Colonel Richard Kemp and the Morality of the War Transcript

Disclaimer: This transcript is an edited version version of a transcript created using AI technology and may not reflect 100% accuracy.

The video can be found here.

Sarah Stern: Good afternoon in the United States, and good evening to those of us that are here in Israel. Colonel Richard Kemp has been among Israel’s staunchest defenders in the world. As most of you know, Colonel Kemp commanded the British Armed Forces in the Balkans, in Afghanistan, and in Iraq. He spent most of his entire life in the fight against terrorism. Since October 7, 2023, when Israel was so brutally attacked by Hamas, he has been to Gaza perhaps eight or nine times, and he has spent more time in Israel than he has in his native England. During his several, several visits, Colonel Kemp has provided firsthand accounts of the complex situation on the ground, emphasizing the many challenges confronted by the Israeli Defense Forces. He’s highlighted the strategic and humanitarian dilemmas that arise in such conflicts, advocating for a more sophisticated understanding and measured response in the international community. His observations and unwavering support have been instrumental in shaping narratives that emphasize Israel’s perspective amid global scrutiny and the almost entire international isolationism and abandonment that the State of Israel is feeling today.

Colonel Kemp is a frequent contributor to print, radio, television, and podcast media. He was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire by the Queen, and, in the words of the Chief of Defense Intelligence, has had “huge influence at the highest levels of government.” Colonel Kemp is chairman of the UK Friends of the Association for the Wellbeing of Israel’s Soldiers, an Israeli organization managed by the IDF and headed by General Yoram Yair. I’m also very proud to say that Colonel Richard Kemp was a 2017 recipient of a Mets Speaker of the Truth Award, which he so richly deserves. Colonel Kemp, can you please tell us the difference between Hamas’s tactics and strategy and those employed by the IDF?

Colonel Richard Kemp: I will. Before I do that, Sarah, I’d just like to compliment you and Emmett on the extraordinary work you do. It’s really important. More power to your elbow, and it’s a real pleasure to be joining you and your viewers and listeners tonight from where I am now in Tel Aviv. I’d say there are many differences. The fundamental difference is that Hamas is attempting the genocide of the Jewish people, and its charter makes it very clear they don’t just want to get rid of Jews in Israel, but once they’ve done that, they want to get rid of Jews around the world. That’s their fundamental objective. Whereas Israel, its fundamental objective is to protect Jews and to prevent the annihilation of Jews, which has been tried so many times before in history, including since the reformation of the State of Israel in 1948. In terms of tactics, Israel does everything it can to achieve its defence of its people by attacking Hamas and also other terrorists on seven different fronts around the Middle East, while at the same time minimizing the deaths of its own soldiers. Of course, Israeli soldiers lives are every bit as important as anyone else’s life, and also minimizing the deaths of innocent civilians. Hamas’s tactics essentially involve doing their best to kill as many Israeli Jews as possible, whether it’s on the battlefield or in their own homes, as we saw so horrifically on the 7th of October, and we’ve seen in rocket attacks fired from Gaza since then—thankfully, not recently. At the same time, they want as many of their own civilian population as possible to die.

That’s an extraordinary thing to have to say, but it is the truth. They want their own civilians to be killed by the IDF so they can exploit those deaths, the destruction, the wounding, the suffering of their own people, exploit them on the world stage in order to vilify Israel, in order to isolate Israel, and in order to essentially undermine the Jewish state. And they’ve been very successful in doing that. We just have to look at the narratives around the world about the horrors that Israel is committing, which are all untrue. And it’s drunken in. This Hamas tactic works, and has worked for many years now, and it works even more so today.

Interviewer: So, we were discussing before, and I apologize if you haven’t yet had a chance to read it, but ‘The New York Times’ columnist Thomas Friedman just this morning wrote an article saying that if Israel continues in this war, it will forever become a pariah state, and Jews throughout the world will be subjected to more and more antisemitism. How would you respond to such an allegation?

Colonel Kemp: Well, actually, I haven’t read Thomas Friedman’s article. I try to avoid doing so if I can. But I have read an article that was published also probably about the same time, certainly yesterday, by a gentleman by the name of Jeremy Bowen, who is one of the BBC’s principal foreign correspondents and spent a lot of time covering Israel in Israel. He wrote a lengthy piece along the same sort of lines. And disgracefully, his article (it was a long article), disgracefully accused Israel of all sorts of horrors and atrocities, while completely ignoring what Hamas has been doing. It was like it was happening in a vacuum. I suspect that Thomas Friedman probably sees things in a similar light. But how do you respond to it? Well, the reality is that, to these people, they have their agendas, they have their narratives. The facts actually don’t matter to them, even though they’re professional journalists. The facts are not important. It’s driving forward this narrative against Israel which is the most important thing for them. And you can only respond by, really, two things, I suppose. First of all, utterly rejecting the distortions that they put out. Secondly, by knowing the truth, knowing the reality, and, where possible, countering that reality. Because to say that Israel is going to bring hate upon itself, it’s going to increase antisemitism if it continues, then what’s the alternative? The alternative is to give up. The alternative is not to fight. The alternative is to have Hamas, have the Palestinian Authority, which is also a terrorist organization, on two sides of Israel, and plenty of other candidates to be attacking Israel as well. Give up to them. Let them do their worst. Let them attack Israel. Let’s end the State of Israel. That’s the only alternative.

