interests are are some of the factions which were
29:12
involved in the taking of Aleppo.
29:14
So they are this it's extremely complex, like you're saying as
29:18
well. What I want to understand is now
29:21
we've talked about that group and I know obviously we've we've
29:23
touched briefly on Hezbollah and the axis of resistance.
29:28
I want to understand how the the non state actors have a part to
29:35
play in this, specifically Hezbollah and other Axis groups.
29:40
So when we're talking about Hashda Shabi, for example, is
29:44
there going to be any intervention from from Houthis
29:47
or anyone else? I think these are questions
29:49
people are asking. The way we've seen in in Gaza,
29:51
different elements of the Axis take part in whether it's naval
29:55
or air or on on foot. Could we imagine the same thing
29:59
kind of taking place in Syria as well?
30:00
Yeah, look, just just just to make it, yeah, just to make it
30:04
clear as well, you know, when we talk about the American and the
30:07
NATO and and everyone else, it's a point that I should have
30:10
raised earlier as well. In the context of what's
30:12
happening now is we saw back in, you know, 2014, 1516, many links
30:20
to the Zionist regime, right where it extended to things like
30:25
Netanyahu meeting injured rebel Takfiri fighters in hospitals,
30:30
shaking their hands, pictures of it.
30:33
And I remember there was a show on Al Jazeera, Efraim Halevi, he
30:36
was the former director of the Mossad.
30:38
Yeah, being interviewed. By Matthew.
30:39
Hazard and being told, you know, you treated, treated al Qaeda,
30:43
he said. Al Qaeda.
30:44
I remember this, yeah. Yeah, went viral, he says.
30:47
Yeah, we did, because, you know, this issue firstly trusted the
30:49
humanitarian, humanitarian thing.
30:51
So then he's asked, well, OK, well then if there was an
30:53
injured Hezbollah fighter, what do you do?
30:54
He says, Oh no, no, we haven't. We have accounts with Hezbollah.
30:57
We have history. We go back long time with them.
30:59
They've attacked us a lot. And he says verbatim, Al Qaeda,
31:04
to this day, al Qaeda have never attacked us.
31:06
And to this day, that is the truth, right?
31:08
The opposite. They are attacking their, the
31:12
Israelis enemies. And there is a professor, his
31:16
name is, he is a Israeli Arab, kind of like Professor Mordechai
31:21
Kadar. He gave an interview on Channel
31:24
2, Israeli Channel 2, and he said, I'm in touch with these
31:27
rebel leaders. And they say if they take over
31:28
Syria and if they take over Lebanon, they will establish
31:31
ties with Israel and they will establish an Israeli embassy as
31:35
well. They're happy to do all of these
31:37
things. And they want weapons and
31:39
support from us as well. So, you know, these lines that
31:41
come out from some people, what they say, oh, you know, we are,
31:46
you know, oh, yeah, we'll defeat that after that and then we'll
31:48
March on Jerusalem. This is this is delusion.
31:51
This is pure delusion. And anyone who's listening to
31:54
this stuff coming out and thinking that's what's going to
31:57
happen, it's totally not what we've seen from every other, I'm
32:01
sorry to say. You know, force in the region,
32:05
which opposes the resistance axis is normalization and
32:07
Zionization. And there's nothing to indicate
32:10
that it's going to be any different here.
32:11
It's the opposite. We're seeing material support
32:14
for HTS. We're seeing media support.
32:17
We're seeing, in their own words, lines of communication,
32:22
and we're seeing, and it's just obvious to everyone to see with
32:25
the timing and everything else that this is an attack on the
32:28
resistance axis. So I think that context is
32:31
important because then when you talk about what will hedge the
32:33
Shammi do, what will Hezbollah do, what will Ansar Allah do,
32:39
Each to his own capacity, but I think it's clear from how we've
32:43
seen, especially in Iraq, people mobilizing.
32:46
They're not going to allow the spillover that happened in 2014
32:49
where you had ISIS mainly in the Iraqi context, made-up of former
32:55
Baathi officers marching and taking over half the country.
32:58
They're just not going to let it happen again.
33:00
Now there is an argument, different groups within the
33:02
hesitation because you know, it's an umbrella.
33:04
It's not all one group. Some are going to Syria to
33:07
fight. Some are saying we're just going
33:08
to be on the border. We're not going to let anyone
33:10
come into Iraq. But there are many, many men who
33:14
understand that, you know, this idea of nation states or state
33:18
and non state, This is this is non such thing.
33:21
They're, you know, like ISIS proof.
33:23
They're not going to stop at a border and go, oh, well, this is
33:25
psych speaker, this is Iraq. We're not going to move.
33:27
So they're going to have to mobilise and they're going to
33:30
have to take over. Not for Bashar's sake.
