Episode 436, The Andrew Parker Show - DON’T MISS THIS EPISODE: The Arab–Israeli Conflict 101 with Uri Goldflam: Debunking Genocide, Apartheid, and the Myths Fueling the West’s Decline

Former IDF paratrooper and educator Uri Goldflam returns for a clear, no-spin primer on the Arab–Israeli conflict—and why today’s fight is as much narrative and lawfare as it is military. We cover Gaza after October 7, Hamas’s tunnel war, why repeated land-for-peace gambits failed, how the Abraham Accords reframed the region, the emerging Turkey–Qatar–Syria axis, and what Israel’s election year could bring. Uri also dismantles the “genocide,” “apartheid,” and “colonialism” claims using first-principles definitions and history, and explains how the same framing is now aimed at the broader West.

Listen for practical arguments your friends can actually use—and a sober look at whether we’re nearing a new paradigm or drifting back to October 6.

Highlights

• Arab–Israeli Conflict 101: the core “organizing principles” driving the conflict
• Gaza withdrawal, tunnels, and the failure of “land for peace”
• Narrative warfare: lawfare, academia, media, and social platforms
• Abraham Accords, economic levers, and regional realignments
• Israel’s election year: coalitions, courts, and national service debates
• Rapid debunks in plain English: “genocide,” “apartheid,” and “colonialism”

Guest: Uri Goldflam — educator, former IDF paratrooper and platoon sergeant • www.https://www.urigoldflam.com

Transcript

Episode 436 Transcript

Andrew Parker (00:01)

welcome to another episode of the andrew parker show thank you so much for joining us on the show today as you know each episode we talk politics israel and the law we've had some very ⁓ interesting gas of late and ⁓i think some enlightening ⁓ episodes in particular and that continues

here today as we are very fortunate to have with us once again as a return guest to the andrew parker show or its predecessor or a gold flam joins us today at twenty ⁓ a year veteran of the idea ⁓ was a compact platoon sergeant paratrooper

⁓ one of the most ⁓ elite of all of the forces in the idea of the paratroopers raised in both the united states and israel or real holds a b a in international relations and judaic studies and a masters in foreign policy and diplomacy from the he re university in jerusalem an alma mater of mine in fact as nineteen eighty three ⁓

attended the Hebrew University on Mount Scopus campus and I recall it with ⁓ great warmth indeed. You know, I wanted to have Uri back on the show because really there are few who have studied and have the ability to articulate what the Middle East is all about, what is going on and how it all began and how it has evolved.

That is the Arab-Israeli conflict, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, just a subset ⁓ of that. And what the future might have to hold in that regard. It's something that I have been asked time and time again, what is the whole fight all about? It just seems like it goes on and on and on, and nothing gets accomplished, even when the most

heinous of acts are committed against the Jewish people. ⁓ It continues. ⁓ And so that's where I'd like to start. ⁓ Uri, if you can give us a sense, and by the way, go to urigoldflam.com, U-R-I-G-O-L-D-F-L-A-M, urigoldflam.com, and you're going to find a fantastic website that's going to share

with you a lot of the information, the background, the detail ⁓ that will help you further understand the issues in the Middle East. ⁓ Uri, let's talk about that. If you were going to give ⁓ someone an ⁓ Arab-Israeli Conflict 1001 course in short, how would you do that?

Uri Goldflam (03:19)

Well, first of all, hi, Andrew. Thank you for having me. I'm very pleased to be back on your show. And that's a great question. It's a great place to start. A big misconception. Most people think it's about territory or even they think it's about transgressions that have been done in the past and retribution to reproduction to reproduction. All those are false. And the people who got it right first were actually the British. Of one of the very few things that got right, because most of the things that got right.

Andrew Parker (03:45)

Yes, indeed. And it's

only gotten worse from there for the Brits, I will tell you.

Uri Goldflam (03:49)

Like that.

Exactly. So I'm gonna take a page out of my friend and colleagues, Anat Wilf's book, I.D. Swartz and Anat Wilf wrote a wonderful little book called The War of Return, which I recommend everybody.

Everybody read, you can find a link to it on my website. ⁓ And she wrote about how Lord Bevan, who was the Minister of Colonies, a foreign minister at the time, 1947, stood up in London and gave a speech, and how he described why, he explained why the British are leaving the British mandate. They are putting the British mandate behind, they're giving it back to the now new established United Nations and leaving the territory. And he said very simply.

We're not talking about a conflict between two groups over territory. It is two groups that each have an organizing principle and those organizing principle are irreconcilable. You have one group, the Jews, the Zionists, whose organizing principle, the principle around which they organize the entire actions and attitudes and intentions is to build a state, to build an independent sovereign state. And you have the Arab group,

whose entire organizing principle is to prevent the Jews from building their state. So one group wants to build a state, the other group wants to prevent the first from building a state, and that has not changed. Everything else is commentary. So when we talk about, the territories and the occupation and the settlers and they ⁓ go back whatever years to whoever did, I did this to you, you did this to me, all that is just noise.

It goes back to the fundamental principle. The Jews want to build an independent state. The Arabs want to stop the Jews from building a state. And that has not changed. And that's why between 48 and 67, when Jordan was in charge of the West Bank and Egypt was in charge of Gaza, there was never a Palestinian state. The PLO, the Palestine Liberation Organization, was established in 1964, three years before Israel captured the West Bank.

And five times an offer on the table to establish a Palestinian state was rejected. If it was ever about building a Palestinian state, they would have had a state a long time ago. But that's not what it's about. It's never been.