The other thing is to fight. And, yes, it’s terrible. The bloodshed, the suffering among the people of Gaza. I feel for them, and I’ve seen their suffering firsthand. I feel for them just as much as Thomas Friedman might do. But all of the suffering, all of the bloodshed, all of the death, all of the destruction, all of it has been brought down on them by Hamas. Hamas has to be countered, it has to be removed, it has to be eradicated, and it is in the process of being eradicated. You hear so many people saying what Israel’s doing wrong. Well, I don’t hear anyone saying how Israel should do it differently and still protect the Jewish state. What is the alternative? If you’ve got a fighting organization that wants your destruction, and they’re not prepared to have any form of compromise or reconciliation (which they don’t), then you have to destroy it. It’s the same as in the Second World War. I’m sure lots of Germans hated the British at the end of the Second World War, and during the Second World War, because we bombed many cities, and we fought and killed many of their soldiers, and the Americans as well. I’m sure the Germans hated that. Well, what would be the alternative? Let Hitler run rampage over Europe without any kind of halt on his activities? No. Churchill knew. Roosevelt knew. They knew what they had to do, and they got on with it and did it. Netanyahu and his war cabinet are doing exactly the same thing, and long may they continue. Every death, every piece of suffering, everything, all of it, is down to Hamas. All of it.

It wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for 7 October, and it wouldn’t continue to happen if Hamas laid down their weapons and handed over the hospital. That is the reality. Thomas Friedman maybe understands that. I’m sure he probably does. He’s an intelligent man, but that’s not his narrative.

Interviewer: Colonel Kemp, you have been in many areas of the world where you have witnessed firsthand conflict in urban settings. You’ve been to Iraq, Afghanistan, Northern Ireland, the Balkans. How would you compare the way the IDF behaves as opposed to other military groups that are forced to operate in these densely populated urban settings?

Colonel Kemp: Well, I’ve also been to Ukraine several times during the war, and I was, in fact, there last week. I’ve seen the way that the Russians have fought and the way the Ukrainians have been trying to defend themselves. The Russians don’t really adhere to the laws of armed conflict. So looking at them in any comparable way to the IDF is not the right one. The Ukrainians can be compared, and I think Ukrainians do their best to adhere to the laws of armed conflict. But in the places you mentioned, in Iraq, Afghanistan, et cetera, and indeed the Balkans, the jihadists (and there were jihadists in the Balkans, for those who aren’t aware of it), and I’m thinking particularly in Afghanistan and Iraq, they use the same tactics as Hamas, Hezbollah, and the other terrorist groups fighting Israel use. And they had to be dealt with in pretty much the same way. Our armed forces tackled those conflicts in pretty much the same way as Israel does. We have the same laws of war to adhere to. All of our countries, Britain, America, and I fought, or served, shall I say more accurately, served alongside the American forces in many different campaigns, including in both Gulf Wars and including in Afghanistan. We have the same laws of war as the Israelis do. We have the same rules of engagement, which basically are a means of turning what can be quite complex and incomprehensible laws of war into plain, simple language that a soldier can understand. So we have the same rules of engagement, pretty much. They vary to a certain extent, but I think the tactics and techniques are pretty similar.

The one big difference, I think, in these campaigns is that Israel has been fighting on its own doorstep. It’s not 3,000 miles away, or wherever it is, or thousands of miles away, where it wasn’t as intense in places like Afghanistan and Iraq. It wasn’t really the same, in a way, existential threat that exists today from Gaza, or did exist. I don’t think it does to that extent anymore. Equally, we were fighting an insurgency. In Iraq and Afghanistan, there was an insurgency, which means, essentially, you’ve got irregular fighters trying to bring down the government of that country and attack the armed forces, and the armed forces supporting it. We’re not in an insurgency in Gaza, we’re in a fully-fledged war. And in a war, you must and can use different tactics than in an insurgency. So the IDF has been, I think, far more ferocious in its attacks against Hamas than we had to be in Afghanistan and Iraq, except in the conventional elements of those wars at the very beginning of both the First and Second Gulf War. A lot of people seem to think that Afghanistan is an insurgency, and very often I’ll hear people, “We fought a long 30-year insurgency in Northern Ireland as well,” and I hear a lot of British people who just don’t understand this situation out here saying to me, “We never had to bomb Belfast with aircraft. We never had to carry out the same, we didn’t have to smash a lot of things up with bulldozers.” But it was a different situation. It was a policing situation, particularly in Northern Ireland, but in the other places.

