Is Biden going to Israel a bad idea?
The News Agents - USA
Global
4.3 • 717 Ratings
🗓️ 17 October 2023
⏱️ 36 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Joe Biden is heading head-first into an active warzone. The 80-year-old is travelling to Israel tomorrow to begin brokering the toughest negotiation of his presidency - in an attempt to restore relative calm and peace in the Middle East. It's a dangerous, herculean task that has the potential for domestic and foreign backlash. It will require every ounce of his weighty diplomatic might.
We speak to General David Petraeus, formerly the head of the CIA - and military historian Andrew Roberts. They've just co-authored a book about modern warfare called Conflict: The Evolution of Warfare from 1945 to Ukraine. It may well need a new chapter soon.
Editor: Gabriel Radus
Social Media Editor: Georgia Foxwell
Video Producer: Rory Symon
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The Newsagents USA podcast is brought to you by HSBC, UK, opening up a world of opportunity. |
| 0:09.6 | This is a global player original podcast. |
| 0:13.6 | On Wednesday, President Biden will visit Israel. |
| 0:17.1 | He's coming here at a critical moment for Israel, for the region and for the world. |
| 0:23.6 | That was Anthony Blinken, the US Secretary of State, announcing today that President Biden is, matter-of-factly, just going to drop in on Israel tomorrow. |
| 0:35.3 | It was almost as if he was in the White House briefing room, |
| 0:38.1 | just reading out as the press secretary used to do, the details of the president's diary for the day. |
| 0:44.3 | This is no ordinary visit. Presidential trips take months of planning. Presidential trips to war zones tend not to happen. But on Wednesday, Air Force |
| 0:58.9 | 1 will be landing at Israel's Ben-Gurian airport where rockets have been landing that have been fired |
| 1:06.3 | from Gaza. The risks are high, but the risks of staying away even greater. Welcome to Newsagents USA. |
| 1:22.2 | It's John and Emily's away this week. She'll be back next week and look forward to welcoming her back then. |
| 1:28.6 | I went with President Trump in 2017 to Israel, |
| 1:33.3 | when on the tarmac, Israel's Bengurian airport, |
| 1:37.7 | the whole of the Israeli cabinet were present to meet him. |
| 1:50.9 | The Mishmariah will come to the... to meet him. The trip had been painstaking in its organization. |
| 1:54.9 | The choreography, the orchestration was done to the nth degree. |
| 1:59.9 | And yet now you can imagine that the US Secret Service has been |
| 2:03.7 | scrambled. They probably are thinking the risks are too great, but the political imperative is even |
| 2:10.7 | greater. And so, President Biden, who has offered full-throated support to Israel, much more full-throated, it should be said, |
| 2:19.1 | than the previous Democratic President Barack Obama. Biden is very much alongside Israel, |
| 2:26.0 | in defiance of some in his own party. And he wants to show support. He's also sent two carrier |
| 2:33.1 | groups to the Eastern Mediterranean, and that is a lot of |
... |
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