Andrew Parker (06:07)

And that interesting, by the way, I hear you say it so simply plainly and straightly, something that I've been talking about for years and have never said it so straightly and plainly. I mean, how can I not figure that out? It is beautifully stated. ⁓ And let's challenge the proposition, though.

You know, people will say, no, that's not true. All the Palestinians want is their own state, a two-state solution, living side by side in peace. ⁓ You know, what's wrong with that?

Uri Goldflam (06:46)

Nothing's wrong with that. That's a wonderful idea. I think that most Israelis will sign on to that if they thought that was even possible. indeed they have. Through the 90s we had the Azo process and this idea that we have the opportunity to build two states together. Majority of Israelis signed on to that. ⁓ When ⁓ the opportunity came before the Palestinians to actually implement their own statecraft and their own state building, they failed. They chose violence.

Anytime Israel gave up territory.

Andrew Parker (07:17)

Well, in reality,

what they did was they implemented what they have always wanted, and that is the destruction of the Jewish state, as you've pointed out. And it underscores the truth of your statement.

Uri Goldflam (07:27)

That is correct.

The steps towards peace have always been used as a stepping stone or springboard to the next stage of the war. Israelis learned, even those Israelis who support in the past and the present, support the two-state solution. What we've learned is every time we gave up territory in order to establish that state, that didn't result in peace. That resulted in greater violence and more war.

And so Israelis are no longer willing.

Andrew Parker (08:02)

October 7th,

the perfect example.

Uri Goldflam (08:06)

October 7th is the final and devastating and horrific catastrophic example of this, but it's been true from, know, it's been true since 2000 that we gave up territory in Lebanon and we got the war with Hezbollah. We gave up the West Bank to Yasser Arafat and we got the second intifada where those of your listeners and viewers who are old enough to remember back in 2000 the buses blowing up and restaurants and drive-by shootings, that

Andrew Parker (08:31)

Yes!

Uri Goldflam (08:34)

came after we gave up territory for peace. Every time we give up territory, this idea of land for peace formula, we give up land and we're supposed to get peace. We gave up the land and we got violence and blood and tears. And so, and this has gone worse than ever before. And so this exercise in this idea that, no, everybody was willing to be the two-state solution, just give peace a chance. Well, we did.

Andrew Parker (08:48)

Worse than ever before, even.

Uri Goldflam (09:01)

We did, we gave up territory to establish a state, we got violence. The greatest example is in 2005 when Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip. Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip, removed the living and the dead, the Jewish cemeteries were uprooted and moved out, the civilians, the military, and we have established what is de facto a Palestinian state in Gaza.

a territory completely void of Jewish presence, Jewish population, Jewish soldiers, and given them the opportunity to build on the most beautiful stretch of beach in the Mediterranean, an economy that will rival Singapore and Dubai. And the investors were there, the money was there, the talent was there, the assistance was there, the infrastructure, we left behind the industrial and agricultural infrastructure, all they had to do was flip a switch.

And within a week, they'd be exporting cherry tomatoes, strawberries, and tulips to Holland. And instead, in four days, they destroyed it all and turned it into a terror base. Hamas took over very quickly and spent the next 16, 17 years building an integrated civilian military complex the world has never seen. It is unprecedented, Andrew. All those billions of dollars that went into the Gaza Strip for aid for the Palestinians.

Andrew Parker (10:17)

Yes.

Uri Goldflam (10:23)

went into terror infrastructure. They talk about 500 kilometers of tunnels. Now the Gaza Strip is only 40 kilometers long. That's about 25 miles for your listeners. Where do you put 300 miles of tunnels in 25 miles of strip? And the answer is you crisscross underneath civilian infrastructure, hospitals, schools, homes, UN bases.

Andrew Parker (10:26)

Yes.

Yeah, unbelievable.

Uri Goldflam (10:53)

It's multi-tiered, right? It's two, three and four tiers deep. This has never been done before. It's unprecedented. It's a fully integrated civilian population into military infrastructure. And they use that, that Palestinian state to attack Israel on October 7th. And that's something Israelis are not saying never again.

Andrew Parker (11:14)

One ⁓ comment and then ⁓ I want to springboard from this discussion because it is, you're correct, it is the proper way to open this kind of discussion. ⁓ But the comment is that far from there having been a genocide, the combatant to civilian ratio of this war, this urban warfare,

This most difficult of terrain in urban warfare, more difficult than any other urban warfare ever in human history because of the 300 miles of tunnel, the tunnels that you refer to. It is not only not a genocide, it is perhaps the lowest civilian to combatant ratio for this type of campaign.

in this type of environment and territory in military history. And the world should be, you know, they don't need to, but should be thanking Israel for taking such care. And of course, that will never happen. Let me ask you, we now have had the decimation, some would say, ⁓ of Hamas. We have this,

⁓ quote-unquote peace deal and I will never acknowledge that it was a peace deal because it isn't a peace deal. It's hardly even a ceasefire. ⁓ But it's certainly not a deal. But we'll call it that for shorthand. We have this peace deal. ⁓ Trump is taking great credit and you know that's the way he is and that's what he's going to do no matter if it really is what he says or something completely different.

⁓ Sadly it may come back to haunt him But that is the question are we after this peace deal after what has happened to Hamas the destruction of its leadership? ⁓ etc Are we still in the same soup or is this really a new paradigm or maybe an opportunity? for a new paradigm or is it just same old same old and we kick the ⁓

can down the street a bit further.