So this is all-out war, and one side wins, the other side loses. I think what we’re seeing, I’m glad to say, is we’re seeing, I think, Hamas even more rapidly losing now than it was before. And Israel, certainly, has achieved huge damage to Hamas in Gaza, and also to its other enemies like Iran, the jihadists in Yemen and other places, and of course, Hezbollah. Now, I hope, is getting close to the defeat of Hamas in Gaza.

Interviewer: Yes, but even today, Melanie Phillips has written that according to a recent survey by the Center for Policy and Survey Research, Kalil Shikaki’s group, they say that 64% of Gazans actually approve, still today, of the October 7th attacks. We achieved a denazification program during World War II, and it was through military victory, but once these people have been so indoctrinated for decades and decades to just really despise my people and to try to eradicate them, how does one achieve some semblance of victory?

Colonel Kemp: I think we shouldn’t forget as well that there is a very high level of support in Judea and Samaria for Hamas, a very high level of support. And of course, I mentioned before that the Palestinian Authority is effectively a terrorist organization. It is. It uses slightly different tactics. It’s not as out front as Hamas is about it, but it is behind the scenes. The leadership of the Palestinian Authority encourage terrorism. They indoctrinate their people, their children, their adults. They pay terrorists. They pay the families of terrorists that successfully attack Israelis or get put in prison. They basically glorify terrorism. Mahmoud Abbas, the well-known Holocaust denier and unelected president of the Palestinian Authority (he was elected once, but that was many years ago and his term has long since ended), he is praised. There was an interview that he did recently come to light, I think he did it a few months back, but it’s come to light, in which he again has praised Hamas and what Hamas has been doing. So you’ve got that not just in Gaza. You’ve got it in the whole of the Palestinian Authority territories. How do you stop it? How do you undermine it? Well, with immense difficulty is the answer. Some countries have carried out de-radicalization programs against terrorists, some countries in the Middle East and in Southeast Asia. Some have been fairly successful, but involving a relatively small number of people. So there are templates for de-radicalization. They can’t possibly work in Gaza while Hamas has any control over Gaza. Of course, they can’t if the likes of Thomas Friedman and Jeremy Bowen have their way and Israel basically surrenders to them and allows Hamas to remain in power, then they will simply continue with their radicalization policies and programs, which have been so successful.

So they have to go, and there has to be something that takes its place. And that, I think, to have any significant effect inside Gaza, in the population of Gaza, would have to be an Arab country. Not to take control of Gaza, I don’t think. I think the IDF will have to maintain security control over Gaza. But maybe an Arab country or consortium taking administrative control of parts of Gaza, at least, and attempting a de-radicalization program. It’s not going to work if the Israelis do it, that’s for sure, or any Westerners. It could possibly work, but it’s a very long-term project. And I’m not optimistic of achieving that either in Gaza or in Judea and Samaria.

Interviewer: Right, but World War II took 6 years, and people are so impatient today. I want to ask you about that. On October 7th, it looked like we Jews (and I’m in Israel now, I spend a lot of my time in Israel, as you do), we had the empathy of the world, and it eradicated so rapidly. How do you account for this?

Colonel Kemp: Well, I think we shouldn’t forget that the empathy, at least of many people, was extremely short-lived. There are still a lot of supporters of Israel and the Jews out there who are not Jews. There’s a lot of them. I’m at a conference in a couple of weeks’ time in Washington, which is the annual summit of the Christians United for Israel, the biggest pro-Israel organisation in the United States. They’re not Jews, they are fully supportive of Israel, and there’s plenty of others like them. The loud voices, the noises of the anti-Israel mobs on our streets, in our university campuses, and elsewhere, that’s a small number of people. It’s not many people, but their voices are very loud. I think the majority of people in both of our countries, in the United States and the UK, of ordinary decent people who actually care at all about Israel, are supportive of Israel. The majority are. So I don’t think we should look upon it as a complete and utter disaster. It’s just that the voices, the anti-Israel voices, are very loud. The pro-Israel voices are not very loud. That could be maybe a change to an extent. I don’t know quite how, but I think it needs to be. But it didn’t start on the 7th of October. The anti-Israel campaign that we are seeing today didn’t just flourish out of nowhere from the 7th of October. It began back in the 1960s in its current form, and it was a campaign that was orchestrated in the Soviet Union, that wanted to turn Israel into a weapon against the United States and the United Kingdom, the two most influential powers in the Middle East at the time, in the mid-60s. They did that by creating the Palestinian national identity, a Palestinian national, I forget what it was.

Interviewer: [inaudible]. The charter? [inaudible].

