the time has come to give a proper response to hezbollah and hezbollah is also preparing for this conflict, that is, we can wait for the opening of the second front, although whether the hostilities there will reach the scale of 2006 with such full-fledged airstrikes on the south of lebanon, well , that is also a question, although in the future, if not in the next month, then a year, i think this can be expected, because without removing the threat from hizbul. well, it is hardly possible to talk about any kind of security in israel, and even more so, strikes on lebanon, they will be perceived very different than the strikes on the gas sector, even in arabic with the public, because ruk hizbullah, it does not have as many followers in the arab countries as hamas did, because hamas is such a sunni movement that was associated with the muslim brotherhood, here it turned out that the palestinians are the indigenous population of the region. which acts against the occupation, i.e.

the narrative looked relatively attractive, then some iranian advisers, shiites, fanatics who came to lebanon, deceived the locals, it is not clear why they are attacking israel, i.e. from the point of view of, for example, saudi arabia or the united arab emirates, in principle hizbullah can be calmly merged, and there will be no special protest, even if we are talking about the north. africa and those countries as well, so in principle such a moment has come, again the question is how israel's allies react, specifically joe biden, who is now withdrawing from affairs, we see this, because trump's policy was declaratively more anti-iranian, and he is now demonstrating that, as they say, if he had been there, hamas would not have attacked would, well, these are well-known propagandistic theses, and somewhere the israelis are obviously also waiting.

american elections, in this case, even when we see that biden withdrew from the elections and the coming of trump conditionally became on the horizon and more realistic, and netanyahu is his bad supporter, then israel significantly, well, so to speak, stepped on the gas and began to yemenis to carry out some operations more successfully in lebanon, well, obviously, having secured the support of some american circles, and we see that this gave... a new signal for the possibility escalation, and the issue of returning the hostages has been postponed indefinitely, because, as we can see, until netanyahu agrees to the terms of hamas, this is roughly the situation that is currently unfolding. regarding the definition of escalation, it seems that before, before this powerful blow, joseph biden called on netanyahu to be more careful, to stop escalating. and it could even be about

limited aid from the united states if the israeli leader does not listen to these very subtle but sure advices. at the same time, the un secretary general considers the elimination of pro-iranian hoodlums in beirut and tehran as a dangerous escalation is interesting, and besides... i don't know if our viewers and listeners noticed it, but on july 30 , a rather high-ranking diplomat from of europe, the european commission sent its representative there, and actually many people were a little surprised by this, but is it normal in this situation, according to... the spokesperson of the european commission,

peter stano, actually we need to adhere to the policy of critical interaction. mr. mykhailo, is this situation normal, or in principle we are simply seeing and observing certain ceremonial things. i think that from the point of view of the european union it is quite normal. even this last exchange, when putin's killer was returned from germany, was in principle calm, although... germany could react in the same way to the murder of another citizen by a russian killer, as iran is now trying to react, it is basically the same situation, but the person was deported , and it turned out that it is possible, so when we we hear that dialogue with russia is impossible there, it is a terrorist state, there can be no negotiations and so on, well, things like that, they significantly question this narrative, because there is a real policy and a rational calculation, if we talk about iran,... diplomatic

relations with the iranians are maintained, for example, the biden administration has lifted some of the restrictions imposed by trump. for example, trump did not allow iranians to communicate at all. he did not even open visas to scientists, in fact, i have colleagues who could not leave iran because of such events, despite the fact that people are allegedly not connected with the regime, but we also see the european union, he still believes that there may be some kind of agreement in the future that iran does not make a nuclear weapons, and we buy cheaper oil, and iran is constantly speculating on this, and eurosoy doesn't want it... for iran to finally slip to such a satellite shared between china and russia. and the iranians themselves do not want this. they have a very long history of dialogue with israel and the west. you can recall the events of 7-8 years ago back when iran dispatched its military

