you made it very clear throughout this program which also leads to an increase in confrontation in the middle east should the united states be sent a similar signal that this is not the kind of behavior that its european allies welcome on the international arena. leaders around the world including from our closest allies have condemned this decision and the very fact that europe has now shifted from negotiating with the united states to negotiating with iran is a strong rebuke to the decision that president trump made i would i describe president obama's leadership on sanctions with iran with russia with other countries a little bit differently from what you did i don't think it's a question about germany making a moral stand or a value judgment what i would say is that we were able to convince countries around the world that on a variety of problems we had a plan and a way forward and that if countries were willing to suffer a certain amount of economic dislocation in the short term we can solve real

problems and so in the iran case we were able to convince the government of russia china india as well as our closest allies to stick with us and we got to the g.c. . and some of russia's policies we were able to convince as you say germany and other european countries to suffer some real economic harm because they thought we had a plan i think the problem now is that the united states is proving that we cannot be trusted with this tool and so the chances of getting even our closest allies let alone a nontraditional partners like russia like china decide with us i think they're they're much much reduced i don't know if you heard this but chancellor merkel said the other day you're of can no longer rely on the united states in order to protect itself and i would argue that the more pressing. question right now is whether you're of can really take it for granted that the united states will not lash out at europe economically do you think this rad of secondary sanctions is real do you think. the united states could convict full force against european countries if

they decide to continue trading with iran provided of course if iran is in compliance with the. so the threat of secondary sanctions is very rule real basically this idea that you know if you're a non us company you've got to choose do you want to do business with iran or do you want to do business with the united states and for most companies that's going to be an easy choice and for most companies the threat is sufficient the u.s. doesn't really have to do much in force meant in order to get a lot of big companies to say you know what this isn't worth the risk but european governments do have tools available to them to seek to counter the secondary sanctions threat and that's the question i think that's going to be on the table when europe negotiates with iran with russia with china with the remaining participants in the g c p a way to see if there's a way to salvage a sort of a rump version of the g. c.p.o. a and and if europe were to try to deploy those tools then you could be in a situation of some confrontation government to government confrontation between

the u.s. and our allies but but we're still a little ways off from that at this point well mr bank we have to take a short break now but we will be back in just a few moments stay tuned. facts geysers financial survival. housing bubble. oh you mean there's a downside to artificial mortgage through don't get carried away that's cause report. to begin to.

open up a bit. in the. house will be useful if. you are talking to the. kids who are only a few easy charities. and that a lot of the money but about time out i skid but i'm looking at him as art when i was up the money into. him taking money out of my money. to me feel that there. is a long. long way to be made by. other people who go films of all those moments of. our. lives of little. doubt out.

welcome back to worlds apart jarrett blanc former u.s. state department coordinator for iran equally implementations mr blank just before the break we talked about the european the reaction to trump's decision and let me ask you a few questions about to russia. as you may imagine many people in moscow very very skeptical of all the speculations about trump's supposed collusion with the kremlin but given where we are with the iranian nuclear issue trumps rebuke of both the american obligations and to your european allies don't you wish moscow had some leverage some for a poor with basic ministration well into. the collision question i'll just say.

we don't know whether or not laws what specific laws might have been violated in the united states we don't know what president trump himself knew what is out in the public though obviously demonstrates that the trump can play in colluded with russian actor is in a way that is deeply disturbing for for america i don't want to make it have this discussion about the russian collision but what is out in the public at this point of time is the indictment of thirteen russian nationals who tried to do something on social media who have horrible english whose posts have been viewed by you know in some cases zero people so i think you guys are blowing it out of proportion but anyway let's stick to the iran and the trump tower meeting and the payments to michael cohen's accounts i mean the question is not whether or not the efforts were successful i think the point is that the the public documentation shows the trump campaign tried but as your question do i wish that russia had leverage over trump

president trump i guess what i would say is this i remember a time not so long ago when i was working on afghanistan pakistan iran in the obama administration that we were able to compartmentalize our agreements and disagreements with russia so there were some areas where we had a very serious disagreements and we confronted each other on those disagreements we were as i said occasional adversaries but where our national security interests overlapped for example in afghanistan for example on iran's nuclear program we retained the. ability to work together and to achieve things and i do very much regret that the politics i think in both of our countries is pushing us away from the ability to be at least occasional partners i think that's not good for us it's not good for you it's not good for the world for the time being moscow has been very restrained in its reaction to trounce announcement about the j.c.b. zero eight but short term russia is set to benefit from the increase in oil prices

