Qatar’s PM Sheikh Mohammed Bin Abdulrahman Al Thani defends his nation against Western media attacks, dismissing critiques of its 2022 World Cup hosting and cultural norms as hypocritical while framing family-based elder care as a societal strength. He rejects accusations of anti-Americanism, citing Qatar’s U.S. alliance and Hamas office—established per Washington’s request—as vital for peace talks, including hostage negotiations. Denying pro-Iran ties beyond geographic necessity, he warns against striking Iranian nuclear sites due to environmental fallout risks for Gulf states reliant on desalination. Sanctions, he argues, backfire by fueling black markets and harming civilians, while net-zero pledges ignore global energy needs, particularly in developing regions where gas remains critical. His two-state solution for Israel-Palestine hinges on Israeli political will, exposing stalled diplomacy’s core obstacle. [Automatically generated summary]
The whole purpose of hosting the World Cup is to bring the world together in that country, to put the country in the spotlight about the football, about the tournament, and about people coming together.
Unfortunately, countries and some NGOs try to use this as an opportunity to attack on values of the society itself, on values of the country, of the community.
By using it as an opportunity to change these values and to impose their own values on our country and our people.
That's something that wasn't expected from our side, that we will be attacked.
We will be hearing a lot of lectures about values and things that are not belongs to us.
And basically, our decision from the beginning that we don't need to change the country.
For one month tournament.
And I cannot change the value of a whole society and impose on them values that I don't believe in.
And it's against every principle in our society, against the principles of Islam, against the principles of Christianity as well.
And that's basically, we said very clear, we respect everybody who's coming here as long as they are respecting the laws in this country, as you are expecting.
From the Qataris when they visit any of your countries in Europe to respect your laws.
And basically, that's what we want from the people.
Anything happen in their personal life, it's their personal life.
But nothing should happen in public against the laws of the state of Qatar.
And we will never change.
The problem that those countries and NGOs put a lot of efforts in demonizing this World Cup To impose their values, yet there were many things happening around the world, and they are just turning a blind eye.
If they put some efforts and energy on those real issues that are affecting the human lives around the world, it would be much better than the waste investment that was in campaigns against the country to change its values, to impose new values which are not...
You know, taking your values and using force to impose them on another society.
But this is probably the richest country per capita in the world.
It's free.
Qataris can come and go.
They don't have to live here.
They choose to live here.
And your values are thousands of years old.
Why would it be important for an NGO? I thought they were supposed to be feeding people, but instead they're yelling at you for not having enough transgender Qataris.
So an official here told me a funny story, and I want to check to see if it's true.
this person told me that some bureau or commission in the United Nations was raiding the human rights here in Qatar and said in order to score higher, you have to build nursing homes for your old people to live.
And this person tried to explain, you know, we don't have nursing homes because old people, parents live with their children.
But you built them anyway in order to get a higher score on this, and they remained empty.
Sometimes when you have international organizations trying to impose certain conditions in order to give you the better status that will make you look good, it requires from you some steps that you will do that.
It's not even needed here in this kind of society.
Look, Qatar is a very small country.
The people here, family matters for us.
Parents matter for us.
We are in debt to our parents until the last day in their life or in our lives, whatever comes first.
If someone will leave his parents alone without taking care of it, he will be publicly shamed by the society.
It's not really an acceptable custom or habit in this country.
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To have your elder, to have your parents staying in a senior home.
He's the one, the parents are the ones who took care of us when we were children, until we grew up to become independent, and we have the duty to take care of them.
And that's really the genuine nature of the Qatari society, so that's why you end up with something that you don't need.
And that's, I think, the main issue that we are facing and the main threat that we are facing.
You have seen, Taker, you spent now a few days in Qatar, and you have seen, you came to my home, and you have seen that my home is surrounded by my family homes.
And it's not, I'm not really living in isolation from them.
Look, as a country, we always want to do the right things.
And basically, the right things, not only for our people, but for our people, for our region, and for our friends.
And when you are trying to do the right things, sometimes you change your mind.
You know, when you hear this kind of criticism.
But it wasn't really in our culture because we believe that it serves the real cause behind all these efforts is to bring peace.
Peace for the people, peace for the region, and peace for our friends.
And basically, the peace is the main foundation for us, for our people to prosper.
And peace has a lot of enemies.
A lot of enemies who want to undermine it for political reason, who want to undermine it for economical reason, who want to demonize your effort in order to make sure that every step you will take will be suspicious in order to control also the parties that you are helping in that.
