 on trips, running on the floor. You can hear me? Okay, thank you everyone, sorry for the delay. I'm Gregory Salmieri of the Salem Center for Policy here at the University of Texas. I know it's not in the room. Can people hear me in the back? Okay, the mics are just for the internet. Nevertheless, as I say, I'm Greg Salmieri of the Salem Center for Policy here at the University. This event has sparked some controversy leading to some demands that we cancel it into a need for added security. I'd like to thank all of you for complying with the security measures recommended to make sure that this was a safe space where ideas can be shared safely. There's something really important on which the organizers of the event and those who are most upset about it, agree. There are monstrous evils taking place in the world today, perpetrated by factions who seek genocide. Too many people actively support these evils and this support cannot simply be an honest error. Most people simply look the other way, too confused or too frightened to take a strong stand in either direction. It's an issue of life or death, an issue of racist murder and of self-defense against it. What we disagree about is who are perpetrating these evils and who are resisting them. Such disputes are sadly normal in human history. History is largely the story of peoples killing one another, each believing or making believe that they're acting in self-defense. In times of war and atrocity, passions properly run high, propaganda is always rampant, and it can be hard to tell what is true and what is false. Who is wrong and who, if anyone, is in the right. It's for this reason that it's so important that parties on all sides of the most contentious debates have the freedom to speak, particularly parties on all sides of debate about war. And it's equally important that we each take time on occasion to listen to the views we find most important. Over the past months, and again in the past days, I've been reading and listening to a lot of content on the events in Israel and Gaza that I view as wrong, much of it that I even view as evil. I've asked Iran-Brook to come here tonight to present a contrary perspective on the issue that I know will be unwelcome by some. University policy and state law provide that registered university groups are free to put on events advocating any point of view. And the right to free speech demands that when a space has been secured for such an event in accordance with university policies, the event not be disrupted. If there's anyone here who disagrees with Dr. Brook, you're welcome to express your opinion briefly in a question to him at the end, and I hope you will. You're also welcome to frown or scowl during the talk. You're also free to express yourself with talk signs and other means of expression in common outdoor areas on campus in accordance with university policies and at other university events hosted by clubs who are sympathetic to different ideas. You may not, however, make noise in this space or hold up distracting signs here or otherwise deprive Dr. Brook of his opportunity to speak and this audience of their opportunity to hear him. Anyone who violates our freedom of speech in any of these ways will be escorted out of the hall by campus police. If they're a member of the university community, they may also be subject to disciplinary actions. I'd like to thank the administration and the campus police for protecting our right to speak. I trust that they are doing the same for others on campus of very different views. This includes, I gather, an organization that posted triumphal images of Hamas's invasion of Israel in the days immediately following 10.7. I gather that they are hosting another speaker tonight elsewhere on campus. With those preliminaries out of the way, I am pleased to introduce Yaron Brook. Dr. Brook is the chairman of the Einren Institute, the host of the Yaron Brook show, and he's, in my opinion, the most insightful commentator on current events in the world today. Dr. Brook. Thank you. For most of us, I think, the images, the sounds, the voices, the stories that occurred on October 7th are seared in our memory. The horror of the rape, the murder, the torture, the beheadings, just the barbarism of actions on that day against innocence throughout southern Israel. These events were not only horrific in and of themselves. I mean, they were bad enough just seeing the images and knowing what happened and what was going on. Well, what made October 7th in some ways unique is that in our modern era of social media, the perpetrators uploaded the images of what was going on to social media and expressed their pseudo-pride in what they were doing, their satisfaction with the rape, with the murder, with the torture. These monsters, and they are monsters, felt satisfied in killing parents in front of their children, children in front of their parents. They felt satisfied by kidnapping little babies, old people, and taking them back into Gaza. One horrific perpetrator called up his parents, stating with joy that he had just killed some Jews. And one can imagine the parents on the other side probably not chiding him for doing so. What all this really reflects for that day and for the people perpetrating these horrors is the nihilism, the hatred, the destructive urge, the will to destroy, to kill, to bring everything down, to end the lives of so many people. I mean, and with relish, they did this. It is rare to see such relish in such barbarous actions. I mean, what is striking about what happened on October 7th, particularly given the demonstrations and the chance of those who support Hamas and the Palestinians, is their genocidal intent? Is there any doubt that if they could have continued to Tel Aviv or to Haifa or to Jerusalem that they wouldn't have killed hundreds of thousands, millions even, their intent was genocide. Their intent, and they say so in their charter, the Hamas charter, which is the governing charter of the Palestinian people. They say that what they want is the eradication of the state of Israel. They say that what they want is to rid Jews from the territory, from the river to the sea. The river to the sea is a statement of genocide. It is a statement of wiping out a people, of destroying them, killing them, or sending them on boats, who knows where. This is what October 7th represented. And it's not just one time event. One of the spokesmen for Hamas recently said there will be a second and third and fourth October 7th. Israel must be destroyed. And much of this, much of this is motivated not just by hatred and by nihilism, but it is motivated by an ideology, by an ideology driven by religion. This hatred is driven by an ideology of Islamism, of Islamic totalitarianism, the will, the dedication, the commitment to run over the world with Islam, as hard as it is for us in the West, imagine these kind of ideas, but to dominate the world, to bring the world under Sharia law, to make everybody a Muslim or else. Talk about genocide. It's not just river to the sea they want. They want the world. Hamas is just one of many organizations dedicated to exactly this project, as ridiculous and as bizarre and as barbaric as it is. And the question here is, is this just Hamas? When that murderer called his parents, again, did the parents tried him? Or the parents in on it? Indeed, are not the Palestinian people in on it? Do not a significant majority of them vote for Hamas? In poll after poll, do not a significant number of Palestinians support Hamas, accept Hamas as their government representing them? This is not just Hamas. And indeed, the war is not a war with Hamas. One does not fight just a governing party, a governing ideology. What is involved here is a war between peoples, between nations, an Israeli nation, a Palestinian nation. What is involved here is a war between two cultures. We'll talk about those cultures in a minute. The war in Gaza is not a war just against Hamas. And one of the mistakes Israel's making is conceiving of it as a limited war against Hamas. So Hamas is not just a terrorist organization. I think it's a mistake to say Hamas terrorists. Hamas is a governing political entity. It runs the government. It has the police. It funds the hospitals. It does what a government does in every other state. World War II was not a war just against the Nazis. It was a war between the United States and Germany. A war between the United States and Japan. Not against, I don't know how you even describe the ruling elites of the Japanese Empire. And the war Israel has engaged today is a war with the Palestinians. A war by the way that could be ended very quickly. Release the hostages and surrender. Your best chance of survival. How do we judge the Palestinians and Israelis? How do we morally assess who's in the right and in the wrong? Now, you'd think that just the actions of October 7th would be enough that you would be able to judge just that. But people will come and say, but there's a history and horrible things have happened in the past. And I'm happy to take questions on history from anybody and to be challenged on this. But I don't