even though it's sad both before and now that they devalue strategic stability more than short term material again now from my point of view of the crime and will now have to think very carefully whether it wants to be proactive in its defense of the j.c.b. away or whether it just wants to go with the flow and a lot of the europeans have the initiative what would you personally like to see well i think you're right that both russia and china we've talked we've spoken a lot about the three european countries but both russia and china also have some decisions to make here as you say how active do you want to be in the defense of the g. c.p.o. a and how much potentially do you see the resumption of u.s. secondary sanctions as creating commercial opportunities for your firms in iran. you know what i would hope at least in the immediate term is that iran is clearly trying to make an effort to see if it's possible to salvage the deal foreign

minister zarif is visiting moscow he's visiting beijing is in brussels it's hard to know what those negotiations what those conversations will look like and whether in the end i would think that whatever emerges from them is a good idea but i do hope that all of the remaining participants in the g. . will make a sincere effort to figure out if the deal can be salvaged now you've given a number of interviews lately into each you essentially explain how unfair it is trumps criticism of president obama's dedication to the disappearing. but i wonder if there was anything that the obama administration could have done to make it more difficult for its successor it's you bringing on the agreement you know when i was asked in twenty sixteen what happens if if donald trump wins the presidency will he tear up the deal my answer was always it is hard to imagine any president of the united states tearing up this deal if it's working if it's managing to constrain iran from developing

a nuclear program and imposing all of these very strict inspections on iran i said it and i believed it and as problematic as the trump administration has been so far i still find myself surprised at every new bad decision they managed to make though in terms of the question of you know would it have been possible to make it more legally difficult for trump to pull out the answer is really no there's been a lot of talk in washington maybe you're referring to the idea that if this had been a treaty through the senate trump could not have pulled out that's not really legally the case previous presidents jimmy carter george w. bush have pulled out of treaties just on executive authority so even if you could imagine that the republicans would have seriously considered an obama proposed deal back in twenty fifteen twenty sixteen it would not have protected that deal from from it you also made a point in one of your articles when they disappear it was drafted it was primarily a bill to respond to possible iranian violations nobody could have. foreseen that

they need to guard against american noncompliance and i wonder what is the implication of that because you you mentioned that they were a number of previous american presidents who essentially walked away from the previous deals but it seems to me that the message to the rest of the world here is that you can strike deals with the united states but they will only last as long as the current administration is in office well unfortunately i think that that's right i think that there is. the president terms decision is danger. as for the iran situation it's dangerous for the region but it also does undermine the position of the united states in the world we are demonstrating that we cannot take yes for an answer and that makes it very very difficult to make credible deals with the united states with any future president of the united states who hopefully will be able to recover they'll be able to demonstrate that our political sense system has come to its senses but it's going to be difficult now you mentioned before that on a number of strategic and important issues the obama administration and the putin administration

despite the lack of very warm personal chemistry between the two leaders they were able to find some degree of compromise they could work together but obviously i think in moscow at least there is a sounds of missed opportunities what's interesting about donald trump is that so far he has been finding it very hard to find the strategic overlap if he's adversaries but he found one geopolitical soul mate and this is israel's prime minister benjamin netanyahu. do you think the two are working in concert or do you think that policies are planned mutually planned and coordinated or is israel just being a portion a stick in following a perhaps orchestrating directing president presidents trying to leave so you know i think it's very difficult to work in concert with the trump administration because the trumpet ministration is so internally chaotic they don't have anything

that resembles a normal policy process in the united states and so i'm a little bit skeptical that anybody including prime minister netanyahu is really working in concert i think that this is more opportunistic you see where president trump sort of biases and guts gut feelings take him and then you see what you can do without and so you know i think prime minister netanyahu wants a more confrontational u.s. position toward iran he wasn't going to get that in syria because the president trump doesn't want a deeper investment in syria so he found a place where he might be able to rile up the trumpet ministration and increase the risk of confrontation now as you perhaps know it prime minister netanyahu has just visited. on sources here say that he's trying to advance a very interesting narrative he's suggesting that after trump's blog from the day scipio a threat emanating from iran is ever more pressing despite the fact that it was in

fact israel which has been clamoring for the american administration to abandon this deal do you think israel is poised to become even more proactive in quote unquote defending its security in other countries and the where can it lead all of us well you know that for for a long time i've been trying to remind people to distinguish between prime minister netanyahu and israel prime minister netanyahu has spoken you know bitterly and angrily about the j.c. the israeli security establishment including now a string of to. he says army staff have all made clear that the j c p a worked for israel by removing the existential threat that neuron in nuclear program would have been just making iran a threat but not next essential one so to some extent i think that present prime minister netanyahu is now in a phrase we use in english the dog who caught the car he got what is rhetoric wanted but he's right that this does pose real risks for israel the right response

