Judging Freedom - Judge Andrew Napolitano - Pepe Escobar : Trump Fumbles as Russia and China Wait.
Aired: 2025-02-12
Duration: 25:35


=== Arab Reaction to Gaza Plan (12:08) ===

[00:00:32]  Hi, everyone.
[00:00:34]  Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom.
[00:00:37]  Today is Wednesday, February 20th, excuse me, February 12th, February 12th, 2025.
[00:00:44]  It's midnight in Moscow, so it might actually be February 13th there.
[00:00:50]  Pepe Escobar joins us from Moscow.
[00:00:52]  Pepe, always a pleasure, my dear friend.
[00:00:53]  Thank you for joining us.
[00:00:55]  Thank you.
[00:00:55]  I want to talk to you about the international reaction.
[00:01:01]  And the geopolitical consequences of President Trump's offer to acquire Gaza.
[00:01:10]  You referred to the Gaza Riviera Resort and Casino not as a scheme, but as a scam.
[00:01:20]  What did you mean?
[00:01:23]  Because this is going to be paid essentially by the petro-monarchies, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and UAE, which will be given, according to Trump's idea, free reign to build everything they want in Gaza, which is, by the way, completely illegal.
[00:01:44]  We don't know how this would probably be accomplished.
[00:01:48]  And in the end, the US takes it all.
[00:01:51]  Of course, Trump never says that the emphasis is not exactly the Trump resort, casino, Gaza, Riviera, whatever, built by petro-monarchies.
[00:02:04]  It's the unexplored oil and gas deposits of Gaza.
[00:02:09]  And this has been completely absent from this whole kabuki so far.
[00:02:15]  But it's going to be...
[00:02:16]  Has any head of state...
[00:02:32]  Exactly, Judge, no.
[00:02:34]  And the closest we had, of course, under extreme pressure, King Abdullah from Jordan, which I have to be very careful.
[00:02:47]  How to describe him.
[00:02:49]  Politely, he is not exactly popular in his own kingdom.
[00:02:54]  He said that he would take 2,000 very ill children from Gaza.
[00:03:04]  And that's it.
[00:03:05]  But he condemned the plan.
[00:03:07]  Sisi condemned it.
[00:03:08]  The Arab League condemned it.
[00:03:10]  Everybody in the Arab world condemned it.
[00:03:12]  The Arab Street condemned it.
[00:03:13]  The Lands of Islam condemned it.
[00:03:15]  BRICS countries condemned it.
[00:03:18]  China condemned it.
[00:03:19]  Russia condemned it.
[00:03:20]  The Sultan Erdogan.
[00:03:23]  And Sultan Erdogan, he said that it's completely absurd because the Palestinians have eternal rights to their own lands.
[00:03:33]  So, in your mind, do these countries view that Trump...
[00:03:46]  Let's see.
[00:03:47]  The IDF couldn't remove them.
[00:03:50]  Is Trump going to land a couple of thousand Marines?
[00:03:53]  And are they going to point weapons at people saying it's time for you to go?
[00:03:57]  I don't know where, but it's time for you to go?
[00:03:59]  Is that realistic?
[00:04:01]  No, it's not.
[00:04:03]  And the problem is this is like a construction in an enormous fictional scenario.
[00:04:11]  This is something that might happen, and it's being sold by Trump directly as what will happen.
[00:04:18]  As he said many times, we will own Gaza.
[00:04:23]  What rights do the United States have to own Gaza?
[00:04:27]  So nobody's asking this question in detail, and Trump is not volunteering any detailed answers.
[00:04:34]  He throws this geopolitical grenade on the global stage, and obviously everybody's scurrying around.
[00:04:41]  But when we start looking at the practicalities of actually implementing that, it's absolutely impossible.
[00:04:50]  Or it will, if the beginning of this plan will be implemented, then there will be a revolt all over the Arab world.
[00:05:03]  Propelled by Arab public opinion and the lands of Islam, of course.
[00:05:08]  What would happen specifically in Jordan and Egypt if they agreed to accept hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees?
[00:05:22]  Well, Sisi, at least, he went straight to the point.
[00:05:25]  His flat, no.
[00:05:28]  It means that if he would ever agree to it, he would have a civil war in Egypt, obviously.
[00:05:34]  In fact, Sisi proposed a reconstruction coordinated by Egypt, lasting from three to five years, with input from the UN, non-specified, and the Europeans, maybe European construction companies, who knows.
[00:05:52]  And then it will start from south to north, Gaza, and rebuild Gaza in a spectrum of five years, coordinated by Arab countries.
[00:06:02]  This was decided in a meeting.
[00:06:04]  It's very important who decided in favor of the Egyptian plan.
[00:06:11]  This meeting was, if I remember correctly, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar.
[00:06:19]  And there was a fifth component that I don't remember at the moment.
[00:06:23]  So this is a collective decision of a significant part of the Arab world.
