Mehdi Unfiltered

Over 70% of Americans believe lobbyists have too much influence – so why do Democrats and the media remain silent when it comes to the most powerful pro-Israel lobby in America, AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee? In this episode of ‘Mehdi Unfiltered’, Mehdi not only calls out AIPAC for helping the GOP meddle with Democratic primaries, but also calls out his main interview guest, Democrat Congressman Dean Phillips, who recently voted to sanction the ICC for requesting an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Plus, Mehdi speaks with world-famous Bangladeshi photojournalist Shahidul Alam on his protest against the war in Gaza and what it has cost him. Watch the full show above. Pressing Rep. Dean Phillips on his vote against the ICC…Minnesota Congressman Dean Phillips says he stands for the rule of law. So why did he choose to vote for a bill that would sanction International Criminal Court officials – as well as their families – after the court requested an arrest warrant for Netanyahu’s role in the war on Gaza?Phillips told Mehdi that he objected to the ICC’s decision because of the fact that Israel is not party to the ICC – a claim that Mehdi rebutted by pointing to last year, when Democrats praised the ICC arrest warrant against Putin for his war crimes in Ukraine, even though Russia is not party to the ICC either. “Even if we were to agree with you that they're outside the purview, and they [the ICC] would say they're not, it didn't just go after ICC officials, but also quote ‘immediate family members’ of ICC officials. That is mob-like behavior – is it not? To go after family?” Mehdi asked Phillips.“We have votes in Congress that we know will not end up going anywhere. We have votes that we know will probably be signed into the law. They have very different consequences,” Phillips responded. “With respect, Congressman. It doesn't matter what your intent is. It matters what you voted for. You voted for a very mafioso bill,” Mehdi told Phillips. They also debated U.S. complicity in war crimes, whether Democrats value Palestinian life, and Phillips’s own failed presidential bid earlier this year. Let’s talk about AIPAC…As AIPAC spends millions of dollars trying to unseat pro-Palestine progressive Jamaal Bowman, Mehdi begs the question: Why does AIPAC, a pro-Israel group that openly brags about their influence over elected officials, rarely get criticized? “Anti-Semitic tropes about ‘rich Jews’, whether they’re Soros or the Rothschilds or the Jewish community in general, should absolutely be condemned. But that’s not what we’re talking about when we’re talking about AIPAC. We’re talking about a self-described powerful lobbying group,” Mehdi says, adding that the lobbying group, “should be rejected in the same way that we reject, say, the NRA.”Watch his powerful and timely monologue above. Artists speaking up on Gaza…This past March, Bangladeshi photojournalist Shahidul Alam was supposed to curate the first ever edition of the famous Biennale photography exhibition in Germany with three non-European curators. However, the exhibition ended-up being canceled in November due to Alam’s criticism of Israel’s war on Gaza. “We worked really hard to put together a show that would have been very different. The whole point in inviting initially me and me inviting the others was to bring about a change to the way they'd always done it,” Alam said of the exhibit. “But of course… what they needed was someone who would be non-European, but still follow the European scheme of things.”Alam of course has not backed down from his criticism of Israel’s war on Gaza. Watch the full show above and, for paid subscribers, be sure to let us know in the comments below what you think of the show and who we should have on next! Get full access to Zeteo at zeteo.com/subscribe

Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu might have expected the entire world to celebrate the news of four Israeli hostages being rescued from Gaza, and the entire world might have done - had it not been at the cost of hundreds of Palestinian lives. Saturday’s bloody and brutal operation has raised new concerns among many of the Israeli hostage family members, who accuse Netanyahu and his far-right government of deprioritizing the safe return of all the hostages.Enter Zahiro…One hostage family member who believes that is Zahiro Shahar Mor, who says there is more reason to fear for the safety of his 79-year-old uncle, Avraham Munder, while he remains captive in Gaza.Avraham was taken by Hamas on October 7th, along with his wife, daughter, and grandson, all of whom were released during a hostage deal between Hamas and Israel in November - with the exception of Avraham.His nephew Zahiro tells Mehdi: “Ever since October 8th, everything they [the Israeli government] do is directed at not getting the hostages back,” and that Netanyahu’s government is actively “sabotaging their own initiatives” by rejecting deals that would have secured the release of all the hostages much earlier in the war. Betrayed by his own country’s officials, Zahiro says Israel’s government “is being taken hostage by the diehard, right-wing, extremist fundamentalists.” Also on the show, more betrayal …Zahiro isn’t the only one who felt betrayed on this week’s episode of ‘Mehdi Unfiltered.’ Palestinian Pastor Munther Isaac of Bethlehem’s Evangelical Lutheran Christmas Church accuses Christian evangelicals in the U.S. of abandoning their fellow Christians in the Occupied Territories.“They [US Christian evangelicals] have created a worldview in which support to Israel is integral to this American identity, American exceptionalism, American national Christian identity,” says Munther, a worldview that he thinks would change if they were to visit occupied Bethlehem, for Christians the birthplace of Christ, and see the situation on the ground for themselves. Munther is no stranger to the apartheid rule of Israel, where government policy and a 708-kilometer separation wall disrupt the worship of thousands of Palestinian Christians. Recalling conversations with fellow evangelicals from South Africa, Munther says they described the situation in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories as being “much worse than apartheid,” adding that “you would assume that people would respect what South African theologians, church leaders are saying.”Watch both interviews above and, for paid subscribers, be sure to let us know in the comments below what you think of the full show and who you think we should have on next.  Get full access to Zeteo at zeteo.com/subscribe

While Joe Biden struggles to draw a red line for Israel in its genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, a handful of principled officials within the administration are making their red lines very clear. This week on ‘Mehdi Unfiltered’, Mehdi dives into the latest wave of resignations within the Biden administration over its handling of the war on Gaza, with one outgoing political appointee accusing the president of “making Jews the face of the American war machine.” The exit interview…The latest resignation from the Biden administration came into effect just this Monday for Major Harrison Mann. Formerly an official at the Defense Intelligence Agency, and an active-duty U.S. army officer, Mann made headlines for a resignation letter he shared last month to his Linkedin page criticizing the “nearly unqualified support for the government of Israel.”In one of his first TV interviews since leaving his post, Mann explains to Mehdi the reasoning behind his decision, the role US agencies play in Israel’s ethnic cleansing, and how others in government share his views - but are afraid to air them.“I also suspected and have increasingly learned even in national security circles that my views are not particularly uncommon or controversial,” says Mann. Mann, who is Jewish-American, compared the treatment of Palestinians today to the way in which Jews were treated in the run-up to the Holocaust: “It was very easy for me to see in the Palestinians another unwanted population, the way that Jews were in Europe.”Also on the show: a forgotten war…One genocide overshadowed by another. This week Mehdi sheds light on the atrocities that are taking place in Sudan but are unable to reach the world. With more than 14,000 people dead, and more than 8 million displaced, the violence in Sudan is still going mostly unnoticed in Western media. Mehdi is joined by Nesrine Malik, an award-winning British-Sudanese journalist with the Guardian, who has covered the story in Sudan for years. She explains how the lack of information from the ground there is making the situation much more dire, especially when paired with false stereotypes.  “We don't tend to think of war happening in countries like Sudan as a profoundly tragic, destabilizing thing, and more as business as usual.” Watch both interviews above, and for paid subscribers, be sure to let us know what you think of the full show and who you think we should have on next.  Get full access to Zeteo at zeteo.com/subscribe