Uri Goldflam (13:44)

So I think that's a really good question because first of all I agree with you, I don't think this is a peace plan. Nobody in Israel believes that this is an opening of a new era of peace. There is no peace with Hamas as long as Hamas is still there. The decimation of Hamas militarily is great and it's a first and necessary step but it doesn't end there because if Hamas is allowed to maintain its presence and power which is

It's consolidating right now as we speak in Gaza, it will just re-emerge as a military force. And that's at the end of any plan for future peace. And by the way, the Arab countries know this too. It's not just our assessment. So I think that this entire exercise is an opportunity. We're in a fork, we're in a fork in the road. And you're right, very correct.

in that it can either lead to an entirely new paradigm in the Middle East, or we can go back to October 6th. And it's not clear right now which part, which side of that fork we're taking. On the one hand, yes, if Hamas is gone, we have this blue, by the way, this is not something new. We've seen this before, we've seen this before in World War II, we've seen it in Germany, we've seen it in Japan.

a destruction of the enemy, a surrender of the enemy, enemy that knows that they have been defeated completely and laid down their arms. Then there's a short period of occupation. Then there's a period of re-education, of de-nazification, de-radicalization, a generation that has to grow up not viewing.

the Americans, the Israelis as mortal enemies, as murderers, as thugs, as usurpers, as liars and thieves, and then with economic investment to build a new society. That has been done before to a great degree of success. And that's needs to be implemented here. And the only way that we are going to go down the road of a new paradigm is if the entire world gets behind

the United States and gets behind Israel and gets behind the other Arab countries who wanted this mental tamas and create this new reality with this radical element which is threatening Israel but it's also threatening the moderate Arab world. And when I say moderate, I want to put that in quotes because, you know, moderate is a very relative term when it comes to these things. But pragmatic, let's go with that word. More pragmatic, more west leaning.

Andrew Parker (16:14)

yeah.

You know,

and speaking of pragmatic, as I think about from 30,000 feet, ⁓ whether or not there can be a new paradigm, ⁓ Donald Trump may be on to something by bringing to the negotiating table ⁓ the economics of the situation.

Uri Goldflam (16:30)

You

Andrew Parker (16:47)

and how the United States can help along through the economics and economic levers, both carrots and sticks, the Arab countries to understand what is in their best interests. The reason they have jettisoned Hamas is not because they disagree with Hamas or its fundamentals. It's because Hamas went too far and damaged the Arab world by its

⁓ October 7th actions and may well have done it kind of on their own or or at least not fully ⁓ Cooperatively and So what are your thoughts on that? Okay? Good

Uri Goldflam (17:27)

Yeah, I'll push back on that a little bit. I'll push back a little bit on that. Although I

agree with you, I do agree with you that many of even the more radical countries when they saw what Hamas did were like, whoa, you took babies? What? And you filmed it? That's a bit, like, at first they didn't believe that, they thought Israel was faking and Israel lied about, for example, the kidnapping of the Bevis family until they saw children coming back from, the first hostage release and they said, okay, wait a minute, so they weren't lying.

Andrew Parker (17:39)

Right.

Uri Goldflam (17:57)

But I'll push back a little bit on your point because this goes back way before October 7th. You know, when Saudi Arabia woke up on the morning after 9-11, ⁓ they realized that they have been growing at home a very, very bad element. And they themselves came to the conclusion that this radical Wahhabism, this radical version of Islam is not good for them.

Not because of our Western values that they started to realize that Judeo-Christian value system are better, but because they understood that on this track, it only leads them to chaos and destruction. And so they themselves began the process of eliminating these radical elements from within them. They canceled all these schools, they rewrote their education system, they expelled all these radical clerics, and they did this because of their own interest.

And I think, and that's the genius of the Abraham Accords, right? The Abraham Accords that Trump ⁓championed and led by Jared Kushner and others, they recognize and identify this mutual interest and created both the economic, you're correct, the economic incentives and the diplomatic ⁓ umbrella to develop these relations between Israel and other Arab states. And I think that's where they're also going. But to go back to your earlier question,

Andrew Parker (18:54)

Yes.

Uri Goldflam (19:20)

we're still in that fork in the road. If the world doesn't get behind United States and Israel in eradicating Hamas, and again, this piling on and Israel continues in its attempt to enforce the cease, so-called ceasefire, then we're back at October 6th. All so we're at a very, very dangerous fork in the road right now. And one of the things that I talk about now in my current speaking tour in the United States and Canada,

is to try to identify these lessons from what Israelis learned in the last two years that now the West must learn too. If we don't learn to identify these points, we will repeat these mistakes and the war on the West is just a matter of time.

Andrew Parker (20:04)

What here here's another way to look at it and it completes kind of my my previous thought and may explain it further. I believe that there was a time when the Arab nations and in particular Yasser Arafat and the PLO ⁓believed that they could destroy the state of Israel militarily.

That went away sometime in the last, well, probably 25, 30, 35 years ago. And they said, they thought, no, the way to defeat Israel is to beat them in the world of diplomacy, in the world of how people view Israel. And we've already got a head start because people hate the Jews, because there is anti-Semitism

Uri Goldflam (20:47)

Thank

Andrew Parker (21:03)

thousands of years back. And so we've got this great tool that we can use with the rest of the world to make them understand we have to join together and get rid of this state, not militarily, but just isolate them entirely to get rid of them. And what Hamas did on October 7th is set that back. It set back the, I'm gonna call it diplomacy, it's not really.

⁓ but the narrative that had been building to isolate Israel. And it made Israel, for at least a minute and a half, the victim, or at least ones that even if, you know, France and Britain and Germany felt bad for, for a minute and a half. so, you know, I'm thinking that they may be right. Yasser Arafat may well be right when he reached over and shook the hand of

Yitzhak Rabin, it was a shift in the whole approach of defeating the Jewish state. The idea of defeating the Jewish state never changed, and it has never changed. It's just how they were gonna go about it. And so that's what I mean when I say what Hamas did is they stepped outside of the strategy.