[00:06:27]  And it's a plan of reconstruction of Gaza without expelling the Palestinians.
[00:06:32]  The problem is how would Israel react to that?
[00:06:38]  When Trump was asked if the Palestinians whom he would expel could return, And enjoy the Trump-built Gaza.
[00:06:53]  Here's what he said.
[00:06:54]  Chris, cut number five.
[00:06:56]  Think of it as a real estate development for the future.
[00:07:00]  It would be a beautiful piece of land.
[00:07:02]  Would the Palestinians have the right to return?
[00:07:04]  No, they wouldn't because they're going to have much better housing, much better.
[00:07:09]  In other words, I'm talking about building a permanent place for them, because if they have to return now, it will be years before you could ever.
[00:07:18]  It'll be years before it could happen.
[00:07:20]  I'm talking about starting to build, and I think I could make a deal with Jordan.
[00:07:24]  I think I could make a deal with Egypt.
[00:07:25]  You know, we give them billions and billions of dollars a year.
[00:07:29]  Right, the deal with Jordan, non-starter.
[00:07:33]  The deal with Egypt non-starter.
[00:07:36]  The concept of we can cause these people to leave and they wouldn't have the right to return non-starter.
[00:07:43]  Here he is on Air Force One when told that his own advisors have said it would take 10 to 15 years to accomplish what you want.
[00:07:52]  Do you envision this project going beyond your presidency?
[00:07:56]  Here's his answer, cut number one.
[00:07:59]  Steve Witkoff said that process would take 10 to 15 years.
[00:08:04]  Does your commitment to rebuilding Gaza extend beyond your time in office?
[00:08:09]  I'm committed to buying and owning Gaza.
[00:08:12]  As far as us rebuilding it, we may give it to other states in the Middle East to build sections of it.
[00:08:19]  Other people may do it through our auspices.
[00:08:22]  But we're committed to owning it, taking it.
[00:08:26]  And making sure that Hamas doesn't move back, there's nothing to move back into.
[00:08:31]  The place is a demolition site.
[00:08:35]  He's committed to buying it.
[00:08:38]  Buying it and owning it.
[00:08:41]  And owning it.
[00:08:42]  From whom or from what would he buy it?
[00:08:46]  Exactly. And terminology, Judge, is very, very important.
[00:08:51]  He's using the same terminology that Israeli not-so-secret plans.
[00:08:58]  The first one, in fact, is from October 13, a few days after October 7, 2023.
[00:09:06]  Demolition. And it's the same language of a plan, a four-stage plan that was circulating in Netanyahu's cabinet in May last year, where the key terminology was demolition.
[00:09:23]  And after the demolition, they would expel the Palestinians, raise it to the ground, and obviously to the benefit of Israeli settlers.
[00:09:32]  What Trump is saying is that...
[00:09:44]  Obviously not the Palestinians.
[00:09:46]  And he said that many, many times over.
[00:09:49]  They will be going to a new wonderful location where they can live in a sort of Trump-style condo land.
[00:09:58]  So who will live in this New Gaza?
[00:10:00]  He's not saying it.
[00:10:02]  Yeah. How does China and how does the Kremlin view statements from President Trump that are obviously nonsensical, not run past his national security team, impractical, or even impossible.
[00:10:23]  The official responses by Ministry of Foreign Affairs of both China and Russia, strict China, Russia, in fact, they usually discuss this.
[00:10:36]  It's part of the special relationship as well.
[00:10:39]  They have a unified position on Palestine.
[00:10:42]  Sovereign Palestinian state, right of return for Palestinians, and no matter whatsoever of trying to ethnic cleanse Palestinians from Gaza and from the West Bank as well.
[00:10:59]  But this is the language of diplomatic rationality, which is practiced by Beijing and Moscow.
[00:11:07]  What we have from the US now is a completely deranged reality show, which has some contact reality here and there, but overall is a construct.
[00:11:22]  So what Trump came up with, okay, this is being defended.
[00:11:26]  By Trump 2.0 functionaries as, ah, he's thinking outside the box.
[00:11:31]  But you cannot think outside the box when you turn a genocide and an ethnic cleansing operation into a real state opportunity.
[00:11:42]  Has the foreign policy of the United States of America with respect to Israel and Gaza changed on January 20th?
[00:11:56]  Not necessary.
[00:11:58]  It's even more brutal.
[00:11:59]  In fact, what was...
[00:12:03]  Until a few weeks ago, the US and the collective West, what I call NATO stand, they were weaponizing, supporting, but they were keeping a certain distance to the ongoing genocide.
[00:12:22]  Now, we have the transformation, the metastasization of the genocide into something completely different in a follow the money vein, without any regards to geography, history, and culture, which is something that...