think you actually have to go very deep into history to discover who the good guys here are and who the bad guys here are. All one has to really do is look at their culture, look at their societies. What does it mean to be good? What does it mean to be bad? To be good is to be life affirming. To be good is to be pro-human flourishing. To create a good society is a society of flourishing. It's a society where individuals can make the most of their life, can pursue happiness. To be bad is to create a culture in which people cannot thrive. People cannot live freely. People cannot speak their mind. People cannot live based on their own values in pursuit of their own goals. Let's look at Israeli society and look at Palestinian society. And everything you need to know about who the good guys are and who the bad guys are is right there in front of you. Israel, start with Gaza. If you look at Gaza, if you look at the West Bank, you find a society that is fundamentally anti-life, a society that relishes martyrdom, relishes death, a society that venerates its martyrs, that teaches its children hatred, teaches its children that the best life, the most noble life, is a life of martyrdom. It's a life of killing. It's a life of violence. You have a society in which free speech doesn't exist. You disagree, get killed, you go to jail, you get burned alive. The violence in such a society against its own people is horrific. It's theocratic, authoritarian, tribal, no respect for the individual in a sovereignty, no respect for the individual in his mind. I mean, I find it bizarre and horrific and weird to see signs in American campuses called queers for Palestine. Really? Do you really know what they do to queers in Palestine? Do you have any idea? Have you not seen the images of them throwing homosexuals off the roofs of tall buildings? They kill gays. They don't respect their rights. They don't say, oh, well, choose. You do what you want. As long as you're not hurting other people, who cares? Their ideology calls for death, and that is exactly what they act on. They don't treat women with any kind of respect. Honor killings are prevalent. So your sex life is regulated by family, regulated by the tribe, the community. It is a primitive society. It is a society that's anti-life, anti-individual, anti-happiness. Instead of investing in Gaza, instead of building up this beautiful piece of land right on the Mediterranean with amazing beaches, instead of investing their building, hotels, resorts, industry, what did they do? They built tunnels, bought weapons, built missiles, all in the name of destruction, not in the name of life, in the name of death, in the name of killing, in the name of their own suicide and martyrdom. You know, one of the, I think, most illustrative stories I heard about this mentality, anti-production, anti-wealth, anti-industry, anti-growth that exists in Gaza is in 2005 when Israel left Gaza. And maybe you guys don't know, but Israel used to occupy Gaza and then left in 2005, which dismantled some of the villages and towns that had been built in Gaza. And part of those villages and towns, they were greenhouses, these beautiful greenhouses in which Israelis had made amazing agricultural products in Gaza, incredibly valuable. And when the Israelis left, they left the greenhouses there. Now, you would think, people focused on life, focused on wealth, focused on production, focused on progress would take those greenhouses and use them. This is great, free stuff. But on day one, they were destroyed. They didn't want to have anything to do with it because it was built by Jews. It was built by Israelis. What motivates them is not progress. It's not success. It's destruction and death. This is not a healthy society. This is not a good culture. This is a culture of death. Israel, on the other hand, and let me tell you, in other contexts, I am probably one of the biggest critics. So in different contexts, I am one of the biggest critics of the state of Israel. I have long lists of problems with the state. Ultimately, I left a long time ago. But Israel, in comparison, is a land of life. It is a fundamentally free society. Individual rights are protected. Free speech is protected. The individual mind is respected. Individual opinion is respected. Arabs and Israel benefit from the security of rights, just like Jews. It's a society that is thrived, that is produced, that has become incredibly wealthy. Those are signs that they're doing something right. When you grant people free speech, when you respect their property, when you respect property rights and contract law, people thrive. People build. People create. And the testament to that is the tech industry that is booming in Israel and is a sign of everything good about that society. In comparison, there is no comparison. One is a good culture, a good society, a good country. The other is not. It is bad. It is evil. It is dedicated to death, life versus death. Now, none of this is ingrained in anybody's genes. None of this is deterministic. None of this has to be. These are all human choices. It is a choice what kind of society you build. Anybody could build a great society. The Palestinians have chosen a path that is wrong and destructive. The Israelis have chosen a path that, for the most part, is good and productive. Now, we are in the midst of a war, a war that is being fought primarily in the Gaza Strip, a war of self-defense, a war that was necessary, necessitated by October 7th. It is a war that Israel is engaged in to defeat its enemy, to defeat Hamas, to defeat the Palestinian people. But defeating the Palestinian people is not, in spite of what some in this room think, is non-genocide. The Allies in World War II did not commit genocide against the Germans. Allies in World War II did not commit genocide against the Japanese. They defeated them, and that defeat ultimately led, I would argue, to much benefits to both Germany and Japan, to them learning the evils of their way, to them learning through being defeated, that the cultures that they had before were destructive or horrific, and that they needed a change. And they changed. Look at Japan and Germany today. Not only are they thriving, prosperous society, but also the best friends the United States have, in spite of them being defeated, or maybe, just maybe, because they were defeated. The same is true in the Gaza. Israel must defeat its enemy. It must shake them to the core so that they question the culture, the society that they have built. Shake them to the core so that they think and consider better alternatives. They think and consider a society that ultimately can live in peace with Israel. Any army's responsibility in a war is to defend its own. The responsibility of the Israeli army in Israel is to defend Israel, and it's to defend its own troops, to minimize its own casualties. And indeed, I believe it is a travesty. It's so many Israeli soldiers are dying on the field because Israel refrains from defending them and places the lives of civilians on the other side as more valuable than its own soldiers. That is a moral travesty. It's a moral travesty in any war. Civilian casualties are unavoidable in any war, but in this one, where Hamas is hiding behind the civilian casualties, where Hamas is placing its own fighters inside hospitals, inside schools, inside mosques, of course civilian casualties are gonna occur. And yet in spite of this, per bomb dropped, there's a new statistic for you, but bomb dropped fewer civilian casualties have died in Gaza than in any previous war. No army in history has done more to try to avoid civilian casualties than the Israeli army. I think they've tried too hard. You've got that, you're five years old. You're five years old. All right, guys, calm down, calm down. All right, guys, guys, guys, guys, guys, calm down, calm down, calm down, calm down, calm down. Calm down, calm down. Israel indeed has been suicidal and sacrificial and the number of troops it has lost for the sake of saving Palestinian lives. You know that about 25 to 30%, at least of the Israeli soldiers that have died in Gaza have died from friendly fire and they've died from friendly fire because of the unique challenges of fighting in an urban landscape, but beyond that because of the ongoing attempts not to kill civilians. I think that is tragic and sad. Israel is also engaged now in negotiations, negotiations to free hostages. But every time they negotiate with Hamas, they recognize it as a legitimate political entity. Every time they negotiate with Hamas, they give more power to Hamas. Every time they negotiate with Hamas, they encourage the taking of hostages. They encourage more October 7th. Why my heart is with the hostages and I feel terrible about their fate. Israel cannot sacrifice victory for the sake of saving the hostages that is sad, it is tragic, it is horrible, but it is the truth. Israel is doing the opposite of committing genocide. It is trying to win. Genocide is the organized, systematic murder of a people. Israel is doing the exact opposite. And if you think about the history, just the short history of the Gaza