Uri Goldflam (22:25)

Yeah, I think that you're right about that. I think that it's part and parcel of the entire strategy is the lawfare, the attacking Israel on the international stage. also think, and this is again going back to my earlier comment, that this is the same strategy which is employed against the rest of the world. Israel is not, it's the lightning rod. It does attract the attention.

And the campaign, this delegitimization campaign, is now focused on Israel, but it's not unique to Israel. This idea that the narrative of Israel is bad, Israel is evil, Israel was born in sin, the very idea of the state of Israel is based on white supremacy and colonialism, etc., etc. Take out the word Israel, put in the United States. Put in Canada.

Andrew Parker (23:21)

And so it's a marriage.

It is a marriage of communism. Yes, yes. you can put it in. So what we're seeing in New York City with the election of Zoran Mamdani, how does that relate to what we're talking about?

Uri Goldflam (23:23)

put in Western civilization.

I think it goes hand in glove with this idea of narrative. mean, this attempt to paint Israel as the root of all evil is only a unique case. It's the lightning rod. It's the epitomization of that same narrative that's directed at the West. The West as the root of all evil, capitalism, and exactly. if it is so corrupt and so evil,

Andrew Parker (23:59)

and capitalism and

Uri Goldflam (24:07)

it doesn't have a right to exist. And so somebody like Zoran Mamdani can come up and give all his empty slogans. A man that was born with a gold spoon in his mouth and is a privileged individual who's never had a job in his life can go and talk about the masses and the working class. ⁓ And he can be completely complete. But he gives all those slogans, gives a big speech.

And all these young folks will be attracted to because we've been building this narrative for 50 years. It's been 50 years that the, the, thought, you know, back in the early nineties, we had this belief that the world was the history's over, right? Francis Fockeama wrote that famous ⁓ article in book, the, the, the, the, the new world order, the, the idea that the end of history has arrived, right? The end of history has arrived.

And now the West has won. Everybody wants to be like us. Let's go focus on our technology and our genes and our questions of what is a woman and the war is over. And they never stopped. They never stopped subverting the West. They never stopped undermining the West. They never stopped with their war against the West. They changed it to different means. Israel continued to be the lightning rod. This idea that the vilification of Israel, I you mentioned this before, Andrew.

why this insistence on calling this war a genocide? Why use the word apartheid? Why use the word colonialism? By the way, in my lectures, I debunk these pretty easily. If you have five minutes, I can show you exactly why all these are absolute nonsensical lies. But why do they stick?

Andrew Parker (25:47)

yeah.

Let's do that. I want to do

that in a minute, but I want you to finish your thought. are hitting on something that is in the crucible. It's the essence of the mineral, the element.

Uri Goldflam (26:07)

The vilification of Israel. If all these accusations are true, then Israel is indefensible. Trying to do so is reprehensible. And if Israel is the root of all evil and now the Jews are the new Nazis, that means that killing them and atrocities committed against them are not that bad. It makes standing up against Israel a moral virtue.

Andrew Parker (26:36)

Yes.

Uri Goldflam (26:37)

You understand this inversion? They completely, this narrative inverts good and bad, right and wrong, and makes anti-Israel, anti-Zionism, which is an extremely racist, genocidal ideology, a moral virtue. And these young folks are flocking through it like...

Andrew Parker (26:55)

And

the key for people to understand is you can replace Israel with the West. Because Israel may be first, but it is a roadmap for the destruction of Western civilization as we know it. And it's to bring back the communist ideas.

Uri Goldflam (27:06)

Correct.

That's right.

That's right. And the Soviets... That's right.

And the Soviets were the first to identify this. The Soviets back in the 60s and early 70s were the first to identify this idea that if you make Israel the villain of the West, you make Israel the poster child of what they consider to be Western imperialism. You take down Israel and that's the domino, that's the headstone that will take down the West. And they...

Andrew Parker (27:20)

They were.

Uri Goldflam (27:41)

And nothing that we're seeing now is new. You think this is the first time we've been accused of genocide, colonialism and imperialism? Absolutely not. The Soviets did this 50 years ago. Except that now, with social media and the financial backing of the endless, bottomless pit of money that the Qataris are funneling into the system, the cyber attacks by the Russians, the cultural attacks with Chinese,

and the infrastructure of terrorism that's set up by Iran all over the world. You have this combination of elements that are subverting the West to bring these ideas into the academia, into the media, into pop culture, into sports. It's pretty much everywhere. And it seems to me that the West is sleeping on their nose. not really, we haven't woken up to this reality yet. And that's very dangerous.

Andrew Parker (28:36)

Very, very dangerous. ⁓ I want to do two things, ⁓ Uri, if we can. I wanted first, because I think Donald Trump, who is a great friend of Israel and understands to a certain degree what needs to be done, ⁓ but not entirely. I'd like to get your opinion and judgment as it relates to ⁓ Donald Trump's apparent attitude toward this

I guess he's the president of Syria. I don't know how he became the president of Syria, but I guess he's the president of Syria. This, you know, arch ⁓ terrorist blatant overt terrorist murderer. course, Syria is used to that as their leaders. So they'll bring in the next one. ⁓ But Trump's, you know, he's taking pictures with this guy. And secondly,

Uri Goldflam (29:19)

He's a,

Andrew Parker (29:35)

Trump's attitude toward Qatar, you know embracing him with a full bear hug

Uri Goldflam (29:42)

Well, listen, you've hit the one issue that I don't have answers for, Andrew. Honestly, I don't know to explain this. think that Trump has been right on many issues. He's been on the right side of many issues in the Middle East that his predecessors have not been. He's done things that consecutive presidents and administrations failed to do because he had the right way to look at things and not the way they did it.

