Rick Green: 0:08
This is the Intersection of Faith and the Culture. Thanks so much for joining us today. On WallBuilders, we're taking on the hot topics of the day from a biblical, historical and constitutional perspective. My name is Rick Green. I'm a former Texas legislator and America's Constitution coach, thankful for you joining us today and very thankful today to get to serve here with David and Tim Barton. David's, of course, America's premier historian and our founder at WallBuilders. Tim Barton is a national speaker and pastor and president of WallBuilders. You can learn more about all three of us at our website, WallBuilders.com. That's WallBuilders.com, and there's a ton of great resources there for you as well. If you're not familiar from your first time listener, WallBuilders comes from the scripture in Nehemiah that says arise and rebuild the walls that we may no longer be able to approach. Our job as citizens today. If we're going to render unto Caesar what is Caesar and unto God what is God's, and as Americans, we are Caesar, we, the people, are in charge. That's how our particular system works here. If we're going to rebuild the walls, if we're going to be good citizens, good biblical citizens, we have to be informed and we have to be engaged and we have to take action, and so, by being a listener of WallBuilders, you are obviously a person of action. You're someone that wants to learn and wants to put that to good use to save our country. Alright, David and Tim, we got Rudy Atallah back with us today. We had him a few weeks back, right after the attack on Israel by Hamas, and we talked about some of the geopolitical issues, talked about what the Biden administration might do on this, but we're going to get him back for an update today. And, of course, we've been very pro-Israel on this program because they're the good guys in the Middle East and they're our best friend in the Middle East. And this attack, of course, unwarranted and probably one of the most gruesome things that has happened between two countries since World War II. And yet Israel, in their response, is doing everything they can to save innocent life, but they have to clean out Hamas. So how are we doing? Where would a month? It's been more than a month since the attack.

David Barton: 2:00
Yeah, and it's interesting, in that month a lot of stuff has happened. I want to go back even to the day the attack. When it happened, I was really, really, really surprised at how strong Biden came out in support of Israel. I mean, he came out just whole Israel and it was like no restraint, no, they need to go on there and get those terrorists gone. And those first few days there's really amazing to watch Biden. I literally was very pleased with the position he took and he was very bold and no, I'm not going to call for ceasefire, they need to take care of these murderers. And it was very good to see that. And then the State Department came out with well, here's the official State Department position. It's probably a week or ten days in and they came out and said no, there's no right or wrong here and there's provocation of both sides and there needs to be a ceasefire. And and and the State Department came out very much with a position that was not good for Israel. Now, that's not surprising because the State Department, by and large, is not not pro-Israel. And so, even going back to Reagan, reagan talked about how bad the State Department was even in his day and he had to go against the State Department so many areas to be able to take down Gorbachev and the Soviet Union, all the things he did that they led to the fall and collapsed the Soviet Union. He went against the State Department time after time after time. So the State Department is filled with entrenched bureaucrats that are globalist. They are not. They don't have any concept of right and wrong in the sense of morality and religious right and wrong and and you know where the Bible is on things. And so when they came out, since that point in time, biden has lined up behind the State Department and it's not been good at all. He started really strong. He has not been good as he's gone through that. And I'll take you back even to Trump. When Trump was there, he had to go against the State Department due to the Abraham Accords, moving the embassy to Jerusalem. The State Department said, oh no, it'll erupt in all sorts of wars and all sorts of nations. It didn't. State Department is wrong with so many areas so consistently. I think that may be the deepest swamp that's in Washington DC is the State Department. I mean, they're really entrenched. They have massive funds, they have a massive amount of employees and, you know, to Trump's credit, he ignored the State Department in several areas and went ahead and did the right thing and it turned out right. So where we are right now is Washington has changed a whole lot. Now how much impact does that have on Israel? Israel is concerned about US opinion, but at the same time, Israel is more concerned about existing and surviving than it is US opinion, and so I'm really looking forward to what Rudy's got to say about what's happening in Israel and whether all this changed by Biden and this much more neutral position toward Israel and which makes it more pro-Hamas Interesting to see what's going to happen there, because I have not heard an update from inside Israel on whether it's affecting what they're doing there. But no question, biden started really good, but after the State Department got involved, he has backed off and has been really bad on this war that's going to Israel right now.

