it's not the actual course you want your to of the fact is you want to you want to tell you what exactly is the fact is there are young people that could be watching you that are listening to you and you're perpetuating hate speech and wise untruths you don't know who i am or what i did and say ok one thing i stand for to bring it to go if i can't talk about the democratic party right here along the grocer and among a lot of people my age is your i said you know did mitt excuse me at tyco there's still time to have a real being raised to memorials in public places removed. of course whether i like or should go through these dances but simple as your work it . mirrors the civil war when he was released the bloodiest you are an american he has on which i let me the americans not let me speak was was too when you see it it lasted a little wrong here here and our american it was a rehab we have to live with these symbols of racism white supremacy for the rest

of our lives you know these things should be taken off they shouldn't even be put in museums they should be melted down we should finally put these relics of four years of war the bloodiest war in american history that perpetuated four hundred zeros of the i agree like i was taking a more evil president i overnighted i'm gonna bring in iran we should note them down weak and then anyone that says you're dead what if when the right to have these statues on our streets in america should be should be marginalized and told that their that their speech is not relevant now in this day and age their relics of the past just like those relic is that of the past in these parks a question for john please that i can go through the national whey to get our country back congress now and united i say something please go ahead listen what does that tell you on the left they want to destroy statues here and they've made common cause with islam fascists in the middle east and elsewhere who are also destroying history history is the is history it's part of it's part of our humanity

for better or for worse and i agree that in some cases these statues should be removed but it should be done in a thoughtful process not by blowing things up and throwing a rope around them and tearing them down by a mob that because that's that's what the islam or nazis do in the middle east and in afghanistan where they've destroyed countless pieces of the nazi party you see what i'm saying let rise asian new words in rob and rob rob the native people of the patrimony that isn't rant against you mean i. just as wrong recognized by no question for you or to be jonah in a thoughtful process i do apologize don but we are running out of time i have one final question now pose are of course only an indication or hey we have twenty eight percent of americans saying actually freedom of speech is no the existent in america today while seventy three percent are prepared to die for its which is

closer to the truth in your views than i'm going to give you thirty seconds each to wrap up and then we can have steak of by at to you folks don't well you know people i think think that's why the republicans even under you know divided republican party continue to win elections because the average american sees that the left the liberals the the you know under the last eight years of president obama took this country so far to the left and they want to do they want to destroy the basic fabric of american society and culture and they're and that's why republicans win election after election and the next to be swept out of establishment republicans people want their rights back this is a great country there's a generous country we love everybody and we we hold very dear our freedom of expression ok thank you don and i would see you take just thirty seconds please. yes i mean as you see this the sacred right of freedom of speech was boiled down to

the fact that democrats hate freedom of speech and republicans love freedom of speech the fact the matter is we're all americans and all americans hold the first amendment to the constitution near and dear to our hearts but we also know the facts and the facts are that there are people out there provocateurs that would love to take down our country to take down our our drummer girl who are you guys are you sure are quite emotional or laughter is out of the interrupted. i see this is what i'm talking about that's what is the weaponization of his reasoning and he interrupts he uses i hate speech he uses wrong it words he uses false news he uses false comparison is no one is that we're doing you wrong the democratic. senate right now there's a crime friendly crowd of party i'd like to thank both of you make coming out prior crime has been such great sports and to bring in bringing it lots of issues to line head that said deputy director of the u.s. middle east alliance to support john hunter and also take barry from the code pink

movement thank you see but if you. leave. ok we have some breaking news for you now this just in a man armed with a machete has been reportedly shot dead off the he attacked soldiers on patrol in brussels now witnesses claim they heard gunshots as others reported the man confronted two soldiers in the belgian capital we're going to be bringing you more details on this breaking news story as soon as we get them we'll. be back at the top of the hour with more news for more details to go to our website on t. don't come thank you. hello