Colonel Kemp: The PLO basically. They wrote a charter, and they used this to create a war of national liberation. Previously, the anti-Israel actions and violence before the 60s was religiously motivated, as they are today, but they didn’t think that would play well in the West, a religious war. So they turned it from a religious war into a war of national liberation. They invented the fiction, the lies, that Israel is an occupying power. They invented the idea of apartheid, genocide, Israeli war crimes. All of this was made up in Moscow. It was all pre-planned, and it’s been carried on. All the slander and the chants, and the “from the river to the sea” that we hear from our students and other people, that’s where they started. They started in Moscow, and they’ve continued. It’s been a very successful campaign, and it’s accrued in power. Over the years we’ve seen it so many times in the United Nations, other international bodies, and it’s reached (not necessarily its height), but it’s reached a very high point now as a result of this terrible war in Gaza. I was on the streets myself in London a couple of weeks ago, at the Nakba Day parade through London. I joined a counter-protest. Partway through that protest, I left the counter-protest and went and spoke to some of the anti-Israel protesters. They didn’t know what they were protesting for. For many of them, it was a day out. Buses or trains were organised for them to come down to central London. In some cases, I’ve no doubt they were given incentives to do so. In what form, I don’t know. I asked them, “What are you protesting about?” “Israel, genocide,” but they couldn’t go any further than that. They just had “from the river to the sea” on their banners and things like that. So, that’s unfortunately the result of what started back in the 1960s.

Interviewer: Unbelievable. And the irony of ironies is that Hamas, which is a radical religious movement, has joined in with the far left. Of course, all of the transgenders, gays, lesbians, and all those people would not last a day under Hamas rule in Gaza. But they of course embrace this. It’s gone full circle. I believe there’s some deep-seated anti-Semitism, because in Sudan, how many people are being murdered each day? Nobody seems to know. Throughout so much of the continent of Africa, people are murdered. The Uyghurs in China are taken and kidnapped, and brought to re-education schools. Nobody is protesting what Russia is doing to Ukraine. Nobody goes into Russian neighborhoods in the United States and says, “Death to Russians,” but they do go into Jewish neighborhoods and they say, “Death to Jews.” So it has transcended the bounds of geography, and it is an attack on our very peoplehood, our nationhood. Anyway, getting back to Gaza, right now, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation is distributing the aid. Would you like to describe how different this is from when it was in the hands of Hamas?

Colonel Kemp: Yeah, one thing that we should all recognize is, I’ll put it this way, more calories per person in Gaza have been delivered into Gaza since this war began, enabled by the IDF, than were received inside Gaza in a comparable period before the war. So there’s been no shortage of food and medical supplies delivered into Gaza, none whatsoever. The biggest problem that the Gazan people have is Hamas. They have seized a great deal of this aid. They’ve used it for their own purposes, and what they didn’t need, they sold to the Gazan population. Free aid given by American citizens, paid for in some cases by American taxes, given free, they have sold it at a premium price to the Gazans that need it. So that’s been the greatest obstruction. And that’s a means for Hamas to raise money, to recruit more people, to pay its killers, and to organize itself, because most other funding sources have dried up. So that’s been an important source of funding. It’s also been the most powerful means of exercising direct control over the citizens of Gaza, and forcing them to do what you want, because otherwise they’ll go hungry. So that power obviously had to be removed from Hamas. The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which I think started operations at the end of March, something like that (it was basically a U.S. and Israeli initiative), they worked out how best to get aid directly to the people that needed it without falling into the hands of Hamas. I think they’ve recently opened the four of protective bases inside Gaza where people can come and collect aid as a family or as an individual, collect aid for the family, food in particular.

So far, the GHF, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, have delivered something, this may not be the exact accurate update, but something like 10 million meals into Gaza. Their aim is to deliver, when they’re fully up and running, something like 4.5 million meals per day in Gaza, which is, I think, more than enough for the average citizen in Gaza. But one thing they’ve started recently is, they’ve evolved slightly from their original concept. Now, in addition to these four bases, they’re delivering aid directly themselves to the people that need it without going through Hamas. So this is really important. I think so far it’s early days, but it will be a pretty successful operation. But if you look at Gaza, I mentioned before that it’s received a huge amount of food, and people were talking about starvation in Gaza, famine in Gaza. The UN particularly were harping on about this, and other people. It never has come near that situation. I’ve not seen any footage of anyone in Gaza who’s emaciated, except for the Israeli hostages when they were released in some cases. I’ve seen a lot of healthy-looking, well-fed Gazans. I’m not saying they’re not suffering, because they are, but they’re not lacking in food.
They may not have as much as they would want, but they’re not lacking in it. All I’ve seen, the only emaciated figures I’ve seen on any footage, is some very young children, skeletal children, often with their fat mother sitting next to them. Now, that doesn’t happen. That does not ring true. How do you get a child that’s starved to death, and its mother’s still fat? It couldn’t happen.

So what that means, I think that most of those images, the ones I’ve seen, are children with pre-existing wasting diseases or whatever, with their mother beside them. So a lot of fiction goes on. One of the biggest fictions has come out of the UN. Let’s not forget the UN humanitarian chief said a few days ago, or maybe a couple of weeks ago, he came out with a thing that, “14,000 babies are going to die in Gaza in the next 48 hours.” Absolutely preposterous. Preposterous. I’m not an expert on any of this, on nutrition or humanitarian aid or any of that. I’m not an expert on that. But I knew as soon as I saw that figure that it wasn’t true. It simply was not true. It was repeated by the BBC, and no doubt by media organisations in the United States, just repeated as though it was true. 48 hours later, there weren’t 14,000 babies dead of malnutrition.

