Sean Hannity Show - Trouble in Iran

July 19, 2019 - Sean Hannity Show

01:41:26

Trouble in Iran

Join Sean as he covers all of the breaking news behind the British Tanker that was seized in the Strait of Hormuz. What's next for this troubling incident and how should America respond?! Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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	This is an iHeart podcast.
	All right, glad you're with us on this Friday.
	We have some breaking news as we begin this day.
	It appears that the Iranians now very stupidly, this is really dumb, have seized a British-flagged oil tanker in the Straits of Hormuz amid what is obviously growing tensions in the region, which you know, really are caused by the fact that the president and his sanctions have been phenomenal.
	It's had a great impact, a negative impact.
	We now see, and intelligence people that I know that are really smart, that know the goings-on inside of Iran, they've all been suggesting that the younger population has been resisting, risking their own lives on a regular basis to take down this regime.
	Problem when you get in a situation like Avin Iran, you can't win revolutions with slingshots.
	It's never going to happen.
	Or Molotov cocktails.
	That's never going to happen.
	And they have no compunctions about killing and imprisoning anybody that they deem as any type of threat to this radical Islamic regime that they have.
	But things have been growing.
	And of course, we had the one tanker that was hit.
	We had the drone that was hit.
	Yesterday, we took out their drone because they had a drone flying within, what, a thousand yards of one of our ships in the Straits of Hormuz.
	And anyway, so the report that we now have is that apparently this British tanker was approached by unidentified small crafts and a helicopter during transit through the Straits of Hormuz.
	Now, I just want to back up for a second here.
	Strategically, tactically, I mean, the Straits of Hormuz has been always this very sensitive area where the free flow of oil at market prices, a lot of the world's oil has to pass through those straits.
	Very narrow Straits of Hormuz.
	Anyway, the vessel was in international waters.
	The shipping company that owns the vessel said in a statement, we are presently unable to contact the vessel, which is now heading north towards Iran.
	And Iran's Revolutionary Guard forces, in a statement on their website, say they seized the ship for, quote, non-compliance with international maritime laws and regulations.
	And it's being brought to an unnamed Iranian port, according to the AP.
	Websites that are tracking the ship's path show it turning sharply in the direction of this island off of Iran instead of its intended destination, which was Saudi Arabia.
	Quote, we're urgently seeking further information and assessing the situation following reports of an incident in the Gulf, according to a UK government spokesperson telling Fox News.
	Mike Pompeo is speaking now.
	Can we dip in and hear what Mike Pompeo is?
	Oh, no, he just cut off.
	Okay.
	But obviously, as information becomes available, we'll share it with you throughout the afternoon.
	Second time now in just over a week that the UK has been the target of this escalating violence by this radical, insane Iranian regime.
	The U.S. will continue to work with our allies and partners to defend our security and our interest against Iranians' malignant behavior.
	And there have been no reported injuries.
	Obviously, the safety of the people aboard this British oil tanker is of primary concern.
	And this comes after Iran last week warned the British that they will face repercussions over the mean and wrong seizure of one of its supertankers in early July that authorities believe was operating in violation of European Union sanctions.
	So that's really all we know now.
	Iran's Revolutionary Guard saying that it seized a British oil taker in the Straits of Hormuz.
	Now, this on the heels yesterday, the president shot down an Iranian drone after giving multiple warnings of the drone flying close to a U.S. vessel in international waters.
	All right, so let's just stop for a second here, and let me just sort of lay out: we have our friend Daniel Hoffman who's going to be with us.
	He's a 30-year CIA officer, knows a lot about Iran and the inner workings of this radical regime.
	And one thing we can first start and be thankful for is that for the first time in 75 years, because the president kept his promise and eliminated burdensome regulation, well, we're now energy independent.
	And I have said this for years and years and years and years and years.
	We have more resources, natural resources, than the Middle East combined.
	We do not need to get our energy, which is the lifeblood of every economy, from countries that hate our guts.
	Now, with that said, the radical mullahs in Iran that I thought Biden and Obama fixed this problem, I thought they made a deal.
	I thought when they dropped $150 billion in cash and other currencies in the tarmac and cargo planes in Iran, I thought they were going to like us.
	This naive foreign policy view that Democrats so often have is despicable.
	You know, as Bill Clinton, this is a good deal for the American people.
	When he allowed Kim Jong-il, Kim Jong-un's father, well, they tried to bribe him too.
	And they bribed him, but yet they allowed him to continue to do, you know, build centrifuges and et cetera, et cetera.
	And it was just a horrible deal.
	The Iranian deal allowed the Iranians, even after 10 years, it would be okay.
	They can have, you know, build their own nuclear weapons.
	This was a temporary band-aid that was dumb.
	I don't know what it is about the liberal mind that believes in appeasement somehow.
	We never learn the lessons of history.
	You're not going to convince brutal regimes to change and money and bribery and appeasement and ass kissing doesn't work.
	The only thing that evil will respond to is certain military force against them.
	And the Iranians, obviously now, with all the saber rattling, they've been picking a fight with all of us.
	Now, what's happened, though, is almost there isn't, think about the situation, the Camp David Accords.
	Let's go back to the UN partition plan.
	You know, there's never been a moment like we currently have, and I'll explain why in a minute, there's never been a moment where an alliance of countries in the Middle East that was perhaps the most unlikely is happening right before our very eyes.
	And now, by the Iranians taking on the U.S., as they've already constantly picking fights, fighting proxy wars against Israel and funding Hezbollah and these terrorist attacks against Israel.
	Then, of course, they've been fighting a proxy war with the Hudus in Yemen and those forces there.
	And so, you know, now the Saudis are on board.
	So you got the U.S., now the U.K. and Israel, and the Jordanians, and the Egyptians under El-Sisi, King of Dullah and Jordan, and putting aside Khashoggi for just a minute, even the Saudis are now aligned against Iranian hegemony.
	Now, the Straits of Hormuz have been historically the single most strategic transportation lanes for what is, I've always said, the lifeblood of every economy.
	And that's oil and gas in our case.
	Oil and gas, free flow of energy at market prices.
	Now, the fact that the Iranians are foolish enough now to take on everybody only makes what eventually has to happen easier.
	That's a good thing.
	Now, because of the fear of Iranian hegemony and because of the radicalism and the proxy wars and the terrorism that is funded by the Iranians, they're the biggest state sponsor of terror.
	And now because of the saber rattling, because they want attention because they want the world, they want the appeasers that are still a part of the stupid deal that Biden and Obama made.
	They want them, oh, oh, please, President Trump, you've got to capitulate.
	No, he doesn't need to capitulate.
	What needs to happen now is something that at some point we're going to either regret we didn't do or be glad we did.
	It's a simple mathematical formula.
	You know, there's math formulas.
	You know, what is it?
	The speed of light.
	Energy equals blah, blah, blah, blah.
	What is MC squared?
	What is it?
	E equals MC squared.
	E equals MC squared.
	Okay, I'm not a mathematician, right?
	But it's, that's, again, brilliance on the part of people that have mathematical talents I could only dream of.
	A squared plus B squared equals C squared.
	Radical Iranian mullahs that believe in a caliphate and believe in strategically planning generational convert or die.
	Just a quick update, Sean.
	Fox News is now reporting that he wrote.
	They claimed a second, now says RAN is now claiming, I just see across in the wires, claiming they seized a second oil tanker.
	Is that also from Great Britain?
	That's the only thing I don't know yet.
	We don't know the origin of the tanker.
	We don't know.
	So what I'm saying is we're not dependent now for the first time in 75 years.
	The straits of Hormuz for the United States is less important than it's ever been.
	But it's important for the world.
	So you now have the biggest terrorist state in the world.
	They're now decided that they're going to pick fights with everybody.
	If they're going to pick a fight, obviously they chant death to America, death to Israel, burn the American flag, burn the Israeli flag, threaten to wipe Israel off the map, the United States off the map.
	A squared, B squared, C squared is radical Islamic terrorists that run this regime, the mullahs that Biden and Obama bribed and some of our weak allies that are appeasers bribed with $150 billion in cash and other currencies used to kill people and fight proxy wars and fund terrorism.
	Well, now you have a situation where the world has aligned against them because they realize if those radicals that believe in convert or die get weapons of mass destruction, the same people that would strap bombs on their own kids to kill innocent men, women, and children, the second tanker is a British tanker also.
	That they would strap bombs on their own kids.
	We can't have radicals with nuclear weapons.
	We just can't.
	Because that would be A squared, the radicals, B squared, the nukes equals a potential modern-day Holocaust.
	We can't risk that.
	Now that the British are going to join us, as they've kind of been with us from the beginning, we always can count on the British.
	And Israel is certainly with us.
	The Saudis hate the Iranians.
	They're with us.
	The Jordanians are with us.
	And that would be under King Abdullah.
	And General Al-Sisi is with us of Egypt.
	And I, you know, I don't care what the French president thinks.
	I don't care what Putin thinks.
	You know, but this can't continue.
	You're not allowed to just shoot out and stop the free flow of oil at market prices if you do.
