--:-- [Theme music fades out]
--:-- John Bickley: This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Fiscally responsible. Financial geniuses. Monetary magicians. These are things people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds. Visit Progressive.com to see if you could save. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations.
--:-- [Sound effects: A news broadcast theme plays in the background]
--:-- John Bickley: I'm Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief John Bickley. Georgia Howe is off this week. It's Monday, April 15th, and this is Morning Wire. President Biden responds to Iran's escalation by pressuring Israel to hold back on a military response, while former President Trump says this would never have happened on his watch.
--:-- [Sound effects: A news broadcast theme continues to play]
--:-- John Bickley: This is a very dangerous period of time in our nation, and a big reason that it's dangerous that we have a president that's grossly incompetent. What is the White House's strategy going forward, and will Israel strike back? Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned.
--:-- [Sound effects: A news broadcast theme fades out]
--:-- Brandon: Hey guys, producer Brandon here. Balance Nature is our go-to way to get whole food ingredients every day. They use an advanced cold vacuum process that encapsulates fruits and vegetables into whole food supplements without sacrificing their natural antioxidants. The capsules are completely void of additives, fillers, extracts, synthetics, pesticides, or added sugar. The only thing in Balance Nature fruit and veggie capsules are fruits and veggies. Go to balanceofnature.com and use promo code WIRE for 35% off your first fruits and veggies set, plus $10 off each additional set. That's balanceofnature.com, promo code WIRE.
--:-- [Sound effects: A news broadcast theme plays in the background]
--:-- John Bickley: Iran's military and its proxy militias across the Middle East fired hundreds of missiles and drones at Israel over the weekend in the first ever attack on the Jewish state launched from Iranian soil. Here to talk about what happened between Israel and Iran is Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Hey, thanks for having me on the show.
--:-- John Bickley: So first, walk us through what happened on Saturday.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Well, as you noted, we just witnessed unprecedented action from Iran against Israel. Now, Israel came out of it largely unscathed, but that doesn't mean that this was a token attack. Iran and its proxies in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen launched over 300 drones in both ballistic and cruise missiles at targets inside Israel. Most of the ordinance was blown up in the air by Israel's excellent defense system, but it's still threatened hundreds of Israeli lives, civilian and military.
--:-- John Bickley: That's incredible. Some Israeli officials have threatened a response, and the War Cabinet has already started meetings to discuss one. Retired Army General and former head of the CIA David Petraeus said on CNN that Iran has forced Israel's hand and Israel will have to respond. Well, it is significant. It's a very big deal, and I think Israel will have to take some action in response. I think it's in the interest of everyone to stop the increasing escalation, but we'll have to see what Israel decides to do in this case.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Despite the scale of the attack, the actual damage on the ground was relatively minimal. You mentioned the defense system. Tell us more about that. How was it so successful?
--:-- John Bickley: That's a great question. The damage was minimal. An air base in southern Israel was damaged, and a seven-year-old Israeli Arab girl suffered a severe head injury from shrapnel. But overall, Israel's air defense was incredibly successful. One reason for that is Iran announced the attack hours before its rockets would arrive in Israel. That gave Israeli jets time to get in the sky. Iran also appears to have contacted the U about the attack by back channels through Sweden and Turkey. Another sign that surprise and damage weren't Iran's top priorities here.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Israel also received help in its defense from the U.S., Britain, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia. Petraeus noted that Iran's economic interests are really best served by de-escalation. Keep in mind that the real issue here, in addition to Israel's security, of course, which is first and foremost, but it's also about freedom of navigation from the Gulf for the oil and gas that come from the Gulf and fuel much of the global economy. That's the biggest issue here. And Iran, I don't think, wants to have that disrupted either because they export about 1.6 or 1.7 million barrels a day themselves.
--:-- John Bickley: For those who haven't been tracking this as closely, what's the rationale Iran is giving for launching this attack? What led up to this?
--:-- Tim Pierce: So Iran began threatening this attack after Israel hit Iran's embassy in Syria on April 1st. We should note that international law says embassies aren't military targets, but one possible exception to that is if the embassy is being used for military means, which is what Israel said about Iran's embassy in Damascus. Israel's strike killed seven officers in Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, including Mohammad Zahadi, a senior commander of the IRGC's elite Quds Force. Zahadi was instrumental in planning and organizing the October 7th Hamas terror attack against Israel.