Andrew Parker (29:47)

Yeah.

Uri Goldflam (30:12)

when it comes to Qatar, his embrace of that regime. And by the way, again, this is my opinion, my opinion only, I don't represent the government of Israel or anything like that. I don't get paid to do what I say. Qatar is an enemy state and should be considered as one. It's pernicious, it is adopting and pushing forward the ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood. can only...

I can only imagine, and this is just speculation, that in this case Trump is using the strategy of keep your friends close and your enemies closer. ⁓ So that's the only thing I can think of that could justify this kind of behavior. That's vis-a-vis Qatar. When it comes to Syria, this is a security arrangement.

Andrew Parker (30:49)

Yeah, yeah, I think that could be.

Uri Goldflam (31:04)

How did he get there? He got there on the bayonets and the ⁓ and the fuel given to him by Turkey So Erdogan who's also Islamic Brotherhood pushed us forward and he got there by Israel's destroying the infrastructure and the capabilities of Assad's best fighters, which is Hezbollah ⁓ and so by removing the obstacle the Hezbollah and introducing the ⁓ The fuel which is which is Turkey. He was able to take over and

But not completely, he's not in complete control. What we're seeing here in Syria is a certain new security arrangement. It is not peace. Syria is not joining the Abraham Accords. Syria is a serious future threat. In Syria today, all the schools have become Sharia law schools. They're teaching the most radical versions of Islam. Al-Julani...

Andrew Parker (31:54)

Oi.

Uri Goldflam (32:00)

The Shahra might be dressing in a suit and he trimmed his beard and he walks into European capitals and he gets hugs and kisses. But this is a jihadi Islamic terrorist and we should make no mistake about this. And he's preparing the infrastructure in Syria for the entire country to become ISIS. That's what they are. We should remember that in the back of our heads. Having said that, they don't have the ability, the power and the capability at this point.

to threaten Israel. So what Israel's creating with the United States is a sort of a security arrangement in the southern area of Syria that borders with Israel. The Druze population that were slaughtered, slaughtered and butchered by Ashara just a few months ago, and the world was silent again, is protected now by Israel. And so that, and they live,

Andrew Parker (32:51)

Mm-hmm.

Uri Goldflam (32:56)

relatively close in the south of Syria near the Israeli border. That with the Kurds in the east, if your viewers can open a map, you'll see in the east of Syria on the Iraqi border is a large contingent of Kurds who are relatively pro-western, pro-US, and they're Muslims, but they're not radical Muslims. That creates kind of like a security corridor for Israel. So that's the goal. It's a short-term goal, though.

Andrew Parker (33:00)

Mm-hmm.

Uri Goldflam (33:26)

It's a short-term goal because what we're seeing now, and again, you said 30,000 foot, we're going even further up. We destroyed the Iranian axis. The Iranian axis of the surrounding Israel with proxy armies that were supposed to attack it at their order and destroy Israel are gone. Israel removed that circle of fire and essentially took four decades, five decades and billions, many billions of dollars

that the Iranian invested in destroying Israel instead of the normal people and went to the dustbin of history. That is now gone. But a new axis is now forming and we have to be vigilant and keep our eye on the Turkey, Qatar, Syria, Sunni radical axis. The Iranians are Shia. ⁓ The Turks, the Qataris, the Syrians, they're Sunni and they ascribe to no less radical version of Islam.

as the mullahs of Iran. So we have to be wary about that. There's not, like you said in the very, very beginning of this conversation, we're not really looking at a new era of peace. ⁓ But we might be looking at a new era, a new paradigm of security arrangements with the moderate or the pragmatic forces that will counterbalance these radical elements.

Andrew Parker (34:49)

Well, God willing, the axis of Qatar, Turkey, Syria, with the backbone being the Muslim Brotherhood, which has always been there. They have always been, I believe, perhaps the most dangerous of all because they have generationally raised their kids to hate and to want.

to take over the world, to recreate the caliphate.

Uri Goldflam (35:21)

Yeah,

it's a global aspiration. They have a global aspiration for Califet and it's not something that's just happening far away in the Middle East. It's happening right here in the United States, in the West, in Europe. Europe has already mostly fallen, but it's happening right here where we live. it's where your audience and your viewers, you guys are familiar with this in Minnesota, but the rest of the United States as well are gonna be waking up very, very soon.

to a reality that they only saw on their screens from the Middle East. But it's right here right now.

Andrew Parker (35:58)

And Tucker Carlson does not understand that. He does not understand it at all. And unfortunately, we have significant problems here in the United States with the far left that is not so far left. They're now more mainstream Democrats. We have significant problems with them as it relates to understanding.

Uri Goldflam (36:19)

I just lost your audio.

Andrew Parker (36:23)

As a can you? OK, so it's the you know, to having a clear understanding of the vilification and the impact of the vilification of Israel on the West and Western civilization and ideals. ⁓ You indicated that. You could help our our audience understand the.

Uri Goldflam (36:25)

Yes, we're back. I lost your audio.

Andrew Parker (36:53)

⁓ the falsity, the malevolence of the charge of genocide, of colonialism, and of ⁓ failing in providing humanitarian aid. What can you tell us about that just to ⁓ give our listeners something to respond with, understand, fight back with?

Uri Goldflam (37:01)

Yeah. Yeah.