Interviewer: So if, God forbid, Israel were to lose this war, of course, the 10 million people living here would be eradicated. But what is the likelihood that other jihadi groups would use hostages again to attack the west?

Colonel Kemp: Well, it’s proven to be extremely successful. Hamas’s hostage operation was a fundamental part of the plan of the 7th of October, to get as many Jews as they could into Gaza, dead or alive, preferably alive, but they took dead bodies in as well, of course, because they knew how powerful that weapon was. Today, it’s pretty much the only weapon they’ve got left. I’m sure they would have been eradicated now if they weren’t still holding hostages, and the IDF didn’t have to strike a balance between killing Hamas and rescuing the hostages. But of course, rescuing hostages is probably the single most difficult thing you can do in wartime. I’ve been involved myself in hostage rescue operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, most of them were unsuccessful, because it is so hard. You have to have two things, and those two things are hard to come by. The first one is that you have to have precise intelligence on the location of the hostages. I’m sure Israel (the IDF) have got pretty good intelligence on the location of many of the hostages today. But then you’ve got to achieve surprise in rescuing them. And why you’ve got to achieve surprise, two reasons. One, because if you don’t achieve total surprise, then unfortunately, the terrorists holding the hostages will kill the hostages, and you defeat the object. Secondly, you stand a high chance of your own soldiers getting killed. Again, I mentioned before that an Israeli soldier’s life is no less important than anybody else’s life. So this is so difficult. The lessons that have been seen by jihadists elsewhere will have made this an absolutely rock-solid tactic to use in the future. That and human shields.

Jihadists are adept at using human shields anyway, but they will see how effective Hamas’s techniques on human shields and use of their own population are. We will definitely see these techniques, as well as others, used in future conflicts.

Interviewer: It is very difficult for me to look at the system of underground tunnels that looks like the New York subway system, and not to realize that Egypt was allowing all of this to happen. The concrete and the weapons; it was going in from a supposed ally of Israel. They signed a peace treaty together in 1979, but somehow, all of this happened, and it’s very hard. In 2024, the United Nations condemned Israel a total of 17 times, with only one resolution condemning each North Korea, Iran, Syria, Myanmar, Russia, as well as one condemning the United States. Do we ever, ever see a worldwide condemnation of Hamas? And why is that?

Colonel Kemp: No, we don’t. The reason is, as you say, we don’t see very much condemnation of countries that are carrying out real atrocities, as opposed to Israel, which is not carrying out atrocities. It’s fighting a tough war. It is killing a lot of civilians, it’s killing as few civilians as it can. But you can’t fight an enemy that is embedded in the civilian population that’s trying to get you to kill their civilians, without unfortunately killing civilians. Israel is not carrying out atrocities, and has not carried out atrocities in Gaza in previous conflicts, either, despite the accusations against them. But the United Nations is an intrinsically anti-Israel body. It has a built-in anti-Israel majority in the United Nations. People, unfortunately, take it seriously. So when the United Nations Human Rights Council, for example, condemns Israel for war crimes and crimes against humanity. I’ve spoken at some of these emergency sessions at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, and I’ve seen them in action. One after the other ambassadors stands up and condemns Israel. The last time I went, even the Russian ambassador, who, by the way, was suspended from attending UN Human Rights Council sessions, but somehow still was there, condemned Israel for breaching human rights and demanded that Israel ends its illegitimate war against Gaza. The Russian ambassador, that is. One after the other, they churn it out. I think the United States stands out in this, very few countries don’t condemn Israel and don’t vote against Israel at the UN. There are one or two others, but not many.

In some of these sessions, I’ve spoken to some of the UN ambassadors during breaks in the emergency debates, and I’ve asked them, “You said this, this is not true.” They don’t know. They’re just reading a script that’s been sent down to them by their capital city. It doesn’t take account of the reality. There was a very famous UN investigation into ‘Operation Cast Lead’ back, I think it was 2008, 2009, in which Israel was condemned, found guilty of war crimes, crimes against humanity, by Judge Goldstone, who then subsequently withdrew his allegations. But the interesting thing, I think, about that was that the military aspects of the investigation were led by an Irish army colonel. Of course, the whole thing was military more than anything else, legal as well, of course, but primarily military. The Irish army have never fought in any war in history. They have no air force, and a lot of it was about the air. So you get somebody who’s utterly unqualified to pronounce on the rights and wrongs in a conflict, dominating the scene, and being largely responsible for producing a report condemning Israel.
There was no fact, it didn’t matter. He was actually interviewed. This Irish army colonel was interviewed, I think, a couple of years later by an American magazine. The interviewer said, “You said that Hamas would never hide weapons in mosques, but yet we’ve seen evidence that Hamas has hidden weapons. Why do you say that?” He said, “Well, because they wouldn’t.” He said, “I would never hide a weapon in church, so Hamas wouldn’t hide [inaudible].”

