Judging Freedom - Judge Andrew Napolitano - Prof. Jeffrey Sachs : Who Would Trust Netanyahu?

Oct. 13, 2025 - Judging Freedom - Judge Andrew Napolitano

27:21

Prof. Jeffrey Sachs : Who Would Trust Netanyahu?

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	Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom.
	Today is Monday, October 13th, 2025.
	Professor Jeffrey Sachs joins us now.
	Professor Sachs, I know it's a it's a late in the day where you are, but thank you very much for accommodating my schedule today.
	I would like your thoughts on what took place in Israel today and how a ceasefire came about with any without any negotiations involving one of the combating sides.
	Well, fortunately, uh for the moment at least, the mass murder has uh stopped.
	I think uh what happened is that uh Israel reached its uh uh its blood quota.
	Uh Israeli uh officials had said that 50 Palestinians will die for every Israeli that died on October 7, 2023.
	Uh and uh that totals about uh sixty-four thousand, and by the official count of the Gaza Health Authorities, uh the death toll uh is around sixty-seven thousand.
	Uh I think uh Israel had just murdered uh enough people, and Donald Trump uh said in his speech in the Knesset that it was bad.
	It was bad killing, killing, killing.
	So stop.
	I I think this is a deal, so called that could have been reached uh any time uh in the last couple of years.
	Uh basically uh it stops the killing, and the hostages were released.
	Nothing else is settled, but fortunately the killing is stopped.
	Uh and that's that's good news.
	Uh the rest is uh about real politics, and there aren't real politics right now yet.
	Uh and so this is um uh uh uh a day to uh hope that uh somehow reality uh will pierce through the showmanship of the Trump White House, which has been complicit in this mass murder since it came into office.
	Uh and of course the Biden administration was complicit in the mass murder.
	Uh we can hope that something more real happens going forward.
	This is not a peace agreement.
	This is uh the end of fighting and the release of uh hostages held by Israel, uh, a couple of thousand.
	Uh the 20 uh living hostages uh that were uh held uh by Hamas.
	And this is uh good, but it's not unfortunately a peace deal because a peace deal requires uh serious politics.
	Um and uh we don't know whether this White House is uh interested or capable of that, and we don't know uh what the stamina of the rest of the world will be to try to do uh a serious peace agreement that could really resolve this crisis.
	If we don't have such an agreement, there will be more war and uh renewal of killing, maybe war with Iran and the United States.
	Uh many terrible things can happen uh unless there's a movement to peace.
	As uh I've discussed with you on probably dozens of occasions by now.
	The only peace that is possible is a state of Palestine, uh, that it lives alongside the state of Israel.
	Uh that was not mentioned by Mr. Trump today, either In uh his speech in uh Jerusalem or his uh speech in Cairo uh not in Cairo, sorry, in Egypt in Sharmel Sheikh, uh, in the meeting that followed uh the uh speech in Jerusalem.
	So uh so far it's um uh just uh uh an important uh step today.
	There should be no congratulation of Trump or Netanyahu.
	Uh this killing has gone on far too long, and it could have been ended on these terms uh at any time.
	Uh Hamas didn't Hamas actually didn't Hamas actually accept a deal like this, Professor Sachs, several times before, and the Israelis rejected, or maybe the Americans under Biden.
	Of course.
	This uh deal could have been had at any time.
	The Israelis wanted to kill a lot of people.
	They wanted to kill a lot of people, they wanted to reassert their dominance.
	Uh, and the way that uh they explain that is that they need to kill 50 Palestinians for for every Israeli that died.
	This was a show of might and terror, and that's what this was about.
	This was not about um uh even uh Hamas, because uh uh Hamas as a fighting force was a degraded uh soon after uh uh the uh Israeli operation started.
	Netanyahu himself said that.
	Uh and today didn't change anything dramatic.
	There was uh no disarmament or anything more fundamental.
	What happened today could happen.
	Uh tens of thousands or maybe hundreds of thousands of deaths earlier.
	And I'd like to say something to the viewers because last time that I mentioned uh when we were together, the 67,000 deaths, there were a lot of correct comments that uh why do you say 67,000?
	It's probably hundreds of thousands.