Sure. So first of all, we have to understand that the charge itself is the goal. It's not really about trying to save any lives in Gaza or about caring about Palestinian lives. If they did, you'd be seeing now people in the streets supporting the ceasefire and the end of the genocide, but they're not. They're continuing in their ⁓ calls to destroy Israel, which means that from the get-go,

They weren't really caring about Palestinians. So what actually is going on? Again, sticking these charges to Israel is to vilify Israel, to delegitimize Israel, to create a situation where Israel is so evil that it loses its moral standing. But genocide in and of itself is a very clear legal definition. It's the intent to destroy the entirety of the population of a part of an ethnic group based on their ethnicity, nationality or religion.

The intent is the clear part of it. If Israel intended to destroy all of the Palestinians, it would have done so in three afternoons. It would have done so without risking Israeli lives. There have been close to 1,000 Israeli soldiers who have been killed prosecuting this war. Now, if Israel has intended to only destroy all the Palestinians and commit a genocide, why would we commit our soldiers

to put themselves in danger in harm's way in order to fight the terrorists. It makes absolutely no sense. When it comes to the numbers, what I do in my lectures, I have prepared graphs and your audience can do this very easily at home today with AI, it's very simple. Take genocides from history with the Jews in Europe, Armenians in Turkey, the Rwandan genocide, Khmer Rouge,

the Hindus in Kashmir who were genocided by the Muslims. And look at it on a graph. You look at the population over a period of time, 10 years, 15 years, whenever that was, and you see a very sharp decline in population. When you look at the Palestinian population, it's an increase. The Palestinian population, whether it's the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, or the Arabs living in Israel since 1948, the population has only increased. So, and again,

⁓ Genocide is not about numbers. You don't have to kill a single person to be guilty of genocide. It's about intent. If Israel has intended to commit genocide, then how has the Palestinian population only increased in the last 75 years? And so from this, just asking these simple questions about what genocide is, and then seeing the actual reality on the ground,

you can very, very clearly see that it doesn't match. Like the definitions don't match. You can call it, it's a war. It's a terrible war. Civilians die in war. This is not something unique to this specific war. But like you said also earlier, the ratio of combatant to non-combatant ⁓ casualties in this particular war is far lower than, far lower than any other warfare in history.

And so from all aspects, when you look at the numbers and you look at the intent, the accusation of genocide just does not fit, which is why, Andrew, many of Israel detractors are not trying, they understand that they can't win on this issue. They're trying to change the definition of genocide. And that's why they call Israel a, a, a imperious colonial settler state. Have you heard this, this terminology? It's a settler state. It's a colonial white settler, super settler, why?

Andrew Parker (41:07)

Yes, it's laughable. Sure. It's ridiculous.

Uri Goldflam (41:12)

Why? Because in these academic circles, in these academic circles, this idea of a colonial settler state, by definition is genocidal. I've heard these statements by these so-called professors and academics who are saying that the state of Israel, this is what they're saying, the state of Israel could not have been established without genocide, without ethnic cleansing, which is remarkably and demonstrably false. The state of Israel

was established before the war broke out. state of Israel was established before a single Arab left their home. The population was displaced because of the war that they started. So once again, they start a war, they lose, they accuse Israel ⁓ of being evil. But they're changing the definition. And then you can be a really nice guy, you can be a liberal Zionist, but

because you accept Zionism as your foundational ideology, by definition you're genocidal even if you're a really nice guy. This is how they tried to change the discourse to attach the accusation of genocide. So really, genocide is very easy to refute, which is why nobody has ever actually made the case for it. They lie about the ICJ, never really made that accusation as well. They talk about the plausibility of South Africa, bringing forward a case.

towards the Palestinians to be protected from genocide. That's kind of the jargon. And then, you know, they made that claim. It's same is true for colonialism. Like you really have to make intellectual ⁓ gymnastics to make the case that the Jews are colonizers in Judea. Right? You really, you really have to make an effort.

and to jump through intellectual hoops in order to make the case that somehow the Jews are a European race that have now occupied a country that's not theirs and they're colonizers and settlers in Judea. And you have to ignore 3,000 years of history and archeology and liturgy and holidays and language and a continuous presence in the land of Israel for Jews.

Andrew Parker (43:37)

Well, it's like

saying, you know, for those here in the United States that can't get their head around it, it's like saying the Native Americans that were here when the first European landed on the shores of the United States are colonizers of this land. And those Europeans that came over here, it's their land, even though it was the first moment that they stepped foot and they didn't even know this land existed. But the Native Americans...

who lived there for eons before, they're colonizers. That's the same kind of argument. Let me add, and you may or may not be aware of this, but it just goes along with what you were just talking about. The Twin Cities Democratic Socialists of America have a set of bylaws, and they pass resolutions.

Uri Goldflam (44:10)

There's, that's right.

Andrew Parker (44:32)

Be it resolved that all Twin Cities DSA members who are credibly shown to have proclaimed that they are a Zionist and intend on advancing the interests of the Zionist settler colony, or be a member of or have consciously provided any material aid to any Zionist organization, or have ⁓ failed to publicly, or who have publicly opposed

BDS as a legitimate form of struggle will be considered in substantial disagreement with DSA's principles and policies and will be removed as a member. ⁓ Well, no, they used the word expelled, expelled for their offenses. There it is.

Uri Goldflam (45:24)

There

you go. There you go. There you go. Listen, this idea that they stole Zionism from us. They stole the word Zionism and poured content into it. Again, again, it started with the Soviets back in 1975 with the resolution in the UN that Zionism is racism. It was rescinded since. But that's where, again, there's nothing original about these people. They don't have a single original thought.

Andrew Parker (45:34)

Yes?

Uri Goldflam (45:52)

This is something that has been thrown at us for decades. Zionism, for those viewers who need to hear this, Zionism is the political expression of the 2,000 year old yearning of the Jews to return home. It is the idea that Jews have the right of self-determination in their ancestral homeland. It is not exclusive.