33:32
I don't know this notion that people are wedded to this
33:34
person. There's a bigger principle here,
33:36
which is the resistance to the greater Israel project, which I
33:40
think people need to understand is what this is all about.
33:43
Israel is a existential threat to Muslims of all stripes.
33:48
It is a expansionist, maximalist state which, as we've seen in
33:52
Gaza, has no qualms genociding and wiping out men, women and
33:56
children if they can get away with it and if there's not
33:59
sufficient resistance that they face.
34:02
And their vision, which they believe they've been taught in
34:05
the Torah and in the Talmud, is that, oh, this will stretch from
34:08
the Euphrates to the Nile. Now, years ago, people talking
34:11
about this, that's a conspiracy theory.
34:14
There's no such thing. Now we're seeing IDF soldiers
34:16
with patches on their arms saying, no, no, no, we're
34:18
coming. We're seeing them settling in
34:20
Gaza, that we're seeing them releasing pamphlets saying, oh,
34:23
yeah, we're going to buy beachfront property in the in
34:25
the South of Lebanon. Now, Hamdallah, you know, like
34:28
we say, they plan and Allah flatness, Allah, the greatest of
34:31
planet, the men of the resistance made sure that that's
34:33
not going to happen, not without a hell of a fight.
34:36
But now with all the focus on Syria, for sure it helps them.
34:40
So will the other resistance axis members just stand aside?
34:44
No, because they don't view this as the context of a nation
34:47
state. They view this within the wider
34:48
context that this is, which is, you know, aiding essentially
34:51
Israel's plans to, if not expand geographically to expand their
34:55
reach and their dominance of the region, which is what it's very
34:59
interesting. Jared Kushner, Trump's
35:00
son-in-law, after said Hassan Ashfallah was assassinated in
35:05
Beirut. He sent a whole tweet out and
35:07
they were very cocky in in a cock show at the time.
35:10
Oh, this is the plan. I encourage people to go and
35:12
find the tweet. And he essentially said, we're
35:14
going to do this, We're going to take out these people and we're
35:16
going to end up with Iran. Now after Truthful Promise 2,
35:19
which followed a few days later, there might be some pause
35:22
because actually Israel's offences melted because Iran
35:25
used their hypersonic missiles. And while for many people that
35:31
wasn't enough, it still gave a warning to the Israelis.
35:33
You're not going to have everything your own way and.
35:35
There's talk of True Promise 3. Yeah, which should have happened
35:38
the night Israel attack because, you know, you have to set that
35:41
line of deterrence. And just to go back, you know,
35:43
we spoke about the assassinations of, let's say,
35:46
for example, SEPA commanders in in Syria.
35:49
There are many within the resistance axis who as far back
35:52
as 2018 said we should have set the deterrence then.
35:56
So this notion of strategic patience has proven to be
35:59
unfortunately, a failure because you didn't reply when generals
36:04
were being killed in 2018, then it emboldened them to kill the
36:07
head of the Quds Force in Baghdad had class in Soleimani.
36:11
And people can debate whether the response to that was
36:14
sufficient. And now we've got to the point
36:16
where it's no, no, don't retaliate strategic patience.
36:19
And they've assassinated Hassan in in Lebanon.
36:24
So one has to ask themselves, has it worked, this notion of
36:27
strategic patience, or should we have set a deterrence?
36:30
So we're here where we are now. Yes, Trump is going to be
36:34
president in a month and a half. What I, I, I have my own views
36:39
about how that that needs to go. You need to set a deterrent.
36:41
You need to understand that there's going to be a cost, not
36:43
just to the Americans, not just to Israel, to everyone in the
36:47
region and everyone in the world.
36:48
Trump talks about making America great again.
36:50
You want $600 a barrel of oil? We can make that happen
36:53
overnight. We can shut down the entire
36:56
world's oil supply if we want, pretty much.
36:58
And then you'll have to dip into your strategic reserves, which
37:00
you don't want to do. So, you know, I, I, I think it's
37:04
time to get, take the gloves off because we're in a real
37:06
existential stage of this war now.
37:09
What about the the ordinary person?
37:10
So now when we talk about the, the media war in the West, the
37:15
information war, you mentioned Ghazovs.
37:17
He's been documented the most documented genocide in history
37:20
while it's taking place and we've seen and it's.
37:23
Just been totally pushed down the new.
37:25
It has. It has, I think, new.
37:26
Cycle. And I'm guilty of it myself
37:28
because I'd be like, like you said at the beginning, I'm
37:29
trying to keep up with Lebanon, then you're trying to keep it in
37:31
Syria. It's tough bro, honestly.
37:33
And every day the images come, I saw a video, the other, sorry to
37:36
interrupt. I saw a video the other day of a
37:37
young man in Glasgow and it just burnt my eyes.
37:41
I don't know of everything we've seen for 14 months.