What has Israel’s relentless assault on the southern Gaza city of Rafah revealed about the U.S.? That Joe Biden, has no red line, no pink line, no line whatsoever when it comes to Benjamin Netanyahu. This week on ‘Mehdi Unfiltered’, Mehdi begins the show with a condemnation of the lack of condemnation for Israel’s deadly airstrikes in Rafah. A decapitated toddler, a massacre of Palestinians in tents, and a complete rejection of an order from the top U.N. court demanding Israel halt its operations in Rafah – none of it led to the U.S. saying much at all. “We live in a world where non-existent images of imaginary beheaded Israeli children can help launch a genocidal war,” says Mehdi, in his opening monologue, “but actual images of real-life beheaded Palestinian children don’t force the entire world to bring an immediate halt to that war.”Also on the show… Ambassador Husam Zomlot, the current head of the Palestinian Mission to the United Kingdom and a member of Fatah spoke with Mehdi about the role of the U.S. in this decades-old conflict, saying it’s “not about Trump or Biden.”“So far, the U.S. has failed miserably to bring itself to the level of an honest mediator, of a leading force in our international relations,” Zomlot says. “The US has remained, whether Democratic administrations or Republican administrations, has remained completely and utterly biased.”Zomlot also talked about Nikki Haley signing Israeli artillery shells destined for Gaza, recent recognition of Palestinian statehood by three countries, and what the future of governance in Gaza could look like. Biden and Black voters…Recent polling shows Black voters are much less interested in Biden and the Democrats in 2024 than they were in 2020. From feeling that the president hasn’t done enough to earn their vote to complaints over the U.S.’s handling of Gaza, the reasons vary – and some Black voters are even turning to Donald Trump. So, does Biden have a chance in November if he loses Black voters? Has he taken them for granted? And how big of a role exactly is Gaza playing in Black disillusionment? Don Calloway, a former Democratic member of the Missouri House of Representatives and now a Democratic Party strategist, and Pastor Michael McBride, a founder of Black Church PAC and the lead pastor of the Way church in Berkeley, California joined Mehdi for this debate. “People do believe that the president and this administration, and by extension, the Democratic Party, has lost its way on this issue [Gaza],” McBride argues. “We believe there has to be a course correction.”Calloway pushed back. “Black voters do not have and have never had the luxury of being single-issue voters. So, do we care about Palestine? Absolutely… Do we vote against Joe Biden and the interests of Palestine against reproductive freedom? Probably not.” To hear McBride’s response and more of this exchange, watch the debate above. Be sure to let us know what you think of the full show and who you think we should have on next.  Get full access to Zeteo at zeteo.com/subscribe

“Raisi very much was someone that they were banking on, and now their plans have to go back to square one. On your question about this new guy…his mandate is to do nothing.” -  Iran expert Trita Parsi on finding Raisi’s successorSince the sudden death of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi in a helicopter crash this week, there have been a lot of hot takes on what this means for Iran. Why does it matter? What does it mean for the Iranian people? This week on ‘Mehdi Unfiltered’, we thought we’d speak to an expert to help us make sense of it all. Have a listen to what author and analyst Trita Parsi had to say. Plus, former ICC Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo and UN Special Rapporteur Francesca P. Albanese join Mehdi to lay out just how consequential the ICC’s request for Israeli arrest warrants is. On Iran…This past weekend, a helicopter crash in the northwest province of East Azerbaijan left no survivors, including Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi. His death comes not only as fighting continues between Iran-backed Hezbollah and Israel, but also just a little over a month since Iran launched its first-ever direct attack on Israel.Iranian-American relations expert Trita Parsi joined Mehdi to discuss the elephant in the room – whether there was any “foul play” involved with his death, or if anyone is blaming Israel or the U.S. for the crash. “The regime has a very clear interest in denying that there could have been anything else but an accident, because if there, for instance, had been an Israeli hand in all of this…it would show that the Iranians failed with their attack last month. They did not establish a new equation. They did not restore deterrence,” Parsi said. “Now, having said that, there’s