Rick Green: 5:12
Well, we're going to take a quick break when we come back. We've got Rudy Atallah with us. Stay with us folks. You're listening to WallBuilders.

Tim Barton: 5:26
Hi friends, this is Tim Barton of WallBuilders. This is a time when most Americans don't know much about American history, or even heroes of the faith, and I know oftentimes for parents we're trying to find good content for our kids to read and if you remember, back to the Bible, to the book of Hebrews, it has the faith hall of fame where they outlined the leaders of faith that had gone before them. Well, this is something that, as Americans, we really want to go back and outline some of these heroes, not just of American history, but heroes of Christianity and our faith as well. I want to let you know about some biographical sketches we have available on our website. One is called the Courageous Leaders Collection, and this collection includes people like Abigail Adams, Abraham Lincoln, Francis Scott Key, George Washington Carver, Susanna Wesley, even the Wright brothers, and there's a second collection called Heroes of History, and this collection you'll read about people like Benjamin Franklin or Christopher Columbus, Daniel Boone, George Washington, Harriet Tubman, friends the list goes on and on. This is a great collection for your young person to have and read and it's a providential view of American and Christian history. This is available at WallBuilders.com that's www.WallBuilders.com.

Rick Green: 6:29
Welcome back to WallBuilders. Thanks for staying with us. Rudy Atallah back with us been a couple of weeks. We wanted to get him in for an update on what's going on not only in the Middle East but around the world. So thankful for your work, rudy. God bless you, man. Thanks for a little more time today.

Rudy Atallah: 6:41
Thank you so much for having me.

Rick Green: 6:42
Well, you've obviously got a lot on your plate right now and it's not just dealing with the, you know, when we think Middle East, specifically Israel and Hamas and all that, it's its rescue missions all over the world. But of course the world is focused, it seems like, right now, specifically on the Israeli situation. So wanted to just see, kind of in the last few weeks, since we had you on, what your perception of America's handling of that has been and and kind of what we should expect going forward. And, David, it specifically asked to get your thoughts on on what it looks like is now a major disagreement between the Biden administration and Netanyahu, and just the the challenge of what happens after they clean out Hamas in terms of reoccupation of that area, so that Hamas cannot, you know, just regroup. So, man, that was a lot of questions at once, but I guess just first, generally, from your perspective, what's the last couple of weeks? What would you see as the most important things to update our listeners on? Wow, well, there's a lot.

Rudy Atallah: 7:44
There's a lot happening in the world. I mean right now, as you correctly said, we're focused on the Middle East. But you know, while that's happening, a lot of things are happening, for example, in Africa. Africa just saw another attempted coup in Sierra Leone. They've had five coups this year in countries like Guinea, burkina Faso, mali, niger and Gabon. So there's a lot happening there. Of course, you know all the protests you're seeing in Western countries and around the world. And then, of course, there's cyber warfare going on as we speak. But I won't dive into that, but focusing more on the question of what's going on specifically with Israel and the current situation with Hamas. Unfortunately, you know, the Biden administration is pressuring the Israelis to ceasefire and drag on the ceasefire. What that does is that puts a lot of pressure on Israeli soldiers. Long term A, it gives time for Hamas to regroup, but B it also makes life difficult for the Israelis because, you know, internally most people don't think about it. But you know, even though you have Palestinians displaced, you also have Israelis displaced within Israel itself, because many of them had to vacate the borders with, you know, close to Lebanon, the borders with Gaza, the borders with the West Bank. So you've got over a million internally displaced Israelis as well, and you know there's just a lot going on there Economically also, when you delay, it means that the war will prolong because Israel is determined to eliminate Hamas, and rightly so. What that means is it will cost them more in the long term in terms of lives and in terms of finances. So so, yeah, we're not doing Israel a favor in this, in this aspect. But one thing to say about Israelis and within their, I guess, their long term view is do whatever it takes and sacrifice whatever you can sacrifice to bring back every single hostage, and after that then you just focus on, you know, the next step, which is continuing the war. You know Biden, the Biden administration, hasn't even focused on bringing Americans home. We haven't seen any Americans coming home, really, the other other people coming home, and you know this appeasement to Iran is just downright wrong. I mean, iran has been hammering US military all over the Middle East Syria, of course. I'm sure you've heard there's been over, or now, over the last few years, there's been a lot of media attacks against US soldiers in Syria.