to fight edil, which, by the way, the europeans encouraged in every possible way, and in fact, when , for example, they liberated mosul and the north of iraq from edil. there were a lot of iranian troops there, and the bombing was carried out from the north by the americans and coalition members, in fact, they were allies, which led to the preservation of the regime of bashar al-assad, and many such questions, by the way, are about iraq, in general, iraq is trying to successfully balance there between the west and iran, that is, these relations, as european diplomacy believes, have not crossed red lines, even, let's take the issue of the supply of iranian weapons. to russia, well , in addition to these shahids, which are already produced by russia itself, well, in principle, iran drops something there from time to time, but it is not weapons of the level of ballistic missiles, just as, for example, the russians produce many of their weapons using israeli technologies and others, and well, no one does not

say that israel supplies weapons to russia, therefore the issue here with iran with sanctions is very ambiguous, and unfortunately, the european... diplomacy here in many respects demonstrates such the very amorphousness, as it demonstrates even in the issues of the russian invasion of ukraine, that is why here we europeans still believe that it will be possible to come to an agreement with iran very calmly and easily, and this agreement with iran is future, it is even more realistic than the agreement there with russia, because iran still, well, formally, so far it did not attack anyone, directly only worked through... without a proxy, and the israeli attack was successful, the attack on israel was successfully repelled and resembled, frankly, enough , you know, a controversial show off rather than an actual punch. mr. mykhailo, thank you for this high-quality analysis for our viewers and listeners,

mykhailo yakubovych, orientalist, candidate of historical sciences, researcher at the oriental studies department of the university of freiburg in germany, joined the saturday political club, in which within a few minutes vitaly... portnikov, which we are all looking forward to, wait. vasyl zima's big broadcast. my name is vasyl zima, this is a big broadcast on the espresso tv channel. two hours of airtime, two hours of your time. my colleagues and i will talk about the most important thing two hours to learn about the war, about the military, the frontline component. serhii zgurets and how the world lives. yuriy fizar is already with me, and it's time to talk about what happened outside of ukraine. yury, good evening, two hours to be. up to date with economic news, time to talk about money during the war oleksandr morchivka next to me and sports news, i invite yevhen pastukhov to the conversation, two hours in the company of favorite presenters about cultural news, alina chenina , our tv viewer is ready to tell good the evening of presenters, who have become familiar to many,

is already next to me, ready to talk about the weather for this weekend, as well as distinguished guests of the studio, mustafa dzhemilov, the leader of the crimean tatar people, is in touch with us, mr. mustafa, i congratulate you, have a good day, the events of the day in two hours, vasyl zima's big broadcast, a project for smart and caring people, in the evening for espresso. this is saturday's political club, my name is khrystyna yatskiv, and in the future we have more than an hour to enjoy and analyze, critically analyze the latest events, and i'm already happy to welcome vitaly portnikov, without whom this program would be possible, in connection with our kyiv studio. it is impossible to imagine, congratulations, mr. vitaly, congratulations, ms. khrystyna, long time no see, very mutual, long time no see, and i am glad to be with you again in the same ethereal context, i wanted to start with you on the subject of the great exchange of prisoners, i would like to remind the audience that russia and

belarus on the one hand, the united states, germany, slovenia and great britain on the other have carried out a prisoner exchange, and this is an extremely large-scale event that is already growing. certain analytics, but it's simple now in the minds of ukrainians there is also a certain, quite understandable criticism, we will talk about it a little later, to you, mr. vitaliy, the main question: why this exchange right now to putin and why it, on the other hand, to the united states, in the person of joseph biden, well and democrats? well, i think that putin has had one goal for quite some time now, quite important, and that is to release krasikov, the man who is known for his murder right here in berlin in terganterpark dashvili, a georgian citizen. of roman origin, it is a famous story with a political assassination, and this is it history, of course, always interested putin,

because we already know that krasikov is a personal acquaintance for him, this is a person who carried out some special confidential assignments, it is important, not only putin, maybe this whole so-called cooperative lake, and besides of this murder of khongashvili, krasyk is known for the fact that he is involved with several russian businessmen in the northwest, west. in the northwestern region of russia, and this is a person who served in the federal security of the russian federation, and before that in the kgb, i.e. this is just a person from the same corporation as putin, who is personally close to putin, i even believe that he was once his bodyguard during the st. petersburg period of activity, when putin was the vice mayor of st. petersburg, and of course in this situation it was very important for putin to show that people who carry out such orders of his, they cannot leave this prison. moreover, in the case of krasiuk, it was a question of life imprisonment, and by the way, i want