And basically, they don't know by doing such a thing, they are not harming us, but they are harming the region and they are harming our friends, including the United States.
And having an ally and partner and friend like Qatar with the airbase as one example and working together very closely on...
A lot of issues, a lot of files helping bringing Americans homes from different countries, whether it was in the evacuation of Afghanistan, whether it's in American hostages all around the world mediating in different conflicts.
They basically keep criticizing Qatar and attacking Qatar.
They think that this is just harming Qatar and Qatar reputation.
It's not.
It's actually because we always, like, you know, we go back to the results.
We focus on the outcome and we think about that that should be our objective and we should focus there and we shouldn't really disturb ourselves with any noise.
But they don't know that this is harming the U.S. and the U.S. interests at the end of the day.
So, my sense is that part of the criticism and the confusion from Americans, well, I think two causes.
One, you have a Hamas office here.
And Hamas has been designated, I think, repeatedly by the U.S. government, certainly by the Congress, as a terror organization.
And people say, well, how could you have a Hamas office here?
What is that?
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We have to go back to the root of this office.
Like, why it's here in the first place?
And Hamas office, when it was opened here in the first place, it was opened with full transparency and full consultation and actually even request from the U.S. The U.S. asked you to put a Hamas office here?
They have asked us to open the channels with them and to have an established communication channel with the same case which was applied to Taliban as well.
And look, at the end of the day, if you have a presence of someone in your country and you are engaging and talking, it doesn't mean that you are endorsing his ideas.
It doesn't mean that you are supporting him.
The purpose of this office was to facilitate peace, to stabilize the region, and to make sure that always it's serving the purpose.
Everything that, all the events that happened in the recent 10 years since the office was officially opened here in Lwaha.
How many peace deals have been brokered from that office through that channel?
Many of them.
2014 was the discussion and negotiations was initiated here and ended in Egypt in 2018, 2020, and 2021. With all those escalations, and many of escalations that we avoided to prevent a war.
There are many, plenty of them.
You will lose count.
Then, after 7th of October, the first hostage deal that released the hostages, the women and children, was 109, and the foreigners, was 109 hostages, November 23. It happened through that office.
I've been working under the leadership of the Emir.
We are sure that every step we are taking, we are very transparent, coordinating with the US, and making sure that we are doing the right thing.
So I have nothing wrong that I did that I am shying away from.
I know that we have a lot of attacks, and unfortunately...
We have attacks from the US legislation, like from the Congress many times, that although we did it at the request of the government, yet the Amir always tell me that if we are able to save a single life, it's worth everything.
And I'll tell you something.
We've been under a significant attack in the last 15 months during this war in Gaza.
Who unfortunately very much misinformed that this is very critical for the U.S., for the U.S. security to be here in this region.
And, you know, actually the base itself, when it's moved in the first place, it was moved after September 11th to Doha.
And it was a very risky decision for any country to take it.
And we took it.
We took it because of the friendship that we have with the U.S. Because of the partnership that we are committing ourselves together with the US. And it turned out to be like the most important US base outside the United States.
And basically it served the security of the United States, but also it served the stability of this region.
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So the president's envoy in this region and to Ukraine and globally at this point is Steve Witkoff, his friend.
Well, you know, sometimes when you read the reports about Qatar, you feel that this is a superpower that controls everyone and everyone is a tool in the hand of Qatar.
This is all a joke.
Steve is...
A respected businessman.
He has done business.
We didn't do anything wrong with him.
We have done business.
I've known him for a long time.
I attended his son's wedding.
I have a personal relationship.
And all this happened before even the election.
You know, before the election taking place, this was, I think, last February, just months before the election.
But just, you know, if you look at this and look at the ones who attacked someone like Steve Witko, who achieved and succeeded in reaching this deal because of his relation with Qatar, is to make sure that the next time...
He calculates his steps.
But Steve is a great man, straight shooter.
It doesn't matter for him as it doesn't matter for us.
We are friends.
Yes, this is something I feel proud of.
That I have many friends in the United States.
And those friends might become, you know, in certain positions, whether in this administration or in the future administration.
Doesn't mean that, you know, those friends will be like a tool in our hand or Qatar hand.
And basically, the people who are using this, they just, you know, the problem that they cannot take it that a small country can get the results.
They always have to think about an external factor that bringing them these results.
And when they look at it as a small country and...
With this amount of resources, the first thing that will come to their mind, oh, they are bribing everyone.