37:43
And he's been shot with a he's a smoke canister and.
37:46
He's. Penetrated his body and he's
37:48
dying slowly and it's coming out and I'm thinking to myself how
37:51
is it not obvious to all of these people now cheering on
37:55
these Tekfiri death squads, these Zionist NATO proxies how
37:58
is it not obvious to you what's. Happening.
38:00
This is my this is my point, this is my question.
38:02
Like, how can you, how can you be so passionately against the,
38:07
the genocide and the oppression and the apartheid taking place
38:10
in Palestine and at the same time align with people who have
38:15
not even broken a fingernail of an IDF fighter?
38:19
Just what I mean and, and, and say that these are freedom
38:21
fighters and they're doing things.
38:23
They're we're standing against depression and we're pro
38:26
justice. And you can't, you have to be
38:28
consistent with your mentality, with your allegiances.
38:31
Just what I mean and what I struggle with, especially now.
38:35
And I was speaking to my parents yesterday and I was mentioning
38:37
to them that I think for the majority of the community now we
38:40
have to be extremely careful and we have to tread carefully.
38:44
And I think this is a message that we should share with a lot
38:46
of our parents, you know, with the what's what's up forwards
38:48
and all of that stuff that go around.
38:50
But be careful who you listen to and what, what you, what
38:53
information you consume. There's podcasts that I listen
38:56
to, which until very recently, I was a fan of or a fan of a lot
39:01
of their guests. And now obviously you see a
39:03
change in tone and you see like double standards.
39:07
And it's, it's crazy for someone who's been in media for so long
39:11
and who understands the sensitivities politically and
39:15
obviously like the moral obligation of a Muslim, what
39:19
advice do you have to people who are trying to consume
39:22
information and be genuine and honest in their search for
39:26
knowledge and, and like morality, if that makes sense.
39:30
I think it comes down to. It's easy to be deceived,
39:32
manipulated. If you don't have a overarching
39:36
framework for how you view the world, yeah, then yeah, it's
39:39
very easy. You're.
39:40
Going to be very delicate. Yeah.
39:42
You know, I've said this for years.
39:43
You know, it amazes me that, like you said, people can say
39:47
they stand with Palestine and maybe sincerely hold that
39:49
belief, but then stand against the only force, the only real
39:54
capable material force opposing Zionism, which is the resistance
39:58
axis in the very same breath and say things like, like I said, Oh
40:02
yeah, well, once we get rid of the resistance, we're going to
40:03
March on Jerusalem. This is delusion.
40:05
And it's born of the fact that when you don't have an
40:07
overarching ideology of your own, when you don't understand
40:10
who the enemy is, when you don't have an understanding of the
40:14
enemy friend distinction, you don't view the world like that.
40:18
So, you know, it's it's might sound very simple for many
40:22
people to say it, but. If you see a a state or an
40:27
entity like Israel which is built on genocide, colonialism,
40:33
Jewish supremacy, all of these things which view everyone
40:37
else's lesser humans and sub humans like this is how they
40:40
talk. If you view that as the central
40:44
threat to your existence then you won't be fooled.
40:47
However, if you're unfortunately many, as many seem to be, but
40:52
not everyone can delight, I think many people are seeing
40:54
through it. If your guiding force seems to
40:55
be sectarianism or this delusion that you're going to re
41:00
establish the Ottoman Khalafa or this Khalafa or that dynasty,
41:03
and you're living in the past constantly, or you're holding
41:05
grudges from hundreds of years ago constantly against people
41:09
you view as an enemy who don't view the world in a sectarian
41:12
lens, then you have a problem. And like, you know, you go and
41:17
speak to somebody in Lebanon whose house has been destroyed,
41:20
who may say I'm a follower of that debate, but I have no
41:23
regrets because I did it to stand with the people of Gaza
41:25
who follow another school of thought.
41:26
They're Sunni Muslims, but there's a bigger principle here.
41:30
These are my brothers and sisters being killed.
41:32
This enemy is vicious, brutal enemy that doesn't differentiate
41:36
between us. A genocidal enemy has no place
41:39
in this part of the world or anywhere.
41:41
And, you know, we gave our our jewel in the crown, if you will,
41:49
we gave you our best men. We, we've given you our leaders.
41:52
And we didn't do it on a sectarian basis.
41:55
So when you don't operate from that framework, it's very easy
41:59
to get LED astray. So what I would say to people is
42:01
first understand what's happening, really understand who
42:04
your enemy is. What does our last panel tell us
42:06
as well in the Quran about all of these events about Bani
42:10
Israel? You know, it's, it's, it's
42:12
something which is rhymed and, and and sorry, passed all
42:16
through history, the same people, the same mentality.
42:21
You know, in the house that we have whole modules about this.
42:24
And I think that that's part of it as well.