Rick Green: 10:47
And Rudy, nobody's fooled by this right. The fact that it's these militant groups that Iran funds, Everybody knows. I mean, that's got to be at the direction of Iran. Is that the perception from people you talk to? Or do people say, oh, that's people Iran can't control? I mean, how kind of? How do, how do? How? Are people, you know, perceiving that?

Rudy Atallah: 11:05
No, I mean, it's well known that Iran is directing this. Okay, it is well known that Iran is also directing the information warfare against Israel and the region I mean we, that they're directing essentially everything. So so every everybody knows that these proxy groups are 100% funded by Iran, 100% controlled by Iran, more specifically, the IRGC, the Iranian Republican Guard, and this is part of their long term calculus, essentially, yeah because the more chaos you create, the better it boasts for them, because now you just you're basically dragging on and creating all these distractions and dragging on the Israeli Hamas problem. What that does is it allows more time for sentiment to build up against Israel, against the United States, and the US is doing absolutely nothing about it, absolutely nothing about it. I mean, imagine we've been attacked over 80 times and and we haven't done a single thing. That one goofy retaliation where we had a pair of f 16 drop bombs on two depots, two arms depots, that's it. That's that's. That's the extent of what we've done, which is nothing.

Rick Green: 12:22
What is their? What is their thinking behind that? Like? I don't pretend to understand the left and the Biden administration, but are they just thinking well, this will, if we respond, then it's going to escalate everything in the in the Middle East. But but by not responding don't we encourage more than it had it? How do they even justify that?

Rudy Atallah: 12:39
Well, it's sad, but their justification is and this goes the entire Biden administration to include Blinken is appeasement. Essentially, if you appease enough and if you coddle enough that people come around and go, oh okay, fine, we'll do what you say, which is completely wrong. There's gotta be a carrot and stick with Iran, and right now we need to be carrying a very big stick, because that's the only way they respond. I mean, look at what Trump did. And when Trump took out Kostin Suleymane, the head of the IRGC and the guy that essentially was part of the initial planning against the October 7th attack in Israel, all of a sudden, when he took them out, the left one. Oh my God, there's going to be major war in the Middle East. Nothing happens. The Iranians went right back into their little cubby hole and everything stood still and everybody backed down. You have to show force or else there's no. The weaker you are, the worse it's going to be.

Rick Green: 13:52
And we've seen that play out over time, right. I mean, it's like when the world knows okay, look, if you attack in any way any Americans anywhere on the planet, we're going to come in and absolutely make you pay for it. Then the attack stops. It's like Gaddafi, right? I remember the interview with Ronald Reagan after Gaddafi had done some of his stuff and Reagan basically bombed Gaddafi's palace and Reagan almost kind of like smirked and said well, you notice, there haven't been any more attacks like that since then, you know, and he was right. I mean, it was like once you let him know we will respond, they think twice or three times and they stop. And right now we're saying just keep attacking 100%.

Rudy Atallah: 14:33
Well, not only that, but I mean we have sanctions that are in place for their oil embargo that Trump put in place, that are not being enforced, and right now Iran's producing three million barrels a day and they're cashing in like big time, taking in a lot of money, and that's what they use to pay their proxy groups and fury out and around. So, essentially, iran is just running a muck and the Biden administration is totally asleep at the wheel. And one thing they should be pointing out too, by the way, just more specifically on Hamas, which is a terrorist group. I mean, just if you look at the leadership in Hamas and you look at the Palestinian leadership, you know, through time, all the aid money that's gone to these guys have never not one dime has ever gone to the Palestinian people. It's always gone into the pockets of the leaders. I mean Yasser Arafat, when he died, was worth $3 billion. You know Hania is one of the leaders of Hamas is worth $4 billion.

Rick Green: 15:36
Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. Back up, yasser Arafat was worth billions. I didn't know that. That's crazy. That's crazy All of that money flowing from all over the world to the Palestinian Authority and this guy's pocketing billions of it.