and welcome across town for all things considered i'm peter lavelle every once in a while crosstalk as a look at the big picture of a story in this case it is the middle east one of the current defining trends who are the winners and losers and how is this volatile and very dangerous region changing and is american influence on the decline. cross talking the shifting sands in the middle east i'm joined by my guest so i mean nader in beirut he's a middle east analyst and in erbil we have joe lauria he is an independent journalist all right gentlemen crosstalk rules in effect that means you can jump in anytime you want i always appreciated let me go to you first joe my introduction was very very broad. from your standpoint and you're in iraq right now what what are the most important trends affecting the middle east because there's so much going on right now unfortunately particularly the united states it's overshadowed by what i call fake news i want to do real news on this program here joe your

thoughts what how is the middle east changing go ahead it's very easy to get lost in all the details like this so frankly complex particularly in syria i think the overall if you're looking for a really big picture you have to look at u.s. iranian relations i mean that in the subtext of that saudi iranian relations and below that the standoff between saudi arabia bahrain egypt against qatar which i think could be a prelude to a conflict with iran trying to bring qatar into their own capital. they were too close to iran so i think that conflict again between syria and iran us are choosing between saudi arabia and iran overshadows the entire region their sectarian proxy wars their conflict has to be brought to an end and some kind of an accommodation between these two regional powers they're not going anywhere there has to be a balance of power there. the united states if it wanted to be a great power they're the only ones that have the leverage on both parties to bring

them together to end their their their conflict because that spreads all over from black rain to afghanistan certainly lebannon syria and in iraq the iranian saudi conflict is the overall issue right now and it has so many complex local localized conflicts that has to be dealt with and it doesn't look that way at all the trump administration is not doing that they are lowering themselves united states to the level of the sectarian combatants they are just taking sides or taking a sunni side in a friendly complex sectarian war that goes across the region this is the major issue in the issue in the region and the major problem that washington is is is committing right now ok let me go to sami in beirut we can talk about american influence in a second here but could i ask you the same question that i asked joe we knew your mind what are the main confines of what's going on in the middle east because as joe has pointed out it's

a long long laundry list ok go ahead sami. yes i think what this at stake today is the new order in the middle east because or that. one hundred years ago has definitely gone and now there is a new or dude but to a different players with different powers that opening them up and for instance you have russia getting a big role in syria especially in the last two years iran the united states of america and. to a lesser extent saudi arabia so this is a new order. by. their powers and of course i forgot turkey that is a compact of that power it's on the scene for us. and the name of the game today is fighting the guy. who are. who will be policing. this. influence.

each in the work that we have already mentioned so what's at stake today. or. do you find the balance of power for years. to come in joe it's very interesting in looking at syria here with the end of dash i saw islamic state it seems to me that there's a lot of jockeying position for what could possibly be could be some kind of peace settlement. in your mind here is you know we have tillerson the secretary of state saying if i can quote foreign policy tillerson ready to let russia decide assad's feet i mean that is a remarkable statement considering the flip flop flip flop flip flop that we keep hearing from washington on syria i mean do you take killer since words at face

value because i mean i thought it was interesting but i mean what's what are these guys going to say tomorrow go ahead joe. no i do not his words at face value i don't think they know what the hell they're doing it's clear that look at that during the campaign trump said he would not announce what his plans are you know military plans or does want to give the enemy the heads up now obviously tactically in a battle that you don't do that but the strict strategy of the united states for the middle larger middle east or in syria has to be explained to the american people whether we agree with it or not at least the obama administration you know pretty much stuck to regime change which we you know most of us on the show have agreed that that's a mistake but trump we don't know what exactly they're trying to do there except iran iran seems to be the underlying theme in everything you do everything they say they've this seems to be shaping up some conflict with iran which is an enormously dangerous and even closer real. saudi arabia their religion but israel is taken for