It does not negate any other claims to the land. It does not require anybody else who's not a Jew or a Zionist to leave the land. It is simply the stating of the fact that the Jews have a right to self-determination in their ancestral homeland. That's what Zionism is. And any other attempt to create a falsified version of Zionism is simply that. It is pernicious. It is evil.

And it's a genocidal ideology because by denying...

Andrew Parker (46:53)

It is just another.

Yes. And it's just a another portrayal of anti-Semitism of the thousands of years of different. ⁓ Idiations of anti-Semitism. This is just another one of those. Uri, I want to go on to say, wait a minute now.

Uri Goldflam (47:07)

That's right.

It, yeah.

Andrew Parker (47:21)

Goldflam, what are you talking about? What about apartheid? Israel's engaged in apartheid. It's as bad as South Africa, if not worse.

Uri Goldflam (47:31)

Well, I happened to visit South Africa when I was younger in the 1980s when it was still apartheid and I can tell you that it looks nothing like it. You need to have a functioning brain and open eye and five minutes on an Israeli street, any city, to realize how stupid and ridiculous this allegation is. Honestly, again, this accusation can only stick when people are ignorant.

It can only stick if people view reality detached from reality. If they're connected to phones and not to the ground around them. ⁓ Israel's, first of all, go back to Declaration of Independence. When you look at Israel's Declaration of Independence, the basic laws and the values that govern Israeli society, they're about inclusivity, they're about equality, they're about civil rights and liberties to all.

They're about inclusion, they're about peace, and they're welcoming. And there's a specific call to welcome peace and to welcome Arab residents and citizens of Israel to have to take full part in the development of Israeli society. And they do. Israelis that are Arab or Palestinian Israelis that serve in the Israeli parliament and speak out against the government as it is their right to do. 20 % of the Israeli population is Arab.

and many of them define themselves as Palestinian Israelis and they function as doctors and lawyers and they are in academia and in media and entertainment and in accounting and in law and in any other aspect of Israeli society fully integrated and again you have to be in Supreme Court in bank they're head of the biggest banks in Israel they're department heads and managers of hospitals they're in the Supreme Court they're a judge I mean

Andrew Parker (49:14)

What about the Supreme Court?

Uri Goldflam (49:27)

Honestly, again, have to be detached from reality. Of course they are. There are three parties, there are three Arab parties, they vote and are elected. There are three parties that make up 10%, more than 12-10 % of the Israeli parliament. So this idea that somehow Israel is like South African apartheid means one of two things, or both.

Andrew Parker (49:30)

but are they but are they in the Knesset? I mean, are they in the law building?

Uri Goldflam (49:54)

You've never been to South Africa and you have no idea what you're talking about. Or you are from South Africa, you know about South African apartheid, but you've never been to Israel. And you don't know what you're talking about. So both of these, one or both of those things can be true. Or you're dishonest, which is absolutely a possibility. There's so much dishonesty and so much lies to make the case against Israel using lies and it's out there all the time. That's why I chose the big three.

Andrew Parker (50:07)

or you're dishonest.

Uri Goldflam (50:23)

genocide, apartheid, colonialism to focus on, but there many, many, many other lies. It seems that every day there's a new lie about Israel and the blood libel that continues to be mentioned. It's all the continuation of the age-old anti-Semitism. Anti-Zionism today, this horrible version or definition of Zionism that they've made, is again an iteration of the Jew that is standing in the way of me and my redemption.

The Jew that is preventing me from reaching my utopia. I'm not supposed to say Jew, it's a Zionist, heavens forbid. But being anti-Zionist, rejecting Zionism means that all the Jews of the Eastern Hemisphere would be dead now. Because Zionism is the only thing that saved them from Nazis. And so if you're anti-Zionist, then you're by default in favor of all the Jews being murdered by the Nazis. It's a genocidal ideology and it should be viewed as such.

Andrew Parker (51:20)

Let's turn our attention, Uri, and ⁓ very insightful comments for sure. And I think very helpful to our listeners to understand, to be more educated on a subject that frankly, unless you spend a lot of time on a deep dive, nobody ever really spends time explaining it. ⁓ And they just go on with the headline to the next headline to the next headline.

Let's turn for a minute before we end today. It's just been a great session and we're with the Rory Goldflam who You know, he is not just a political rock on tour who assesses different situations that exist around the world He's educated highly educated. It has backup for all of what he ⁓ Says and his opinions As far as the Andrew Parker show goes are spot-on

Let's talk politics for a moment. ⁓ Politics in the United States is a, it's not for the faint of heart. It is a blood sport and quite frankly politics in Israel are even harsher. I mean, if that's possible. ⁓ So what is happening in Israel? Isn't there an election coming in the next year and... ⁓

Uri Goldflam (52:44)

We're now officially in an election year. The next election, well, the legal date for the elections at the end of October 26th. So we're now officially in an election year.

Andrew Parker (52:54)

So what does it look like ⁓ or you know not predictions on who is going to win but what are the factions talking about and who's attacking who?

Uri Goldflam (53:04)

So, first of all, want your viewers or your listeners and viewers to understand that the Israeli democracy is not like the... It's like, you know, it's like you guys play football and Europeans play football. You call it the same thing, but it's two different games. Right? So, it's a very, very different game. Israel has a pure proportional representation system, which means that every citizen gets to vote once for a list for a party. And then the parliament is made up of...

Andrew Parker (53:20)

Yes.