I'm a country like any other country.
I'm operating like any other country.
I protect my people's interests.
I protect my region's interests.
I protect my friends.
And that's what will always continue the same way.
So Trump gets elected in November, inaugurated in January, and immediately there's a ceasefire.
Almost immediately, with Steve Whitcomb, reading the negotiations with your help.
But that's coming after years of bloodshed, utterly destabilizing this part of the world, the world itself.
Where was the Biden administration during all of that?
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Look, Tucker, what's really making me feel sad, that the agreement that we have achieved on 15th of January this year, Is almost 95% the framework that's been agreed in December and the agreement that's been agreed in March 24. And it took all these months in order to put
The U.S. is the friend and the ally of and partner of all the GCC countries.
So the U.S. expects from us to come to them with vision that this is the way we would like to see the region and that's the way we are going to work on the region.
And we would like to have also your support in that direction.
That's, I believe, how the relationship should work between us and the U.S. Not, I'm waiting for the U.S., what's the problem between them and Iran, and then I based my dealing with Iran based on what the U.S. want.
The U.S. is waiting to listen to me what I need from Iran, because I am the friend of the U.S., and Iran is my next-door neighbor.
And basically, I think this misunderstanding, or let's say the legacy issue, that's what's driving this whole narrative.
Floating here and there.
I think that, you know, one day everything will be resolved diplomatically.
If I take a stand against my neighbor because of an external issue, very strong stand, what I'm going to do if those two adversaries come together.
Well, look, actually, a nuclear weapon is bad for the region, for any country, whether it's Iran or any other country.
But also, like, when it comes to, you know, developing a nuclear program, there are concerns, of course, whenever any nuclear program is developed around your region.
And those concerns can be So there's a nuclear side directly across from you.
You know, that's why it's putting the entire region in a lot of risk if there is no clear standards for managing those nuclear facilities.
And those clear standards ensuring that this is a nuclear power plant that will be used for peaceful use.
Now, who's right and who's wrong, this is not for me to judge.
Yet, what we would like to see, we would like to see...
A nuclear program that has complying with the international standard.
We are speaking with the Iranians all the time that we need to work together.
We need to work with the IAEA in order to ensure that those standards are followed.
There are a lot of news and headlines.
We see that Iran is close to a nuclear weapon.
This is nothing we have ever heard, we have ever seen, I mean, or experienced.
Leaders there, even with the supreme leader, he said very clearly that he has issued a fatwa or a declaration that Iran will never go for a nuclear bomb.
And basically, this has also its moral status within the country.
So I hope that we can reach to a solution, a diplomatic solution, where, you know, there is...
Prosperity for the region, sanctions are lifted, nuclear programs, peaceful and assurances for the entire region.
And this will be, I think, a booster for the region development and prosperity.
So there's a great deal of pressure in Washington on the White House and on the Congress to participate in or sign off on an attack, an aerial bombardment of the Iran nuclear sites?
However many there actually are, one of which, as you said, is directly across from you, so you think about this a lot.
What would be the consequences if that happens?
And that's not theoretical, as you know, that could happen soon.
What would happen next?
unidentified
Well, I think it will just be a start of a war that will spread all over the region.
Do you think, I mean, to the extent you can say, I should say you're the Prime Minister, but you're also the Foreign Minister, so this is what you do all day, every day.
But to the extent you can say, do you think that the Iranian government is willing to de-escalate through negotiation?
Open up its nuclear sites to international inspection of some kind.
Reassure the world they're not two weeks away from getting a bomb, as we read practically every day on the internet, whether it's true or not.
And actually, all the engagement that we had with Iranian officials, as I mentioned to you, it's...
We were just there a few days ago, actually, and engaging with the president, engaging with the Supreme Leader, with the foreign minister over there, in order to find a diplomatic solution.
And basically, they are willing to engage.
They are willing to get to a level that creates comforts for everybody.
And most importantly, they are focused on mending their relationship with the region.
And that's something...
In itself, it can create a lot of progress in every front of Iran.
So I believe there is an opportunity.
Now, we come back to the question, the chicken and the egg, which come first.
I believe we should forget about these questions and get the parties together, start to understand each other's concerns.
And basically, if everything is complying with the international standards, I don't see any reason why we don't have a deal.
Well, can I just ask, so three of the biggest oil-producing countries in the world, Venezuela, Russia, Iran, have been under, I mean, the most extensive sanctions in history.
I think it's mainly it's sold in different means, in different currencies.