Rudy Atallah: 15:51
Yeah, mahmoud Abbas is worth two billion. I mean, these guys are think about this. We are such fools, man, we're such fools, and Hamas has spent over $10 billion on building the tunnels that these railies are trying to fight around today. So we pour billions of dollars in aid money and we go, oh, we got to help these people, and none of it goes to the people, it simply goes into the leadership. And then they fool the world and we dump more money on top of them. And then Iran is smiling because now they have this proxy group. All they needed is they have the money. All they need to do is give them the guidance which they've done for October 7th, and they're now helping them regionally to continue to have the upper hand. And so this is where things have just run amok and this administration has screwed up on every level. And I would say watch Lebanon carefully, continue to watch Lebanon carefully, because a lot of these proxy groups have sent also a lot of the militants into southern Lebanon to back up Hezbollah, who is, by the way, using Christian towns like Mermayesh and Ain Ibn al-A'idh in all these areas as Christian towns, as human shields in case Israel attacks. So this is what the Biden administration has created in the Middle East and we're soft for it.

Rick Green: 17:21
Let's, before I let you go, let's talk about what happens. Let's just kind of project ourselves out to okay, Israel does what they need to do to clean out Hamas, they don't let America tie their hands like the Biden administration wants to do, and they get done, and however long that takes let's say that's a year from now or whatever, hopefully just months from now. But I mean I don't see how Israel could be in any way go forward with any sense of security without reoccupying that area and preventing this from happening again. But it's apparent that the Biden administration is very much against that They've made it clear. And so, first of all, do you think Israel will do it anyway, and could this stretch out into a new administration? Maybe? I mean, I know I'm asking a lot of questions again, but do you think Israel can be secure without occupying that area and preventing terrorists from literally just breeding more terrorism?

Rudy Atallah: 18:20
No, I mean, yeah, I mean. So the short answer to your question is yes, they will wait the long game. Israel will stretch it into our new elections. Hopefully it will be positive for them and for us. But B you have to occupy that territory and create a buffer so this never happens again. Israel unfortunately relied too much on technology to protect them and was asleep at the wheel. I don't think they'll make that mistake ever again. And in terms of occupation, everybody keeps talking about a two-state solution. Well, that's been tried and failed numerous times. Gaza was completely given to the Palestinians, who gave it to Hamas, who ran amok, and basically October 7th was the result. So Israel has no choice but to protect itself. So this never, ever, ever happens again.

Rick Green: 19:20
I noticed Mark Levin has been very outspoken against Blinken and said that he's, from years and years ago, always been undermining Israel. And I remember right after October 7th we had a rally in Dallas for Israel and I didn't know a lot of the details, but I still said in my talk there we've got to really watch for the Biden administration to say one thing on the media but then be undermining behind the scenes and tying Israel's hands, according to Levin. I mean he really thinks Blinken is just. He's literally like putting up, working out a plan that completely undermines Israel. How bad do you think he is as the one that's the Biden administration's representative in all of this, and what do we do about that?

Rudy Atallah: 20:02
Look, I mean Blinken is the one that screwed up Afghanistan. He's the one that Blinken just goes around just appeasing everybody and you speaking with a forked tongue, I don't see. Yeah, I agree with Levin. I think Blinken is totally going to screw it up for Israel, but you know what he's got a year and then hopefully we'll have a new administration and all that will, whatever it is, will be unraveled and Israel will be better off with a new administration. Because I don't trust Blinken as far as I can throw him. I mean, I had to deal with them during the Afghan evac and I mean it was all appeasement and just pull out, pull out, pull out and let's forget about it and don't worry about anything. Let's not worry about terrorism or blowback or anything like that.

Rick Green: 20:56
And they were wrong. Yeah yeah, this would be a whole other program and we're out of time, but if you have a quick answer on this one, are there better friends to Israel at this point? I mean, are there other countries that are standing stronger with them than us?

Rudy Atallah: 21:10
You know small countries, you know Poland, you know Hungary. I would say you know, quietly, morocco. Some of the Arab countries stand with Israel, but quietly. You know they project one thing to the public oh, shame on you, Israel. Blah, blah, blah. Palestine, palestine. And on the back side, hey, Israel, we love you.

Rick Green: 21:34
You know what?

Rudy Atallah: 21:35
has Israel given to the world? It's given technology, it gives all these wonderful things. You know, what have the Palestinians delivered to the world? Absolutely nothing but war and chaos and war and chaos. So I mean, that's why Arab countries don't want them. So, yeah, you have people that quietly support Israel, but on the outside optic it's a different thing, just because it's politics.