42:26
It's when you haven't been reared and understanding the
42:29
difference between a friend and an enemy, you can be LED astray
42:33
as well. Now you talk about, you know,
42:34
all these people online, There's, there's this, there's
42:39
the thinking Muslim podcasts, yeah, Muhammad Chahal and all of
42:42
these other, all of these other guys, Sami Hamdi, these are all.
42:46
I tried not to say any names or what else but I think like the
42:48
nail my head. Is.
42:50
Yeah, I mean, I was, I'll be, I'll be really honestly.
42:53
Like I was specifically thinking about thinking Muslim.
42:55
Yeah. And like, we're not, we're not
42:57
trying to obviously cause tensions.
42:59
Fine. I mean, look, with five pillars,
43:01
I think there's been, there's, there's some nuance there.
43:03
And I think from the last few days, what I've seen there
43:06
hasn't been, we know where they may stand or where their
43:09
sympathies may lie, but it's been the thinking most important
43:12
cast. You mentioned others.
43:14
Sammy Hamdi as an example. And now I don't know.
43:18
This is coming out. We're recording on Tuesday.
43:20
It's Thursday, I think, when this episode airs.
43:24
But it's going to be obvious that we're going to see a
43:27
certain tone come from that podcast and from from almost
43:31
like and certainly going to be Sami Hamdi.
43:33
And it's going to be a narrative which is very like anti
43:36
resistance and so on. Whereas you know, they've a name
43:40
has been made out of being pro Palestinian and supporting the
43:44
the oppressed in Palestine and so on.
43:45
I'm sorry, what? What have they done in
43:48
Palestine? I'm sorry to say it.
43:49
What? What specifically?
43:51
I'm talking about people who follow whatever Muslim
43:54
Brotherhood ideological bent they are upon what, what have
43:58
you actually done in a material sense to support Palestine,
44:01
support the resistance of Palestine to do anything.
44:04
And it seems all of a sudden they found their voices and in
44:07
in Syria and, and even with like, for example, you know, all
44:11
of these, these podcasts and people like Sami Hamdi, they,
44:16
they, I don't know if they're fooling themselves or they're
44:18
fooling their listeners, but one line they like to push is that,
44:21
Oh, well, actually the Iranians and the Israelis are in a secret
44:24
conspiracy and the lives. Of each other.
44:25
They're in bed together. I don't know if this is what a
44:27
conspiracy looks like because from what I can see, you have
44:30
many countries in the region which have openly normalized
44:33
with Israel, which are opening embassies or have embassies open
44:37
which are which, including Turkey.
44:40
And this is the crux of the matter.
44:41
Throughout this genocide, Turkey has continuously supplied Israel
44:45
with oil, gas, food and all other things to sustain.
44:50
It's not mistaken. Or through secret ships, through
44:53
different label chips and so on. So how can you now turn around
44:57
and, you know, you get these big bloviating speeches by Erdogan
45:00
about we're going to March into Palestine?
45:01
That's what it is. He's he's, he's appeasing his
45:05
the populist opinion. Sure, that's fine, but then
45:07
you're the host of, you know, widely watched podcast or you're
45:11
a self styled political analyst and and consultant and whatever
45:15
else you call yourself. Do you think people are stupid?
45:19
You can't, you can't. You can't look through this.
45:21
Do you think there may be elements of sectarianism?
45:23
Massively and unfortunately, this is this is it.
45:25
It's it's, I would say motivated by sectarianism and motivated by
45:32
me, by an element of and I've always felt this, you know, for
45:36
many years, sure, the the Shias were an irrelevance on the world
45:40
stage. Since 1979, they haven't been.
45:44
And maybe there's an element of why are they doing it and not
45:48
us. Well, that's a good question.
45:49
Why? Why help us?
45:51
All Muslims should unite. All Muslims should be together
45:54
to deal and focus on this threat.
45:57
And yeah, sadly, you always see it seem to you know it.
46:02
There's there's that funny meme that goes around that when it's
46:04
Palestine, we're weak. Pray for us all.
46:07
The only needs your prayers when it comes to Syria or Iraq or
46:09
anywhere else. It's right time to go lads.
46:12
Time to strap on your. Boots, that's not true.
46:14
I remember back, I think in the year maybe 2011, approaching
46:19
close to 2012, where there was like fatwas calling for charge
46:22
to go off to Syria. Where are you now with us?
46:25
Well, to be, and again, to be fair to a lot of the other
46:27
countries in the region, that's not happening at this point.
46:29
Many of them are very, very worried about where this can end
46:33
up because what happened last time ISIS developed out of it,
46:36
you had the sons of, you know, some of the biggest, most
46:40
powerful families in the Khalid ending up joining them.
46:43
And, you know, famous videos of them burning their passports and
46:46
giving their allegiance to, to the to the Islamic State.