	Now, we're going to have to make a decision at some point.
	At some point, we better take out these nuclear sites.
	Now, when the Israelis did it in the 80s in Iraq, there was worldwide condemnation.
	When they did it in Syria, it's like the most underreported, greatest military attack ever.
	They took out the Syrian sites by flying under Syrian radar to get the job done.
	Hardly anybody even knows it happened.
	It's so amazing.
	But if we allow the Iranians to do this without do this, it is now giving us the opening that we really at some point need to take.
	Doesn't have to be today, but it's got to happen.
	It'll be a safer world for our kids and grandkids.
	The president has been informed.
	We'll get an update throughout the show today as this continues to unfold.
	All right, if you're just joining us, two British tankers now have been seized in the ever-so-strategic Straits of Hormuz.
	If you look at a map, so you got these very narrow straits, which strategically have been so important for the passage of oil, which is the lifeblood of every economy.
	By the way, as a little side note, we'll get into more details of this.
	It just, it really brings into focus the importance of America not relying on foreign sources for our energy, the lifeblood of our economy.
	We've already seen this play out where people artificially raise prices.
	You know, when remember when North Dakota was doing so well, what happened with Middle Eastern oil?
	They purposely drove down the price to drive our companies out of business.
	The Middle East knows we don't need them.
	They absolutely know.
	Why has there been so much talk about the Saudis trying to alter shift their economy away from their one source of revenue, oil?
	Because they know we're not needing them anymore.
	And it only took one president to get us there.
	But so strategically, a lot of the world's oil passed through these narrow straits.
	Imagine on one side, you have the Iranians, on the other, the UAE and Omam.
	And so when you have so much of the world's oil passing through those straits, it's strategically imperative.
	No economy can live without this energy.
	That's why it's so insane, the new Green Deal.
	And now that the Iranians, they've been now beginning to escalate day after day after day.
	They've now have taken in two oil tankers of Great Britain in international waters on the heels of shooting down a U.S. drone on the heels of us yesterday shooting down one of theirs, although they deny it.
	It's going to precipitate what I think eventually has to happen.
	And by the way, this is not an extended war.
	This is a strike.
	Take out the sights and see you later.
	All right, just breaking in the last hour, we now have confirmed that in fact two well, let's go to the president.
	He's walking up to the microphone as we speak.
	And two tankers, British tankers seized in the Straits of Hormuz by Iran.
	Very good numbers economically.
	The country is doing really well.
	We expect great things, and we have a lot of potential, a lot of way to go.
	We're the hottest economy now, definitely, actually, for the last quite a bit period of time.
	And I think we have tremendous potential for a lot of growth.
	Europe is not doing well.
	A lot of places.
	So, I just want to let you know.
	Well, it's alliance with the UK, and we always have.
	We heard that.
	The United States has very few tankers going in because we're using our own energy now.
	We've made a lot of progress over the last two and a half years.
	We don't have very many that are warships, and we'll talk to the UK, and we have no...
	And we're going to get a better audio.
	The president is now speaking.
	Yeah, we don't have as many tankers.
	The Straits of Hormuz are less strategic than ever before because we've been smart.
	All right, let's go back to the President.
	And what has she said to you?
	Oh, good grief.
	The media, really?
	This is their question.
	If you go back into the four Congresswomen, the things they've said about our country are terrible.
	What they've said about Israel are just terrible.
	I don't know.
	I can't say for sure, but certainly a lot of people say they hate our country.
	And I think it's a disgrace what they've said.
	I think you can't talk that way about the United States.
	And I think, frankly, to say that about Israel, you know, we just gave the embassy in Jerusalem making Jerusalem the capital of Israel.
	I just gave Golan Heights, recognized Golan Heights for Israel.
	I've done all of this for Israel.
	And then you have these people.
	I think that Omar, I find it hard to believe, but I hear Omar today put in, or yesterday put in, a sanctions bill against Israel and other things beyond sanctions.
	So when I hear that, you just can't talk about our country that way.
	And when people are angry at them, I fully understand it.
	That's the political spew that you're having with Congressman Omar and the rest of those Democrats that protected.
	Is it good thing politically for you, or do you think it turns people off?
	I don't know if it's good or bad politically.
	I don't care.
	But when people are speaking so badly, when they call our country garbage, Mark, think of that.
	That's worse than deplorable.
	Well, they call our country garbage.
	I don't care about politics.
	I don't care if it's good or bad about politics.
	Many people say it's good.
	I don't know if it's good or bad.
	I can tell you this, you can't talk that way about our country.
	Not when I'm the president.
	So I think they've said horrible things.
	They're anti-Semitic.
	And you look at the kind of statements they've made about Israel, it's a disgrace.
	Help me, Mr. President.
	They have First Amendment rights to say what they want about our country.
	That's what the Constitution guarantees.
	Do you see not agreeing with you as the same thing as hating the country, sir?
	They have First Amendment rights, but that doesn't mean I'm happy about them saying, and when they say bad things about us, we can certainly feel, and again, we have First Amendment rights also, we can certainly feel what and say what we want.
	Say it, Steve.
	What do you mean what is this kind of achieve?
	So we're going to be speaking with the UK.
	And this only goes to show what I'm saying about Iran.
	Trouble.
	Nothing but trouble.
	And remember this, the agreement, the ridiculous agreement made by President Obama expires in a very short period of time.
	It was a short-term agreement.
	When you're dealing in countries, you have to deal in 50 years and 100 years.
	You don't deal in the short term.
	That was a ridiculous agreement.
	And it goes to show you I was right about Iran.
	And let's see what happens.
	But I know that it's not Americanship, it's UK.
	I guess it could be one, could be two.
	And we'll be speaking to them.
	They have a new prime minister coming soon.
	And that's a good thing for the UK.
	Go ahead.
	In the past, you said that America is the laughingstock of the world, that you don't believe in American exceptionalism.
	Why is it okay for you to criticize America, but not Democratic Congress?
	I believe all people are great people.
	I believe everyone is great.
	But I love our country, and I'm representing our country.
	And people can't go around speaking about our country and saying garbage.
	This is the greatest country in the world.
	We now have the strongest military by far.
	We had a depleted military when I took over.
	We spent $716 billion last year, $700 billion a year before we have a great, powerful military, more powerful than we've ever had before.
	We have the greatest economy on earth, not even close.
	You can't speak about our country the way those four congressmen said garbage.
	They say things about Israel that's so bad.
	I'm not even going to repeat them right now.
	They can't get away with that act.
	not the right thing.
	These women have said horrible things about our country and the people of our country.
	Nobody should be able to do that.
	And if they want to do that, that's up to them.
	But I can't imagine they're going to do very well at the polls.
	And I say this, if the Democrats want to embrace people that hate our country, people that are so far left that nobody's ever seen anything like it, if they want to embrace people that are so anti-Semitic and anti-Israel, they want to do that.
	That's up to them.
	But I don't have to do that.
	I think what they say and what they've said is a disgrace to them, to the Democrats, and frankly to our country.
	Long time ago, yeah, 15 years ago.
	I had a falling gun.
	Well, I didn't get along with them.
	David?
	Wait, wait.
	Why you want to phone with Michael Cohen in October 2015 with Michael and Hope?
	Why were you on a phone call?
	What was that about?
	I don't really know.
	I'd have to look into it.
	That's a long time ago.
	I do think we have bigger problems than plastic straws.
	You know, it's interesting about plastic straws.
	So, you have a little straw.
	But what about the plates, the wrappers, and everything else that are much bigger, and they're made of the same material?
	So the straws are interesting.
	Everybody focuses on the straws.
	There's a lot of other things to focus.
	But it's an interesting question.
	Go ahead, talk up.
	Mnuchin just had Hong Kong with his Chinese counterpart.
	So how did the Hong Kong work and wait for that?
	So Secretary Mnuchin did have a call with the Chinese counterpart.
	They had a very good talk.
	We'll see what happens.
	We're dealing with China.
	We're doing very well.
	They are not doing very well.
	They had the worst year they've had in 27 years, and we're having the best year we ever had.
	So we're doing well, but let's see what happens.
	And our farmers are doing very well because I've taken some of the billions of dollars of tariffs that we collect from China.
	We collect billions and billions of dollars of fees and tariffs, and I gave it to our farmers.
	I know you guys talked about it.
	False information.
	It was fake news.
	Nope, I talk about it, but they didn't advise me.
	They told me, but I didn't.
	It's fake.
	By the way, what you're saying?
	Fake news.
	Fake news.
	Rand Paul, what does Rand Paul want to do for North Iran?
	What do you want?
	Well, Rand is a friend of mine, but I have really 53 very good friends, and they're in the Senate.
	I also have a lot of friends.
	You saw that the other day when they brought a ridiculous vote up, and only four Republicans out of hundreds voted against.
	So I have a lot of great friends.
	I'm 94% in the Republican Party approval rating.
	Rand is a friend of mine, and Rand asked me if he could get involved.
	The answer is yes.
	And if other senators asked me to get involved, I'd probably say yes, depending on who they were.
	We'll see what happens.