--:-- John Bickley: Iran, on the other hand, said Israel violated international law. Israeli officials have pointed out that Iran's proxies have aggressively attacked Israel for months and have been attacking Israel on and off for decades. In just the past few months, Israel has been attacked by various proxy groups, such as the Houthis in Yemen and Hezbollah in Lebanon. All of them have received training, supplies and orders from Iran.
--:-- [Sound effects: A news broadcast theme plays in the background]
--:-- John Bickley: Now, following Iran's attack on Israel, President Biden is calling for allies to unite around a diplomatic response that will prevent the conflict from escalating into a full-fledged war. Meanwhile, Israel has made clear that it will respond to the attack on its soil. Here to discuss is Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, what's clear after this weekend is that President Biden has already made up his mind on what should be done in the wake of these attacks. Over the weekend, he spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and urged restraint above all else, warning the Israelis that a tit-for-tat strategy would almost certainly lead to an all-out regional war in the Middle East.
--:-- John Bickley: According to Axios reporting, Biden told Netanyahu, quote, you got to win, take the win. Biden also reportedly told him that a response would only escalate the conflict and importantly, that the United States would not take part in any offensive strike against Iran. He issued a statement saying he told Netanyahu a response was not necessary because Israel's thwarting of the attack, quote, sent a clear message to its foes that they cannot effectively threaten the security of Israel.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So Biden is essentially saying that no response is needed due to the success of Israel's air defenses, even though Iran just directly attacked them. Yeah, so instead, the White House is calling for a strictly diplomatic, not military response. Biden convened an emergency meeting Sunday with leaders of the group of seven nations, that includes Japan, Germany, France, Britain, Italy, and Canada. And on that call, he reportedly laid out plans for increased sanctions on Iran and urged allies to join him in calling on Israel to show restraint.
--:-- John Bickley: Critics of Biden, however, were quick to remind folks that earlier this year, he actually allowed sanctions targeting Iran drone and missile program to expire. Those were the same weapons used on the attack this weekend.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, the president has faced a great deal of scrutiny for his actions before and now after the attack. Tell us about the response we seen so far to how he handled this.
--:-- John Bickley: For their part, the pro-Palestinian wing of the Democratic Party unsurprisingly lauded Biden for telling Israel to back down. They argued that things never would have gotten to this point if the White House had demanded a ceasefire sooner.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: However, critics of the strategy, including a large number of Republicans, point out that the official position of the Iranian government is that Israel should be wiped off the map and argue a show of force is the only effective response. They compared the situation to a criminal shooting someone who had a bulletproof vest on. Just because the victim was unharmed, they say, does not mean the shooter should be let off the hook.
--:-- John Bickley: And there are also those accusing Biden of tailoring his response in an effort to score political points with his increasingly anti-Israel left-wing voter base.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: At that point, Florida Senator Marco Rubio appeared on CNN, arguing that the White House intentionally leaked the details of Biden's call with Netanyahu for political gain. They know that Israel's going to respond. They know this for a fact. So why would the White House leak it? There's only one reason they leaked that. And that is that so when Israel does respond, the White House can say, we told them not to do it, and at least somehow appease these so-called peace activists.
--:-- John Bickley: As President Biden has begun to publicly distance himself from Israel as their war on Hamas has dragged on, Republicans have been warning that daylight between the two countries would only increase the likelihood of Iran entering this conflict. They say this weekend is proof of what happens when Western allies turn on Israel.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: To that point, as you can imagine, former President Trump also weighed in on the conflict, posting an all-caps message on his Truth Social app that read, America supports Israel. He went on to say during a press conference with House Speaker Johnson on Saturday that things would be going very differently if he were in office. They wouldn't be attacking Israel if I were president, that I can tell you. And they never did. They wouldn't be attacking. Iran was in no position to attack. They had no money. They were broke. But now they have $221 billion. So, look, with Election Day just six months away now, you can almost certainly expect the Middle East to once again become an issue that defines this race.
--:-- John Bickley: And from what we see in the data, that appears to be bad news for President Biden. The latest polling from the New York Times this weekend, for example, found that his approval rating on his handling of foreign conflicts is 25 points underwater, with just around one in three Americans giving him a positive mark. Trump, on the other hand, has a 30-point advantage on the topic, with a net positive rating around 5% when it comes to his handling of foreign conflicts.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So definitely something to keep an eye on as this all develops.