to remind you that putin personally came to the airport to meet these people who were released with krasikov, he hugged and said to him: great, and by and large, after but krasikov, this was the second such russian prisoner in western prisons, and it was very important for putin to make sure that he was released, but there was such a problem that krasikov was... . specifically to germany, germany does not go to such an exchange quite often, so putin needed the united states to be interested in freeing its citizens, so that these citizens from the received states were an important target of the american administration, so that the american administration cooperated with the german government on the release of krasikov, it was such an important moment, you know, that the russians began to simply take a hostage. american citizens, such as our colleague from the wall street journal

, evena hershkovich, who was released on this exchange, others were known hostages with american citizenship, a former marine, our colleague from radio liberty, and here we will now look at american interests. it was very important for joseph biden to release these people during his presidency. because the biggest the nightmare of any american president is what happened to jimmy carter. jimmy carter negotiated in the last period of his term with iran for the release of american diplomats who were then held hostage by the american, by the iranian leadership in tehran, and he did practically all the work on this exchange, his administration was successful, but then in november, as is always the case in the united states. jimmy carter lost the election to ronald reagan and the iranians released these people on

ronald reagan's inauguration day. and to biden naturally wanted to prevent such a situation in any case. first, that it should happen during his term of office. the second thing is that it doesn't happen, you know, that he's done all the work, and then trump wins the election all of a sudden, and on trump's inauguration day, his thing happens. new celebration putin frees american citizens, the anchors are told to see, i became the president and everything began to be resolved , even if it happened after november, when trump spoke, there is not even my inauguration, russia is already afraid of us, that is, it should have happened by november , it is very important moment, this is the moment of american interest, now the moment of german interest. germany was very reluctant to release krasikov, we can see this, it

even caused an outpouring of emotions in the german media, which means that the federal chancellor needed that he not just release american citizens in exchange for krasnikov, but that he releases german citizens, and putin just went to take the germans hostage, even. contributed to this adventure, you know that lukashenko was sentenced to death just a few weeks before a german citizen, no one at all understands what it is, that this person is real. did, and lukashenko pardoned this person after the death sentence, this is not even a life sentence for you, i apologize, and of course, it was important for germany that it had a humanitarian context, that is, the head of the german ministry of foreign affairs berbeck, you know she is a representative

of the green party, she was categorically against the dismissal of kask and believed that it would be a disaster, morally, and olaf scholz ... and antony blinken and all the others convinced her that no, people's lives are more important than such things, let krasikov sit there in russia, but the main thing is that we free american citizens and your citizens, german citizens, but one more important humanitarian component was added, these are russian political prisoners, ugh, ba moreover, in principle, the west believed that if you replace, say, krasikov with navalny, then germany will not have any... at all special issues, because you know that navalny's fate was personally taken care of by angela merkel after his poisoning, he was treated in the charita, and it is as if so happened, you understand, but they release krasikov and together with it american citizens navalny, several more russian politicians,

then this would not cause any indignation of public opinion, and they believed that... even ready to go for it, there is information about it was roman abramovich talking and putin seemed to be interested in it, but just a few days before this exchange, navalny died, that is, it was such a cynical game that we had already agreed on the exchange, in principle, decided who and how, but navalny died, and the exchange was delayed for several months because they then they started thinking again about who could be included in this exchange. so that this exchange would have a humanitarian character, these russian law enforcement officers were included, by the way, i do not understand why the belarusian ones were not included, if there was a person who was wronged by lukashenko, the nobel laureate ales biletsky, let's say, is in prison , who received the nobel prize together with our