Uri Goldflam (53:32)

all these different parties can be 10 or 11 parties. ⁓ The head of the largest party is tasked with building a coalition. So he has to now create a coalition of partners to bring him to at least 50 % of the parliament to create a government. And that's the ⁓ chicken barrel politics ⁓ that we have in Israel. Unfortunately, I have to say,

that the ⁓ polarization and the political discord in Israel has become worse than it was on October 6th two years ago. So we talked about how October 6th there was a lot of discord. That's one of the things that triggered or encouraged Hamas to pull the trigger because of the internal strife within Israel. We thought that we will be unified after the war, ⁓ but that's not the case. We're now as divided as ever.

⁓ There are some domestic issues, there are terrible domestic issues within Israel that ⁓ are defining. The main question is yes Bibi, no Bibi. And so the main question is do you support Netanyahu as Prime Minister or not? It's not right and left because there's a lot of non-Bibi supporters on the right as well. ⁓ And then there are other issues that are related to this. It has to do with

the drafting of the ultra-orthodox to the military, for example, or passing a bill that will exempt them from military service that's ripping the country. There's the judicial overall and the idea of that. Where does the power lie in the judicial branch or in the legislative branch which is elected? These are some of the arguments that are really tearing at the fabric of Israeli political system. It's yet to be seen what kind of

coalitions and new leadership will emerge ahead of an election within the next year. Having said and to add to all this, there is the reckoning. Now you can't avoid the fact that Netanyahu is the prime minister, has been the longest serving Israeli prime minister, and he's been the prime minister for the majority of the time leading up to the last 10 years leading up to October 7th. And many Israelis are still asking for answers.

and to take responsibility. You might be credited with all the success Israel's had since the war started, but you're also responsible for the catastrophe of October 7th, and nobody's heard Netanyahu take responsibility or set up a inquiry commission to investigate. And so those are the things that will be discussed in the next year leading up to elections, and it remains to be seen whether the Israeli public will give Netanyahu the

the credentials and the support to build the government once again.

Andrew Parker (56:31)

If not Bibi Netanyahu, who by the way is vilified and hated, not as much as Donald Trump by the Democratic Party in this country, but nearly ⁓ as much as Donald Trump. ⁓ And it's sad, there's no ⁓ sound basis for it. It is ignorance and a complete lack of understanding of... ⁓

Uri Goldflam (56:39)

Thank you.

Andrew Parker (56:58)

The Israeli while the Arab Israeli conflict and the issues that we talked about today It is a and and policies of the Democratic Party have failed for decades ⁓ Consistently and they keep coming back to the same way of looking at things. We have one minute left Uri ⁓ and I'd like to ask you kind of a Question a bit out of the blue ⁓ Well two questions

so we're gonna go with for two minutes. The first question is, if not Bibi, who? And the second question is, what's your view of JD Vance?

Uri Goldflam (57:41)

Okay, if not Bibi, then who? I don't have an answer to that question. I'll tell you though why I'm optimistic. First of all, I know people criticize Netanyahu. Some of the criticism is justified. ⁓ Some of it is not. Within Israel, there's lots of arguments for or against. There's only one way to replace a government in democratic society, and that's through elections.

So we'll have to wait for the elections and let the Israeli public, the Israeli people speak. And if you want to change that, you're welcome to move to Israel and join and vote. So that's number one. But my optimism comes from the fact that the war showed us that forces stood up. Young Israelis, civil society, military, reservists stood up, sacrificed and did what it needed to be done.

to save the country. And those forces, for good, I must believe, will also transfer into politics. There are several candidates. There are old names. There might be new names. There might be coalition of people that will stand up and create one. ⁓ There's Naftali Bennett. There's Gadi Aizenkopf. There's Yair Lapid. And maybe new names that we don't know yet that will come from this amazing, emerging generation that will take the leadership. So that's what I can hope for.

As to your second question, I'm not sure I have the ⁓ depth to answer that question. Like Donald Trump, Israelis judge foreign leaders but what they do and not what they say.

All right. And so, as vice president, ⁓ I don't think he has still had the track record of policy behind him to have Israelis have any opinion. ⁓ He was chosen by the party. He seems to support Trump. He supports Israel. He's been to Israel, spoke well, visited the holy sites. ⁓

Andrew Parker (59:23)

Yeah, smart.

Uri Goldflam (59:51)

attitude towards him is generally positive, ⁓ but I don't think I can say anything beyond that ⁓ for the future.

Andrew Parker (59:59)

Well, he made some comments recently that ⁓ made my eyebrows raise and I was a bit concerned about. But we shall see as we continue to watch JD Vance, someone who I want to like. ⁓ But if he makes it more if he continues down the path of these previous comments, it will be difficult to do. So we'll see how that rolls.

Uri Goldflam (1:00:22)

you

So maybe I can just add this, the

strife that is now going on in the conservative movement against the fringe, ⁓ which are not so fringe anymore, but the group of people who are trying to distance themselves from Israel and are adopting anti-Semitic rhetoric and hatred towards Israel and platforming people who are vowed Nazis.

and bigots and racists, ⁓ I think that's very big danger for the Republican Party and for the conservative movement. And if that's not nipped in the bud, then that will be a, that will spread like wildfire and might cause some.

Andrew Parker (1:01:08)

Yeah.

If it's not nipped in the bud, the Republicans will look like the Democrats because they didn't nip it in the bud and it's now tipped over and gone beyond repair. Uri Goldflam, thank you so much for joining us on the Andrew Parker show, sharing your thoughts, your knowledge, your background. It's been exceptional.

Uri Goldflam (1:01:15)

That's Exactly.

Thank you for having me.

Andrew Parker (1:01:36)

⁓ One of the finest episodes, I think, since the show was reformed and I've really, really enjoyed it. Great to have you on. We will do this again. And for all of you out there, until next time, be kind to your neighbor.