The Fourcast

Donald Trump promised to bring peace to the Middle East, but after months of war with Iran, American voters have delivered a stinging rebuke to the president in the midterm elections.So what does that mean for America's role in the region? And after decades of wars and interventions, has the US done more harm than good?On this episode of The Fourcast, Krishnan Guru-Murthy is joined by the award-winning journalist and author Kim Ghattas. Her new book, The Best Kind of American: Murder, War, and America's Undoing in the Middle East, tells the story of an assassination in Beirut more than 40 years ago, and what it reveals about America's role in the region today.

The midterms have been a disaster for Donald Trump and the Republican party. The democrats have retaken the house and the senate with shock results across the country. So what does this all mean? Is America’s electorate going through another major realignment? And has this completely shattered Trump’s authority? On this episode of the Fourcast, Kiran Moodley was joined by Democrat strategist Joe Caiazzo and Henry Olsen, senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.

Wafa Mustafa has spent years searching for her missing father, who was arrested in Syria in 2013. Before his disappearance, he gave her a chilling warning: if he was arrested again, she would have to flee the country or Bashar al-Assad’s forces would torture her.In this episode of The Fourcast, Syrian filmmaker Waad al-Kateab and activist Wafa Mustafa join Krishnan Guru-Murthy to discuss their upcoming documentary, Maybe Tomorrow, about Wafa’s search for her father, and the thousands of families still waiting for answers about loved ones who disappeared in Assad’s Syria.

As vote counts trickle in following Israel’s high-stakes national election, results indicate a stalemate. Neither Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing nationalist bloc nor the opposition coalition led by former military chief Gadi Eisenkot’s Yashar party appear to have secured the 61-seat majority required to form a government.With both major factions falling short of a clear victory, the country faces a familiar deadlock, leaving Arab-led parties such as Hadash-Ta'al as potential kingmakers. Despite high voter turnout and full-throated campaign endorsements from US President Donald Trump, Netanyahu's bid to secure a stable coalition hangs by a thread.In this episode of The Fourcast, Secunder Kermani is joined by pollster and former Netanyahu aide Mitchell Barak, Senior Analyst from Haaretz , Esther Solomon and Adalah founder and director Dr Hassan Jabareen.

Andy Burnham came to power promising radical change, a circuit breaker for Britain’s stagnant economy. This was his first budget, meant to lay out his bold vision for Britain. But are we left thinking, is that it? Chancellor John Healey announced measures meant to ease the pressure of soaring costs, including a £100 pay out for 20 million households, a rise in the minimum wage and some tax relief for small businesses. He’s targeting banks and the gambling sector with higher taxes to fund his plans.But his opponents accuse him of kicking big decisions on defence and welfare spending into the long grass at a time when the UK is facing global turmoil driven by the conflict in the Middle East. So what are we to make of this budget? John McDonnell who was Labour’s Shadow Chancellor from 2015 to 2020 and Darren Jones, who held several key advisory roles in Keir Starmer’s government, but was sacked in Andy Burnham’s cabinet reshuffle, join to discuss for this episode of The Fourcast. 

Israel is set to vote in its first election since October 7th in what could be one of the country’s most important elections ever.With Prime Minister Benjamin Natanyahu having been in power on and off, for 19 of the past 30 years, his job looks under serious threat from challenger Gadi Eisenkot.On this episode of the Fourcast, Matt Frei is joined by Channel 4’s Foreign Affairs Correspondent, Secunder Kermani, as well as the former deputy managing editor of the Jerusalem Post, Tovah Lazaroff.They discuss whether Donald Trump’s full-throated support for Netanyahu will help him to remain in his job? And as Israeli voters are about to head to the polls, why are the humanitarian crises in Gaza and the West Bank barely mentioned by those running for office?

With the Budget just days away, Prime Minister Andy Burnham and Chancellor John Healey face some big decisions. How much can the government afford to spend? Who should pay more tax? And how on do they get Britain's economy growing at a faster rate?But what if we're asking the wrong questions altogether?Former chartered accountant Richard Murphy argues that the government's obsession with borrowing, debt and so-called fiscal headroom is holding Britain back. He believes we have far more financial freedom than politicians would have us believe.So is Britain really running out of money? Or is it running out of ideas?On this episode of The Fourcast, Krishnan Guru-Murthy was joined by Richard Murphy, Professor Emeritus of Accounting Practice at University of Sheffield Management School, and economist Vicky Pryce, Chief Economic Adviser and a board member at the Centre for Economics and Business Research.

In this special audience Q&A episode of The Fourcast Indicators, Matt Frei and Mark Urban answer your questions on the big geopolitical issues shaping our world.They ask why the West ignored Putin's aggression for so long, why Europe can't build its own rival to Starlink and whether Donald Trump's $1.5 trillion defence spending plan can rescue the US military.Do you have any burning geopolitical questions you want Matt and Mark to answer? Send us your questions by leaving them in the comments and Matt and Mark will do their best to answer them in a future episode of the Fourcast Indicators.

Argentine President Javier Milei, has declared that the Falklands “illegal foreign occupation” and that his country needs to take them back from the UK.But 44 years after Britain defeated Argentina in the Falklands War, could another invasion be on the cards?And with Britain’s military much more depleted today than in the 80s, could they even retake the islands?On this episode of the Fourcast Indicators, Matt Frei and Mark Urban speak to Chris Sabatini, the Director of the Latin America Programme at Chatham House.He says that the presence of oil near the islands, as well as his tanking popularity at home, has pushed President Milei into putting the archipelago back into the spotlight.

Is the AI bubble about to burst? And could the trillion-dollar investment boom trigger the next global financial crisis?Gary Gensler, the former head of America's financial regulator, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), warns that a major downturn in AI investment could be just 18 to 30 months away, potentially putting banks, pensions and the wider global economy at risk.In this episode of The Fourcast, Krishnan Guru-Murthy speaks to Gensler about why he believes the AI boom is unsustainable, whether the world could face another financial crisis like 2008, and what happens when the enormous debts funding AI data centres come due.They also discuss Donald Trump's approach to financial regulation, his family's involvement in cryptocurrency and prediction markets, and whether America's financial watchdogs are still capable of holding the powerful to account.Gensler, now a professor at MIT and host of the podcast Power and Consequences, also explains why he believes the risks posed by increasingly powerful AI systems are real, despite Trump's dismissal of AI safety concerns.