oleksandra mitveichuk and her organization, well , there are many political prisoners in belarus after the 20th year. at least someone should have been included as well, well, this is such a question, rhetorical, i'm just asking for a measure, well, that means all these interests converged, because germany was interested in the fact that there would still be such a humanitarian moment as the liberation from russian prisons, if there is no longer novalny, well, several significant russian political prisoners who were against putin's regime and against the war, you know that yashin just... he left according to the war article, and there are still a few people who left precisely because they condemned russia's war against ukraine, in kara morza there is a more serious charge, y there is treason there, it has been there for 25 years, it seems that there is something like that, here, but there are other people, they went about what exactly, fakes about the army and so on, so on, oleg orlov, the chairman

of the board of the now banned memorial, so what’s in this the germans still... it would be important to demonstrate that they are releasing from russian prisons people who protested against putin's war of aggression against ukraine, well, that's also an important point, and several people from fbk immediately from this navalny fund, well, no bulk, but we at least give the opportunity to get freedom for his associates from russian regions, well, if this approach is logical, it is clear that what happened? mr. vitaly, if i understood you correctly, there is a possibility that... oleksiy navalny, well , let's put it this way, could have died in connection with this exchange, if we assume that he died in connection with this man, that they just laughed at the event, uh, as for it, they already understood that krasikov will be released, please, so-and-so, that krasikov will be released, but at the same time they will not give navalny’s symbol, but

at the same time, they will not give navalny, of course, this was their main idea, that in principle the parameters of the exchange are clear. this exchange will take place at all because biden is interested in it, the americans need to be released, but without navalny, well, it was such a cynical, cruel game of theirs, on the other hand, i always told you and now i will say that i do not understand the logic of people at all , i will never be convinced by the harsh imprisonment and then. realizing that they will be put in prison, and then they will have to pay for them, let's say, all these russian bandits and spies. well, navalny returned to russia from germany, we remember this after the poisoning, which he was counting on, karamurza

also tried to triple it several times, in the end they gave him 25 years, the situation with yashin is also strange, because he says that he would like to return to russia and continue his activities there, but he will not return, because he understands that then there will be no exchanges. he wanted people to be released in the future, i never understood that and i don't understand it, they say it's courage, but it seems to me that it's just a misunderstanding of the situation that these people invented some kind of country that doesn't exist and won't exist in their lifetime and they just fall into the trap of the russian regime, uh, i don't know if you've read or watched, there was once, there was exactly such a situation in the 20s, i think, in the years of our century with the famous russian politician boris savinka, who was

a famous terrorist of the time of the empire, and then, when the soviet union had already appeared, and the whites lost the elections, he was aser , that is, a socialist, a revolutionary, he created quite an influential opposition organization, and he was ready for weapons. of the struggle, as you understand, he knew what armed struggle was, because he was a terrorist, the head of a combat organization. mr. vitaly, we lost the sound with you, we still can't hear, unfortunately, but now, now yes, yes, on the phone, there was a whole story with savink, uh, eh, in soviet times, people who watched soviet films, they remember how savinkav was lured into... ra soviet russia, lured into soviet russia illegally, people who were nkvd agents announced that they were oppositionists

and associates of savinkov, he came, he believed that he would have great success, and in the end there was a show trial of savinkov, to whom he told that he agreed with the soviet authorities, and then he, as it were, ended his life ... by suicide at home ogpu, well, we understand that he was simply killed, and you understand when, yes, mr. vitaly, i again ask you to fix the microphone or do something with the sound, but for us and the audience , every word of yours is extremely important, so and so when, when there was such a situation with ee... salenkov, when i mention salenkov, i i think about navalny, about yashin, about karamorza, i think that this is about the same situation, stalinkov absolutely did not understand

russia, the russia that appeared, and he was sure that he understood, because he lived all his life in russia, he was engaged in revolutionary activities there, he was the commissar of petrograd during the provisional government, how could he think that the country in which he spent so much time. it has changed so literally in 6-7 years that it is a completely different country, and putin's russia, it has been since 2014, and even more so after 2022, has changed beyond recognition, it so often happens when the regime goes from authoritarian to totalitarian, and by the way , sayenka was already killed after lemin's death, ugh, this was an important rubicon for the soviet union. and for the capabilities of the nkvd forces of all of them, that's why i think that there is such a problem here that they don't really understand the country in which they live, they talk about some kind of political