=== New Sponsor Welcome (02:51) ===

[00:12:52]  Before the fateful telephone call today between Putin and Trump, Ryabkov, number two of the Russian Foreign Ministry, he said a few days ago, and this was absolutely essential, I use it in my latest column, this quote.
[00:13:11]  He said that we are ready to discuss everything with the United States, but in a spirit of dialogue and respecting history and geography.
[00:13:22]  So history and geography applies from Gaza to Ukraine and Russia as well.
[00:13:29]  But this is the rational approach.
[00:13:31]  Yes, Judge, please go ahead.
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[00:13:39]  But when we come back, we will transfer from Gaza to the Kremlin and what Trump and President Putin talked about today.
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[00:15:03]  What does the Kremlin think the Trump administration thinks of Russia, Russian culture, and the Kremlin itself?
[00:15:16]  Well, Trump, in fact, he said that he loves the Russian people.
[00:15:22]  So we assume that he has at least a superficial knowledge of Russian culture.
[00:15:28]  And, of course, he came to Russia a few times.

=== Top-Level Diplomat Warns of Relations Rupture (09:50) ===

[00:15:31]  There's a photo of him with Ivana in St. Petersburg circulating on the net.
[00:15:36]  I think it was in 1987 when they visited Russia.
[00:15:41]  He is not adversarial to Russia.
[00:15:44]  Members of Trump 2.0, they are saying it out loud, in fact, that Russia is a competitor.
[00:15:52]  They do not describe Russia as a threat, as the previous administration did.
[00:15:57]  And they see points of...
[00:16:03]  Ryabkov, once again, he said earlier this week.
[00:16:07]  This was before the phone call.
[00:16:09]  Very important.
[00:16:10]  Russia-US relations are on the verge of rupture.
[00:16:15]  This coming from top-level diplomat is extremely serious.
[00:16:21]  And this is something that we have been hearing from Ryabkov.
[00:16:25]  I heard this over a year ago, personally.
[00:16:27]  From Lavrov, when we talked to us roughly a year ago, he said more or less the same thing, and he was appalled because there were always very good channels.
[00:16:36]  Why do the Russians believe that there is a rupture or a coming rupture in the relationship with the United States?
[00:16:45]  Is it because Tony Blinken and Joe Biden wouldn't speak to their counterparts for three years?
[00:16:50]  It goes way beyond that, Judge.
[00:16:53]  Because of the demonization campaign against Russia in terms of culture, in terms of civilization, in terms of civilization state, and even the Russian people.
[00:17:08]  This under Trump is going to be slightly different.
[00:17:11]  In these past 24 hours, there were some, I would say, auspicious signs that...
[00:17:30]  There could be a meeting next month, March, for instance.
[00:17:33]  But the great problem is after all these years of Russophobia and demonization of Russia, and this doesn't start after the SMO, this comes...
[00:17:49]  And we can say that it has been going on for the past 30 years or so, since the fall of the Soviet Union.
[00:17:56]  How are you going to have a dialogue as the Minister of Foreign Relations here?
[00:18:01]  It's always very specific.
[00:18:03]  Mutual respect and real dialogue.
[00:18:07]  So coming from the still exceptionalist power.
[00:18:11]  So from Trump, this would...
[00:18:19]  Only a matter of a few days or weeks.
[00:18:22]  And what does he have to offer to Russia in terms of his much hyped, I'm going to end this war?
[00:18:30]  Well, if you listen to two of his closest aides, Sebastian Gorka and General Kellogg, they offer threats.
[00:18:41]  And General Kellogg, by the way, Judge, is viewed here diplomatically as a Cold War relic and undiplomatically, like the dinner I was last night talking geoeconomics, as an imbecile.
[00:18:57]  And in the corridors of the Kremlin and the corridors of the agencies here, yes, he's regarded as an idiot.
[00:19:04]  How can you have a negotiator trying to, you know, Organize the lineaments of a dialogue to end a war, and you start insulting one of the parties, which is the case of Kellogg.
[00:19:18]  So obviously he's unprepared for this task.
[00:19:21]  So this will have to be conducted personally by President Trump himself, assuming he has anything to offer Russia, and he doesn't.
[00:19:30]  The Secretary of Defense, either on his own or with instructions from the White House, I made a public statement.
[00:19:41]  We'll run this in just a second.
[00:19:44]  Yesterday, which should be pleasing, pleasing to the ears of the Kremlin.
[00:19:50]  You tell me what you think.
[00:19:51]  Chris, cut number 16. A durable peace for Ukraine must include robust security guarantees to ensure that the war will not begin again.