	And of course, that's right.
	I said sixty-seven thousand because that's what the Gaza health authorities uh officially declare as the bodies that have been collected.
	But the specialist, the epidemiologist, and common sense uh indicates that the actual deaths are many times that there are no doubt thousands and thousands of bodies uh buried in the rubble.
	There are no doubt uh tens of thousands of people who have died from hunger, who have died from deprivation of safe water, who have died from lack of access to health care.
	It will only be now, and let us hope that specialists are allowed to go in and do their job to ascertain what the actual death toll has been.
	In my view, this is a crime scene, Gaza.
	Uh it's a uh crime of genocide.
	It needs to be documented what has actually happened.
	It's likely that the actual death toll is many times the 67,000 uh that have been counted.
	But when I refer to that number, it's not that I'm oblivious of the reality, quite the contrary.
	It is that that is the official death toll of the Gaza health authorities at this moment.
	I'm curious about why you think Netanyahu claimed to be happy today.
	He failed to crush Hamas, he failed to eradicate the Palestinian people from Gaza.
	He severely wrecked Israel economically, politically, culturally, diplomatically, and the whole world now questions the moral basis for the Zionist apartheid state.
	I agree.
	Uh Netanyahu uh has brought Israel uh closer to self-destruction than was imaginable.
	Uh but uh Netanyahu, first of all, is uh a politician uh and he's playing for the masses, and he wants to take credit for bringing 20 hostages home.
	And there was uh thrills and excitement in Israel of the hostages coming home.
	It's an odd thing, I I have to say, it makes me very makes me very sad and uh very wary of all of this.
	Of course, uh the 20 hostages uh coming home is uh is a good thing, but there have been perhaps hundreds of thousands of deaths, uh, not mentioned today by Trump or Netanyahu, who of course they're they are uh the the uh agents of that mass murder.
	Um and so it's all very strange and and very peculiar and a lot of showmanship.
	Uh but like a politician, he wants to uh uh show that he's in control and hosting Donald Trump, and they each praised each other as wonderful people and everything's fantastic.
	And of course, uh till now it is still the case that uh Trump uh and uh his uh cronies uh don't don't say anything about uh state of Palestine and don't uh say anything about the realities of uh a genocide.
	And so Netanyahu may think uh, well, I still got this guy in uh in our control, and uh we're still going to have permanent control, uh, and we're uh uh maybe gonna go to war together against Iran.
	Uh everything is unsettled right now.
	Uh so Netanyahu, who knows uh to put uh the smile on and and uh take the applause and take the happiness of uh the Israeli people that uh hostages have come home and take credit for it.
	It's uh it's from any objective uh standpoint uh uh almost uh uh a sickness uh uh in this tragic situation in uh the immediate aftermath that we hope of a genocide uh for this kind of spectacle to be staged.
	Uh but this is how it is.
	We're in the land of uh make believe and and spectacle.
	Uh and our president is uh is a showman, he's not a serious person.
	Uh he's a showman, and this is uh the show that we have put on.
	Apparently, in addition to being a showman, he's still a businessman.
	I don't even know if this is licit, and I should.
	But while on a government plane and a government mission, he's uh negotiating for a deal uh with the president of Indonesia.
	This apparently was a hot microphone that neither of them knew was hot.
	Watch this.
	Can I meet Eric?
	Yeah, very close.
	Yeah, yeah, yeah.
	That's a good boy.
	Yeah, yeah.
	I'll have that.
	Thank you.
	Yeah, yeah.
	I can carry also.
	I can carry.
	We'll look for better place.
	Yeah, all the best.
	Do you remember what you said before?
	Okay, here you are.
	I heard.
	Now, let's get a little done.
	Okay.
	Yeah, let's do that.
	Okay.
	You're a fantastic thing.
	I'll have one of them fast.
	Thank you, my second.
	I like that you don't need that.
	We're um I'll translate some of it, yes, and it's in the region, and I'm not perfectly at least safe and secure here.
	Can I meet Eric?
	Yeah.
	How do I talk to Eric.
	Yeah, you're such a good boy.
	I'll have that.
	Yeah, I need it.
	Yeah, I'm not afraid of Eric.
	The Eric is probably Trump's son.