would be to try to find ways to deescalate the situation with iran on syria and other issues i think as we've seen this week there's certainly a risk that netanyahu will take the other course and see this is an opportunity to escalate tension and see if he can draw the united states into a regional conflict that you know to be honest president trumps instincts in this case or right he'd like to avoid now the rainy and also wrote it in one of your articles now have a lot of things to consider the economic pressure the i would suggest a very provocative israelis behavior certainly emboldened by trump's moves also the considerations of domestic politics come into play here this multiplicity of challenges do you think it's likely to make iran more careful more cautious or on the contrary make it feel that it has nothing else to lose you know before it's a question i do want to say you know i heard you refer to israeli steps as provocative i would just say that everybody acting across that israel syria border

is being provocative right now the iranians are being provocative the israelis as well it's incumbent on everybody to try to lower the tell me mr blank let me let me get to this point because i don't think there is a moral equivalence here because iranians and the russians as much as you may hate their presence in syria of their own the invitation of the legitimate u.n. recognized government you may question the legitimacy of assad as the united states has done informally but you have never sought to revoke its membership in the united nations so your government also recognizes the legitimacy of the sea. you're in state at least at this point of time so suggesting that iranians flying over the syrian territory throwing throwing bombs on the syrian city syrian facilities is not provocative i think this is not a fair comparison so i didn't say it wasn't provocative i said that everybody was being provocative you keep bringing us back to these legal and moral questions i would just say i'm focused on i think an overarching moral question which is how do

you avoid a war and the fact is that israel israel does have real national security concerns about what's going on in syria including the iranian presence and it's in everybody's deeper interest i believe to try to lower the temperature that need to go back to your earlier question which is you know what does this mean in iran is it is iran going to be pushed into a corner or do they act more provocatively or are they on the defensive you know my my guess is that we talked a little earlier about compartmentalization i think you're going to see some of that out of iran as well i think they're going to be areas where they try to be conciliatory toward europe and other is and they're probably going to be areas where they try to where they they feel like they can or they need to be fairly provocative and again my hope is that everybody will take a step back from that and try to find ways to prevent an escalation which would be dangerous for all of us while mr blank i can certainly agree to that that we have to leave it there i really appreciate you sharing your perspective but that's today

and our viewers can keep this conversation going in our social media pages as for me hope to see you again same place same time here and we'll to part. but i am finally in a moment also to pick up now hans a little bit on the album to the point about. finding a good many of you wouldn't be that easy to find and found that out and me.

plus is that going to get the muscles to people who. didn't. vote but i thought it might have been my little bit that it was a bum about a little bit of shock that that out of money good job out of much of the woodwork the mob not to go to jail but it. exists in london as the floods blues. some boards of the. list. to see. if anybody will go to. what politicians do something. we put themselves on the line to get accepted or

rejected. so when you want to be president i'm sure. some want to be rich. to want to be close with what will befall three of them or can't be good. i'm interested always in the waters in the. first six. president.

time for the weekly. face book is upping the ante in its crusade against fake news it's. the phenomenon and the political manipulation on the platform. thanks for joining us franco with your latest news in the world of social media facebook and twitter have gotten rid of suspicious accounts spewing fakes and propaganda from iran the troll factories not only after the minds of the americans but users all over the world it's claimed to be run by iran's government media. not just at the by.

some of them through. facebook already enables users to check if they've been exposed to russian vaults and trolls how many trolls does it take to incite i've evolution scores of so-called russian bots took over twitter and facebook as well this facebook slash twitter online police raid is an actual news story this week yeah you can take plenty of the earlier reports replace the word russia with iran and get pretty much identical stuff all right speaking of facebook this time it banned six hundred twenty five pages traced to iran and an unknown number of pages linked to russia it just wouldn't work if russia didn't get mentioned and the reason for this verdict is we removed multiple pages groups and accounts for coordinated inauthentic behavior on facebook and instagram what kind of sin is

this in authentic behavior let's hear from zax people they use similar tactics by creating networks of accounts to mislead others about who they were and what they were doing we ban this kind of behavior because we want people to be able to trust the connections they make on facebook the issue of trusting what pops out at you from the internet it's almost as old as i am. ask her where we should meet. it seems like you're chatting with somebody just like yourself not only even if they show a picture of themselves it may not really be who they say they are it could be somebody dangerous i'm not trying to say criminals who take advantage of online platforms shouldn't be banned or prosecuted but dear facebook the way the internet and social networks have worked for years is that users can be who they want to be online who