	But I have many people involved, and Iran is going to work out very nicely.
	Iran is showing their colors.
	It's going to work out very nicely.
	Iran is in big trouble right now.
	Their economy is crashing.
	It's coming to a crash.
	They're trying to bring soldiers back home because they can't pay them.
	A lot of bad things are happening to them.
	And it's very easy to straighten out or it's very easy for us to make it a lot worse.
	You can't send them home.
	No, you know what's racist to me?
	When somebody goes out and says the horrible things about our country, the people of our country, that are anti-Semitic, that hate everybody, that speak with scorn and hate, that, to me, is really a very dangerous thing.
	I think these four congressmen, I could say some worse than others, but if you look at the statements they've made, what they call the people of our country and our country garbage, when they hit Israel the way they've hit Israel so hard, so horrible, I think to me that's a disgrace.
	And we should never forget it.
	We're dealing with people that hate our country.
	The Pressure of the President, Mr. President, Mr. President, are you planning on this?
	No, I don't.
	I know.
	Let me tell you.
	They had an impeachment vote the other day.
	Just a big waste of time.
	It's a disgrace.
	No other president should ever have to go through it.
	And the vote was a totally lopsided vote with many Democrats voting in favor.
	As far as I'm concerned, they already took their impeachment vote.
	And the impeachment vote was so lopsided, it was a massive victory.
	And you know what?
	At some point, they have to stop playing games because they're just playing games.
	No, I won't be watching, Molly.
	I told you about it!
	They say that's a good opportunity.
	Optica-funding to engage more in work with the United States.
	But the president of Zimbabwe, he said that because of the sanctions of the U.S. who votes in Zimbabwe, they cannot, he will be honored with them to work with you guys.
	We're looking at Zimbabwe right now.
	The First Lady feels very strongly about our country.
	The First Lady thinks that it's horrible what they've said about Israel and horrible what they've said about our country.
	These Congresswomen, they can't call our country and our people garbage.
	They can't be anti-Semitic.
	They can't talk about evil Jews, which is what they say, evil Jews.
	That's what the First Lady does.
	All right, the president now walking away.
	A lot to absorb there.
	The first observation is we just had confirmation the Iranians have seized two oil tankers in the ever-so strategic Straits of Hormuz.
	Rightly, the President points out, well, we have very few tankers there because he has pursued a policy of energy independence that is truthful and honest and important because it's less strategic for us than ever before.
	President reaffirming our strong friendship and alliance with, of course, Great Britain, went on to say about Iran that they are about to crash.
	He's talking about the sanctions have been devastating, which is why I believe we're seeing a lot of the saber rattling and the incidents now moving forward.
	He said, well, it's going to end one way or the other, and there's a lot is they're in a lot of trouble.
	And then said that they're bringing home soldiers because they can't afford to pay them.
	I know from my intelligence sources that there is a lot of internal strife within Iran.
	That means people in Iran have been standing up, protesting, risking their lives, many imprisoned, some have been killed as they want a regime change there.
	Shockingly, but not shockingly, the media wanted to talk an awful lot about the squad, and the president kept reiterating the point that you can't call America, the United States of America, garbage.
	And we have outlined repeatedly the anti-Semitic comments by Congresswoman Omar and others.
	And he said, somebody said, well, what about their First Amendment rights?
	He says, yeah, well, we have First Amendment rights too.
	And if you say the United States is garbage and you say things that are anti-Semitic and hateful, we have the right to point that out as well.
	And when you speak badly about our country, well, we happen to have the strongest economy right now on the face of the earth, which is also true.
	Anyway, here joining us right now is my good friend and colleague, Jennifer Griffin from the Pentagon, reporting on what's been going on in the Straits of Hormuz.
	I got to imagine there's a lot going on behind the scenes right now where you are, Jennifer Griffin.
	Hi, Sean.
	Well, what has been particularly surprising in the last hour is to find out that it's not one, not two, but three oil tankers that Iran is now holding against their will.
	Two were taken today, we've confirmed.
	One is a British oil tanker, the Stena Imperu, and one is a Liberian tanker.
	It's not clear when the Liberian tanker was taken, but we do know that the British flag tanker was passing through the Strait of Hormuz when it was seized, and that we have a statement from the shipping company.
	The UK Security Council is having an emergency meeting about how to respond.
	And while these are not American oil tankers, it is definitely a disruption to the flow of oil and the flow of shipping and freedom of navigation in that very vital Strait of Hormuz.
	Jennifer, if I can just interrupt you for one second for our affiliates on the Sean Hannity Show Network right now, I just want you to know we will be continuing our coverage and bypassing this current break.
	If you need to break, we understand.
	We go back now to Jennifer Griffin, now telling us, in fact, three oil tankers have been seized in the ever-important Straits of Hormuz.
	These straits well known for the traffic of oil and known for its strategic importance at guaranteeing the lifeblood of every economy on the face of this earth, which is the free flow of oil at market prices.
	Three tankers.
	I only had two, so now we have a third one.
	Jennifer.
	Yes, in fact, Sean, the third tanker we've confirmed is a Liberian oil tanker.
	We don't have its name at this moment, and it's not clear whether it was taken before or after this British flag Stina Imperial.
	We do have a statement from the British shipping company saying that the Stena Imperial was approached by unidentified small crafts, Iranian ships, and a helicopter during transit of the Strait of Hormuz, and the vessel was in international waters.
	They are unable to contact the vessel.
	There are 23 seafarers on board.
	We learned yesterday that the Iranians had admitted that they were the ones who seized the United Arab Emirates oil tanker that went missing over the weekend.
	The UAE has been very quiet, most likely, because they are out there in the region sitting right across from Iran, and tensions are very high in that very tight region, as you mentioned.
	And so the UAE did not immediately come out and suggest that the oil tanker that was missing had been taken against its will.
	But we now know that Iran, according to U.S. officials, is holding 12 sailors on board that UAE tanker against their will.
	So that would mean four tankers now have been taken.
	Three total.
	So you're saying that one originally there was reports of a second British tanker, and you're saying there's only one that we can confirm.
	What we can confirm is that over the weekend, a UAE tanker was taken by the Iranians.
	There was some confusion over that for a number of days, but the Iranians released video showing their fastboats taking that tanker toward Iranian waters.
	We do know about that one at this point.
	Today, two tankers were taken: a British flag tanker, the Stena Imperial, as well as a Liberian tanker.
	All right, Jennifer Griffin, my Fox News colleague at the Pentagon today.
	Jennifer, thank you.
	We hopefully will check back in with you later on.
	What's so amazing?
	I mean, there's a possibility now of significant real military action, and you just heard your media mob.
	It is beyond, it just is everything I've said about their sickness, their psychosis, this rage and fixation on just hating Donald Trump.
	Really, the squad and their significance at this moment is non-existent compared to what may potentially be happening with Iran and the Straits of Hormuz.
	Let me explain the Straits of Hormuz for those of you that don't know.
	It is a very narrow passageway, which strategically, historically, has been one of the main points where the world's oil passes through.
	The Straits on one side, you have Iran.
	On the other side, you have the UAE and Omam.
	Now, what's important about that is what Jennifer Griffin had said.
	Now that we can confirm, Fox News confirmed that a UAE tanker had been seized over the weekend.
	Add that to what has happened just in the last hour, hour and a half, two hours.
	One British tanker, one Liberian tanker.
	Add that to the other saber rattling, and that, of course, being the shooting down of an American drone, what happened yesterday, the president's response.
	And all of this is a result of the president not following in the footsteps of the appeasement policies of Biden-Obama and laying cash and other currency from cargo planes, $150 billion on the tarmacs in Iran.
	They think they can get away with it.
	What you have in the Straits, this is a very narrow waterway, very strategic waterway.
	It is only 21 miles wide at its narrowest point with a shipping lane just two miles wide in either direction.
	That's how small this is.
	Now, these are international waters, and literally the Straits of Hormuz, they link the Gulf north of it with the Gulf of Oman to the south and the Arabian Sea beyond it.
	The UAE, the Saudis, have sought to find other routes to bypass the Straits of Hormuz, including building more oil pipelines.
	This matters because, well, let me just give you the numbers.
	Almost one-fifth of the world's oil passes through the Straits of Hormuz.
	Okay, now, the president rightly pointed out: well, we have very few tankers now passing through the Straits because of the policies of energy independence that he has pursued with a passion since his first day in office.
	But a fifth of the world's oil, again, oil, gas, the lifeblood of every economy, passes through those straits.
	And some 17.4 million barrels of oil per day versus the consumption of about 100 million barrels per day in 2018.
	Now, how much time do we have here, Linda?
	What time are we out?
	All right, we'll take a break.
	We'll come back.
	Three tankers seized in the Straits of Hormuz by Iran.
	We'll have the very latest next.
	I'm going to be speaking with the UK.
	And this only goes to show what I'm saying about Iran.
	Trouble.
	Nothing but trouble.
	And remember this, the agreement, the ridiculous agreement made by President Obama expires in a very short period of time.
	It was a short-term agreement.
	When you're dealing in countries, you have to deal in 50 years and 100 years.