	They're obviously talking about some kind of a deal that the president of Indonesia wanted to talk to Trump's son Eric about.
	I don't know if Eric was there on the trip where the president of Indonesia was trying to arrange it.
	This type of thing is de regure for uh the Trump uh presidency today, is it not?
	Everyone in the entourage has a side uh a side deal going.
	Uh it is pervasive.
	Uh, of course, the president uh himself and his family, uh all of these uh so-called negotiators, uh, they have side deals.
	Everybody's uh everybody's uh making money, they're they're having a good time.
	It's um this is uh what has happened uh to uh to the United States.
	Uh it it is uh pay-for-play politics everywhere in the Congress, in the White House, uh, and uh uh on all of these uh foreign trips we know, but we see this every day.
	Uh there's uh um nothing uh uh new or surprising.
	What is the uh shocking thing is that it doesn't matter.
	There's no control, there's no interest in control, there's uh no uh uh second guessing of this.
	Uh there's no inspectors general, there's no one in Congress.
	This is this is America now.
	We have a profoundly corrupt political system.
	Americans know it.
	They don't know what to do with it, they don't have any power to do anything because frankly, it's the billionaires that run the show.
	Everybody understands this.
	Uh and the billionaires are in every deal.
	Here's um Trump praising the Mossad's wealthiest asset.
	Cut number 11.
	She's got 60 billion in the bank, 60 billion, and she loves and she I think she said no more.
	And she loves Israel, but she loves it, and they would come in and her husband was a very aggressive man, but I loved him.
	He was a very aggressive, very supportive of me.
	And uh he'd call up, uh, can I come over and see you?
	I say, Sheldon, I'm the president of the United States.
	It doesn't work that way.
	He'd come in with the.
	But they uh were very responsible for so much, including getting me thinking about Golan Heights, which is probably one of the greatest things to ever happen.
	Miriam, stand up, please.
	She really is.
	I mean, she loves this country.
	She loves this country.
	Her and her husband are so incredible.
	We miss him so dearly.
	But I actually asked her, I'm gonna get her in trouble with this, but I actually asked her once I said, so Miriam, I know you love Israel.
	What do you love more?
	The United States or Israel.
	She refused to answer.
	That means that might mean Israel.
	Is that really something to joke about?
	Is it really appropriate for the president of the United States to reveal to the whole world uh someone's personal uh wealth?
	Well, it's the personal wealth that uh helped buy him his presidency, to which he owes his allegiance and to which his interest is always dedicated.
	So uh for Trump, this is uh absolutely normal.
	The fact that uh this is what has become of the United States is our tragedy.
	Uh and it's the tragedy of the Palestinian people, it's the tragedy of uh people that uh die uh in wars concocted uh by these billionaires.
	Uh for them, it's a game.
	For us, it's a reality.
	Uh It is repulsive to watch that, frankly.
	Completely repulsive.
	Because there's so much giddiness of power.
	There's so much drunkenness of power on display today that there's no attempt even to hide anything to hide the money influence to hide uh the mass killings.
	Nothing.
	It's uh they are giddy with power, and it is uh a class of uh billionaires uh like uh Mrs. Adelson uh who own our media who uh own our Congress,
	who own our president, and uh uh if the results were I'm dreaming, of course, kind of normal and good, that would be one thing, but they are awful.
	Uh absolutely uh nothing to do with American public opinion or American interests or the world's interests or peace and stability.
	Think of uh all the tech companies, how much money they've made on this war, uh how they have big contracts with the Israeli defense forces as this mass killing was going on.
	Did we hear from uh Microsoft or Amazon or uh Meta or uh Alphabet uh Google or anybody uh a word about the mass murder?
	Of course not.
	This is their business model, and um no reason to even take note of it.
	So it's so interesting, yes, that for Trump, this is it's it's not even um a question for him to celebrate her 60 billion dollars or whatever it is, and the role that she's played in this in American politics, uh in this destruction that's just happened.
	And of course, for them, there's no destruction.
	Uh for them, this was all a game.
	And for Israel, it was a show of force.
	Uh we kill 50 for every one that died on October 7th, 2023.
	That's just how it is.