Strip, the population of Gaza has well more than doubled over the last 20 years. I mean, if Israel is dedicated to genocide, that's a pretty bad job they're doing of it. They've grown. They've grown because they've had babies, they've had children, they're living longer, life expectancy has increased. Indeed, even now of a population of two million people in a dense urban area, one of the most dense urban areas in the whole world, the numbers are incredibly small. Of the number of Palestinians that have died, if this is genocide, then again, they're doing a horrible job. What they're trying to do is not genocide, they're trying to win. They're trying to defeat an enemy, a murderous enemy, a barbaric enemy, an enemy that we saw what they did during October 7th. They're trying to do it in a way that there will never be another October 7th. Now, one of the things that are truly, I think, stunning and maybe really shocking and surprising, even more so to some extent than what happened on October 7th that many of us in many regards saw coming, is the amount of support Hamas has received in the West, in the United States, including among people in this room. It's hard to comprehend how they can venerate the barbarism of October 7th, how they can venerate an organization so dedicated to death and anti-life. I mean, the hatred, the hatred that they must have is incredibly intense and strong towards Israel and towards Jews more broadly. Part of this is some ancient kind of leftover of anti-Semitism, not leftover, it's still rampant. But there's something modern about this particular hatred. There's something about it that is related to the modern leftist views about anti-colonialism and intersectionality and all woke phenomena. There's something about this idea that we must divide the world into oppressors and oppressed. And everybody's an oppressor or an oppressed. And how do we decide who's an oppressed and who's an oppressor by the outcome? If you're successful, if you're wealthy, if you're pursuing happiness, if life is pretty good, you must be an oppressor. And if you're poor, if you're struggling, if things are not going too well, you must be oppressed. It can't be your fault any more than it's the fault of the successful person. The world is now divided into oppressed and oppressors. Jews, Israel, Israel in particular, is an incredible success. It thrives, it's wealthy, people pursue happiness, they're well off. It can't be the color of the skin because if you've ever been to Israel, you know that Israelis come in all colors. It's something about Israel. It's something about them being Jewish. That somehow made them, I guess, oppressors. Israel has become a culture, a good culture, a successful culture. And therefore, by definition, they're oppressors. By definition, they're the bad guys. And by definition, you can do anything you want. To the bad guys, to the oppressors. There's no limit to the barbarity you can commit against an oppressor and a bad guy. And that is to be celebrated. They can be killed, they can be murdered, they can be raped, they can be tortured. And it's okay because they're oppressors. They had a coming. And of course, the Palestinians who struggle, who are poor, who have been defeated, they must be oppressed. By definition, look at the outcome. We don't have to know anything more than to see that they are struggling and they are poor and they are in bad shape. And they're the oppressor. And as oppressors, they're allowed to do anything. We can never criticize them. We can never condemn them. They, by definition, good. Now, this is a sick, distorted ideology. This is real perversion. It denies any agency. Denies any responsibility for the choices you make. If you're good, it's because you oppressed other people. Not because you created. Not because you made good choices. Not because you produced something. Not because you have good ideas. And if you're not doing well in life, it's never your fault. It's always somebody else's. You're, after all, just the oppressed. This dynamic is playing out and manifest in this crisis. It's so obvious and so horrific and so tragic and sad. Instead of giving Israel the credit for what it has built, the fact that it is successful and be built is now a vice. Instead of telling the Palestinians they should be doing better, and that there are better ideas, and there is a better way of life, and there is a way for them to flourish. We tell them it's just the nature of their being oppressed. And the only time this somehow will go away is if we ever achieve some mythical equality where we're all exactly the same. And if there are no oppressors and no oppressed, and of course we all know when that will happen, never. So, two cultures have made two different sets of choices. They've gone in two different directions. One towards life, towards happiness, towards freedom, towards success. The other, towards death, destruction, oppression, and authoritarianism. It's not surprise one led to poverty and one led to wealth. Now all of this sounds pretty bleak, and it is. It's horrific. But is there any chance? Is there any possibility of peace? Is peace in the land of Israel possible? Now today it is not. It is not. With 70% of Palestinians supporting Hamas, how are you gonna have peace with people who want to destroy Israel? How can Israel negotiate, never only settle, never mind live side by side with people who want to kill them, who people who celebrated October 7th? That is impossible. It cannot be achieved, and it should not be tried. After all, before October 7th there was ceasefires, after ceasefires, after ceasefires, after peace agreements, after other peace agreements, to no end, and all they resulted in in a long string of agreements and violence. Peace cannot be achieved as long as you have two cultures side by side with such opposing views on life and the world. You cannot have peace with a culture dedicated to death. You cannot have peace with a culture dedicated to your death and your destruction and genocide inflicted on you. So there is no way to negotiate a peace today. Does this mean peace is impossible? No, I don't think that's the case. I don't think it's impossible. What would it require? It would require not genocide, not extermination, but it would require victory. It would require the victory of Israel over the Palestinians. It would require the Palestinian accepting, once and for all, that they cannot use violence to get out of the situation they're in. They cannot use violence to destroy Israel. That violence is not a means for their success. It means the Palestinians have to give up on the sword. They have to give up on violence as a tool. And they have to embrace a proper culture, a culture of life, a culture of progress. They have to embrace the same ideas as live in Israel. The ideas of individual liberties, the ideas of free speech, the ideas of property rights and contract law, there needs to be a fundamental shift in Palestinian culture. That shift will only come when they have lost. When every ounce of hope that they can beat Israel, that they can destroy Israel has been lost, has been eliminated. When they are truly hopeless, Germany at the end of World War II understood that they had lost. And therefore, we're willing to consider something completely new. Japan, at the end of World War II, had lost. And we're willing to consider something really radical for them. Very different than ancient Japanese culture, and yet they thrive today. Israel, or the Palestinians, needs to be where Germany and Japan were in 1945, for them to reorient themselves, to recognize the fact that they must rethink their life, their values, their focus. When that happens, peace, of course, is not only a possibility, but will be a reality. Israel fundamentally wants peace, at least a vast majority of Israelis do. Israel wants to live with their neighbors. Whether that happens to be a two-state solution, a one-state solution, I don't know and I don't really care. I'm not against any of those solutions. Now I know what the Palestinians want. They want a one-state solution with no Jews. But that is what they have to give up on. That's what they have to eradicate. I really do believe there is a future. I don't know when, and I don't know that I will see it in my lifetime, although I believe it could happen. In which Jews and Palestinians, Jews and Arabs, live side-by-side in Israel, or in Israel and Palestine, or whatever you want to structure it, in peace, in a thriving society that respects the rights of individuals, and it builds on the success of Israel, and allows everybody in that geographic area to benefit from that success. Thank you all. Thank you. We're ready. That's the best they can do. I'm not worried. Yes. Yes, Dr. Brooke. Oh, the mic's working. Go ahead. Yes, just as the ultimate antidote to anti-black racism. Yeah, yeah, just yell and we'll, I'll repeat the question so everybody can hear it. I've got a big voice. Yes, just as the ultimate antidote to anti-black racism is in black nationalism and Liberia, it's classical liberalism in the United States. The ultimate antidote to anti-Semitism