	You don't deal in the short term.
	That was a ridiculous agreement.
	And it goes to show you I was right about Iran.
	And let's see what happens.
	But I know that it's not American ship, it's UK.
	I guess it could be one, could be two.
	And we'll be speaking to them.
	They have a new prime minister coming soon.
	And that's a good thing for the UK.
	Rand asked me if he could get involved.
	The answer is yes.
	And if other senators asked me to get involved, I'd probably say yes, depending on who they were.
	We'll see what happens.
	But I have many people involved.
	And Iran is going to work out very nicely.
	Iran is showing their colors.
	Going to work out very nicely.
	Iran is in big trouble right now.
	Their economy is crashing.
	It's coming to a crash.
	They're trying to bring soldiers back home because they can't pay them.
	A lot of bad things are happening to them.
	And it's very easy to straighten out or it's very easy for us to make it a lot worse.
	Very easy to straighten out and very easy for us to make it a lot worse.
	Glad you're with us.
	To Sean Hannity Show.
	If you have just joined us, that was the president moments ago in a press conference.
	We have now gotten a lot of new information.
	It appears that it is not just one tanker or two tankers.
	It appears to be four tankers now that have been seized.
	One, the UAE from a couple of days ago.
	I'll explain probably why we had not heard about that.
	Two British tankers and one Liberian tanker.
	There is, now the president pointed out in his little gaggle with the press, he did point out that we have very few tankers in the Straits of Hormuz.
	And what we, but we do apparently, the U.S., this is now being reported on the wires that the U.S. is taking measures to protect one ship near where the two British tankers were seized by Iran.
	So that means we have armed aircraft in the region and we're ready to go.
	And according to a U.S. defense official with direct knowledge at this hour, the U.S. military is monitoring the transit of a U.S. commercial cargo ship through the Straits of Hormuz using armed aircraft overhead.
	The U.S. will not say the location or give any other details.
	This transit typically takes six to eight hours.
	And the seizure of two ships was clearly pre-planned, coordinated, an Iranian Revolutionary Guard operation.
	According to U.S. officials, both tankers were boarded by a Republican Guard of the Iranians and taken into Iranian waters.
	They were all in their proper area, if you will.
	It's obviously a situation that is unfolding.
	I mean, it's kind of insane, but the president got more questions about the squad and about freedom of speech.
	And the president repeated over and over again: well, when you talk about the U.S. as being garbage, the way that has happened, and when you talk about in very anti-Semitic tones, Israel the way they have, sure, they have a First Amendment, but if they're going to talk badly about America, when I'm the president, I'm going to talk about the good of America because what they're saying is not true about America.
	The president also talked about the military, the dramatic increase in spending, $716 billion this year alone, 700, last year alone, the first year of his presidency, $700 billion, pointing out it is the greatest military on the face of the earth.
	We also have the greatest economy on the face of the earth.
	And Iran now, he keeps saying, is going to work out very nicely.
	President doesn't seem to have a lot of fear in any way in his voice.
	Let me also say that, again, I want to just give you some background on the Straits of Hormuz.
	Strategically, it's always been very important.
	Lifeblood of every economy, I say it every day, is energy, oil, and gas.
	America now, for the first time in 75 years, is energy independent.
	We're now a net exporter of energy.
	That had never happened before.
	Those were the policies of the president.
	Previous presidents have basically capitulated to the pressure of environmentalists, which made us forever dependent on foreign oil, even from countries that hate our guts and the ebb and flow of whatever the hell they felt like charging us.
	The Straits of Hormuz, very, very narrow straits.
	On one side, you have Iran, on the other, the UAE, Oman, and which is probably why we didn't hear about the UAE tanker that had been seized a few days ago.
	It is a link.
	It links the Gulf North to the Gulf of Oman to the south and the Arabian Sea beyond that.
	It's an eight-hour operation getting through those narrow straits.
	So they're about, it's 21 miles wide at its narrowest point with the shipping lane just two miles wide in either direction.
	They're talking about a very, very tight lane for this oil to pass through.
	Now, how much oil passes through?
	You might be wondering.
	Almost one-fifth, that's 20% of the world's oil passing through the Straits of Hormuz.
	That would be 17.4 million barrels of oil a day.
	We as a world consume about 100 million barrels of oil per day.
	OPEC members, the Saudis, the Iranians, the UAE, Kuwait, Iraq export, most of their crude comes straight through the Straits of Hormuz.
	Qatar is the world's biggest liquefied natural gas exporter.
	They send a lot of their product through the Straits also.
	And because of the U.S. sanctions, as the president has pointed out, they've been extremely effective and that the Iranian economy is now pretty much down on its knees and crashing is the word that the president used.
	They're in a lot of trouble now.
	And either way, he points out it's going to work out very nicely.
	And these sanctions were imposed by the president, aimed at halting their, again, oil exports because of their pursuit of nuclear weapons.
	And Iran, now, of course, I think a lot of the saber rattling is as a result of trying to pressure European allies of ours to pressure us to get back into this insane deal, which would allow them to build nuclear weapons.
	The problem with the Iranians having nuclear weapons is it's a simple math equation, A squared, B squared, C squared, radical mullahs that want to destroy Israel, the United States, and advance the caliphate, that think it's justified to strap bombs on children to kill Jews and Americans and anybody that disagrees with them that really adopts the convert or die caliphate.
	Yeah, they're a threat to the whole world.
	You give them weapons of mass destruction, and then you're worried about a modern-day nuclear holocaust.
	And they have threatened this before.
	And now that they have escalated to this level, I've got to believe that military plans are actively being spoken about as we now bring you the show.
	Joining us now is Daniel Hoffman.
	Daniel Hoffman knows a lot about Iran.
	He's 30 years a CIA ops officer, also a Fox News contributor.
	Thanks, sir, for being with us.
	What are your initial thoughts on all of this now that we know four tankers have been seized?
	Well, you know, I think it's important for us to go back to July 4th when the UK Royal Marines seized an Iranian oil tanker transporting fuel to Syria in violation of EU sanctions.
	And it was only a few days later that Iran threatened to retaliate.
	And that was when the UK raised the threat level to critical.
	And now we're seeing Iran retaliating by seizing oil tankers.
	They are clearly trying to interfere with the flow of oil through the Persian Gulf, through the Strait of Hormuz.
	But, you know, Iran is certainly capable of mounting these sorts of attacks.
	But with the U.S. Bahrain-based Fifth Fleet in the region, there's no way that Iran could close the waterway.
	But they'll certainly seek to drive up oil prices.
	And again, at the end of the day, what they're trying to do is this, along with nuclear blackmail, induce us to return to the very flawed nuclear deal and eliminate those sanctions, which, as you correctly pointed out, are crippling Iran's economy.
	The one thing I could say with certainty, Dan Hoffman, is President Trump is not going to bribe the Iranian mullahs.
	He's not going to drop $150 billion in cash and other currency on their tarmac so that they can the world's number one terrorist state.
	They foment terror.
	They fight proxy wars.
	And I actually think they've overplayed their hand here now because you and I have discussed privately what nobody really in the media has paid attention to.
	A moment in history that nobody maybe would have imagined even five years ago, and that is as a result of Iranian hostilities and the potential Iranian hegemony in the region.
	Well, we now have alliances, the U.S., Israel, the Jordanians, King Abdullah, General al-Sisi in Egypt, the Saudis, the Emirates.
	They're all aligned against this Iranian aggression, which would mean to me that the one thing that I think ultimately has to happen, and I do not ever want a ground war again, I've been talking about the next generation of weaponry so we don't have to send kids door to door like we did in Iraq ever again.
	But with all this new military might we have, it seems to me that the moment's going to come when those nuclear sites of Iran are going to be taken out.
	Your thoughts?
	Well, that's certainly possible.
	You know, the administration has a pretty clear policy right now.
	It's we're not going to return to that flawed nuclear deal, which did not deal with Iran's ballistic missile capability, allowed the sunset clauses on their nuclear program, and didn't touch Iran's state sponsor of terrorism.
	At the same time, we've mounted what are very flexible, proportional response to Iran's military aggression in the Persian Gulf, and we've offered an off-ramp to negotiate.
	And all of that restraint and sensible policy is what's bringing us closer with our European and other allies.
	Just recently, India has offered to assist with some of the security through the Strait of Hormuz and in the Persian Gulf.
	That's obviously critical for us, South Korea, Japan also on board, in addition to the other allies you mentioned.
	So I agree with you.
	I think that Iran is going to continue to mount, ramp up their military aggression.
	I hope it doesn't result in what would be an all-out war.
	That would be regime suicide for Iran and irrational on their part.
	Well, now we've got the Brits.
	The Brits are certainly on our side, and probably that now awakens the stupidity of some of the other leaders in Western Europe.
	What do you think?
	I agree with you.
	I think Iran, by taking this aggressive military action, is uniting all of us against them.
	They had tried, one of their key tenets to their strategy was to try to divide us from European allies.
	Remember, to get the Europeans to provide them with sanctions relief and financial assistance skirting around the sanctions that we impose, that proved to be impossible.
