Tom. Hey Tom. Hey boys and girls nice to see you all. You as well. How's the other

coast? Yeah it's a lot better. Arles Charone once said you know when he became

Prime Minister there are things I can see from here that I couldn't see from

there and that's how I feel. From New York Times opinion I'm Ross Douthit. I'm

Michelle Coddle and I'm Lydia Bullgrain. And this is matter of opinion. This will

be our second consecutive episode talking about the ongoing crisis in the

Middle East. The possibly looming Israeli invasion of Gaza. Joe Biden visited

Israel this week. Thousands have been killed around a million people have been

displaced within Gaza. And so to push that conversation a little bit beyond our

own shared expertise, awesome as it is. We're going to do something slightly

different. Carlos is not with us this week and in his place we've asked a

colleague who knows this region very well. Indeed he spent his entire career

covering it to join us. And that of course is Tom Friedman who's been bureau

chief for the Times in Beirut and Jerusalem. The papers diplomatic and White House

correspondent and he's covered foreign affairs in his opinion column for

nearly 30 years with several Pulitzer prizes to go along with all of that

expertise. And I just say you know among people who apply our particular

trade, he is the columnist who you know if when you imagine columnists on the

phone with world leaders at a moment of crisis, you imagine Tom Friedman

because in fact he is. So with all of that said, Tom thank you so much for

joining us. Real pleasure Ross thank you. So we're going to try and start by doing

some historical context talking about the big picture and then get into the

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