is in Zionism in Israel, it's classical liberalism in the United States. So my question is, Dr. Brooke, and I understand you have emigrated, and thank you so much for emigrating to our country. We're better off for it. I'm not sure I'm that welcome. Well, I guess it just seems as if, it seems as if you're giving up on classical liberalism in the United States. I don't understand why. I mean, shouldn't we just allow complete open immigration from Israel and allow the people like you yourself came? So let me just say, absolutely, let's allow open immigration, maybe not just from Israel, but maybe Israel is a good start. I'm not sure most Americans will accept that, right? So I don't think that's a proposal that would fly very far anyway. But no, I'm not giving up on the United States. I'm adding Israel to the world of classical liberalism. The United States has come a long way from its roots in classical liberalism and Israel has come a long way from its roots in socialism and has moved towards classical liberalism. So I want a world of classical liberalism. I want the Palestinians to be classical liberal. I want all of the world to benefit from the enormous prosperity and individual liberties that are possible as a result of classical liberalism. So why limit myself just to the United States when the United States is in decline and the rest of the world can benefit from these ideas? So it's not a matter of giving up on the United States, quite the contrary, 99% of my talks and my lectures about how to make the United States better, how to save capitalism, how to save freedom. My concern is though that there are few bastions around the world, you know, parts of Europe, parts of Asia and Israel, that represent what I believe is classical liberalism. And I'd hate to see them destroyed because you know what, when they're destroyed, you know where they're coming next. Hi, thank you for coming to talk. My name is Colby Martin-Jones. I am currently working on my Masters in Public Affairs here at the LBJ School. Earlier you mentioned that there was about 20,000 odd deaths to the two million population and how that was a shoddy job of genocide. And I guess I just wanted to ask you, we were talking earlier about how during the SEAL Team Six expedition to kill Osama bin Laden, the sanctioned UN amount of civilian deaths to achieve his death was 30. So I guess I would just like to know, given that information and given what you know about what seems to be happening, how many civilian deaths are justified in this fight? However many it takes to bring victory against the enemy, there is no number. And by the way, I didn't mention the 20,000 figure. This is the first I've heard. The formal number that Hamas presents is 25, maybe a little over 25. But of course, that is massively distorted because at least 10 of those are actual combatants, people with guns. And of course, how do you tell who's a combatant and who's not when Hamas fights in civilian clothes, when Hamas hides behind civilians, when Hamas is among the civilians? You can't tell who is a fighter and who is not. So in terms of civilians, the numbers are a lot less than 20,000 once you take it out. But the reality is there is no magic number, 30 to one, 50 to one, 100 to one, one to one. Proportionality, the ideal proportionality is suicidal. There is no such thing as proportionality in war. The good guys have to win and they have to win quick and they have to win with the least casualties possible. That is what an army's responsibility should be. It's not. And part of the reason America hasn't won a war since World War II is that it won't fight like that. Israel has adopted that strategy and I fear that it's not gonna win this war, not in the way I think it should. Thank you so much for taking the time to answer. I would like to add that the willingness to kill every member of any population is indeed also genocide, so thank you. Nobody has said. Nobody has said the willingness to kill every member of a population. Indeed, it is never necessary to kill every member of a population. It is not necessary. And it's certainly not Israel intend to do that. Certainly not my intent to do that, but it is necessary to kill as many as is necessary to achieve victory. For Hamas, Hamas will surrender. The Palestinians will surrender. Hey, Iran. I was wondering if you could give advice to those of us who are on the right side of this issue, who are on Israel's side, about how to avoid falling into tribalism ourselves and about how to support Israel for the right reasons. I think a big part of it is to emphasize the fact that there's nothing inherent in the Palestinians being the way they are. That is, there's nothing that necessitates the Palestinians being as murderous as they are. That this is a choice. It's a civilizational choice. It's a cultural choice that every culture in a sense makes. It's intellectuals, it's people, it's leaders make. You can choose to adopt an anti-life, a suicidal, a destructive ideology, and you can choose to be pro-life. And there's nothing that says that Palestinians cannot be as rich, as successful, as individualistic, as prosperous as Israelis, if they make the right choices as individuals and in aggregate as a culture. And that's the way you get around the kind of deterministic tribalism that so pervades so many conflicts. There's nothing inherent in being Israeli that makes you good. There's nothing inherent in being a Palestinian that makes you bad. I know a lot of Israelis that I hate. So it's not about that. It's about what ideas you have and it's about what you do with those ideas and how you live your life as an individual. And again, how that impacts the culture as a whole. Thank you. Hi there. I just wanna start by saying, I am a proud anti-Zionist Jew. We do exist. Thank you. And... Thank you. Thank you. Yes, yes, I am. Okay, well, it's fine. Okay, so I wanted to ask, I was sort of interested by this, in your talk, you say, Israel is a fundamentally pro-life society. I'm curious, how is Israel a pro-life society if at the same time you're also saying that Israel should prioritize winning this war over both protecting civilian lives but also the lives of the hostages? I don't understand this. It feels like a contradiction to me because if you're saying that we should risk more civilian lives, haven't we seen that in the US war on terror that ISIS originated out of our ground offensive to eliminate al-Qaeda, right? A large-scale ground offensive of this size will inevitably lead to more trauma and more terrorism. I just want to end off also on there's a Jewish midrash. There's a saying that when you save one life, you save an entire world. You save an entire universe. And I think that in this war, we should be protecting lives at all costs, whether they're Jewish or Palestinian. So I'd say... So first, I'm not going to get into it, but your interpretation of the rise of ISIS is completely wrong and happy to cover that another time in terms of the history and what led to the rise of ISIS. I've written about this and Doug talks about this a long time ago. You know, violence does not create terrorism. Never has. The reality is that I don't know when was the last time Americans were killed by Japanese terrorists. We dropped two nuclear bombs on them and yet they were our best friends. How many of you fear going to Germany because those Germans are going to kill you because when they find out you're American and you're part of the people who flatten Dresden? They don't. Defeated countries do not then engage in violence against once they realize they've been defeated. Once they realize their way of life was wrong and the Palestinian way of life today is wrong. It needs to change. And they need to come to that realization. And the only way they will come to that realization is when they are defeated. And that would be good for the Palestinians, not only for the Israelis. Their lives will be better because they will live in a thriving, pro-life society once that happens. In terms of valuing life, the responsibility of an Israeli military is to value the life of Israelis. The responsibility of an Israeli military is to protect the lives of Israelis. Now, you say, but what about the hostages? There are Israelis after all. My fear about the hostages is that yes, there are 100 and something hostages there. But by negotiating with Hamas, by cutting a deal, by having a ceasefire, by not defeating Hamas, you sacrifice many, many times the 100 people in the future. Many, many, many more Israelis will die in the future if you compromise today. And look, this is not theoretical. This is not hypothetical. Israel has done this many, many times. One of the reasons they took hostages is because of Israel releasing 1,000 for one soldier, Shalit, a few years ago, when they released it. And Israel has cut deals with the Palestinians over and over again without defeating them. And the results of those deals have always been more violence, not more peace, more violence. So it's time to stop pretending, stop deluding ourselves, stop pretending that there's somebody to talk to right now because there