	And now the Europeans are understanding that Iran really is a nefarious actor and that we've got to take a hard line towards them, albeit one with the restraint we've shown thus far.
	But remember, we have the USS Abraham Lincoln and B-52 bombers in the region, and if Iran crosses our threshold, a red line, we will end their regime.
	Do you agree with me that there's going to have to be at some point a military action if they obviously, if they're not willing to give up their nuclear program, we can't allow the radical Islamic extremists to have these weapons?
	Do you agree with me at some point strategically they'd have to be taken out?
	Well, here's the problem.
	Right now, Iran is stockpiling low-grade uranium at levels beyond that was what was allowed in the nuclear deal.
	They're also beginning to enrich uranium to weapons-grade levels.
	If they enrich the uranium to weapons-grade levels, to the do we really know where they are?
	I mean, part of the idiocy of the Obama-Biden deal is we didn't have anywhere, any time inspections, and we didn't have our own inspectors.
	And there's certain sites we can't even go to.
	That's how dumb they were.
	Right, and this is the challenge for our intelligence community and where, frankly, we also work with our allies in the region and beyond.
	But one of the key requirements I can tell you from my experience from the executive branch, from the president and his advisors to the intelligence community, is, hey, where are the nuclear facilities and what are their vulnerabilities?
	And then the president can decide on what options there might be, if needed, to eliminate those facilities before they enrich uranium to such a level that Iran would have a nuclear bomb and threaten the Russian government.
	I got to take a break.
	Stay right, that's not the one.
	All right, got to take a break.
	800-941 Sean, if you want to be a part of the program, we'll continue if you're just joining us.
	The Straits of Hormuz, Iranian aggression, four tankers have been seized.
	Two British, one UAE, one Liberian tanker.
	The president has commented, and he said pretty much either way, this is going to work out fine with Iran.
	Quick break, right back.
	We'll continue.
	Exposing the Pelosi Party's chaos and corruption all day, every day.
	This is the Sean Hannity Show.
	All right, breaking news.
	If you just are joining us, we now have four oil tankers seized in the Straits of Hormuz by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
	Two British, one Liberian.
	And apparently a few days ago, we weren't aware of it, probably because of the close proximity across the Straits of Hormuz.
	One UAE tanker also.
	The president commenting on it earlier, and he basically said Iran's economy is crashing, very confidently saying, oh, it's going to work out.
	And they're in a lot of trouble right now, especially, I think, based on strategic alliances that now have been built.
	Dan Hoffman, I think I can say this: CIA ops officer 30 years.
	I think I know the president's thinking on this, having interviewed him many times.
	He is not going to get involved in a long, protracted conflict.
	The president took off the handcuffs in Syria, and guess what?
	The Caliphate ISIS was beaten back.
	He bombed the crap out of them.
	And the rules of engagement changed dramatically from one of handcuffing our troops to allowing the troops to do their job.
	I would imagine the president is not going to allow the Iranians to keep the Straits of Hormuz and hold it hostage.
	And I would imagine that there's going to be an alliance that will engage Iran if this behavior continues.
	And I wouldn't be surprised if something happened as early as today or tonight.
	Yeah, Sean, I agree with you 100% about the Strait of Hormuz.
	I think what we also need to watch for is that Iran amounts asymmetric warfare against us.
	They know they can't go toe-to-toe with the United States military.
	They'll lose.
	But they've got proxy militias, Lebanese Hezbollah, militias in Iraq, Yemen, the Houthis in Yemen.
	They tried to kill the Saudi ambassador here in the United States.
	And so the concern, I think, in our intelligence community and also domestically here in the United States will be whether Iran seeks to mount additional attacks against us in asymmetric warfare beyond the Persian Gulf.
	And that is also something that we'll be looking at.
	And I'm sure you'll hear, whether it's back-channel or overt messaging from our administration, that if Iran attempts to do that and attacks our people and our installations, even via their proxies, there will be hell to pay on the Iranian side in their territory.
	We know, thank you, Dan Hoffman, 30 years CIA ops officer, knows Iran well.
	I know the president's strategy.
	It's not going to be a protracted war.
	It's going to be overwhelming force, and he has a lot of allies to do it.
	I'll tell you the likely moves that are coming if this continues.
	So we're going to be speaking with the UK, and this only goes to show what I'm saying about Iran.
	Trouble, nothing but trouble.
	And remember this, the agreement, the ridiculous agreement made by President Obama expires in a very short period of time.
	It was a short-term agreement.
	When you're dealing in countries, you have to deal in 50 years and 100 years.
	You don't deal in the short term.
	That was a ridiculous agreement.
	And it goes to show you I was right about Iran.
	And let's see what happens.
	But I know that it's not American ship.
	It's UK.
	I guess it could be one, could be two.
	And we'll be speaking to them.
	They have a new prime minister coming soon.
	And that's a good thing for the UK.
	Rand asked me if he could get involved.
	The answer is yes.
	And if other senators asked me to get involved, I'd probably say yes, depending on who they were.
	We'll see what happens.
	But I have many people involved.
	And Iran is going to work out very nicely.
	Iran is showing their colors.
	Going to work out very nicely.
	Iran is in big trouble right now.
	Their economy is crashing.
	It's coming to a crash.
	They're trying to bring soldiers back home because they can't pay them.
	A lot of bad things are happening to them.
	And it's very easy to straighten out, or it's very easy for us to make it a lot worse.
	Very easy to straighten out.
	Very easy to make it a lot worse.
	Oh, Iran's going to work out very nicely.
	That was the president earlier today.
	If you're just joining us, a lot of breaking news.
	We now have four tankers that have been seized by the Iranian oil tankers in the ever-so strategic, important Straits of Hormuz.
	The president reiterating his alliance that we have with the UK.
	Two of them were from the United Kingdom.
	We also have the issue of one Liberian tanker has been seized by the Revolutionary Guard of Iran.
	And we have one UAE tanker.
	Apparently, Fox confirming our own friend Jennifer Griffin telling us this has happened now just a few days ago.
	The world didn't know about it.
	I assume because of geographic concerns.
	You know, the Straits, as I've been pointing out to everybody, is only at its only 21 miles at its narrowest point, 21 miles wide.
	And this is the shipping lane for the majority, well, a significant portion of the world's oil, which is the lifeblood of every economy.
	A full 20-plus percent, a fifth of the world's oil passes through those straits, some 17.4 million barrels of oil a day.
	Now, just to give you some comparison, the world consumes almost 100 million barrels a day.
	So it's a fifth of the world's oil.
	And, you know, this is why this has been so strategic.
	I just want to give you some insight.
	So a lot of you are thinking, all right, well, what is the reaction to all of this?
	Well, we do have some reaction now from Great Britain.
	Their foreign secretary now says that he hopes, quote, that they will resolve the tanker hostage crisis by working with Britain's international partners.
	I'm not sure what that means, but if he's thinking about negotiating with Iran, good luck with that.
	The British Foreign Secretary, his name is Jeremy Hunt, said he's concerned, yeah, no kidding, about the seizure of these two ships by the Iranian authorities in the Straits of Hormuz.
	And the UK is attempting to resolve the situation in Tehran with international partners.
	I'm extremely concerned by the seizure of two naval vessels by Iranian authorities in the Straits.
	I will shortly attend a meeting to review what we know and what we can do to swiftly secure the release of the two vessels, British flag vessels and a Liberian flag vessel.
	Reuters now, you know, telling, yeah, there were two of them, and they were both headed towards Iran after passing through the Straits of Hormuz.
	And we now know that the Revolutionary Guard intercepted them and basically took them hostage.
	There's a lot of considerations here.
	Number one, there are people and people's lives involved in this.
	And so that obviously would be factored into any military considerations.
	On the other hand, there's no way that the president and our allies are going to allow this to stand.
	And, you know, if there's one thing, you know, what is the president's goal militarily?
	I mean, it's a lot of people have questions about it.
	That's why when the media went off after the drone was seized with these, again, insane, psychotic, ridiculous, uneducated, you know, beliefs that they have about Donald Trump, it's so distance from any truth and reality.
	And I think I can say, as somebody that has interviewed the president as much as anybody else, and also have a history of 23 years with Donald Trump, I know his thinking on all of this.
	And he's very firmly, you know, to the extent possible, a non-interventionist.
	And meaning that the president does not want long military entanglements.
	In other words, I can assure you, based on all of these interviews that I have had with the president, he's not going to be sending boots on the ground or approving of boots on the ground in a long, protracted conflict with Iran.
	That's not going to be what the answer is here.
	Now, what do we know about the Iranians?
	We know that the sanctions have been absolutely, utterly devastating to the Iranian economy.
	As the president pointed out earlier today, their economy is an utter mess.
	They just, they're about to crash.
	They're in a lot of trouble.
	And one of the reasons that Iran has been saber-rattling this way is because of the effectiveness of the Trump foreign policy.
	What is the Trump doctrine?
	Well, the Trump doctrine is non-interventionist in that sense, but he also refuses, as he stated many times during the short press conference today, although the media was disgusting.
