Day: November 15, 2022

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Background Briefing: November 15, 2022

On By gram

 

Russia Rains Missiles Down on Ukraine as Top US National Security Officials Meet With Their Russian Counterparts

We begin with the intense speculation over missiles that landed 5 kilometers inside of Poland near the Ukraine border killing two at a rural farm. With talk of NATO invoking Article 5 ridiculously premature since the facts aren’t in yet, it could have been a deliberate Russian strike that went astray or a Russian missile intercepted by Ukraine, or Ukrainian anti-aircraft missiles fired at Russian cruise missiles. Joining us to discuss the broader issues in this war that is going well for Ukraine and poorly for Russia as top US National Security officials meet with their Russian counterparts, is Michael Weiss, news director at New Lines Magazine who has reported on international affairs for over ten years with a focus on the Middle East and Russia. He has interviewed ISIS operatives and Russian spies; published and curated a series of still-classified KGB training manuals; reported from rebel-held Syria and war-torn Ukraine; broken major stories about financial corruption; and exposed the Russian intelligence services’ ongoing subversion efforts in the United States and Europe. He is the the author of The Menace of Unreality: How Russia Weaponizes Information, Culture and Money and coauthor of the New York Times Bestseller ISIS: Inside the Army of Terror.

 

What is Behind the FBI Probe Into Israel’s Killing of a Palestinian Journalist and US Citizen?

Then we look into the just-announced FBI probe into the killing of a Palestinian journalist and US citizen that appears to have a lot to do with an evolving relationship between congressional Democrats and Israel, particularly now that Netanyahu is leading a new extreme right wing Israeli government. Joining us is Zaha Hassan, a human rights lawyer and fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s Middle East Program where her research focuses on Palestine-Israel peace, the use of international legal mechanisms by political movements, and U.S. foreign policy in the region. Previously, she was the coordinator and senior legal advisor to the Palestinian negotiating team during Palestine’s bid for UN membership, and was a member of the Palestinian delegation to Quartet-sponsored exploratory talks between 2011 and 2012.

 

Trump is Determined to be Relevant Again and Dominate Our Politics for the Next Two Years

Then finally, just ahead of Trump’s 9 PM ET announcement from the ballroom at Mar a Lago that he is running for president in 2024, we speak with Dr. Allen Frances, a Professor Emeritus and former Chair of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science at Duke University. He is the author of the award-winning international bestseller Saving Normal and the reference work Essentials of Psychiatric Diagnosis and his latest book is Twilight of American Sanity: A Psychiatrist Analyzes the Age of Trump, and we discuss Trump’s determination to make himself relevant again and dominate our politics for the next two years.