isn't. And it's time to change the dynamics. And October 7th, with the horror that it is, presented an opportunity to change that dynamics. I think, unfortunately, I don't think that will happen because I think your view will win out. Fair? So I just want to say that I am taking a class on Jewish values. And then everything I've learned from it has valued social justice, it's valued repairing the world, and it's valued charity. So I also want to preface that I believe that every people should have respect, safety, and peace. But I do believe that you are mistaken about the Palestinian people. I think you're talking about them like they're black and to the brown. You talk about them like how so many Western countries have talked about black people throughout history. You call it violent. You say that we thirst for blood, that we're uneducated, that we don't know how to govern ourselves. That's at least what I got from your talk. Sure. Right. So yeah, I'm a huge advocate for the virtue of justice. I believe people need to get what they deserve. And justice sometimes demand that people get punished for the actions that they take. I have come to my conclusions about the Palestinian people as they are today, not based on some theory, not based on the color of their skin, not based on history, but based on their actions, based on what I witnessed in terms of their behavior. They won't, my assessment of the Palestinian people was not always like this. I've worked with Palestinian people in Israel. And in those days, it's, you know, it was peaceful and it was a lot of respect. That has changed. And the reality on the ground is that today, if you've seen any of the images of October 7th, you know that they're all murderous. And again, it wasn't five people. It wasn't 10 people. It wasn't 100 people. It was hundreds of Palestinians. And they went back to Gaza and they told bring, come on, it's a once in a life opportunity, kill Jews. That has something wrong with people who think that way. There's something wrong with people who behave that way. And unless we're willing to face the reality of what we see, examine it and deal with it, you can't do tikkun olam. Part of tikkun olam is to face the evils of the world, challenge them and try to repair them. And to repair the evil here, victory and war is necessary. War is a horrible thing. It's the most horrible thing that human beings do to one another. I agree. It's definitely the last resort. But when it happens, you have to make it quick and you have to win and you have to make sure it doesn't happen again. And I do believe in tikkun olam and repair in the world and shodaka and charity. And I believe I am challenging the evil. I believe you set this false binary that we are enemies that the Palestinian people are enemies to the Israeli people when first of all, there are Palestinian Jews there as well. But also, it's not one culture is evil, one culture is good. In this case, they are. And in this case, the reality is... Hamas was created by Israel. Hamas was not created by Israel. Hamas was funded by Israel. I agree. I'm not gonna disagree with you. Okay, can you let me talk for a second? I'll let you talk. Hamas was definitely funded by the state of Israel originally in its origins. It was taken out of the Muslim Brotherhood. Israel believed that because the Muslim Brotherhood was religious, they would be more peaceful than the PLO. So they funded Hamas and its origins in order to provide an alternative to PLO. Stupid, horrific mistake. Stupid, right? Now, what if Hamas came about anyway? Probably the Muslim Brotherhood was already quite dominant in Gaza and the West Bank. And the Muslim Brotherhood, if you know anything about history, is a movement dedicated to Sharia law and to world domination of Sharia law. Comes out of Egypt from the 1920s. We can do the whole history if you want. So, you know, Israel did not create Hamas and did not, it funded it originally and then left it once it realized Hamas that it created. But it created Hamas, but the reality is Hamas in its documents of founding calls for genocide against Israel, against the Jews, right? I mean, does anybody deny that that's what? In the document that they still have not changed and they refuse to change and they reaffirm on a daily basis every time a Hamas leader is interviewed? That is in the document, they're genocidal and they are proud of their genocidal. And Israel is committing the genocide? No, Israel's not committed any genocide. No genocide has been committed by Israel ever. Hamas is committed to this. And on top of that, the Palestinian people love them. I didn't make that up. Look at every single poll out there. The Palestinian people support the genocidal Hamas. They support the eradication of the state of Israel. They support the killing of eight million Jews. Now, not every Palestinian, I acknowledge, absolutely. And I hope that the Palestinians who really want peace in Israel, ultimately, they're the ones who win out. They're the ones who change their own culture and they're the ones who actually establish peace with Israel, ultimately, for their own sake and for the sake of everybody who lives in that region. But right now, the reality we face right now is a majority of Palestinians are genocidal. A majority of Palestinians do support Hamas and a majority of Palestinians, sadly, supported what happened on October 7th. And supporting that is just beyond the pale. I mean, the other people, there's a long line behind you. A long line. My very last point, okay. If we put people into an apartheid state and we continually oppress them for decades, we kill those people, are they not going to become angry and violent towards the other state that is oppressing them? There is no apartheid state in Israel. It is absurd. The reality is, do you know why Israel in 2005, when they left the Gaza Strip, literally dismantled Jewish towns that were in Gaza and forcefully, literally using force, dragged those people out of Gaza and brought them beyond the border with Gaza. Why did they do it? Because no Jew can survive in Palestine. Under the Palestinian Authority, Jews will be killed and they knew it. And they said, we can't protect you there. We're going to force you to come to the other side. If they had stayed in Gaza, the Palestinians would have slaughtered them. That is the reality. In Israel, Arabs in Israel, for the most part, I'm not saying Israel is perfect and it doesn't do things and acts that are illegitimate towards its Arab population. But for the most part, Arabs in Israel have equal rights to Jews. They can live anywhere. They can speak their mind. They can even speak support for political parties that are antagonistic to Israel. They are members of Arab members in the Knesset. They're Arab members in the government. The Arabs have, you know, they have press. They have newspapers. They have TV stations. They are, you know, most of the doctors now, most of the physicians who treat you in Northern Israel are Arabs, non-Jews. If you go to Nahariah, if you go to Rambam in Haifa, half the doctors in Rambam in Haifa, in Haifa, where I grew up, are Arabs, which is fantastic. I love it. That's an apartheid state where they doctors are treating Jews, Arab doctors are treating Jews. Really? Where do you live people? Have you ever seen apartheid? Have I ever seen apartheid? You haven't seen the signs? Have you ever seen the barrel of a gun in your face at the age of 12, sitting in your own home? Okay. I love everyone here. I love everybody. Mercy. Choose mercy, choose peace. That's all I say. Come with me. I answered, I was asking you questions. Let's go. Do you understand the question? Do you understand the question? Why? I was asking you questions. I'm being very peaceful. You were just right. Sorry. How are we doing tonight? Where's it for time? Choose peace. Are you pleased that we're getting some of the challenging questions? And I hope you all will continue. I'll just give them a line in time. One question and then move on up real quick. No worries. I'll stick to one. Good. All right. I didn't really have a massive question for you, but I did have a little bit of an observation as there were people getting up during your talk, leaving saying a couple words and then being escorted out as per the policy. The first person that left stood up and they said, I think, an 11 year old girl had her throat slit by the Israeli people and then she was escorted out. And the first thing that I heard out of a lot of mouths here was laughter. Yeah, I heard a lot of people laughing at her. Maybe it was her, maybe it was her conduct, but still to think about an 11 year old getting her throat slit and one of the first things I hear out of people's mouth is laughter does not feel very pro-life to me. You might have to break it down, but it does not feel very pro-life to me. I did not hear laughter. If people laughed, it was clearly inappropriate and it was wrong. Slitting an 11 year old's throat of a 11 year old girl is clearly not an act of self-defense and is condemnable. And if Jews did that, if Israeli did that, I hope they sit in jail and they