Look, Tucker, I recall when the Russian sanctions came out at the beginning of the war between Russia and Ukraine.
I had an interview in one of the US media channels, and I said very clearly that sanctions will only create a parallel marketplace for other currencies.
So, the dollar-dominated international currency, you will start to see people moving, countries moving away from that.
So you cut out U.S. countries, you weaken the U.S. dollar, you make the country more repressive, inevitably, but you don't dislodge the leadership, whether it's Putin, Chavez Maduro, the Ayatollahs in Iran, Fidel Castro.
And you don't prevent them from selling their oil in international markets.
So why, I mean, just, I think this morning I was reading, we're going to sanction this person more.
There's got to be some reason that the U.S. Congress and various administrations have continued to want to do this, even though there's absolute proof that it doesn't work.
Well, look, as I told you, you know, when You know, some, I don't know, honestly, we can ask this question more for US, you know, legislator and policymakers, but I think from my perspective, this is when you have,
like, if you don't talk to the other party, if you don't want to use military, which is something that we never advise for, the only tool will remain in your hand is...
Sanction to show power and to show leverage, which some people, they think that this is leverage and power, which is not.
Well, look, you know, there is a lesson that history taught us.
That there is no war started when one of the parties wants the war.
Always two parties, they don't want the war, and they end up in a war.
And there is no war ended without a negotiation around the negotiation table to find a peaceful solution, despite how long it took.
So this war will end at the end of the day around the negotiations.
Now, if you look at the recent efforts that President Trump is doing together with the Kingdom of Saudi, I believe this is the right direction, the right path forward.
You know, we were, like, when the war started as a state of Qatar, we always, like, you know, express our willingness to help, to support, if there is any chance for mediation.
We looked at it, it's something far away, it's in Europe.
Yet, we have some experience in mediation, which is a track record that we have built throughout the year.
And we saw that this conflict is too complicated.
We tried to break it down to smaller mediation efforts, and we were working on the children's file, for example, Russian and Ukrainian children bringing them back to their families.
We were working on the energy file, but unfortunately it didn't work out.
in order to build a foundation for, you know, someone like President Trump to come and to broker a peace deal.
I believe it is the moment.
I believe that the steps that's being taken are the right steps.
And basically, the way it ends, it should be the way that it addresses both countries' concerns.
I think that the Ukrainians have legitimate concerns that they need to address.
And the Russians have legitimate concerns that the Ukrainians need to address.
And I believe this will never reach a solution unless There is some, you know, direct talks between them and also some demonstration of support from the partners of both Ukraine and Russia that they need to put an end for this and they need to understand each other's concern and they need to take them into consideration.
And the partner's role is to give them the assurances and the comfort that those considerations will be taken.
You know, if you look at the history since Madrid declaration in the 90s, where Israel needed to be integrated in the region,
economic normalization, Should happen between the countries in the region and a political horizon for the Palestinians to establish their own state on the borders of 1967, which is according to the Security Council resolutions.
Since that time, until today, we didn't see anything, but the situation is going backward.
More settlements, more violence.
More, you know, policies which are destructive for the Palestinians, unfortunately.
And basically, we are expecting from the Palestinians, you know, just to obey, to stay quiet, and not, you know, there will never be anything instigated.
So it's basically, also, it's not fair when you...
Try to impose, you know, these kind of regulations in countries that they have their resources not being developed, not being exploited, and they have no electricity even.
Like Africa, for example.
And you want to make sure that now everything there is green, everything to reach net zero, and you are not allowed to come and to exploit your energy.
And I'm not sure if the world will be able to achieve it.
Look, we understand the danger of the climate.
We understand the danger of the climate change.
But it doesn't mean that we shoot ourselves on the foot.
We need to think about it wisely.
We need to think about it gradually.
And look, Tucker, honestly, maybe I told you...
And a separate meeting that, you know, the pyramid of the needs of the people, first security, then food and water, then health, energy, education, education, strong economy, and then climate change and the environment.
I got a call from a friend of mine yesterday, honestly, true story, who said his girlfriend had just broken up with him over Alp.
He wouldn't stop.
And I thought to myself, that's kind of sad.
And he said, no, it's not sad.
Imagine if I'd married her.
Now I know.
I was saved.
Then the next day, this same friend is driving at twice the speed limit through a major American city, pulled over by a cop in a speed trap.
Cop takes his license and registration, goes back to the patrol car, runs him, comes back, looks in the window, and sees a tin of ALP on the dashboard.
