Israel’s Year of Battles Against Tehran’s Proxies and Pawns

Yahya Sinwar is dead.He was the leader of Hamas, the architect of the October 7 attack on Israel — the largest massacre of Jewish people since the Holocaust.He has the blood of many Americans on his hands, too, and was designated as a terrorist by the U.S.
For Israel, this is a significant battle won in a long and multi-front war.What’s next? Host Cliff May discusses with his FDD colleagues Mark Dubowitz, Jonathan Schanzer, and Hussain Abdul-Hussain.

Gen. H.R. McMaster has written a memoir about his action-packed 13 months serving as national security advisor to the 45th president of the United States. It’s titled “At War With Ourselves,” and it focuses on the widening divisions among Americans — divisions not just between the major political parties but very much within them.H.R. is an historian as well as a soldier, and his mission, in writing this book was, as he spells out for readers, “to explain what the Trump Administration achieved and failed to achieve in the areas of foreign policy and national security during a pivotal moment in American history.”Gen. McMaster now chairs FDD’s Center on Military and Political Power where Bradley Bowman is the senior director. They both join host Cliff May to discuss the new book and a range of conflicts, crises, and issues. 

America and other free nations are threatened by enemies – an axis of tyrants, of aggressors, of authoritarians, of revanchists – all those terms are apt. But the response of Western leaders continues to be woefully inadequate.The most imminently endangered democratic societies: Ukraine and Israel.Host Cliff May discusses with Bernard Henri-Lévy and Oleksandra Matviichuk.

On Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terrorists invaded Israel and conducted the largest pogrom against Jews since the Holocaust. The next day, Hezbollah began to rain missiles from southern Lebanon on Israel’s northern communities. Officials at the UN, other transnational organizations, various non-governmental organizations, and media platforms — AKA the “international community” — has responded to this Iran-backed terrorism mostly by aiding and abetting the terrorists and attacking Israel with a campaign we’ve come to call “lawfare.”Host Cliff May is joined by two leading international law practitioners and experts: Natasha Hausdorff of UK Lawyers for Israel and FDD senior fellow Orde Kittrie.

The theocrats in Tehran have surrounded Israel with proxies — a “ring of fire,” as it’s being called. The regime’s nuclear weapons development program has made progress, too. And so has its development of the missiles that could deliver these nuclear weapons to targets anywhere in the world.Plus: the regime has made common cause with Communist China, neo-imperialist Russia, and the dynastic dictatorship in North Korea: an “axis of aggressors,” as it’s being called.For an update on Iran, its rulers, its proxies, its subjects, its victims, host Cliff May is joined by his FDD colleagues Mark Dubowitz and Reuel Marc Gerecht.

Twenty-three years ago, al Qaeda terrorists hijacked passenger jets to use as missiles and crash two into the World Trade Center in New York City and one into the Pentagon. United Airlines Flight 93 – thanks to brave passengers onboard – crashed into an open field in Somerset County, Pennsylvania.These attacks came as a shock and a surprise.But they shouldn’t have — particularly to the American intelligence community, professors of Middle East and Islamic studies at elite universities, the news media.To unpack why and discuss the threats facing America and other democratic societies all these years later, host Cliff May is joined by his FDD colleagues Hussain Abdul-Hussain and Jonathan Schanzer.

General Randy A. George is the 41st Army Chief of Staff, making him a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the highest ranking officer in the U.S. Army. He enlisted in the Army decades ago, has commanded at all levels, and deployed to war multiple times.What are America’s adversaries up to, and what lessons can be drawn from the conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East? How is the character of war changing, and what is he doing to ensure that the U.S. Army is ready to deploy, fight, and win?To find out, Bradley Bowman — senior director of FDD’s Center on Military and Political Power and guest host — went to the Pentagon to ask the general.

Before Matt Pottinger was a reporter in China, he served as a U.S. Marine, deployed to both Iraq and Afghanistan. He then spent four years in senior roles on the White House National Security Council, including as senior director for Asia, and deputy national security advisor. Now, he’s a distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution and he’s Chairman of FDD’s China Program. And he’s the editor of a new book: “The Boiling Moat: Urgent Steps to Defend Taiwan.” He joins host Cliff May to discuss Xi Jinping’s Stalinist efforts to usher in “the Great Rejuvenation of the Chinese Nation” — and its possible consequences for Taiwan.

Taiwan is a vibrant democracy in the western Pacific just east of Communist China where Xi Jinping, the most powerful Chinese ruler since Mao Zedong, is the decider. His intentions toward Taiwan are imperialist and predatory. But it’s not just Taiwan that is in his crosshairs — he also seeks to displace the United States as the preeminent global power.An FDD delegation led by RADM (Ret.) Mark Montgomery, Craig Singleton, and Cliff May recently visited Taiwan. They discuss their visit and what Taiwan is doing to defend its homeland and its freedom.