want to jail for the rest of their lives. That's my time. Dr. Brook, first I just want to say thank you so much for being here and just to say. You're being documented for. Just on what I thought of, hopefully on behalf of all the Jewish people here, maybe except for him, just how reassuring and encouraging it is to have someone outside. This is legal. This is legal. I would like to say this one has been videoed for me the entire time. This one has been videoed for me the entire time. This one has been videoed for me the entire time. This one has been videoed for me the entire time. All right, ask the question. Yeah. The question is so encouraging. Yeah, we can do it. Yeah, let's wait. Either you're here or you're here. Are you refusing to leave? Oh, are you refusing to leave? I can't stand it all, everyone, but that's how it is all. I can't stand it all, I can't stand it all. In fact, you did it first. In fact, you did it first. That is true. Listen, this is true. I'm just filming. I have not said a word, sir. No, I have not said a word. No, you can't. But you put the camera right in my face. They want you to go, I want to ask you to go. Let's not have to. There needs to be like, we need to have the rules with us. I'm not saying let's not stand up and put the cameras. And make their camera for me while I was off of the economy. You guys have a crazy ass, a volcano that's holding power, right? And I will stand up. It's scary. Do you want me to get that one? Aren't you not saying a word, sir? Put that man over there. You don't have that well, man, that left. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't. Should be so exclusive. Candido. We don't. So, just today, it's... Don't fucking touch me. Don't fucking touch me. Oh, my own piece of shit. You fucking pity. Don't touch me. Please. Please. Don't touch me. But Dr. Brooke, as I was saying, just to have someone outside the Jewish face speak with such clarity and enthusiasm about not only this conflict, but the Jewish people, it really it's very impactful for us and we really appreciate it. So thank you. And I just wanted to give, post two thoughts to you to get your ideas on it. I think a lot of us were really shocked to see how some institutions from Harvard to the UN reacted and the Red Cross and Wake. And I was just wondering what the United States, Israel, the governments, the Jewish people, what our reaction should be to those organizations. And also, as Israel comes in to acknowledge and observe Yom HaShawa tomorrow, what you think the state of the Jewish people, not only in the Middle East, but also in the U.S., Australia, England would be without Israel. I mean, it is scary and shocking the increase in anti-Semitism across the world. I mean, I remember October 8th was at Sydney, they were chanting, Jew shall burn, and things like that. Just things that you couldn't have imagined just a few years ago would be going on and all over, you know, on campuses and all over the world really. It became an international phenomenon. I think there's some deeper rot that is inflicting our institutions. And I indicated a little bit about that when I talked about these ideas of intersectionality and these ideas of anti-colonialism, they call it that, but it's even what they call today anti-racism, not real anti-racism, but the notion of anti-racism. So there's a real perversion of thinking going on in our, unfortunately in our academic institution, and therefore spitting throughout the land, the whole DEI phenomena, which is fundamentally discriminatory, fundamentally anti-reason, anti-individualism. It is very collectivistic, it is very tribal, and I think that the solution to all these challenges has to be ultimately intellectual. It has to be a, you know, to a large extent our educational institutions, particularly the premier education institutions like Harvard and UPenn, have been taken over by a certain segment within the left that is very dangerous and very anti the ideas of the enlightenment that made the West the West, that made America America. And they're chipping away, and they're cutting, they're chipping away at our identity. And what we need is to propose new ideas, ideas of the enlightenment, from the enlightenment to resurrect kind of that spirit of Americanism and that spirit of individualism that I think permeated this country and permeated much of the West for a long time and now being undercut dramatically. Thank you. Let me add, that's the mission of the center. Yes. The mission for having been working on for years and years and years, the mission of the reason to have the protection of my faith here in the West. So I also wanted to thank you for the speech, and I had a deeper question, but I wanted to, I changed it due to some of the other questions, wanted to ask how many lives of Jews were spared during October 7th by terrorists after the terrorists learned that these are anti-Zionist Jews? Well, not only were none of them, and indeed many of the victims, sadly, were supporters of the Israeli left. Quite a few of them were members of Peace Now and the Israeli left and people who basically wanted to cut a deal with the Palestinians no matter what, and yet they were the worst victims. But more than that. Let's talk about what happened in October 7th, I mean, it was indiscriminate. Ties were killed, Filipinos were killed, these are people who worked and when they said, we're not Jews, it doesn't matter, you work for them, therefore you're part of the sin. They killed Arabs, they killed Muslims, they killed Bedouin, who just happened to be there, and a number of Bedouin families who were grieving for the loss of their children as a consequence. They were indiscriminate. If you worked for the Jews, if you were later to the Jews, if you had anything to do with the Jews, you were, it was okay to slaughter you, it was okay to kill you. So you know, this is what an ideology of death really looks like. This is what a commitment to destruction and to death looks like. Thank you. And just a clarification, I think some of the people in the audience are not familiar with some of the terms we use or we're familiar with from the Middle East. Can you maybe explain honor killing for the audience? Sure, for those of you who do not know, honor killing is when a, let's say, a daughter has sex outside of marriage and her father or brother will often kill her as a former punishment for having sex outside of marriage. This is I think, hopefully less common, but it still is prevalent in, and it's barbaric. Look, it's barbaric. I don't care who does it, where it's done. This is a barbaric act that unfortunately is still part of many Arab communities. Thank you very much. I'm dissatisfied with the criterion of victory against the enemy. You state that in defeating Germany and Japan in World War Two, it led to a correction within those countries, and you specified that the allies did not genocide the German or Japanese people. Do you acknowledge that the argument that Hamas hides in civilian clothes and that all Palestinian people could potentially be a member of Hamas? Can easily lead to the genocide of the majority children population of the nation of Palestine, especially as Israel's response to the events of October 7th continues indiscriminately and causes numerous civilian casualties. At what point will enough Palestinians have died for Hamas to have been defeated, especially as you say that there is no one to talk to in regards to Hamas or leadership in Hamas? So a number of things that are wrong in what you stated there, Israel is not indiscriminately killing people. Absolutely not. And as I said, in terms of casualty, civilian casualty, per bomb dropped or by any metric you want to use, this is a war that has killed the fewest civilians, probably in human history. So very few civilians are dying given the extent of this war and given that Hamas is hiding among the civilian population. Who's deciding what counts as a civilian versus a terrorist? Well, nobody is. The reality is that Hamas is reporting that about 25, 26,000 people have died and Israel is claiming, I don't have the exact numbers, that 9,000 to 10,000 Hamas fighters, Hamas militants, have been killed. So you can figure out how many of them are civilians and you might not trust the Hamas numbers. I don't. You might not trust the Israeli numbers. I don't know if they know what they're talking about either, but it's probably somewhere in that ballpark. If you know anything about the military, if you know anything about combat, you probably don't, but if you did, then you know that those are given the kind of battle that's going on there. These are kind of reasonable numbers. These are not outrageous and ridiculous in terms of the reality. They're ridiculous in terms of the fact that so many people have to die and that is sad, but the fault for that is 100% of Hamas. So I don't know how many people have to die. I need to say that again, but I do know this. Every single death in Gaza, a child, a civilian, a Hamas and Israeli soldier, every single one of those deaths is on the hands of Hamas. It is their responsibility. They are to