Joe Kent: ‘Israel convinced Trump on assassinating Ayatollah Khamenei KNOWING the US would be trapped in a war against a more radical Iran.’
The Israelis were very shrewd, and they understood that once this war started, it would go exactly like it is right now, and it would quickly become politically unpopular in the United States.
That’s why the Israelis got President Trump on board with killing the Supreme Leader right off the bat, because once we killed the Supreme Leader, we knew there’d be a rally around the flag effect in Iran.
It would be nearly impossible for the President at that point to get a negotiated settlement with the Iranians because the Iranians would become so radicalised, essentially they would know that they were under siege.
Not to mention the the tragedy at Minab where we killed nearly 200 school children. That basically makes it the popular sentiment in Iran, even for people who were against the Islamic regime, it has them now rally around the Islamic regime.
And now even moderates probably can’t get a deal with President Trump, even if they wanted to, because of the ramifications they would face inside of Iran.
The Israelis knew all this, and that’s why it was essential for the Israelis to get us on board with killing the Supreme Leader within the first 24-48 hours of the war, so now the Israelis can kind of back off and we are we are now locked into this conflict where Trump wants some kind of a deal.
He’s not going to get it diplomatically, and so now he’s left with nothing but various courses of action that involve military escalation.
That’s why I’m recommending him just, you know, flip the table and completely walk away and then work on using the economic carrots and sticks to get the Straits of Hormuz open back up again.’
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@joekent16jan19, former Director of the US National Counterterrorism Center, on the latest episode of Going Underground
Watch the full interview in the quoted post 👇