So this is the level of military expertise that the UN draw upon. I’m afraid it’s a lost cause, the UN. I believe we need to establish an alternative entity of some sort, made up of democratic states who can really counter the UN.

Interviewer: So, we are about to enter the sixth talk with Hamas. It looks this week as though both President Trump and Steve Woodcuff are reaching their frustration level. Do you think that there will be a time when President Trump will just say to the Prime Minister of Israel, “Just take off the gloves and finish them off?”

Colonel Kemp: Well, I certainly hope so. I think, from my understanding of it, although there are these talks going on, I don’t think that the Trump administration is placing the restrictions on the IDF through the government of Israel that the Biden administration did. Unfortunately, the Biden administration helped prolong the war by insisting the gloves were kept on. That, I don’t think, seems to be happening. But there may come a point, and the same applies in many ways to the negotiations over Iran, and indeed negotiations with Russia, when President Trump realizes that he is being taken for a ride. He probably knows that. He’s not a fool; he probably knows that already, but he does want to be seen, at least, to give peace a chance, or if it can be given a chance. But the truth about Hamas is that they’re never going to agree. They’re never going to agree to give up all of the hostages without being forced (militarily forced) to do so. They’re never going to agree to laying down their weapons and ending the conflict. That’s the only basis on which a lasting peace could be achieved. Yes, there can be ceasefires, hopefully with at least some hostages being released. That’s a possibility, I think, but we’re not dealing with people who think the same way as we think. And it’s the same with Iran. The idea of a nuclear deal between the United States or other countries and Iran is, unfortunately, a fantasy. They’re not going to give up their nuclear weapons, no matter what they guarantee, no matter what they undertake, no matter what they say. They’re not going to give them up. And no deal between the United States and Iran is worth the paper it’s printed on.

There was Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran, back in 2014, I think it was, which Iran repeatedly breached. It was a bad deal anyway. It gave Iran a path for war[?], but they repeatedly breached it, and they repeatedly breached their obligations under the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. So, I think it’s folly to think. I’m sure there are political reasons, good political reasons perhaps, for going along with it to an extent, but as long as you know at the end of the day that you’re not going to get a meaningful agreement with any of these players, that they simply do not think and act the way that we do.

Interviewer: Yeah. President Trump just said the other day, that they’re just asking, in reference to Iran, for things that you can’t do. They don’t want to give up what they have to give up, and that is their enrichment[?]. He said, “We can’t have enrichment. We want just the opposite,” and they’re just not there. I hate to say that, because the alternative is a very dire one. I don’t think that President Trump really wants to engage in a military conflict with Iran. But the reality is there of what he is up against, and it is not simply about Israel, it’s about the West. They are developing missiles that can reach to the United States. We know that they have 274.8 kilograms of highly enriched uranium at the 60% level. The JCPOA said you’re not supposed to enrich beyond the 3.6% level. So they’re about a week away from the 90% level. We don’t know if they have the capability of putting that fissile material on a nuclear warhead and sending it to Israel. But I know here in Israel, people are very nervous. There’s this very unsettling sense. People are very jovial in the street, they go on with their lives, and they know how to enjoy themselves, but in their inner core, it’s very nerve-wracking to know that there are people that want to obliterate—first the Jewish state, and then the rest of the West. So, do you feel that President Trump might engage in military action with Israel against Iran, or at least give Israel the military armaments necessary to take them out?

Colonel Kemp: Well, the first thing I’d say about this is: I believe none of us outside the inner sanctums of US and Israeli intelligence probably have a brilliant idea about it. My understanding is that Iran now has sufficient fissile material enriched to 60% to manufacture at least 10 bombs. According to the International Atomic Energy Agency, is manufacturing enough fissile material (highly enriched)nto produce at least, I think it’s one bomb every month. Maybe three bombs every month. I’ve forgotten the exact numbers, but, one is pretty bad anyway. And as you rightly suggested, then that 60% enriched material can be further enriched to 90% for weapons grade within 2 weeks, or maybe less. Again, as you rightly said, we don’t know if Iran yet has the capability of weaponizing that to make actually a bomb work on a nuclear missile. But if we don’t know that, then we have to assume it does, or is very close to getting it. Therefore, action must be taken. We’ve seen the consequences of nuclear-armed states threatening our democracies. I’m thinking particularly of Russia. Russia managed to intimidate President Biden into not doing enough to support Ukraine, to push the Russians back. Now, whether you think he should have done more or not, he wasn’t able to. He was afraid of Putin’s nuclear threat. So we see what can happen to international policy when a country has nuclear weapons. Iran can’t have one. You say it also threatens the world. It certainly does threaten the world. Russia is manufacturing. It’s run short of ballistic missiles, because it’s fired a lot of them at Israel last year. It’s supplied Yemen with a lot—the Houthis. It’s supplied Russia with a lot. So it’s run short, but it’s manufacturing more and more now with the help of China.