46:49
Mass death, but 60,060 thousand people died in the first year
46:53
and a half of that the the since 2011 is crazy.
46:56
So, so if you think like from their perspective, they don't
46:59
want that kind of instability for themselves.
47:01
So we haven't seen that element of, of it, which may lead to it,
47:06
you know, not lasting as long as as last time.
47:08
But again, you know, as we saw Mohammed bin Salman and Mohammed
47:11
bin Zayed meeting a day or two ago.
47:15
And the line seems to be that they're going to offer some kind
47:20
of carrot to Bashar al-Assad to try to to try to draw him away
47:23
from the resistance axis. He seems to have held firm so
47:28
far. You think, But yeah, like the
47:32
alleviation of sanction and stuff like that, too.
47:35
And that just goes to show what the ultimate goal is or what the
47:38
ultimate reasoning behind the conflict is.
47:42
Weaken the axis. Continue, you know, crack on.
47:44
And like you're saying, it's what may have seemed like a
47:48
conspiracy theory is very real. Like, logically speaking, pull
47:52
away from the axis. Give leeway to the genocide or
47:57
entity of Israel to make, you know, advances into Lebanon and
48:01
to continue their offensive. And it's, it is very
48:05
complicated, like we said, the beginnings of minefield.
48:07
But in many ways it's also very black and white.
48:09
It's, it's Huck and Barton. And there's two very clear
48:13
distinctive groups here. And I think the majority of the
48:17
community until now has been a bit in confusion when it comes
48:21
to Syria and, and the the alliances at play and so on.
48:25
But it is very much this side or that.
48:27
I've got $1,000,000 question basically, you know, we asked
48:30
the question the other day, just actually, yeah, the other day by
48:34
the time this is a few hours ago on our on our Instagram and we
48:37
told, we asked a few people, you know, send in some questions you
48:40
may have on the events regarding in Syria.
48:42
And one of them that kept popping up was is Assad actually
48:46
king like people or for example, is there any genuine people part
48:54
of these rebels that really want to see the liberation of Syria?
48:58
Is everything makes like I miss all of this noise.
49:00
Is there a genuine cry for help in Syria?
49:02
Look. If, if, if someone wants to say
49:08
that every single person or every single soldier who's
49:12
fighting in HTS is, you know, some automaton who's getting his
49:16
instructions from Israel in his ears, No, that's not the case.
49:19
Of course, you know, people have different motivations.
49:21
And we were discussing earlier, few, few friends that at the
49:26
very, very, very beginning of 2011 when the Arab Spring, which
49:32
for me all the evidence suggests was a regime change operation by
49:38
Western funded NGOs to bring about change in the region for
49:42
their benefit. Some went their way, some
49:44
didn't. Some of the dictators were
49:47
backed by the West, some weren't.
49:49
And at the very early times in Syria, there were people who
49:54
were protesting because I think there had been a drought.
49:56
That's that previous winter. And things started off, you
50:01
know, people have legitimate grievances everywhere.
50:03
There's a difference between people who have legitimate
50:05
grievances, of course, and we should recognize that
50:07
everywhere. Then very quickly you saw it
50:10
spiralling to the point where it did become very sectarian in
50:14
nature. You had, I remember watching the
50:18
video as early as I think it was July 2011 of Shias being thrown
50:22
off a bridge. And the language in that video
50:25
was like explicitly sectarian. There was no, there's nothing to
50:28
be left in doubt. This is we're going to kill the
50:30
Mercedes, we're going to kill the Rwaffes, the nurseries being
50:34
a kind of derography term, hi Louise and Rafa, the about the
50:36
Shias and so on and so forth. So sure, there are probably
50:41
people originally who have legitimate, you know,
50:44
grievances, let's say. I'm sure there's people who in
50:47
the last 10 years have lost family members and so on and so
50:51
forth. But, you know, I always point to
50:54
this story, and it's a very personal story to me.
50:57
I've never really, really revealed this to anyone.
50:59
Now, in my family, I had my grandfather and two of my uncles
51:05
who were executed by Saddam Hussein.
51:08
They were Shahida, and thank you.
51:12
And, you know, I grew up in a house where Saddam was the
51:15
epitome of evil. And he was.
51:17
But when 2003 came, I was on the streets and marching and
51:21
protesting with millions of other people against the war in
51:23
Iraq. And I even at one point got
51:25
arrested because a few of us broke away and we were blocking
51:27
Oxford Street. And then they marched us and
51:30
they let us go in the end. So technically, I wasn't
51:31
arrested. I was detained.
51:32
And we were marched off Oxford Street into where the old U.S.
51:35
embassy used to be and penned in and kettled.
51:37
And then they eventually let us go.