	You know, all they cared about was, well, what about freedom of speech?
	What about what the squad and the squad?
	I'm like, guys, we're on the verge of war with Iran because that's what's not, they're not, this is not going to stand.
	But we also know a lot more about the president's thinking, and he revealed it again today.
	The president's not going to follow the usual predictable appeasement policies like we saw with Bill Clinton and Kim Jong-il, Kim Jong-un's father, where we're going to try and bribe dictators and then lie to the American people and tell us this is a good deal for American people.
	It's a good deal.
	It wasn't a good deal.
	And offering money, and well, we'll be nice.
	If you'd be nice, what do you need?
	I'll take care of it, but you got to give me your word.
	It's never going to work.
	The same thing that Obama Biden did.
	Who would ever think when you have a regime whose belief system is to advance a convert or die caliphate?
	The number one world sponsor of terrorism is Iran.
	The number one world sponsor of terrorism, Iran, the number one funding source for proxy wars is Iran.
	The ones that have been saying and chanting death to America, death to Israel are the Iranians.
	The ones who've been burning our flags and the Israeli flags are the Iranians.
	It is a simple mathematical formula.
	The world, you would think we learned something in the last hundred years of human history.
	You think maybe we would have learned the lessons about evil in our time.
	We know appeasement, and you know, there's the Churchill comparisons to all of this versus Chamberlain.
	Oh, thank goodness.
	Nazism's on the march all over Europe, but I met with Hitler and things are going to be much better now.
	No, they weren't.
	And it, you know, it was a lie and a false belief system, just like liberals today.
	It's a false belief that you can negotiate with people that you got to understand what motivates and drives them.
	What motivates the Iranian mullahs is their sick, ugly, twisted, radical, extreme ideology that kills Americans in Iraq, that foments terror worldwide, that funds terror worldwide, number one state sponsor of terror, and fights proxy wars, a mindset that is convert or die.
	Be like them or die.
	That's what you're dealing with.
	So now you put convert or die, and people that would even strap bombs on their own children, promise them virgins in heaven, and tell them they're doing God's will,
	Allah's will, if they kill innocent men, women, and children, especially Israelis or Americans, and that they're going to go to heaven if they just pull the cord and kill themselves and blow themselves up and kill innocent people.
	All right, now you take it on a much bigger level.
	And the bigger level would be that sick, twisted, ugly ideology that would do it to their own kids.
	You notice these people never do it to themselves.
	They always get other people to do it.
	They're just leading to caliphate, but they're not going to strap the bombs on themselves.
	Anyway, now you on a worldwide level, their stated caliphate, their stated radical, extreme ideology.
	Now you marry it with nuclear weapons.
	Now we're not talking about a pizza parlor or a shopping mall somewhere where dozens can die or a hundred can die or a large number of people, all innocent.
	Now we're talking about a potential holocaust in our time.
	Now you might say, Hannity, that sounds extreme.
	Well, I wrote a book about evil called Deliver Us from Evil.
	And what I, the amount of research I did, it is painful.
	The last century alone, 100 million human souls destroyed, murdered in the name of, let's see, communism, fascism, Nazism.
	And we had Imperial Japan and 100 million.
	We saw a Holocaust in that century.
	We fought a world war, two world wars.
	You know, it's all about, what do we know about this president?
	This president now, thankfully, has spent a lot of money.
	And he pointed this out in his press count: $716 billion his first year, $700 billion last year.
	Frankly, he did an economic deal he didn't want to do, but he wanted the money for the military.
	Why?
	Because what is the president's thinking?
	He doesn't want a long protracted war.
	And we saw this play out in Syria because the policies of Obama were abandoned, where literally the military's hands were tied, and they had these insane rules of engagement to Donald Trump saying, nope, beat them, win.
	That's what Churchill did.
	Great Britain called on Winston Churchill at that moment because, you know, peace in our time never happened.
	And during the bombing of Britain, there is this one lone historic figure that walked among the people of Britain during the bombing of Britain.
	Not something that you usually have prime ministers and presidents do.
	Blood, pile, tears, sweat.
	Victory.
	As I said to those who have joined the government, I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat.
	You ask what is our policy?
	I will say it is to wage war by sea, land, and air with all our might.
	All our might.
	With all the strength that God can give us to wage war against a monstrous tyranny never surpassed in the dark and lamentable catalogue of human crime.
	You ask, what is our aim?
	What is our aim?
	I can answer in one word: victory.
	Victory at all costs.
	Victory in spite of all terror.
	Victory, however long and hard the road may be.
	I would play it longer, but it makes my point.
	Here you have people that are openly advocating a policy of terror and murder and their way or the highway, death.
	And now, if they ever get weapons of mass destruction, what does that mean?
	So the president doesn't want boots on the ground.
	President's not going to use boots on the ground.
	What have I been saying for a long time now?
	America's future because of the politicians by politicizing wars after we start them and sending our national treasure to fight them only to change our minds later.
	We need the next generation of military might where we can do what we need to do from, well, let's just say an office in Tampa or somewhere else in America.
	And that would mean at some point, if this regime continues and they are pursuing nuclear weapons, we cannot allow that mathematical formula to occur.
	We're radical Islamists with weapons of mass destruction that equal a modern-day Holocaust.
	We're going to have to take out the sites.
	No, I don't want a war.
	I don't want boots on the ground.
	I don't want a protracted war, but they're going to have to go.
	And you'll see an alliance, I predict, with Great Britain, the United States.
	I don't know about these other, you know, appeasers in our time.
	Who cares?
	We don't need them.
	But we'll have the Israelis.
	We'll have the Egyptians.
	We'll have the Jordanians.
	We'll even have the Saudis.
	We'll have the Emirates.
	And the world will be a safer place.
	Israel knocked out Iraq's nuclear sites in the 80s.
	Worldwide condemnation.
	Thank God they did it.
	A few years back, they knocked out Syrian sites too.
	Hardly even reported on.
	Well, let's hope that in this case, we can get that done.
	All right, 800-941-Sean Tolfrey, telephone number, final hour on a Friday coming up.
	So we're going to be speaking with the UK.
	And this only goes to show what I'm saying about Iran.
	Trouble, nothing but trouble.
	And remember this: the agreement, the ridiculous agreement made by President Obama expires in a very short period of time.
	It was a short-term agreement.
	When you're dealing in countries, you have to deal in 50 years and 100 years.
	You don't deal in the short term.
	That was a ridiculous agreement.
	And it goes to show you I was right about Iran.
	And let's see what happens.
	But I know that it's not Americanship, it's UK.
	I guess it could be one, could be two.
	And we'll be speaking to them.
	They have a new prime minister coming soon.
	And that's a good thing for the UK.
	Rand asked me if he could get involved.
	The answer is yes.
	And if other senators asked me to get involved, I'd probably say yes, depending on who they were.
	We'll see what happens.
	But I have many people involved, and Iran is going to work out very nicely.
	Iran is showing their colors.
	Gonna work out very nicely.
	Iran is in big trouble right now.
	Their economy is crashing.
	It's coming to a crash.
	They're trying to bring soldiers back home because they can't pay them.
	A lot of bad things are happening to them.
	And it's very easy to straighten out, or it's very easy for us to make it a lot worse.
	That's the president earlier today.
	What is oil?
	It is the lifeblood of every economy, the world's economy.
	And, you know, it's funny.
	I got sweet baby James actually looks at some of this crazy stuff that crazy people said that Hannity's calling for war against Iran.
	No, I'm not.
	Not at all.
	If you're just joining us, we now have four confirmed oil tankers that have been seized by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
	And two of them are British.
	One is Liberian.
	And a couple of days ago, we now, and by the way, these are international waters.
	And one of them, the UAE.
	And now, how do you get from that, Hannity, to the idea that the Iranian nuclear sites have to be removed?
	I am not.
	I want to be very, very clear here.
	I have been saying now for some time on this program and on TV that I am not in favor anymore of fighting any war unless we have an intention to win it.
	This is not about a war with Iran.
	President's strategy in Syria worked magnificently.
	He took off the handcuffs, you know, the rules of engagement of our military men and women, and he literally went backwards.
	They pushed the caliphate, worked all the way back to the first city in Syria that ISIS took over.
	And the caliphate was defeated.
	Doesn't mean it won't pop up in some way, shape, manner, or form, but a lot of people were killed because the military was allowed to do its job.
	Now, in this day and age, post-Vietnam, 58,000 American kids died in that war.
	That's our national treasure.
	This is, you know, we love our children.
	And they heeded the call.
	Their country asked them to go fight.
	Then the war becomes politicized.
	And at some point, we say, never mind.
	And then if you look at Iraq and Afghanistan, many of the same, you know, the politicizing of that war happened.
	And while I would argue that really the caliphate being defeated in ISIS and Syria, big deal, and, you know, it went to a place we can't let it go again.
	We can't have American treasure, our sons and daughters, knocking on every single going door to door in Baghdad or in Ramadi or wherever the hell, the, you know, Godforsaken place that they have to go.