no evidence that the Israelis were behind this.”Iran has, of course, said they will be holding new elections on June 28th to choose a successor for Raisi, but Parsi tells Mehdi that participation will once again be low, just as it was in March’s parliamentary election. “The people have lost faith in the idea that change can come through the ballot box. Now they [Iran] are going to be dealt with a crisis, because if they have even record low elections in this one that is upcoming right now, it really takes away a key thing that they had treated as a dose of legitimacy,” Parsi said. On the ICC and Israel…In his monologue, Mehdi called out the GOP’s failed attempt to stop ICC Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan from requesting arrest warrants for the Israeli government over the war in Gaza, after 12 Republicans threatened him and his family in a letter sent in April. “The GOP – and in fact, all of the Israeli government’s western allies – better start scrambling because in an earthquake move, the chief prosecutor… requested arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and his defense minister Yoav Gallant.” Mehdi pointed out that Khan’s historic request marks the, “first time an ICC prosecutor has ever gone after the leader of a western country or one of its close allies.”Former ICC Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo and UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese joined Mehdi to discuss the implications of this request, with Albanese calling it a “game-changer.”Albanese, who previously issued a report calling Israel’s war on Gaza a genocide, reminded viewers that although this is the first time the ICC is taking major action against an Israeli leader, it does not necessarily mark the first time Israel has committed war crimes. “There were opportunities and obligations to investigate the [Israel’s] war crimes and crimes against humanity … before the 7th of October. The failure we are under is testament to the lack of effectiveness of that system,” Albanese said. “We can turn the tides now, and this is the challenge of all member states.”Friendly reminder: All of our content is currently available to all subscribers, free or paid. But this will only be for a limited, promotional period. Building and sustaining an independent media company like this requires, above all else, money. If you appreciate the work we are doing, and want to be a part of this effort, please consider supporting us by becoming a paid subscriber. Get full access to Zeteo at zeteo.com/subscribe

“There's just this blind unwillingness to recognize the U.S. does have all the power here – this notion that it’s not really the United States' fault. It is absolutely the fault of the U.S. government.” - Annelle Sheline, former Biden official, on Israel’s war on GazaThis week on ‘Mehdi Unfiltered,’ three former Biden administration officials join Mehdi to explain how Biden’s support for Israel’s deadly assault on Gaza led them to resign. Also on this week’s show…Mary Trump weighs in on her uncle Donald Trump’s hush money trial, a looming presidential debate, and the power-hungry Republicans who are desperate to be Trump’s VP. Plus, Mehdi debunks Israel’s latest attempt at genocide denial.On Biden resignations…The protests against Biden aren’t just happening outside the White House. They’ve also been happening within, as several Biden administration officials have publicly resigned over the support for Israel’s war on Gaza.Three of them – Tariq Habash, Annelle Sheline, and Hala Rharrit – join Mehdi to discuss why they chose to give up their jobs rather than continuing to work for an administration that was aiding Israel in its brutal assault on Gaza.“It’s worse than Iraq,” Rharrit, a former U.S. diplomat, told Mehdi, adding how she watched pictures “going viral of U.S.-made bombs that would say USA and then would show the children that were killed by those bombs.”Tariq Habash was a Palestinian-American political appointee at the Department of Education who resigned in January, making him the first Palestinian-American in the administration to do so. “After months of trying to communicate with the president, with other people in the administration who were representing the president on these policies, it very much felt like there was an exception for Palestinians in terms of his empathy,” Habash said.Mehdi’s interview with these three former officials was held just hours before interior department staffer Lily Greenberg Call became the first Jewish political appointee to resign in protest of the war.On Trump…As Donald Trump weighs his options for a running