granted it's the same with every administration pretty much but the they're even closer to saudi arabia now in particular in this conflict with what they're having what qatar and i think that this is the only thing we can discern coming out of washington is that they're shaping up to some kind of conflict or confrontation with iran which is an enormous mistake other than that on the day to day politics of what do they want to sod in or not whether russia will decide this or not whether the u.s. is cooperating with russia and syria not or whether they're going to shoot us shooting down syrian aircraft piloted aircraft this is just a complete model for a region that's normally a model but this stage is not providing any clarity at least what the hell they want to see done in the region and this makes it even harder as an analyst to try to figure out what exactly is going on and what the u.s. motives are sammy i get the impression that there's been a devolution of responsibility here. so taking what joe just said about saudi arabia do you think the big ministration is kind of allocating saudi arabia to be

its point man in the region of course it has it's an israeli we have the saudis and the israelis very close together but there's one problem with all that in that is turkey and now a nato ally here i mean what's going to happen there because there is an enormous amount of friction here and it's all summed up in one word kurds go ahead sami. i think at the end in mind when it comes to the united states of america has been said to clearly by their chief of the pentagon general davis and he's kind of sitting there. for your interests and he's in iran and so the goal is facing iran now the problem is the united states of america does not have to was. to face to iran iraq and syria is. they could do on a proxy which is. in iraq but this has

because supporting the kurds. and here i mean you can understand the position of secretary of state who try to set the bridge is russia because washington needs russia to pressure on iran or to limit on iran at least in syria so because of obama administration policy or is that all were from. lack of clarity. washington lost a lot of tools east and a lot of leverage it's true that now it's increasing its presence in terms of. presence on the ground and there are investing more but it's not easy to get

back. to all the situation where they were the major force today their primary focus is to face up to iran but they need partners. deafening partner but they need other partners to this is where their son is trying to engage with the russian. it's very interesting is because i absolutely agree with sammy i think it's the there are fewer and fewer tools of influence but there are more and more troops and troops are not a very good instrument of politics at the end of the day look at the number of troops that are in qatar and what in all these saber rattling we have from saudi arabia and other gulf countries and the united states is right in the middle of that you have a turkey a nato ally the united states is on the other side in the conflict in syria i mean this is too much military involvement actually limits their options in a way go ahead joe. i'm not sure i agree i think ok but the other way around that

the u.s. is now looking for proxies the saudis and israel if they want to attack iran which they've said repeatedly they they basically do. while i've been selling the news to pretty calm princes talk about bringing the war inside iran they need the united states this is their long standing goal is to control the united states to back their plans they don't have the military might to fight iran they might have the might to back se it would do to back extremists throughout the region particularly in syria and they can't take on iran without the united states coming on board i think that's what we saw when trump went to saudi arabia and to israel they were lobbying him to do this eventually and it's very scary because trump might be someone who will go along and do it he seems reckless and as far as qatar goes you know i mean and the qatar situation into it gives it shows again this will normally split and really a factor we have to consider is incompetence in washington right now because you've got to listen and not to some one side saying they want to negotiate selman and drops going out on twitter you know backing saudi arabia to saudi arabia to the

hill to calling qatar the largest purveyor of terrorism in the world so you've got they've got to get together on the same page somehow or we don't know what's going to happen but they certainly are not. they are being lobbied to be the force for a war against iran and in southeast syria right now it now time for they are backing so their own rebels this is clearly an attempt to cut off the baghdad damascus highway which the iranians used to supply hezbollah this is israel's main concern is that the iranians continue to supply what they've been doing it by air but this is a land route that the americans i think are trying to cut off that seems to be what their aim is although that's also a guess again right here that that junot let me just because i says not that i have to we have to go to a hard break and after that hard break we'll continue our discussion on the changing middle east a bit thirty. most

people think just stand out in this is this you need to be the first one on top of the story or the person with the loudest voice of the biggest race in truth to stand down this is just the dance the right questions and the right answers. question. welcome back to cross talk where all things considered i'm peter lavelle to remind you we're discussing the shifting sands in the middle east. ok let me go back to sami and beirut one of the most important changes it's been going on is the change in leadership in saudi arabia and the sort of giddy about it