	And I have been now for a long while discussing what we have to do as a country because we can't ask people to go fight wars, put handcuffs on them, rules of engagement, politicize it, criticize them, and frankly, abandon the effort without victory.
	There has to be some to find victory.
	Here's my fear about Iran.
	Prime Minister Netanyahu, who I've also known for 20 plus years, he is now the longest serving prime minister in Israel's history, now recently passing Ben-Gurion, the first prime minister of Israel.
	And I hope and I pray that the prime minister, I mean, their parliamentary system is so messed up that here Bibi wins a massive election and he's one vote shy of forming a government.
	Now we got to do it again.
	It's insane.
	If you're in Israel, you want Bibi to be the prime minister.
	He has been before Trump the one single voice of strong, clear, moral clarity.
	Prime Minister Netanyahu has been a Churchillian figure on the world stage.
	So what am I saying about, okay, well, are we going to allow, and I've gone over this in the course of the program, I'll remind you again, the Straits of Hormuz, they are less strategically important to us than they have ever been because we're, for the first time in 75 years, we're energy independent.
	We're a net exporter of energy.
	Finally, a president that's not giving in to these environmental extremists and is saying, why should we count on countries that hate us for what is the lifeblood of not only our economy, but the world's economy, which shows the new Green Deal, abandoning oil and gas in 10 years, is it would be the single quickest, fastest decline into poverty and pain and misery this country has ever seen if these radical Democrats have their way.
	Separate issue.
	At its narrowest point, now, again, if you're looking at Iran, okay, then the Straits of Hormuz, very narrow waterway.
	At its narrowest point, only 21 miles wide.
	Shipping lane, by the way, is meaning you got to keep it between the borders, if you will, or the lines.
	It's just two miles wide in either direction.
	That's how precarious this is in international waters.
	About a fifth of the world's oil passes through the Straits of Hormuz every single day.
	That's about nearly 20 million barrels of oil per day versus a little shy of 100 million barrels per oil per day that are used according to 2018 numbers, the latest numbers that we have.
	So about roughly 20%.
	Now, the Iranians, who are they?
	Okay, it's run by a bunch of radical Islamic extremists that have been telegraphing and saying death to Israel, death to America, that have said they're going to wipe Israel off the map and wipe America off the map if given the opportunity.
	For some idiotic reason, you have people that believe in appeasement.
	That's why I was bringing up the Chamberlain Churchill analogy earlier.
	And, you know, appeasers, it doesn't work.
	You can't bribe Kim Jong-il, a good deal for America, and you can't bribe Iranian mullahs.
	This is the number one state sponsor of terror worldwide.
	It is the number one funding source of terrorist groups worldwide.
	It has been fighting proxy wars for years.
	They were killing American soldiers in Iraq.
	Well, Hannity, it sounds like you're calling for war.
	No, I'm not calling for war.
	I agree with the president.
	I think, and what I've been calling for is the next generation of American weaponry where we will never, ever, ever have to ask America's sons and daughters to put their boots on the ground in a place that doesn't want us there.
	Now, thankfully, this is not as important to us as it once was, the Straits of Hormuz, but it's important to the world.
	And there really is, you know, only one country that has to be involved if this is going to be successful.
	And my mathematical formula is: if you buy into this sick, rigid converter-die ideology that would strap bombs on children in the name of religion and kill innocent men, women, and children, especially Jews and Americans, then if you give or allow those same radicals to get nuclear weapons, it could result in a modern-day Holocaust.
	What do you mean, Hannity?
	What is that?
	What are you saying?
	I'm saying A squared, B squared equals C squared.
	Radical Islamic extremists with nuclear weapons could be a modern day Holocaust.
	Well, how do you, you're really going off the deep end.
	I wrote a book, Deliver Us from Evil.
	And in the last century, I chronicled 100 million plus human souls dead.
	The Holocaust, it happened.
	Nazi Germany happened.
	Fascism, real.
	Communism, Stalin, real.
	The killing fields, Cambodia, Pol Pot, real.
	100 million.
	So if the Iranians think that they're going to be able to control the world's economy and impact 20% of the world's economy and control the Straits of Hormuz, and they think they're going to get away with taking tankers hostage, again, the lifeblood of every economy in the world.
	Somebody needs to tell the squad this.
	They better have another thing coming.
	Now, so what do you do?
	If you don't support war, you don't support group boots on the ground.
	At some point, if the Iranians are going to continue their ambition towards nuclear weapons with coupled with their sick, twisted ideology, that is a risk I don't believe the world can or should take.
	Well, then what's the answer?
	Well, the answer is the next generation of weaponry.
	We now have Great Britain certainly is on our side today.
	The Israelis are on our side today.
	And we now know that because of the threat of Iran in the region, we now know the Jordanians, the Egyptians, the Saudis, the Emirates, and everybody else is on our side.
	I guess the only people that are on Iran's side would be Putin, the sick, twisted actor that he is, hostile regime, hostile actor that he is.
	By the way, the way to bring Russia to his knees, outproduce them and get our oil, energy, natural gas over to Western Europe cheaper than he can do it.
	Do that, it's over for Russia.
	Over for Iran, too, if we really out-produce them.
	But at some point, if they continue their ambition of nuclear weapons, the only answer is on boots on the ground, and it's not a war.
	They continue taking tankers hostage.
	They continue the saber rattling.
	They continue the pursuit of nuclear weapons coupled with their sick ideology.
	We just have to prevent them from getting nuclear weapons.
	No, I don't want a war.
	I want there would be now a justification for strategic strikes with a world alliance such as I mentioned and maybe other Western European ally partners in this.
	And there probably are about five key sites that would need to be taken out where the most enrichment of uranium, weapons-grade uranium would be happening.
	That's all I'm saying.
	No, I don't want, I want all future wars to be fought from here with the greatest, most sophisticated next generation of weaponry so we don't have to ask our children and our grandchildren and our great-grandchildren to put on the boots and go to some godforsaken place.
	I don't care about regime change in Iran.
	That's up to the Iranian people.
	All I'm concerned about is preventing radicals from getting nuclear weapons.
	Radicals that have threatened to wipe countries off the face of the earth.
	That's what I'm worried about.
	And ones that are obviously stupid because the Iranians, they really, they don't know who they're messing with.
	I think the president has shown great patience, probably will show more.
	But there's coming a time where this is going to have to probably happen.
	800-941 Sean.
	I promise we're going to get to a lot of calls here.
	That's the latest.
	Hannity tonight, 9 Eastern on the Fox News channel.
	We literally will have the very latest on this.
	And a sick, ugly media today.
	All they wanted to talk about was the squad, not about tankers being seized in the strategic straits of Hormuz, which is so sick.
	All right, as we continue, Sean Hannity.
	All right.
	Maybe it's maybe it's me.
	Linda, am I being clear about me not wanting a war?
	Am I clear?
	I'm clear.
	Yeah, I'd say crystal.
	Can I be any more specific?
	No, I mean, we have a media that's asking about plastic straws while we're trying to find out.
	That's what they did today.
	It was so disgusting what they did today.
	Maybe we should play a little of that when we get back.
	I know a lot of people want to, I want to take calls the last half hour.
	But all I'm saying is I believe in simple math.
	E equals M C squared.
	Isn't that the speed of light?
	Sure.
	Sure.
	Okay.
	I was a music major, so I wouldn't take answers from you on that.
	A squared.
	A squared plus B squared equals C squared.
	Is that a mathematical formula?
	Okay.
	Radical mullahs with weapons of mass destruction, people that have no problem killing other innocent people that don't think the way they do with nuclear weapons.
	Does that have the potential, real potential of a modern-day Holocaust, in your view?
	Yeah.
	Stuff is really scary.
	Yeah, it's really scary.
	And 100 million around human souls were killed in the last century alone.
	Listen, we visited Israel's Gaza Strip twice.
	Communism.
	It's fascism.
	This stuff is real.
	This stuff is real.
	And all I'm saying is I don't want boots on the ground, but I'm just saying if these guys are getting close to a nuke, those sites got to go.
	That's it.
	Simple math to prevent C squared.
	A squared, B squared, radicalism, nuclear weapons, modern-day Holocaust potential.
	I don't want that to happen.
	Your calls are next.
	All right, 25 till the top of the hour on this Friday.
	You know, I was thinking a lot about some of the positions of Congresswoman Omar.
	And I heard what the president had said and, you know, go back.
	And when you fix the, you know, the country of her origin, which happens to be Somalia, she's a citizen.
	And the president even tweeted, you know, you're welcome to stay or go, whatever you want to do.
	The media never highlights that part of it.
	And then he said, well, when you fix their problems, maybe you can come back and teach us.
	And I think he was being, but I think the president in his own way was saying, yeah, we're the greatest, best place God ever has given man.
	And some of the outrageous things that you have said, anti-Semitic remarks you have made, you know, that you think you're a better citizen than other Americans.
	And you know what?
	A lot of people, I think, just find the whole thing repugnant and offensive.
	Anti-Semitism, all about the Benjamins.
	Oh, yeah.
	What does he say about Israel?
	That they're liars and comparing Israel to, let's see, Nazi Germany, really?
	And Iran.