China’s supplying some critical material to help with the development of ballistic missiles. So this threatens the world, and Israel, of course, is right in the crosshairs of Iran. But the other Arab states are also in the crosshairs, because Iran hates Sunni Arab states at least as much as it hates Israel, possibly even more. I think it sees Israel as its prime target now, but it still hates the Sunni Arab countries. So it has to be dealt with. Now, whether President Trump is inclined to launch his own military strike against Iran or not, only he knows. I think of all the world leaders, you’d be the most foolish if you were to predict what’s in President Trump’s mind. Obviously, that’s a strength as well; to be unpredictable, particularly against your enemies. But I can’t answer that, whether he would. I think it’s probably more likely that he will enable Israel to do the maximum military damage to Iran’s nuclear capability. And that, of course, includes providing Israel with certain munitions that it may not have, or more of the ones it’s got, whatever it needs to do it. I think that’s a more likely thing. And also, of course, to help protect Israel against the retaliation that is likely to follow if a strike takes place. We saw what Iran did in April and October last year. If anything, it’s going to be more ferocious. And it’s arming some of its proxies around the region increasingly with long-range ballistic missiles, including in Iraq, for the same purpose. So I think U.S. protection, and other allied protection, I hope, will be deployed in order to help protect Israel against the counterattacks going to occur. But one way or the other, something has got to be done about it. And much as I hate to say it, I don’t think there’s any alternative other than a major military strike against Iran’s nuclear capability.

Interviewer: Right. So we discussed before that the Prime Minister of Israel and his administration had set out the two goals of this war: defeating Hamas and getting back the hostages. Do you think it is possible to maintain both goals? Or are there cross purposes, since Hamas uses the hostages as human shields to hide behind? That’s their life insurance policy. So are these two goals achievable?

Colonel Kemp: I think they’re in conflict with each other, but also they’re complementary to each other. That sounds a bit weird, but I think it’s true. So, by continuing to attack Hamas, obviously there is a greater risk of more of the hostages dying in the process. Obviously, Israel will do its best to avoid carrying out a strike which could kill hostages, and that’s been one of the major delays in this war. But also, of course, as Hamas gets closer to destruction, they’re going to more likely kill some of the hostages as well. Therefore, it’s kind of in conflict, but they’re complementary as well in some ways, because I think the hostages that we have seen released in hostage deals up until now, which has been a significant number, have only been released because of Israel’s military action and the military pressure that Israel’s put on Hamas. Does anyone seriously think that Hamas would have released a single hostage if they hadn’t been at risk of annihilation themselves? No, the answer is they wouldn’t have done. They would have kept all of them. So it’s a contradictory situation. But all I can do is say I would hope that, through a combination of military action and whatever diplomacy can work, Israel will be able to save the remaining hostages. and certainly as many of them as possible.

Interviewer: Another rising threat is Erdogan’s Tayyip[?] and his embrace of the Muslim Brotherhood. It seems to me that he would love to resurrect the Ottoman Empire, especially in Syria. What are your feelings about Ahmed al-Sharaa, or his nom de guerre Abu Mohammad al-Julani? Do you feel the United States was right in suspending the sanctions against Syria?

Colonel Kemp: Well, I think there’s a two-pronged effort against Syria at the moment. One is the United States, as with other places around the world, trying to find a way of avoiding future conflict. I think time will tell whether there is any long-term benefit in trying to cozy up with Julani. I’m not particularly optimistic about that, but I don’t think it hurts to try it. While the other pronged approach is, I think, Israel, which continues to attack threats to Israel from Syria. And it’s been doing that incredibly effectively. Obviously, there are other big problems in Syria. There are other minorities that are at risk as well, but I think Israel’s priority does need to be defence against threats to itself. It’s got that very much under the microscope and is doing its best to do it. But it’s possible, I suppose, that we could see some balance coming out of Syria. I think we do have to be wary of Erdogan, with his aspirations for a second Ottoman Empire. Of course, he’s closely allied with Qatar, and he’s a strong supporter and has given a lot of support to Hamas over the years. So he’s a person that is a very difficult man to predict. I don’t think it’s any secret to say that Israel is certainly preparing and planning for a potential conflict between Israel and Turkey, not necessarily a direct conflict, but a conflict using Turkey’s proxies, but possibly even a more direct conflict. Let’s assume that in the medium term, short to medium term, Iran is neutralised by its nuclear weapons being destroyed, or at least severely disabled, with the possible outcome of that being the fall of the Iranian regime (which could happen if Iran is severely attacked). And then, of course, I think, if Iran is at least temporarily neutralised, then you have Turkey probably raising its head even more.

Interviewer: I’m so glad you brought up Qatar. They have an almost ubiquitous presence in the United States: in think tanks, universities, lobbying firms. Unfortunately, they have contributed to many political campaigns. I’m sure the same is true in Britain. Is there any way that you can think of to neuter Qatar? They’re rising in the world stage also.