blame for this. They started it. They forced Israel into a situation where they must fight for their preservation, fight for their existence. They initiated genocide against Israel. Israel is defending itself. It is not intending to. Again, if it intended genocide, many, many people could be dead, but they have done everything they can to minimize those casualties, including the deaths of their own soldiers, often for no good reason. So this accusation is a way for you guys to avoid the moral argument, the fact, the moral fact that Hamas is responsible for all these deaths. It is a way for you to avoid condemning Hamas and what they did on October 7th. It is a way for you to pretend that you're not actually supporting a genocidal regime and a people committed to genocide and the destruction of Israel and everybody who lives in it. Thank you for your response. Hi. The UN Convention on Genocide says attempting to destroy a people in a hole or part through killing or creating unlivable conditions is genocide. You say the enemy is not just Hamas, the war is against the Palestinian people. So if you support targeting the Palestinian people, why don't you just admit that what you support is genocide under the UN Convention and you think genocide is justified in this case? Because that's not what I think. And it's not what genocide is. Genocide is the targeting of the targeting of a population for destruction and elimination. And that is clearly, obviously, if you open your eyes, not what Israel is doing wars are not fought between political parties. It's not the Republicans versus the Nazis. Or in this case, the Democrats because it was FDR, right, versus the Nazis. It's not the Japanese imperialists versus Truman. It's Japan is fighting against the United States of America. The United States of America is fighting against Japan. That is the war. In this case, it's not Hamas. That is the governing body of Palestinians. It's not some little terrorist organization that's hiding among the Palestinians. Palestinians really hate them. They want to destroy them. No, this is an organization supported by a majority of Palestinians. This is an organization that is embedded within the Palestinian people. And the goal here is not the destruction of the Palestinian people. The goal is their defeat. The two are not the same. Genocide is not the same as defeat. America did not commit genocide against Germany. Every war does not end in genocide. But every war that leads to a lasting peace always ends with one party defeating the other. So you don't agree with the UN definition. That's what you're saying. I don't particularly agree with the UN on pretty much everything. So let's be very clear. And I don't agree with your interpretation of that particular definition. Yes. Earlier in the talk, you mentioned that the Israeli society is a thriving society. Yes. And it is. And therefore, thrived societies tend to be considered the oppressor. And if you look at the Middle East, for example, and several other countries, really, there are many thriving countries and they're not considered oppressors or enemies. So I don't get that part. Also, I wanted to correct something. You mentioned that the Palestinians, generally speaking for the most part, are people that hate Jews simply because they're Jews. That is absolutely not true. It's not true that Palestinians want one state that has no Jews. In fact, Jews existed before the establishment of what we call the State of Israel today. And that's a fact. That's a fact. And there and everybody lived in peace. That's everybody lived in peace. Let me read your history. You really need to read some history. I will. 1936. I had 1919. 1924, you know, and I could go on. So that's all that's all after I mean, that's all what after after some Jews emigrated to a land, bought the land, cultivated the land. In fact, I had committed terrorist attacks, committed no terrorist attacks before 19. I mean, this is complete a story. No, I know the history inside out. Believe me, this is not about the history lesson. I just want to say Palestinians don't hate Jews. It's not about one state with no Jews. So did the Palestinians? Absolutely. That's absolutely. Can I ask you? OK. OK, guys, guys, guys, guys, we got a bunch of questions. Let's keep going and end, though, because we got more questions. Really, the matter is much more simpler than that. It's really much more simpler than that. There's injustice that was committed and people just need that right back. It's really not complicated. We don't need to philosophize any of this, make it a big case where we need academia or you don't need a PhD or anything like that. What's wrong is wrong. And it's obvious killing children is wrong, killing children is wrong. I don't care what the reason is when you say this is we're not here for a speech of Hamas. This is not the case. OK, OK, OK, thank you. I'll know that you're right. It's very simple. The path is simple. If Hamas surrender tomorrow, the fighting would be over. If they released the hostages, the fighting would be over. Tomorrow it would be over. It is very simple. And if the Palestinians, if right now, no, no, no. If the Palestinians... Enough. I mean, the reality is this. Good. I'm glad. I'm glad. I'm glad. The reality is if the Palestinian people wanted Hamas to surrender, if the Palestinian people wanted Hamas to surrender, Palestinian people wanted Hamas to surrender, Hamas would surrender. If the Palestinians were not hiding the hostages, civilian Palestinians hiding hostages in their homes. If the Palestinians, civilians, they know where Sinwa is. They know where the Hamas leadership is. If they wanted to end this war, it would be over in a day. They don't want to end this war. They're willing to die for what Hamas did on October 7th. They value it that much. Now, that is sad because it is pretty simple. Bad is bad. Stop doing the bad stuff. Hi. Thank you so much for being here tonight. I think it's been clear from your discussion that there is this idea across Western universities that Israel is the oppressor and the Palestinians are undergoing impression. How can we, as university students, there are a lot of us here tonight, how can we calmly and thoroughly debrief this idea that's clearly being perpetrated throughout our universities? I think the big challenge is that this idea of oppressed and oppressed is not limited to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. As I said, it's a broader philosophical movement that's out there and the universities. And your need is to advocate for its antidote. What you need is to advocate for its the opposite. What you need is to advocate for really American ideals, what this country is founded on. It's in the Declaration. What you need is to defend the rights of individuals to their own life, to live their life based on their own judgment and pursuit of their own values, and ultimately in the pursuit of their happiness. So combat their tribalism and their determinism. And what they do is they turn you, you're part of a group. Right? That is your essential characteristic. And in that sense, they're both racists and their tribalists. You need to dismantle that in the name of an alternative. And that alternative needs to be a positive one. And that alternative is an individualistic alternative. Treat individuals as individuals. And violence, violence never has a place. It's an initiation of force. The initiation of violence is never appropriate. We can have discussions and we can have debates and we can disagree. And we will disagree on a lot of things. And we should be able to walk away our own way. That's what freedom means and we should be advocates for freedom. Thank you so much. Hi. Thank you so much. Oh, right. No, my thank you so much for being here. Something that I didn't get to hear about in your talk that I'd like for you to elaborate on is the role of Iran in all of this. And as well as the role that other nations like the United States members of the Abraham Accords and future members, potential future members of the Abraham Accords, such as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, may play in limiting the influence of Iran, as well as maybe diving in more into what Iran has done to cause this war. So, yes, I mean, there's a lot I didn't cover in this talk. There's a lot to say about the Middle East. I didn't talk about history. I didn't talk about other countries in the Middle East. But suddenly I think the the most destructive country, this most destructive political entity in the Middle East for now. What is it? Well over 40 years now is Iran. The Iranian Revolution in 1979 was the start of a lot of the damage and the horrors that we've experienced in the Middle East. It proved to a certain element within the Muslim world that the idea of imposing Sharia law on a national scale and running a country on that scale and standing up to America. Remember that the Iranian Revolution, you know, culminates really its peak is when they take the American Embassy and they take the hostages. What does America do? Nothing. What does our tough Ronald Reagan do? Negotiates and