mate, top Republicans like J.D. Vance and Tim Scott are keen to earn some brownie points with the former president – flocking to his side at the first ever criminal trial of a former president. Mehdi asks Mary Trump, Donald Trump’s niece, why these GOP members are so desperate for a position that almost got Mike Pence killed. “The promise of power is so overwhelming for them. They literally think that they’re going to be the exception to the rule. And anybody who pledges to shield Donald Trump ends up getting banished, stepped on, or imprisoned,” Mary said. Mary Trump also tells Mehdi why she’s worried about Biden agreeing to a debate with Donald Trump, the first of which has been set for June. “It concerns me that he’s legitimized a man who incited an insurrection against his own government. So by putting him up on that stage with him, he’s essentially normalizing him as the presidential nominee.”On Israel’s genocide denial…In his monologue, Mehdi calls out the Israeli PR machine for warping the UN’s reporting on identified bodies into a false narrative about a “fake” death toll in Gaza. “On May 8th, [the UN] provided a number for reported fatalities – again, over 34,000 – but also included a new subset of 24,686 ‘identified’ fatalities,” Mehdi said. “What they’re pretending is some smoking gun evidence of a Hamas cover-up, is literally just the difference between fully identified bodies and unidentified or partially-identified bodies. That’s it.”Of course, this is not the first time Israel has tried to undermine the Gaza Health Ministry. But as Mehdi points out, Israel’s accusations are nothing but propaganda, especially when you consider that Israel’s own military relies on the Gaza health ministry’s numbers. “There has always been one central goal to all this genocide denial and propaganda around ‘lower’ death tolls: to dehumanize the Palestinians who have been killed,” Mehdi said.Friendly reminder: All of our content is currently available to all subscribers, free or paid. But this will only be for a limited, promotional period. Building and sustaining an independent media company like this requires, above all else, money. If you appreciate the work we are doing, and want to be a part of this effort, please consider supporting us by becoming a paid subscriber. Get full access to Zeteo at zeteo.com/subscribe

“The dehumanization of Palestinians is so endemic in Israeli society, for so many years and has kind of been supported, and not really called out, by Israel's allies.” - Benzion Sanders, former Israeli soldierThis week on ‘Mehdi Unfiltered,’ two Israeli military veterans reveal how serving in the 2014 Gaza war fundamentally changed their view on Israel’s violent approach to the Palestinians.Also on this week’s show…As the Israeli military continues to ramp up its invasion of Rafah – Gaza’s last refuge – an American doctor at the European Hospital in Khan Younis, in the Rafah evacuation zone, tells Mehdi how his hospital has turned into a “scene out of Armageddon.” In his monologue Mehdi not only denounces Israel’s horrific invasion, but also calls on President Biden to uphold the “red line” he told Israel not to cross. Plus, Mehdi fanboys over UK sports broadcaster and retired footballer Gary Lineker in an interview on British politics, anti-immigrant sentiment, Gaza, and of course, English football. Inside Israel’s military operations…After serving in Israel’s war against Gaza in 2014 and seeing their country’s military operations up close, Benzion Sanders and Ariel Bernstein, two former special forces soldiers, turned into anti-occupation activists and have been speaking out ever since against their country’s brutal oppression of Palestinians. They joined ‘Mehdi Unfiltered’ to discuss what they learned from their own Gaza experience and how they view the current Israeli campaign in Rafah – and the right-wing trends in Israeli society.“Destroying a whole neighborhood and all the buildings that we've seen and been inside for no apparent clear reason, seems to me ​– I don't know if it's a war crime or not, according to international law – but it seems like a crime. It seems like something that I am ashamed that I took part in,” Bernstein told Mehdi. On Rafah… “It's just a scene out of an Armageddon.” In an interview with Mehdi, Palestinian-American ICU doctor Mohamad Abdel-Fattah, who's been volunteering at the European Hospital near Rafah’s evacuation zone, describes the sheer horror hospitals are facing as Israel escalates their assault on Rafah.