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Hey, everybody.

Welcome to the Buck Brief, diving into national security, the Middle East, Israel, Hamas, Iran, and more with our friend David Ifun on this

episode. He is the publisher of the New York Sun. David, always a pleasure. Good to see you.

Likewise, Buck. Thanks for having me. First, if you would, would you put into context for us,

you know, last weekend there was this strike of drones and missiles,

essentially all just swatted away by Israel and its allies.

What was your, what were your biggest takeaways from that,

and how do you think it might affect things going forward?

Well, I think the biggest takeaway is just for people to understand that while Iran and its fellow

travelers in the region kind of talk a big game, it really is outmatched when it comes to

direct combat with the Israelis.

As we saw, you know, Israel has multiple tiers of missile defense.

So they have, you know, the David's sling is kind of the first layer. Then you have the Iron

dome. Then you have the arrow. Plus you have Patriot missile batteries. Obviously, the participation

of quite a few allies in the region, including Arab states,

by the way, that see Iran equally as an adversary in the way that the Israelis do.

Iran, on the other hand, has no missile defenses whatsoever, and the Israelis have some quite

potent ballistic missiles as well, Jericho missiles, and they could inflict a great deal

of damage, which is why up until now Iran has taken the approach of working through proxies

...