releases the hostages, you know, in a deal. So Iran since then has been not only a funder of terrorism globally, a funder of movements of Islamists, jihadists all over the world, but it has been an inspiration to them. It has been the model that they aspire to. And it's behind much of the devastation in the Middle East. I do want to caution you about countries like Saudi Arabia. I know there's a lot of positivity and oh, isn't this wonderful? But look, Saudi Arabia has funded many of the terrorist organizations out there. Saudi Arabia has funded Hamas. Saudi Arabia funded or at least funded schools that supported al-Qaeda and brought brought forth many of the Islamists and jihadists. Saudi Arabia still has Wahhabis, you know, who are very, very, you know, bad ideology as part of their regime. So beware of thinking too positively yet. We'll see. Maybe maybe I'm wrong. And maybe they've moderated it. Maybe they've suppressed the Islamist tendencies. But, you know, this is a, you know, in many ways, this is a global problem. It's not just an Israeli problem. Iran is not just after Israel, you know, al-Qaeda, ISIS, the Taliban. All these organizations are united by a shared ideology of Islamism. They're all out there scheming and planning and various terrorist attacks and other things. This is not the end of it. This is, and of course, it's Hezbollah and Lebanon. So, you know, there's a lot to do if you want to actually bring peace to the to the whole Middle East. Israel could start with Hamas, could start with Gaza. But there's a lot more that needs to happen to actually achieve long term peace in the Middle East. I agree. Thank you so much. Thank you, Iran, for doing this and for to everybody who's remaining civilized during a heated discussion like this. I wanted to challenge you on, you said that Japan and Germany, when they were fully defeated, were able to turn around and become great, great allies and friends of the West. So, but Gaza seems to me like it's, the difference is that Germany was the pinnacle of national socialism. It was the exemplar of it. And Japan was the exemplar of its militaristic Shinto style, whatever was going on there. Whereas Gaza seems more like a proxy war or or like a pawn being pushed around by, as you said, in a number of these others by Iran or by by all these other forces. So defeating the defeat of the Palestinians and Hamas seems more like it would be a defeat of of a small portion of that. Maybe it's how do we prevent that from becoming their Alamo as opposed to, you know, something, something. No, it clearly is a challenge. Because, as I said, there is a greater global struggle. There is a there is a certainly a regional. But I think in the end of the day, it is a global issue with regard to Islamism and Hamas is part of a network of these organizations all over the Middle East and all over the world. What's that Sam Harris? Probably, yes, I think that's true. Israel cannot Israel cannot take all of that on. Israel cannot take responsibility for solving the entire world's problems in terms of Islamism. I do think, though, that it can solve the problem with the Palestinians. And maybe I'm being overly optimistic, but I do remember a period, a period where I lived in Israel, a period where Palestinians, there was no wall, there was no fence. Palestinians came to work in Israel every single day. There was a lot of I've been to Gaza. I was in many of these, you know, West Bank cities. I mean, it was nothing to go to East Jerusalem and walk around or even Hebron or Shem or any of these places. In those days, you know, you did it. And it wasn't it didn't feel it didn't feel dangerous. And so so I know that peace here is possible and coexistence is possible. I think Israel made some big mistakes, the Oslo Accords being the primary ones. But I really do think that there are elements within the Palestinian people that would embrace a move towards peace once these more horrific, genocidal elements are being destroyed and proven to be incompetent and to be unable to being about the so-called victory that they keep promising. I could very well be wrong in the sense that you've got to solve the global regional problems and only then will you be able to solve the Israeli problem. I hope I'm not. Thank you. All right, I think this will be the last question. Yes. Lucky me. How are you? Nice to see you. Thanks for coming. I wanted to get some insight from you and perhaps a solution when it comes to the following problem that just came up organically about five minutes ago for me, so I thought it was worth addressing. In my experience, it seems like those who are, you know, pro-Palestine in the West clearly have the Western culture perspective. They're not in Palestine themselves. Palestinians in America are very different from Palestinians and the culture mindset over in Palestine. Thus, it would also follow that I can I understand how it seems and could be incredibly offensive. Palestine is bad. Palestine is bad. Planets, Palestinians hate everyone who's not a member of Hamas. However, there is a serious distinction made between Hamas and Palestine and Palestinians and American in America. So what I'm wondering is what to what extent do you think that lack of experience of being in the Palestinian culture in Palestine and actually having like, you know, the direct experience of Hamas and the conflict with Israel is where what's missing from that experience that is making it maybe difficult for Palestinians in the West to accept that this is truly as horrific as it is. And also, can you do you have any ideas about how this how this problem that is big can be discussed in the West in a way that's kind of constructive between like all parties as opposed to, you know, Americans saying you hate me because I'm this or, you know, I hate you because you're this because no one here probably is in Hamas because they don't tend to like vacation here. Yeah, but but but but there are people here that are willing to apologize for apologies for Hamas, right? They're willing to turn another and, you know, the to let to defend Hamas doing what they did or at least not to condemn them. And that's almost as bad, right? So I think you give them too much credit. I don't think the issue here is that they lack experience of actual Palestinian culture in Palestine and therefore can't condemn it. I mean, anybody who reads can read about what's going on there. You don't need to actually live there to know that if you speak up against the Palestinian Authority, never mind against Hamas. Not good. Your life is going to be is going to be pretty horrible. If you're if you're if you're an atheist, God help you, right? You know, and you know, these are not secrets. October 7th is not a secret. If you're gay and you're Palestinian in that in the West Bank or in Gaza, people know exactly what happens to you. This isn't they're no secrets here, right? And by the way, same thing is true of Saudi Arabia. I mean, we talked about Saudi Arabia, right? Beware if you're an atheist in Saudi Arabia. Beware if you're gay in Saudi Arabia, right? So that's why I'm hesitant to embrace the Saudis and pretend that they are friends of civilization. So so I don't think you can I don't think you can do that. Look, I mean, I said this a few times, but I think it's it's worth repeating. The only way to deal with this is to argue for a positive. We've got I mean, part of the problem is that we don't embrace what it means to be American. What it means to have American values, what those values are. And those values are universal values. They're not unique to some particular people that happen to be born in America, right? They're universal values. The values of individualism, the values of personal responsibility, the values of reason and applying reason and therefore a free speech and and and and and the willingness to debate and discuss on the basis of reason, accepting reason as our guide to truth, right? Those are the values that we need to promote promote and those are the values that are not being promoted at universities and that's the challenge. And as long as that's the case, there is no there is no magic solution. That the solution is educate with the right ideas, educate with the ideas of the Enlightenment, individualism and reason. Those are the core's fundamental values. I believe of what is Western civilization. The good in Western civilization is reason and individualism. And that's what we need to fight for and only on that basis where we see kind of a rebirth of a positive civilization. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Brooke. And I'd like to thank everybody who came tonight, especially those people who came not agreeing with what they expected to be heard said here tonight and who may be leaving not expecting or not agreeing, but who took this evening as an opportunity to hear a point of view different from your own to argue with it and to do it within the bounds of the principles and protocols that make discussions like this possible. I hope we've all learned something and I look forward to seeing you at future events. Thank you. Thank you.