it looks like washington is given a green light is this really smart to embolden this young crown prince i mean you know the recent foreign policy of saudi arabia has been nothing but utter disaster and that you know we can look at syria and we can look to yemen but it looks like the saudis are being prodded along early and given a green light from their allies does this worry you for the region and for saudi arabia itself go ahead sami. definitely that is in a new era in saudi arabia i mean some put it this is of of appeasement that is definitely in change and. it's more. it's better for the young prince given what's going on was in yemen given the challenge of facing up to iran which is not an easy challenge given that

it line in oil prices i mean the conditions of his leadership are not easy at all but however one has to keep in mind. has been directly hit by. inside saudi arabia so that was very close to a yard and maybe this pushed the leadership to this new change in leadership and getting the fact that for the last. iran's influence in that region has been increasing by the day let's not forget in two thousand and three iran was trying to find it was the united states of america to not to be the second in line after the war in iraq today is controlled largely by

iran or iran proxies and that each and this road from damascus to baghdad what has been called the shiite crescent is now a reality and this is giving iran a high leverage region and the ultimate day one with regard to syria is to see to check if iran will be to establishment to establish definitely this bridge that will link the military in iraq. well joe we go back to iran i mean it kind of goes to my point in talking about saudi arabia let's go all the way back to the illegal invasion of iraq in two thousand and three and let's go all the way up to two thousand and seventeen i mean iran's in influence is growing in the region well i wonder why it's because one failure in a venture after another i mean all iran has to do more or less stand there and it can influence increase its influence i mean this is i find it just really amazing

when there's no learning curve coming out of western countries if you don't like a rand why are you hoping them indirectly over and over and over again i mean if this is foreign policy international relations one o one go ahead joe there's no doubt that the american invasion here in iraq in two thousand and three helped iran's position regionally but it also led directly to the existence of islamic state in iraq many of the bath party officials that were kicked out of power joined that group and are trying to get back to power now they're almost defeated now in mosul but they'll continue as an asymmetrical warfare throughout iraq so that they're not going to go away but if you look from a western point of view if you're in brussels or paris or san bernardino or berlin or any of the places that have been hit by either orchestrated or inspired attacks by the islamic state are you looking at iran as being a danger to western cities what is the last remaining and back terrorist group that attacked a western city this is a sunni backed saudi inspired and paid for in many ways groups i'm not saying this

direct relationship between saudi arabia and those attacks they've certainly been supporting isis we know that from hillary clinton's e-mails so these are the groups that are threatening the west why is the west so obsessed about iran and when it's the threat comes from the saudis back groups and as far as yemen goes you know they was a deal you had a deal where the hooters were going to withdraw from sanaa and that's when saudi arabia bombed the day that that deal is about to come into into force the only thing that had settled was the presidency and saudi arabia. did not want to see any kind of democracy within their borders this is been a reckless war with yemen yes they've attacked now it's saudi territory it's become absolutely out of control and mohamed bin salman as a corrupt deputy crown prince the effective king of saudi arabia has got no democratic control on what he does if any country with any democracy would have been a lot of trouble politically after what the disaster in yemen but he continues on with this bellicose speech against iran with this possibility even of an invasion

of qatar by saudi arabia and its allies this is just getting more and more dangerous and he is a reckless force you that united states is backing to the hilt we now doubt that that son in law of trump is great friends with in my home but solomon so i don't know what to say about that now where we're headed with that sami is sticking with . sami this thing with saudi arabia here. i'm going to agree with joe here it is it seems that it wants a gemini in the region and it wants other countries in the region the gulf countries to mirror its domestic politics and foreign policy which means no human rights no democracy no civil society. al-jazeera comes to mind out of qatar i mean is this what the gulf countries are signing up to and at the same time the more they put pressure on qatar qatar just moves into the arms of iran again i don't understand the logic of how this supports the national interest of saudi arabia and