activity, so we need to go back to the prisons, set an example, and all this is not there, you understand, that is, their influence on the real russia, in reality, it is not what they have in mind, but in reality it is zero, and it turns out that when they return to russia... or do not leave russia before the threat of a court sentence, they not only shorten their lives, they actually create opportunities in order for russia to hold them as hostages, and then exchange real spies for them, you know, when a person goes to prison because he does not even imagine that he can become a victim of such and such repressions, it is understandable, the head memorial how he engaged in public activities, which, as it were, was absolutely legal, here they suddenly found some article when he once wrote,

you know? and imprisoned him for discrediting the army, it is very difficult to predict, because the conditions of the game change every day, or our colleague from radio svoboda, she just came there to her mother, was leaving russia, and here the specified people say, oh, you have an american citizenship, you didn't register, for your fine, oops, you really should have registered which agent, oops, and we saw that you were editing some book, and that's all month by month, that is... at first a person doesn't even think that the posation was detained there, so you have to pay a fine and fly on, no, but this is a different situation, on the other hand, of course, the question is how correct it is to come to russia in general, if you actually work for an organization that everyone hates , but that's another story, it's hard to predict to the end, especially when you're not in the context, but when you live there and sincerely believe that your landing will become some important element in the political process, then

again... it says that that you understand little about what is happening to you, this a huge problem for all these people, and i noticed it a long time ago, to be honest, they have moved after all, maybe they have always lived in such a quite and real world, because they do not know their population, that's when i heard their first press- khrystyna's conference, that sanctions should be canceled so that ordinary russians don't feel bad, oh, you and i got to the bottom of this issue. of course, these exploded, and pivovarov, a figure from khodorkovsky's orbit, in fact, and volodymyr karamorza, in principle, in one voice, they all started talking with one voice about what sanctions, in the form in which they currently exist, hit ordinary russians, and in no way cause any specific damage to the regime, this, this is additional evidence of their lack of understanding that

russia itself... in most of them created this regime, and they still endow the great russian people with some kind of, i don’t know, divine, just righteousness, and they do it for nothing, well, this is idiocy, well, imagine some anti-fascist in the year 43 or 44, who they say: you know, these are the bombings of german cities from with the aim of destroying the german military industry, they are killing ordinary germans , i... in fact, they have a very negative attitude towards hitler now, it is obvious that it is necessary to fight, but with whom, with hitler, with goering, with goebbels, with kaltonbrunner, and what do ordinary germans have to do with it , ordinary germans are not supporters of this misanthropic regime, and on the contrary, when you do them harm, you only turn them against you, dear allies, well, that's it, it's strange, isn't it, although now we can say as much as we want that

we too it hurts that during the second world war. the historical centers of german cities died there, civilians died, this is all a huge tragedy, but who started it, you can find out who voted for hitler, who was very enthusiastic about the beginning of the second world war and this idea of ​​expanding life space, who for many years after the second world war considered hitler the best chancellor of germany of all times and nations, not the english with the french and not and not... the americans, but the germans, uh, this is a pretty good question, and here, you understand, they all made up their own minds, and so did navalny, that they are political figures, that they may one day win some election, which there is not and may not be, and that in this way they should not say something that will turn against them the vast majority of what they consider their potential electorate. and that is why they

should be the defenders of ordinary russians, putin is bad, you are good, and there is nothing new in this, this mantra has been around since the 18th and 19th centuries, we must go to the people, work with the people, here we have such an aristocracy is criminal , our people are good, but why did they report us to the police, put us in prison, surely the people are dark, we need to educate them, work with them, well, this is the flag of people's voluntarism. ugh, what's new in russian history? well, now it seems as if putin himself walks around the houses of ukrainians somewhere in buchich, borodyanets, presses all the buttons himself, controls all the planes himself, as if it is not the russians who go to the army with these contracts, it is all putin, but the russians in principle, they are beautiful, wonderful, nothing happens.