said they must stick to what someone thinks is authentic behavior what if i want to be an elf or santa or a real news hound and my now going to be blamed for an authentic behavior and get a red card sooner or later i. universe i come to the us just for all the things they can do i. say because of all the things they can well it looks like online platforms will force us to adjust to a new reality where a step away from your genuine behavior may lead to a ban or some distinguished fact checkers will tell you who you should or shouldn't trust so next when he choose to complain about a post online think twice what if the fact checkers disagree in fact whatever you

do they're better think twice. meanwhile there's concern over facebook's latest tool to tackle fake news which will involve evaluating users based on how trustworthy they are online it's in addition to the site's existing efforts to stem the spread of misinformation the idea is to protect users from others who indiscriminately flag up fake news as real and vice of a system will even be used to predict which articles need fact checking based on the user's history of postings stories now despite facebook boosting its efforts to get rid of fake news there are still a few big questions about this latest method like which users or which countries will be a part of the new fake news initiative it's also not known how the evaluations will affect individual users on the site or how the process will be monitored though it has put facebook in the media firing line but a social media giant insists it's not as bad as it sounds we developed

a process to protect against people indiscriminately flagging news is fake and attempting to game the system the reason we do this is to make sure that our fight against misinformation is as effective as possible the c.e.o. of online privacy company crypto hippi outlined the ethical implications of facebook's practices i think it's political pressure i think it really comes down to that they are putting themselves. in the position of mediating human relationships which is first of all a very unhealthy thing to do and it's something that they really are grossly. incompetent to do the users primarily will not know what is being done to them and they will be manipulated in all sorts of ways we don't know what kind of ways the. talks of donald trump's possible them pietschmann taking center stage in the u.s. media this week amid

a scandal over two of his former associates. can he be impeached with this i think the beginning has to be set and mark right now and wolf we're in a watergate moment but there is i think a lot for the president to fear the talk of impeachment comes off the trumps x. campaign chairman paul manifold was found guilty on numerous fraud charges and his ex lawyer michael cohen pleaded guilty to presidential campaign finance violations allegedly paying hush money to trump's mistresses and slander the u.s. president in hot water as cohen has implicated him as the orchestrator of the scheme but president the democrats are desperately keen to rake up as much muck as possible in the midterm elections all this muck. all that muck you can much as possible for the general public to be influenced by this in the run up through the november elections the special counsel probe was initially launched to

investigate alleged could do with russia but has so far only exposed fraud and election campaign violations. take the rashid which we got to hope the company where is the closure you know they're still looking for collusion where is their delusion finds a conclusion the fact that they haven't come up with anything that proves there is no russian collusion or they've wasted two years to find fairly pedestrian violations sure if you went into any of the campaigns including hillary clinton's and spent two years with an investigation team in the grand juries i'm sure you'd find a lot more than this filings and maybe some violations of campaign finance laws and i've talked to michael cohen legal fees equal big costs the former lawyer has asked for donations to cover his defense and it's paying off as well he's managed to

raise over one hundred fifty thousand dollars in just three days the saudis can them up and reports it's not always bad business to be dismissed by the president and donald trump was a host on the reality t.v. show the apprentice he really took the show's iconic catchphrase to heart you fight your fight your fight. now with donald trump is the president getting fired by him isn't exactly a career setback take the case of michael cohen this is michael collins lawyer urging people to support michael cohen with an online fundraiser for hoping that he will get some help from the american people so he can continue to be the audience is that they don't appear ready to donate some people might be laughing but that is flowing and there's peter straw the disgraced former f.b.i. agent who set up messages to his mistress now he's raising money online he's already raised four hundred forty three thousand dollars half a million dollars on

a go fund me just for hating donald trump has cancer patients on that side that are like hey we hate him too can you pay for my treatments like you know you already have. if we could tell and then there's andrew mccabe the f.b.i. director who was fired without benefits now nick cave has already managed to raise five hundred thirty nine thousand dollars this issue of him raising some money in order to pursue this you know that's one issue it's an athlete cool issue it's it's something that you know doesn't reflect good character and if you want to get more creative than crowdfunding you can always write a book i'm a rose i'm an adult newman's new book unhinged tells stories from inside the white house thirty four thousand copies were sold within the first ten days and before on the rose it was james komi the fired f.b.i. director now he wrote a book about donald trump and within the first week six hundred thousand copies flew off this.