--:-- John Bickley: Political calculations are already shaping the response to this situation. Cabot, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Anytime.
--:-- John Bickley: Joining us to discuss Israel's response to Iran's attack and the mounting pressure from the White House to back down is Aryeh Lightstone, former senior advisor to the U.S. ambassador to Israel.
--:-- Aryeh Lightstone: Thank you for having me.
--:-- John Bickley: First, what is the mood in Israel following this attack from Iran?
--:-- Aryeh Lightstone: I don't know a single adult who slept last evening, certainly not the entire night, most people not at all. But almost everybody I know went up and went to work this morning. Schools are shut, so families who have to deal with their kids obviously have to pivot in that circumstance. But right now we're actually talking, I'm at a wedding where the majority of the participants in the wedding were somehow involved in the defense of Israel last night. And tomorrow morning will be somehow involved in a potential offensive in Gaza tomorrow. But at this moment, they're dancing and celebrating the new union of a bride and groom.
--:-- John Bickley: President Biden reportedly told Netanyahu that he should, quote, take the win from the weekend and that the attack was largely thwarted by defensive measures. How are Israeli officials responding to that advice?
--:-- Aryeh Lightstone: On October 6th or let call it pre 7th world that probably would be advice that Israel would have taken. It did win it. It knocked down what Iran threw at it with tremendous success. And you can make the argument that Iran is likely embarrassed based upon their performance. But what has happened since October 7th is that when somebody says that they are going to try to annihilate you, you should probably believe them. And the feeling in Israel today is nobody wants war and nobody wants to see their husbands or wives or sons off in battle for an indeterminate amount of time. But nobody, and I'll be very clear about this, nobody in the country, not right, not left, not center, is interested in living with a terrorist regime on its border or a terrorist regime capable of reaching its border, which Iran has proven that it is.
--:-- John Bickley: If this government doesn't do it, this government won't be around. There will be another government who will do it and they will run based upon the premise of hitting Iran. Now, I believe this government will take an action. I don't believe it will be immediate, but I believe that it will be meaningful when it happens.
--:-- Aryeh Lightstone: Well, the U.S. is no question. President Biden has created a circumstance where he's been funding Iran since the first day of his return to office, and he's created this disastrous circumstance. We had sanctions on the drone program. We had sanctions on the ballistic program. And these are the two areas that have come to attack Israel directly for the United States of America to be taken seriously anywhere in the world. It needs to be taken seriously here.
--:-- John Bickley: What kinds of sanctions could or should be imposed on Iran by the U.S. and other countries that would actually deter future aggression?
--:-- Aryeh Lightstone: Well, on the ballistics and on the drones, this should be a zero-sum game. All of those programs should be completely and totally bankrupt. My feeling is that they should take a page out of Trump's playbook. Trump did this with Turkey when he was upset with Turkey. We, the United States of America, can do this with Iran. If Iran still has an operating economy by this Friday, Israel should have no choice but to handle this militarily. But if we, the West, the United States of America, want Israel to sit this one out and not grow this into a regional war, then cripple their economy. There needs to be consequences for a U.N. nation attacking our ally, which is also a U.N. nation. And if we're not going to do it militarily, we have to cripple their currency. We have to cripple their economy and we can do it.
--:-- John Bickley: Arie, thank you so much for joining us.
--:-- Aryeh Lightstone: Thank you.
--:-- John Bickley: That was former senior advisor to the U.S. ambassador to Israel, Arie Lightstone.
--:-- [Sound effects: A news broadcast theme plays in the background]
--:-- John Bickley: Another story we're tracking this week, Donald Trump's highly controversial New York hush money trial kicks off in Manhattan today. The case hinges on claims that Trump falsified business records in order to hide hush money payments to Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 election, and it's considered the weakest of the cases against the Republican frontrunner.
--:-- [Sound effects: A news broadcast theme continues to play]
--:-- John Bickley: The trial is expected to last for weeks, possibly even into June. Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back this afternoon with more news you need to know.
--:-- [Sound effects: A news broadcast theme fades out]
--:-- Brandon: Learn more when you download NetSuite's popular KPI checklist. Absolutely free at netsuite.com slash morning wire. That's netsuite.com slash morning wire.