[00:20:03]  This must not be Minsk 3.0.
[00:20:08]  That said, the United States does not believe that NATO membership for Ukraine is a realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement.
[00:20:20]  Instead, any security guarantee must be backed by capable European and non-European troops.
[00:20:28]  If these troops are deployed as peacekeepers to Ukraine at any point, they should be deployed as part of a non-NATO mission.
[00:20:36]  And they should not be covered under Article 5. There also must be robust international oversight of the line of contact.
[00:20:46]  To be clear, as part of any security guarantee, there will not be US troops deployed to Ukraine.
[00:20:55]  If that is credible, Ukraine will never be in NATO, pleasing to the Kremlin.
[00:21:01]  US troops will not be deployed to Ukraine, pleasing to the Kremlin.
[00:21:06]  But European troops will be deployed to Ukraine, not pleasing to the Kremlin.
[00:21:13]  You can take it from there.
[00:21:14]  You're the expert.
[00:21:17]  In many aspects, let's say one minute of Hexet saying what he said is groundbreaking.
[00:21:24]  It's the first time that we hear, can you imagine, this guy leads the Pentagon and he's saying there's not going to be a Minsk tree.
[00:21:32]  Can you imagine listening to something like this until a few days ago?
[00:21:35]  Absolutely out of the question.
[00:21:36]  So this is enormous.
[00:21:38]  What he said about the peacekeeping forces, the Russians already sent their messages through their subterranean diplomatic channels, let's put it this way.
[00:21:50]  It depends on how they're going to be composed and where they're going to be placed.
[00:21:55]  And the Russians would accept that you won't be skipping force, but not an European peacekeeping force.
[00:22:01]  Because the European peacekeeping force means Ukraine What do you think he's talking about when he says non-European troops?
[00:22:13]  Where would they come?
[00:22:14]  Not U.S. and not Europe.
[00:22:16]  Where the hell would they come from?
[00:22:18]  Judge, maybe this would be code for a U.N. peacekeeping force.
[00:22:23]  But we are extrapolating.
[00:22:25]  He didn't say it.
[00:22:27]  But it opens the possibility that they would be UN peacekeeping troops.
[00:22:32]  And in this case, they would be acceptable for both sides, including Russia, right?
[00:22:37]  But the key, I would say that the absolute key argument is no Minsk tree.
[00:22:45]  This means a real end of the war, because here in Moscow, at There are different dates according to internal NATO documents.
[00:23:08]  It could be 2028, 2029, 2030.
[00:23:12]  But it's practically certain that they will try to go back against Russia later if this is on pause, if the war is on pause.
[00:23:22]  Does the Kremlin trust or respect Hegseth?
[00:23:26]  He is, after all, a super Zionist who, if he had his way, would lead the troops personally invading Gaza.
[00:23:34]  Exactly. Let's say it's too early to tell.
[00:23:38]  I'm sure if they pay attention to the clip that you just played, there are elements of rationality in what he said that will be extremely welcomed by the Kremlin.
[00:23:52]  But it comes back to the same point, Judge.
[00:23:55]  The big, big discussion that Putin really wants, and then he tried to have this discussion in December 2021, is indivisibility of security for the NATO space and post-Soviet space and, let's say, this part of Eurasia, Western Eurasia.
[00:24:18]  We are not sure if Trump will be able to sit down on the same table with Putin and start discussing that.
[00:24:24]  Because this means a new organization of spheres of influence and respecting Russia's sphere of influence, which is all across Eurasia.
[00:24:37]  We still don't know if Trump 2.0 is going to respect Russian spheres of influence.
[00:24:45]  And China's fears of influence.
[00:24:48]  Which brings us to the good old, is there going to be a new Yalta?
[00:24:53]  For the moment, the perspective is less than zero.
[00:24:59]  Pepe, a pleasure to chat with you.
[00:25:01]  An absolute pleasure.
[00:25:03]  I know it literally is midnight, maybe 12.30 in the morning where you are now.

=== 2 PM: LAWRENCE WILKERSON (00:30) ===

[00:25:07]  Thank you very much for joining us.
[00:25:09]  Everybody in bed.
[00:25:10]  Except us.
[00:25:12]  Everybody in Moscow, go to sleep.
[00:25:14]  Much appreciated.
[00:25:16]  Thank you, my man.
[00:25:17]  All the best.
[00:25:17]  Thank you so much.
[00:25:19]  Sure. Coming up tomorrow at 8 in the morning, Professor Gilbert Doctorow.
[00:25:26]  At noon, Max Blumenthal.
[00:25:28]  At 2 in the afternoon, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson.
[00:25:31]  And at 3 in the afternoon, Professor John Mearsheimer.