	For the rest of us, and for the Palestinian people, it's an unfathomable tragedy that continues today, uh, because there's no serious talk or reflection about tomorrow.
	There's just deals to be made.
	Uh and uh uh viceroys uh to uh take control of uh someone else's land and they're giddy with it.
	Even if the viceroy like Tony Blair is uh himself a war criminal, I just want to switch to another topic before we conclude.
	Um the question is why is Trump taunting the Russians over tomahawks?
	But in fairness to Trump, I have to play the clip, which is in his usual frivolity, but that's what he says.
	Quest number nine.
	We talked about weapons, and the weapons are sent to NATO, and NATO then sends us a check.
	They pays for info, and uh they would need more weapons, and we're looking into doing that.
	We we hope we're gonna be able to provide them.
	They'd like to have tomahawks to step up.
	They'd like to have tomahawks.
	We talked about that, and so uh so we'll see.
	Well, I don't know.
	I made I might have to speak to Russia, to be honest with you about Tomahawks.
	Do they want to have Tomahawks going in their direction?
	I don't think so.
	I think I might speak to Russia about that in all fairness.
	I told that to President Zelensky, because tomahawks are a new step of aggression.
	Are you saying that you will speak to Putin first about tomahawks?
	I might say, look, this war's not going to get settled.
	I'm gonna send them tomahawks.
	I may said that.
	If the war is not settled, that we may very well We may not.
	But we may do it.
	I think it's appropriate to bring up.
	Yeah.
	Professor Sachs, was anything positive accomplished by the conference that Presidents Putin and Trump had in Anchorage, Alaska.
	The Russians have concluded that there's nothing in this administration that can be trusted, and that no, uh there's nothing that really came out of this.
	What's been reported in the last 48 hours is the extent to which the United States has been uh uh working with Ukraine already for attacks deep inside Russia on Russian uh energy infrastructure.
	Uh Americans should understand that these are attacks by United States personnel on Russia, that uh the U.S. is at war with Russia, and how extraordinarily dangerous that is.
	Tomahawks is not even the point right now.
	Uh the point is that this is already happening.
	Uh Americans are providing uh missile systems, guidance, intelligence tracking uh location, uh everything uh that is uh part of uh an attack on Russia.
	And I think the Russians know full well that uh this is not a serious administration that one talks to.
	They don't uh taunt uh Trump.
	They don't uh want escalation, but this is uh such an unpredictable uh and uh deeply worrisome approach of uh the U.S. That is some mix of uh the frivolousness of the White House and the insidiousness of the normal deep state in the United States,
	meaning decisions taken by the CIA, the Pentagon uh and others to continue to escalate uh the war.
	So from the Russian point of view, they're proceeding with with the war.
	Uh Ukraine is uh the one that suffers uh all of this.
	Uh the Ukrainian people overwhelmingly want this war to end at the negotiating table.
	But there's a dictator in Ukraine uh named Zelensky.
	Uh he rules by martial law.
	He does not uh have public opinion on his side, but he doesn't have public opinion because he's ruling by uh decree.
	Uh in the United States, uh Trump and uh the military and the CIA does what it does, this uh uh security state also without American public opinion,
	uh or without uh any honest discussion, and the situation every day is uh fraught with extraordinary danger that this can escalate to complete disaster.
	This is uh we've talked about this uh for years now.
	Trump has changed nothing about this.
	Uh Trump changed nothing really in the Middle East.
	We had this uh bloodletting, uh, we had this mass slaughter.
	Maybe it stopped temporarily.
	Maybe there'll be uh renewed uh war of the United States and Israel with Iran, maybe there'll be escalation with Russia.
	Uh but this is not unfortunately stable or serious governance.
	It certainly has uh no characteristics of uh deliberative democracy, let me put it that way.
	Uh the American people and Congress play zero role in this, and that is uh by itself quite alarming.
	Professor Sachs, thank you very much.
	Long day for you, long day here, but worth waiting for, I hope.
	Certainly from my perspective and the perspective of our uh viewers, all the best to you.
	We'll see you again.
	We'll see you again very soon.
	Thank you.
	Excellent.
	Thanks.
	Thanks a lot.
	I will be traveling, as many of you know, but uh back before the end of the week.

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