51:40
There was a guy next to me that I started chatting to who was an
51:42
English anti war activist. And I was explaining, we were
51:45
talking, explaining my story. I said my family so on we've had
51:47
Shah this and that. So so why are you here?
51:50
I said this is a good question. I was only 19 at the time.
51:54
And I said, look as much as my personal pain and I grew up and
51:58
my grandmother, God rest her soul.
51:59
My BB used to sleep with the lights on because she was so
52:02
terrified of the dark that someone would come and take her
52:05
that she had this generational trauma deep into her 80s.
52:08
And my family and my my other uncle who came home from school
52:11
that day, he was 12 years old and his friend was riding on his
52:15
bike and came and told him don't go home.
52:16
The army are at your house and arresting everyone who slept on
52:19
the street for three weeks had to go on his own to somehow to
52:23
Kurdistan to Iran and fled. So we have deep trauma in our
52:26
family. And yet I was still protesting
52:28
against the wall because I understood, first of all, how
52:31
can the people who funded Saddam, armed Saddam, trained
52:34
him from when he was a young Baathist activist in 1958 to
52:38
overthrow Abdul Kareem Carson? How can these same people come
52:41
over, come along, and after funding him and supporting him
52:44
and helping him in the Iran Iraq war and everything they did turn
52:47
around and save me? First of all, I don't buy it.
52:50
Second of all, we know from the history of imperialism that none
52:53
of these interventions are for their people and freedom, right?
52:57
So this is what I go back to when I talk about when you have
53:00
a vision in your head of who the bigger enemy is.
53:02
Doesn't mean I was on the streets protesting for Saddam
53:04
Hussein or I wanted him to, you know, oh, he's he's he's a great
53:08
leader. I've got blood.
53:10
I've got skin in the game. But I understand that sometimes
53:13
you have to look at the bigger picture and understand that what
53:16
comes next may be worse. And, you know, people can argue
53:18
about it. Hundreds of thousands killed by
53:21
the American, the occupation of Iraq, all the chaos that
53:25
followed the rise of ISIS and everything else.
53:28
I know there's a counter argument.
53:29
Now we can do Ziara and everything.
53:31
We are more free and cure is great for the disease.
53:33
But it's not just that it's it's but we don't want you to do it
53:37
for us. Now we had our own resistance
53:38
movements. We had our own freedom movements
53:40
and we had our own activists throughout the 80s and 90s was
53:43
still resisting sat down. So that's my message to them as
53:47
well. And I tell you that as someone
53:48
who has, like I say, skin in the game, if you know you have been
53:52
oppressed by someone like Bashar, I'm not here to tell you
53:55
that, you know, none of this happened or, you know, be a
53:58
denialist. But I'm saying that when you
54:00
understand what imperialism is, what the West represents, what
54:03
Zionism is now, and the Greater Israel Project, that should lead
54:07
you to maybe zoom out. I realize you're I.
54:12
Realize that your personal attachment to this thing doesn't
54:16
override what is the bigger cause.
54:18
Yes, yes, yes. And that's that's, that's how I
54:20
would say it. Yeah, absolutely.
54:22
I think the final point for me is, and I think 1, which is
54:27
introspective and I think a lot of us have in the last 14 months
54:31
particularly been so brought back to Earth, I'd say.
54:37
And of course, it's affected us emotionally and physically and
54:40
psychologically, but also spiritually in many ways.
54:43
We continually talk about the Lord of the holy awaited Imam.
54:46
We talk about the Jalalafat al Sharif.
54:49
We talk continuously about the, the, the need for justice and
54:53
the need for, for playing a role which is productive and actually
54:58
proactive in the West. And that active form of
55:00
interval, which is something we've wasted so many years, or
55:04
at least me myself thinking, oh, I'm serving Imam, I'm preparing
55:07
and waiting. But then when push comes to
55:09
shove, you realize, well, what is my role?
55:11
What is my personal position? You you have with I of a middle
55:14
and what many like you. These are the days where you
55:17
know your identity needs to come through where you recognize,
55:21
like you said very much earlier, what hack is or when you
55:25
identify what truth is, you can see through the lies.
55:28
Do you know what I mean? The misinformation, the
55:30
disinformation online, all the nonsense you see the videos of
55:34
of, of, of so-called rebels, Tekphilis, these terrorists
55:39
saying thank you to Netanyahu for for harming and wounding
55:44
Hezbollah. Like it's clear, it's clear as
55:47
day, bro. Like and and your Wilayah comes
55:49
through at that time. You know, you're talking about
55:51
the sons of Mahalia versus the sons of Ali.