Rick Green: 21:59
Oh man, that's so interesting. Yeah, it's like you know we're talking a good game and then undermining them, and then you have these other countries that are talking a bad game but then helping them because they recognize, you know, that Hamas and their Ilka are just as dangerous to these Arab countries as they are to Israel. It was so interesting, Rudy. Always great to have you, man. God bless you for what you're doing, Thank you.

Rudy Atallah: 22:19
Keep up the great work and look forward to getting you back soon. Thank you Alright, God bless. Thank you, brother.

Rick Green: 22:25
We're back now with David and Tim Barton. Well, guys, he didn't pull any punches with what he thinks about Blinken and just what the Biden administration is doing behind the scenes, and you know Mark Levin his comments about just how much they are undermining Israel. It's hard to tell people what to do in these situations. Is this a you know? Call, write your legislator and call your congressman. What do you do to support Israel in this situation?

David Barton: 22:51
You know it's interesting, the House is very strongly pro-Israel and under Speaker Johnson, I mean, he is really strongly pro-Israel, but the House already was, except for the squad kind of folks. The House is pretty strongly pro-Israel and what's happening is it's really the administration, because they are pro-Iran and I thought what Rudy pointed out was really really good they seem to ignore all the protocols against Iran, whether it be the freezes or the stopping the money or anything. They keep putting all this stuff into Iran, and Iran is the threat on the southern border with Hamas, it's a threat on the northern border with Hezbollah and it's a threat over in Syria with the groups coming out of Syria and Yemen. All of this is coming out of Iran and what's happening is the Biden administration has not shut down the money to Iran and that's what's aligned so much of this to keep going. That's where all three of those groups are getting. Their funding is through Iran and it's because America keeps letting that money go and this really pointed out. I mean we're letting Iran drill and we're letting Iran produce oil and sell oil and they're making lots of money off that which is financing this war. So I really think that that may be one of the biggest problems with our policy toward Israel is we're not shutting down Iran, which is kind of the head of the snake on this thing. But I thought Rudy's statement I wrote it down because it was so good he said this administration has screwed up on every level and I think that's probably accurate. So I don't know where you put pressure on them, because the money certainly Mike Johnson in the House is doing a great job of trying to put money in the right direction, toward Israel, try not to put it toward Ukraine. They're trying to focus in on the right stuff. They're trying to shut down Iran. But this is where one of the things that you guys talked about with Rudy is this may last into the next election. They may kind of draw it out, which would give us a chance to have a new president who would go in and shut down Iran as Trump did before. Whoever that Republican president would be hopefully would do the same thing. So it's interesting. I don't know how long it's going to last. We'll just have to see how long it lasts, but there's a lot of important information Rudy just shared coming out of Israel in that war.

Tim Barton: 24:56
Well, guys, there's so much that Rudy said that really, I thought was significant and important, and one of the things that stuck out to me, though, is as he identified what did he say? I guess more than 80 attacks on US bases, on US troops, and there was one very weak response Almost kind of laughable, was the implication from Rudy, from the US government, and then, on the flip side, when you had President Trump showing some strength and right, he's going to take out the bad guys, and he did. He had some strikes and took out some of these terrorists over, really, I guess, a couple places around the world, but specifically over in the Middle East, and people said he's going to start World War 3. Ironically, what we are seeing is that when you show strength, you can have peace through strength, as opposed to when you show weakness, all it does is encourage bullies to continue in their activity, which is certainly not the kind of leadership we want as a nation. It's not helpful, and, man, I think we definitely be praying for Israel, but also for our leaders, that they would have more courage and boldness, so that we don't see America get sucked into these issues because of our weakness and passivity, and not flexing our muscles when we should.

Rick Green: 26:09
Well, we'll get Rudy back again in a few weeks Always good to get an update from him and so much of this goes on behind the scenes where we don't even really know for sure what's happening with the Biden administration. So it's nice to have somebody like Rudy with ears to the ground all over the country. We're out of time today, folks. Be sure and check out our website WallBuilders.com for all kinds of great material and resources and WallBuildersLive.com For any of the archives of the radio program you might have missed over the last couple of weeks you've been listening to wallbuilders.