the security of the entire region it seems are doing everything backwards in brawn go ahead sammy. what it comes to democracy or countries and then we do including iran have this. put including including iran including iran including iran course including including of course including iran when you have i mean one set of experts that all of that would be allowed to participate in that action. we cannot talk about democracy it's not about going to the ballot it's about free campaigning it's about creating the condemn the checks and balances inside the system and the human rights that are respected but this side i would like to focus on one made sure i mean problem was that tension between sunnis and shia and we cannot jump over to the reality the problem is not only

between iran and between the saudi arabia the problem inside the house inside the other board itself you have this big divide between. did in groups and this is at the core of what the war happening in syria and this is bold to could inflame at any point in their been on in kuwait and behind and this. problem i don't think that i mean putting the blame on one side would help definitely between iran and saudi arabia and that killing the real issue would have a lot but they're going to ising or defeat or develop one part the. advantage of the other is not it's not definitely going to how to that is nor. good cop bad cop game here we have deep divide inside. the

king did in demand. that putting or putting. the stability of the whole of the regions for years and decades to come so that if diplomacy has to play at all to push the major players to that each. day yemen case and the syria case can be a good start for this kind of man because the problem is not once more it was a cell. what jordan egypt. we have seen during the last day of this crisis there arises around qatar qatar is directly i mean. to be a supporter of. a group. the where fueling terrorism and this crisis is not between cut out and start with the

third and fourth major countries including egypt which is center of gravity of the award in that each and ok kill i mean how caring divine how how real is it in how is it being used as a political tool i mean if you look at syria for example a secular society. certainly ruled by iron hand but they did did not have that kind of sectarian divide and now it is important to them i mean it seems to me that washington is pick the sunni's israel is overjoyed because it wants to see the sunni and shia fight and it gives them a breathing room and actually to expand and then you have golan heights it seems to me it's a political tool the sectarianism it is it it isn't innate in the populations of the country because we always forget where these are royal families these are dictatorships in there are people here not necessarily states go ahead joe that's

a good question first i agree with sam about iran not being full democracy has more democracy at the saudi arabia and while we're actually sectarian issue the sectarian issue is here i've been now here more than a year and a half in iraq i've spent well more than two years all over the region and it's a real thing on the ground people really do i mean people i know guys here who are very friendly with a really good to mention the well the moment you mention iran or she is and they turn into monsters i mean it's just an amazing crowd. however that has come from the top in a lot of ways there's no question about that it is being used by the rulers of saudi arabia and iran i guess to. push their geo political interests in the region by using religious differences so that you're absolutely right peter in saying that but there are real theological differences you get down and speak with people and they really get upset by things that shia believe in the they some many of them believe they're not even muslims so to me theology becomes the role of history has

been just a way to divide people and not to unite them in any way and that people could believe whatever they want to how they behave that that counts and unfortunately with behavior does bleed into belief leads into behavior so we see this division is absolutely on the ground as sammy said this is a huge huge problem and again as i said at the beginning only the united states is in a position to do something about that they have to bring the major sunni and iranian powers and i think it's saudi arabia is more of the gravity a center of gravity than egypt it used to be i think egypt they have to bring saudis on the egyptians who are all can't really stay here so i got a job here to get them in to we bring those things we together we don't run out of time those were pearls of wisdom many thanks to my guests and herbal and in beirut and thanks to our viewers for watching us here r.t. see you next time and remember cross-talk.

financial survival guide i don't buy any i stumbled. on the friday that's not some of my it's from the future price watch guys are. coming up on our take our to where i got the operative word exclusively from both on long the destruction and the aftermath and the left that and the. to retake the city. and a turkish nationalist leader says an iraqi kurdish referendum on independence could leave directly to war. and the senate intelligence committee declares war on wiki leaks we'll talk to a former cia officer killed drolly for more on this.