55:54
And I know me and said Ali was talking about this earlier, but
55:56
it's it's literally there. You're talking about this the
55:58
the people who have a deep rooted hate for Shia and beyond
56:03
that, if you really look within it, they're actually haters of
56:06
Islam. They hate Islam and what it
56:07
stands for. They hate that a last panel to
56:10
Allah has allowed us to to live for so many years cohesively
56:14
with Sunni brethren. And now unfortunately we, like
56:17
you said, since 79 Muslims, Shia Muslims have got to a place
56:21
where they have political influence and they have
56:23
strategic and geographical influence in the world.
56:25
And now they are seen as a threat and they can't stand it.
56:29
They can't stand it. And you know, at times like
56:32
this, our role as Shia in the West is to be strong in our
56:36
beliefs to, to research, to learn, to bring, you know,
56:39
ourselves close to the Holy Khod Island to the Adebayta name of
56:41
Salaam. And, and to be aware that, you
56:44
know, we have a part to play. And although we don't have a
56:47
role on the ground where we can support those who are oppressed,
56:49
people who are wounded or displaced and, and all sorts,
56:53
but we still have a role of education and we have one of, of
56:55
bringing people together. So we have to continuously plug
56:59
that message and we have to push that message.
57:00
You're very right. And I and I, and I think
57:02
remember, I don't know if you remember, when we had Sister
57:04
Bertolon in a couple of weeks ago when we were discussing, you
57:08
know, the ongoing start of the conflict in Lebanon between
57:11
Israel and Lebanese resistance. And I said something on there
57:13
and I was like, I didn't know much about Palestine, not
57:18
because, for example, I didn't care.
57:21
I didn't care then why? Because I was like, for me, it
57:25
was like a Sunishi, I think, right?
57:26
But I didn't know there was like a greater, bigger game that's
57:29
happening behind the scenes. And I admitted that on the
57:31
podcast, and I still reflect on this today.
57:35
And we live in a day and age. Well, they're very right.
57:37
We can't be ignorant on this information because the
57:39
information is easily accessible and the truth is there.
57:43
Honey, you mentioned for example, good VS evil.
57:45
That's our barometer. Who actually I we live on, will
57:48
I and love. And I think it's interesting you
57:51
say that about like you viewed it a certain way because that's
57:54
not by accident, right? It's, it's, it's not, it's, it's
57:57
conditioning, literally. And also when you talk about
57:59
good. As in when I say, when I, when I
58:01
say I didn't care, it's because I was like, they want to kill
58:03
me. At the end of the day, yeah.
58:05
Then I realized there's no there's like there's a separate
58:07
group completely. No, there, there is this sense,
58:10
sorry, especially in the Iraqi community, right.
58:12
There's this Palestinians are they all have said, yeah, they
58:14
want to kill us. I don't know, even worse than
58:16
apathy, It's it's it's this idea that, oh, they hate us and they
58:19
want to kill us. Now we say to them, like, you
58:22
know, the irony is after October the 7th, the Salafis were making
58:26
the exact same argument. And I'm talking about the Med
58:28
Kelly Salafis, the ones who are like, you know, follow the
58:32
leaders and don't rise up the rulers.
58:35
Yeah, the rulers. And they were, they were the
58:36
ones saying the other way, ah, leave the Gazans.
58:40
They've got pictures of Qassem Soleimani in their house and
58:42
they've got this and they're all Shia and they love the Shia.
58:44
And my, my message and my argument is that, look, if
58:48
you're in the Palestinian context, 99% of the time, if
58:51
someone says, oh, I like Saddam, it's not because Saddam killed
58:54
Shias, it's because they're under siege.
58:57
They're being killed by Israel every day.
58:58
And as far as from their perspective, they can see it.
59:01
He's giving us weapons, he's giving us arms and he threw some
59:03
scuds at Israel. So he's a hearing now the
59:06
Salafis do the counter. So they say to the they say, oh,
59:08
leave the dozens. They like Iran.
59:09
Well, why? Because it's the same concept,
59:11
because the resistance axis is the only one that came to their,
59:13
their support. And so we were put, we had this
59:16
pushed on us heavy like, oh, they don't like you and this and
59:18
that. And when I got older, I started
59:19
to realize, OK, it's, it's, you know, it's I have to see things
59:23
from the from the other one's perspective, from the from the
59:26
other one's shoes. And even like when you talk
59:28
about like good versus evil. And This is why my message to
59:32
anyone of any sex, Sunni or Shia or anyone, to understand what
59:36
Zionism is and how it relates to Islam, how it relates to the end
59:40
times, how it relates to Imam al Mehdi, Adilah Ta'ala Farajah.
59:44
It's these are people that are telling you to your face, you,
59:49
the followers of this Imam who's in hiding.
59:53
We hate you, we're going to kill you.
59:54
We're coming for you. We're coming for you because we
59:56
want to build this temple where we're going to rule the whole
59:58
world from it. And our Master, our Messiah, is
1:00:01
going to rule the world and all of your subhuman Royem.