“It's just chaos…  as you try to maneuver your way through the hospital, there are entire families living in every inch. And so you have kids playing in the hospital. You hear babies crying.”On Biden…In his opening monologue, Mehdi addressed President Biden’s response to Israel’s invasion of Rafah, calling on the president to do more than just “a single pause of a single arms shipment.”“Pick up the phone, Mr President. End all of this, right now,” Mehdi said. “You, Joe Biden, can end this disastrous Gaza war and do all of that, or you can spend the rest of this year trying to conjure up a response to pro-Palestine protesters at public events of yours, as they heckle ‘Genocide Joe’ at you.”A surprise guest…UK sports broadcaster and former footballer Gary Lineker isn’t afraid to speak out. Not just about football, but also contentious issues like immigration and Palestine. In addition to some football chat (or as Americans call it, “soccer”), and a paean to Lionel Messi, Lineker tells Mehdi what it’s like to be targeted by the right-wing press for speaking out in defense of refugees - and how he hosted two refugees in his home. He also talks about crying while watching social media videos from Gaza.“It's slightly bizarre… I just give my honest opinions and generally they're not necessarily political. They're more, I think, humanitarian,” Lineker said. “I've stuck up for the plight of refugees and the awful things and the dreadful circumstances that caused them to perhaps leave their homes, which obviously you would never want to do. So, all I've ever really asked for is a bit of compassion, a little bit of understanding.” –Don’t forget to watch the full show above! As always, for paid subscribers, tell us what you think in the comments and who you’d like to see on next week’s show.  Get full access to Zeteo at zeteo.com/subscribe

Campus protests. Police arrests. The 2024 presidential campaign. This week’s ‘Mehdi Unfiltered’ has it all - plus, a strong rebuke of the media’s latest failings on the Israel-Iran escalation. Our main guest…Mehdi sat down in the studio with independent presidential candidate Cornel West to talk about many things, but the two had a particularly lively exchange on the question plaguing many progressive voters this election year: If not voting for Joe Biden leads to Donald Trump - and thus, a dangerous path for American democracy - is that a price worth paying for holding Biden accountable for his complicity on Gaza? “You know, I would say if we have to choose between Trump leading us toward a second civil war and Biden leading us toward the third World War, that's a choice I refuse, brother,” West said.“But it's a choice you made in 2020.” Mehdi said. “You said in November 2020, when asked why you voted for Biden, ‘what we got to vote for was the mediocre, milquetoast, neoliberal centrist because he's better than fascism’.” Have a listen to see how West responded and what he had to say about Sen. Bernie Sanders, Gaza, and more. On campus protests…Actress and activist Cynthia Nixon, a contributor at Zeteo, discussed what’s been happening at Columbia University. As an alumna of Barnard College at Columbia, Nixon has been deeply troubled: “If you believe in democracy, you have to believe in protest,” she told Mehdi. “You really can't have one without the other.” Nixon went on to talk about two of her children, who are Jewish, and the dangerous and inaccurate conflation of pro-Palestine protests with antisemitism. On Iran and Israel…You’ve probably seen the coverage of the recent back-and-forth retaliatory attacks between Iran and Israel. As Mehdi points out in this week’s opening monologue, there’s been a complete absence of historical and political context from our media when it comes to characterizing Iran’s drone and missile attack on Israel (but not so much, the other way around). The story rarely starts with the headline. As Mehdi puts it, the media failure in presenting the important content is disingenuous and irresponsible. “If you don’t have context, you find yourself being lied to, being duped and deceived, and then sleepwalking into World War 3.”Watch the explainer for more on what the media gets wrong on Iran. –Please enjoy the show! And for paid subscribers, tell us what you think in the comments and who we should bring on for upcoming episodes! Friendly reminder: All of our content is currently available to all subscribers, free or paid. But this will only be for a limited, promotional period. Building and sustaining an independent media company like this requires, above all else, money. If you appreciate the work we are doing, and want to be a part of this effort, please consider supporting us by becoming a paid subscriber.  Get full access to Zeteo at zeteo.com/subscribe