Pauses.
Stunned.
Says to my friend, you use ALP? Yeah, I do.
Says my friend.
So do I, says the cop.
We all do.
He looks at my friend thoughtfully and goes, drive safely, sir, and hands back his license and registration.
No ticket!
So in two days, he's saved from a tragic marriage to a girl who doesn't like Alp and a speeding ticket.
All true.
It's more than a nicotine marriage.
In an age of 350 million people, we're guessing there are about 350 million Alp stories.
It does seem like things have changed just in the past six months, partly because of the electricity needs of AI, of EVs, all the stuff baked in the cake, the clear limits all the stuff baked in the cake, the clear limits of renewables, like they can't actually run a modern society.
that's all obvious now.
And so a lot of investment funds and politicians have sort of pulled back from the net zero theology.
But what's amazing to me is that it seems like some of them really believed it.
I mean, in the case of Qatar, you're opening up a new gas field, and I think some, like, even energy people laughed at you and said there's kind of no future for gas.
We put a lot of pressure on the country and the needs of the country.
And apparently, the LNG picked up and became one of the main sources.
At the peak of the net zero and the green agenda, we announced the expansion of our production, which was back in 2018. And we decided to go on to invest.
And at that time, you can read reports from the IMF, for example, that a lot of countries will end up with a lot of oil and gas, but with no money.
Because they will have no countries to sell the gas to, or they will have no markets to sell their oil to.
And this was just in 2018, and everyone was panicked.
In the same year, we have announced that we are going to expand our gas field production, and we are hoping to double it by 2030. So, from 77 million cubic tons, which was peaked in 2011 and continued being sustained until today, By 2030, we will reach 144. And that basically will be the biggest.
We had the debate about this within our government at that time, and we didn't believe it.
We've seen that the requirement for the energy will just increase.
We were watching the revolution in a lot of technologies, and we have seen that...
Whether it's the green hydrogen, the blue hydrogen, the renewables, all of them, they cannot never be cost-effective in the next 10-15 years, and maybe more.
And they will not be enough.
The base load, you will always need an energy mix, and the base load of this mix will be the LNG, which will remain always the gas.
I mean, we were like, at the beginning when we have seen these reports, we were just questioning why they are doing that.
But it was like part of the...
Global sustainability agent and probably this is an idea that all international organizations agreed to promote and basically it's the same thing like, you know...
When it comes to those organizations, you always see a common agenda item that everyone is advocating toward the same direction.
We have nothing against the green and the climate change.
It's something that all of us, we need for our survival, for our planet, yes.
But also we need to be realistic in our approach.
We need to make sure that this progress...
It's not harming us.
It's benefiting us.
It's not because we want to make sure that the planet lasts forever, that our people doesn't last forever.
I mean, it's basically, it's really a miscalculation.
Now, another example I want to give you, like, for example, in our partnership with the U.S. in the gas area, we have During, you know, the time before, like the fracking and shell gas in the U.S.,
we were supplying the U.S. with LNG at a certain point of time, and we built this, what's so called the Golden Pass in Texas, in order to be a receiving terminal for the gas.
During President Trump's time in the first administration, we signed with him, we signed during his administration to make it as a sending terminal.
All the gas, the U.S. gas, will be exported through that terminal, which is a partnership between Qatar Energy and ExxonMobil.
So to explain, you take natural gas out of the ground, it's often found with oil, but then you have to basically freeze it and convert it to a liquid state in order to ship it across the ocean.
So LNG is liquefied natural gas, that's what you're talking about.
Also, besides that, during the same meeting, during the previous administration with President Trump, the first one, we have signed the largest, single largest petrochemical plant in the world.
It's called the Golden Triangle, which hopefully will be online very soon.
And that's what will provide the basic feedstock for all the industries in the United States, which is the polymers.
And this is also a partnership between Qatar Energy and U.S. companies.
Like who are adopting the green agenda when they are talking about electricity, for example, generating electricity from green energy, green resources.
Those electricity will need batteries.
Batteries will need lithiums for the AVs.
This lithium, when you mine those lithium, what is the effect on the environment?
So it turns out that YouTube is suppressing this show.
On one level, that's not surprising.
That's what they do.
But on another level, it's shocking.
With everything that's going on in the world right now, all the change taking place in our economy and our politics, with the wars on the cusp of fighting right now, Google has decided you should have less information rather than more.
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It's immoral.
What can you do about it?
Well, we could whine about it.
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