1:00:05
You don't deserve to live except for to serve us as slaves and
1:00:08
actually in our holy books, you are Amalek so we can kill your
1:00:11
women, your children, burn your trees and destroy you.
1:00:14
Do what essentially they have been doing, including life by
1:00:16
the playbook in cursor. They've been like like you say
1:00:20
about life. They're killing animals and.
1:00:22
Yeah. And they reference Amalek in
1:00:23
this they. Respect, Amalek.
1:00:24
In the speech, I'm only talking about fringe, you know, oh,
1:00:27
settler groups or no, we're talking about Netanyahu.
1:00:29
We're talking about their land. We're talking about the very
1:00:32
spot land and spot Bengavir and all of these guys, right?
1:00:34
So as a society, they are deeply committed to this project that
1:00:40
they have, which is as again, not to under my genocidal and
1:00:46
expansionist and maximalist. They want or they believe that
1:00:49
they have this God-given right, this God chosen right to rule
1:00:52
over everyone else. When people understand that in
1:00:55
this context, the idea that we're going to argue of, as
1:00:58
Malcolm said, how to cross our arms or how to pray or what
1:01:01
happened in this battle 1400 years ago, Well, that yes, fine.
1:01:04
In a respectful context, I can sit down with you and have this
1:01:07
conversation in a respectful context, not in speakers corner
1:01:10
where everyone's got deep running problems.
1:01:14
It seems psychological problems. That's true.
1:01:16
I can sit down with my friends and have this conversation.
1:01:18
I've I've many some friends thing who who religiously or
1:01:22
historically wise, we have these debates.
1:01:24
But when it comes to the question of the politics and the
1:01:27
reality today are all firmly on side because they understand and
1:01:31
they see it for what it is. And these are like deeply
1:01:34
passionate Sunni Muslims, but they understand because they've
1:01:37
set aside any notions of sectarianism.
1:01:39
And maybe the fact that we're friends helps as well.
1:01:43
So yeah, I just always stress to people that look at the bigger
1:01:45
picture, look at the bigger enemy, look at what they're
1:01:47
saying to you openly that we're going to eliminate all of you or
1:01:51
we're going to make you bow to us.
1:01:52
So we're going to make you normalize and be our proxies, if
1:01:56
you will. Wow, our was it 2800 Gentile
1:01:59
slaves to each one? Yeah.
1:02:01
So no thanks. I don't, I don't.
1:02:04
I don't fancy that for a future. So.
1:02:06
You know, in slaves of a lot. Yeah, exactly.
1:02:08
Inshallah. So yeah, I, I, you know,
1:02:11
hopefully we can all rid ourselves.
1:02:13
Of sense our programming, I think this is going to be an an
1:02:17
ongoing discussion. I think in all of our circles,
1:02:19
our families, our communities, and it should be.
1:02:21
I think we should continue to educate ourselves.
1:02:23
From my part, I just wanted to thank you.
1:02:25
So much Lisa, thank you for having me.
1:02:26
For coming, for showing wisdom and knowledge.
1:02:28
Hopefully it's not the the last time we see you and hopefully
1:02:32
next time we hear things are in a slightly better context and
1:02:34
and and more positive light, said Ali in last words.
1:02:37
I echo Ahmed and for me, this has been educational.
1:02:40
I was telling Ahmed before we came on, I was like, I don't
1:02:42
really know much about Syria. I know about 2011, but I really
1:02:45
don't know what's happening now. So thank you for sharing, you
1:02:48
know, shedding a light on this subject matter.
1:02:49
And may Allah bless the the the Mahomin and the Shwada from your
1:02:53
family. Thank you and shallah.
1:02:54
We ask our viewers and listeners to recite sort of Fati Walmart
1:02:57
homein around the world. I certain you are certain
1:02:59
brothers and sisters, we will see you next week.
1:03:01
Please take care. Leave your comments below.
1:03:03
Make sure you subscribe. Oh by the way guys, thank you so
1:03:05
much for 10K Subs. I should have said that at the
1:03:09
beginning and we may or may not be back for a few weeks.
1:03:14
We are still kind of working out behind the scenes but we have a
1:03:17
lot happening in the next few weeks.
1:03:19
I'm taking a few weeks off for personal reasons and obviously
1:03:23
we have the event in January, which is going to be amazing and
1:03:27
inshallah we look to see you all there if you can come.
1:03:31
But regardless, guys, let us know how you feel, what you want
1:03:33
to see in 2025. It's going to be a big, big year
1:03:37
in Charlotte for aftermarket AB. We want to do more.
1:03:39
We want to have more guests on and be able to achieve more, but
1:03:43
we need to hear from you. So if we don't see you next
1:03:46
week, then have an amazing end to the year.
1:03:48
We love you so much and remember us here dot R, and we'll see you
1:03:52
soon. Take care some Aleko.