	You can't be that ignorant of history.
	Apparently she is.
	And then, of course, she went for leniency and wanted leniency for nine people that wanted to join ISIS.
	I don't want leniency for people that want to join ISIS.
	I want the book thrown at them.
	Now, I think on top of that, I think that one of the worst things that Congresswoman Omar said was when she started laughing, let's play her talking about Al-Qaeda and Hezbollah and the way we talk about, you know, what happened, that little thing that happened on 9-11.
	Some people did something, as she says.
	The thing that was interesting in the class was every time the professor said Al-Qaeda, he sort of like his shoulders went up.
	And, you know, Al-Qaeda, you know, hospital.
	He's an expert.
	And he was, you know, saying his name.
	To see him on Sienna.
	Yeah, of course.
	I love those guys.
	But, you know, but it is that.
	You don't say America with an intensity.
	You don't say England with an intensity.
	You know, you don't say the army with an intensity.
	But you say these names because you want that word to carry weight.
	You want it to leave something within the world.
	It has a cultural meaning.
	Exactly.
	So it's said with a deeper voice.
	You know, if you ask anybody walking on the side of the street somewhere in the middle of the world, they will tell you America the Great.
	But we don't live those values here.
	And so that hypocrisy is one that I'm bothered by.
	CARE was founded after 9-11 because they recognized that some people did something and that all of us were starting to lose access to our civil liberties.
	Now, I just maybe because some people did something and laughing, oh, the professor, the way he would say Al-Qaeda.
	I'm like, my blood boils.
	It really does.
	I was in New York on 9-11.
	We saw two buildings get slammed with commercial planes.
	We saw people that decided their skin is burning off.
	Let me jump out the window from the 100 and whatever floor because it's going to feel better than this and I'm not going to make it anyway.
	We watched our fellow Americans in those towers.
	We watched those towers collapse after another group of people, you know, while everyone's trying to get down and the hell out of there, they're going up in the other direction to help save people.
	They died too.
	And then you look at the Pentagon.
	Wow, Barbara Olson was a friend of this program.
	We lost her and everybody else when that plane hit the Pentagon.
	We learned a phrase called let's roll.
	Field in Pennsylvania.
	Every 9-11 on this program, we play something by Michael W. Smith, and when he plays it in concert with the accompanying video, it is very powerful.
	We'll put that accompanying video on our website.
	We made a little alteration to it, though, because it includes sound of the day 9-11.
	Now we're just going to add some of Congresswoman Omar's repugnant comments just to make a point.
	Listen.
	This just into our newsroom, a plane has crashed into the World Trade Center.
	Apparently that was another plane.
	An airplane has crashed into the World Trade Center.
	There appears to be a gaping hole.
	Yawn away.
	Oh, there it goes.
	There it goes.
	But I know.
	The whole side has collapsed.
	The whole building has collapsed.
	Our two has had a motor explosion and a complete collapse.
	By the lies.
	Our landscape collapsed.
	The honor of the salaries.
	She stands.
	CARE was founded after 9-11 because they recognized that some people did something.
	Two airplanes have crashed into the World Trade Center.
	This waves.
	We're not going to be coward by it that we're not afraid.
	Faithful friends.
	The freedom-loving nations of the world stand by our side.
	Shilling stars.
	Proud to have the red, white, and blue.
	West would win.
	This country will not relent.
	Show away.
	Proud to be a part of this country.
	Carry me.
	I think about the families, the children.
	To the place.
	Freedom itself was attacked, and freedom will be defended.
	Every time the professor said Al-Qaeda, he sort of like his shoulders went up and you know Al-Qaeda, you know, hospital.
	He's an expert.
	You don't say America with an intensity.
	You don't say England with an intensity.
	You know, you don't say the army with an intensity.
	We can hear you.
	The rest of the world hears you.
	Just when you think it might be over.
	Come on.
	Someone will risk his life to raise it.
	But the resolve of our great nation is being tested.
	You know, if you ask anybody walking on the side of the street somewhere in the middle of the world, they will tell you America the Great.
	But we don't live those values here.
	And so that hypocrisy is one that I'm bothered by.
	I pledge allegiance to the blood of the United States and the true power for Richard's hands.
	One nation and the guardian room for the end of this world.
	We will not forget the 2800 people.
	Police and fire not only were heroes at the beginning, but they're still heroes.
	We're going to come out of this emotionally stronger.
	Those that die.
	And the commitment of our fathers is now the calling of our time.
	I don't think anybody should forget the visuals of their faith.
	Those guys did more than anyone ever expected of in this tree.
	They messed with the wrong city.
	They messed with the wrong state.
	Nobody wants to face how the actions of the other people that are involved in the world have contributed to the rise of the radicalization and the, you know, the rise of the terrorist acts.
	And I just don't want people to forget.
	When evil calls itself a martyr, they all had a sense of duty to protect us all.
	When all your homes come crashing down, we'll be steadfast in our determination.
	Someone will fall from above.
	The rest of the country now understands who the true defenders are.
	She stays.
	May the Irish hills caress you.
	Make her lakes and rivers blush you.
	We see the flying sword and settle.
	May the luck of the Irish enfold you.
	We see to stand.
	May the blessings of St. Patrick behold you.
	And throughout it all the fools have fallen.
	God bless Ireland and God bless the United States of America.
	Now America is embracing a new ethic and a new creed.
	Let's roll.
	The phrase New York's finest and New York's bravest means something now, doesn't it?
	This is a time to reflect and be thankful for where we are today.
	And through the fight, we will rebuild New York City.
	She still.
	Yet after America was attacked, it was as if our entire country looked into a mirror and saw our better selves.
	I think it just speaks for itself.
	This country's not perfect.
	This country didn't deserve what happened on 9-11, nor did we need to hear lectures from Congresswoman Omar that our policies caused terrorism in the mall in Kenya, or that we need leniency for people that want to join ISIS.
	I've seen the beheading videos on the beach, nor do I want to hear any Congresswoman ever laugh.
	Oh, my professor, the way he says, Al-Qaeda, I don't think it's funny.
	I don't think any of these comments are funny.
	I find her comments repugnant.
	I don't want to shut her down.
	I don't want to silence anybody.
	But I just want people to understand, you know, this all about the Benjamins.
	Israel's hypnotized the world.
	Israel's like Nazi Germany.
	I mean, how far do we have to go here?
	And people are asking, well, what do you think happened in North Carolina?
	I think the people of North Carolina are like me and find it repugnant what she has said.
	And these policies are insane.
	The new Green Deal is nuts.
	And then, you know, Congresswoman Tlaib, first words out of her mouth as a Congressmother Effer.
	You know, look, I like America's success in the last two and a half years.
	I start as the forgotten man and woman.
	I start with no money in my adult life.
	Been financially independent, honestly, except for a bed and food in the refrigerator since I'm, what, 10, 11, 12.
	Never asked for any money ever from my parents.
	They never paid for college.
	They did pay for my high school.
	Not that they were meeting, I didn't need it.
	I had my own money.
	Didn't want it.
	Was fiercely independent when I was young.
	And today, this country gave this to us.
	This country has never been, I'll quote Barry Farber, a country in the history of man that has accumulated more power and abused it less.
	And I add to that, there's never been a country like the United States of America that has accumulated more power and used that power to advance positively the human condition.
	And also, there's never been a country that has accumulated more power than the U.S. that has used that power to advance the natural state of man.
	This belief that we are all endowed by a creator.
	And the state of God that has given us this gift is freedom.
	And when, you know, I hear people say they're playing on everybody's fears, the same lies that are always told when promises of everything will be taken care of.
	You have no fear.
	Your job, your vacation, your health care, your retirement, your education, your blah, blah, blah.
	We're asking questions about who's going to pay for it?
	Yeah, we're asking questions about who's going to pay for it.
	All right, we're still watching closely the war drums and the saber rattling in Iran as they seized this British oil tanker in the Gulf earlier and their clash with the Royal Navy.
	And, you know, they keep it up.
	It's going to be brutal.
	And now they are now creating the coalition that will be their undoing.
	Israel, the United States, Great Britain, Jordan, Egypt, the Saudis, the Emirates, now in alliance against Iranian hegemony.
	The terror that they sow, the proxy wars their fight, the Americans they killed in Iraq.
	Just a matter of time.
	Those sites are gone.
	Meaning they're nuclear sites.
	That's my prediction.
	All right, 800-941-Sean is our number.
	All right, that's going to wrap things up for today.
	All right, Hannity, tonight, we are going to cover now four tankers seized by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
	We'll talk about at some point, Iran, they can't get nukes.
	I will explain.
	We'll have all our experts, the disgusting display by your news media today.
	You know, I mean, very few questions on Iran.
	They're so sick and twisted.
	So we'll get to that.
	That's all happening.
	9 Eastern tonight live.
	Hannity on Iran.
	We'll do the news they're afraid to do.
	All right.
	We'll see you tonight at 9.
	Have a great weekend.
	We'll see you back here Monday.
	We'll see you tonight.
	Thanks for being with us as always.
	Have a great, safe, fun, hot weekend.

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