Colonel Kemp: Yeah, again, the whole of the Middle East is a very difficult web to maneuver, to navigate around. But of course Qatar, as you mentioned, has huge investments in our countries, and cutting those off is not an easy thing to do. And not forgetting as well that Qatar has an enormous U.S. military base in its country, and moving that out is not an easy thing to do. So I think that probably the proper approach is not to just cut Qatar off entirely, but to do our best to manipulate Qatar, and to call Qatar out when it’s necessary. I think, on the more positive side, some of the other Gulf states (particularly Saudi Arabia and the UAE) have a far more promising approach towards Israel. I think certainly that Saudi Arabia, I’m very confident they have an intention of normalizing relations with Israel, that sort of Abraham Accords–type thing. The more strength Israel and the West can get by alliances with other Arab countries in the region, the more difficult it’s going to be for Qatar. I don’t think we should think we’ve got all the answers necessarily. The Western way of thinking, as I’ve said a couple of times, is different from the Middle Eastern way of thinking. We can get Saudi Arabia and the UAE, in different ways, to guide us and help us with Qatar.

Interviewer: Right. And China and Russia, especially China, has a huge impact in this region. We don’t want them to get into the orbit, into the constellation of China and Russia. There were points, I must tell you, in President Trump’s trip to the region where I was a little disappointed, but I understand why he is courting them. It’s not all negative. There are some positives as well. So, are there any things you feel are important to leave us with? Right now, you and I are both in the State of Israel. I’ve already encountered 14. As a coach, where I’ve had to run into sealed rooms, sometimes with my grandchildren, sometimes alone. Are there any words of encouragement to get us through this fog of war right now that you could leave us with?

Colonel Kemp: Can I just say one thing on a completely different topic first? I will give you a few final words as well. You didn’t raise something that’s been in most of our newspapers, television, iPhone screens, and things for the last few days; which is a lovely young lady called Greta Thunberg. She, of course, made a valiant attempt to breach Israel’s blockade and get vital aid into Gaza. Of course, it was a publicity stunt, and it was intended to discredit Israel. I think her hope, and the hope of people with her on board the so-called selfie ship, was that Israel would take a hard-line intervention against them. Of course, that didn’t happen [inaudible] would not do so. One thing that people are maybe unaware of, because she’s accused Israel of kidnapping her, and people like Amnesty International have said that Israel’s maritime blockade of Gaza is illegal. Of course, it is entirely legal. The Secretary-General of the United Nations in 2011 said himself that the Israel maritime blockade was legal. So what Israel did, of intercepting that boat on the high seas, was entirely legal. All that Greta Thunberg succeeded in doing was to humiliate herself by being seen with a big broad grin on her face, being handed a sandwich and a bottle of water by a very kind IDF soldier. But there’s something even more problematic than that. And that is that this action, and it’s a small action, but it’s part of a bigger action, just encourages Hamas. It gets the eyes of the world on people. The government of Spain and the government of France demanded that Israel release Greta Thunberg. All of that stuff just feeds into supporting and encouraging Hamas.

The final thing I wanted to say was personally, I’m very optimistic about the future of Israel. I don’t agree with Thomas Friedman’s analysis. I think Israel is undoubtedly going to emerge from this war both with its reputation intact, and also much stronger than it went into it. And I say that because, first of all, Israel now has generations of people, men and women, who have fought for this country and made sacrifice to this country in the last more than 18 months, whatever it is now. That kind of sacrifice, terrible though it is, does strengthen the country. I think Israel will be much strengthened by that experience, unfortunately, in a way.
Secondly, Israel knows who its friends and enemies are, and it knows it now needs to be more self-reliant. It has already got action in hand to manufacture and produce more of its own military materials than it has up until now. Very important. Thirdly, I think that the diaspora around the world may, and certainly not in every case, but in many cases has woken up more to the threat that Israel is under than it believed to be the case before. You all know better about this than I do, but I would hope that many more people in the diaspora will stick up for Israel and understand how important their presence in the different countries they’re in, particularly the United States, is for Israel.

Finally, I mentioned it before so I won’t repeat it, but the Abraham Accords, I think, are going to be extended, and that will strengthen Israel in the region. So I really do think that Israel is going to come out of this a great deal stronger. It’s absolutely right that many of us are concerned, in some cases maybe even depressed, about what’s going on, but it will end, and Israel will emerge in better shape than it went in.

Interviewer: I can’t thank you enough, Colonel Richard Kemp, for your wonderful words of support and encouragement through this very difficult time. One thing I do also gain a lot of encouragement from is looking at young men and women, like my son-in-law, who has done over 200 days, I’m sure, in reserve duty—leaving his family, four young children. There are so many people like him all around Israel, willing to serve, willing to step up to the plate. And there were times when people did not have so much faith in this next generation, but it does give me renewed Tikvah, renewed hope, and renewed faith in a future of Israel. I really can’t thank you enough. Right now, we are meeting with people on Capitol Hill as we speak. We have a staff in Washington, and I Zoom into meetings from here, from Israel. And your presence, I think, is a gift from God, and we’re just really honored to know you. Thank you.

Colonel Kemp: Thank you. Yours is too, and it’s my pleasure.

[END]