Netanyahu’s Crude Exploitation of Charlie Kirk’s Death
by Glenn Greenwald
Sept. 13, 2025
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Transcript
[Music]
It's been a frequent theme in my reporting over the years on this show over the last several years that
emotions are often easily exploited when they're at their peak moment, their peak
level of intensity and then they're misdirected opportunistically for all sorts of ends that people end up
regretting. talked a lot about how that happened when Russia invaded Ukraine and the propaganda was so intense showing
grandmothers in Ukraine who were dying and people got very emotionally invested
in Ukraine and four years later now we're still funding it we're still arming it and a lot of people have come
to regret that same thing happened after 911 of course where people ended up cheering for all sorts of things they've come to regret last night was September
11th 24th anniversary of that attack where we examined many of those lessons that I would hope people have learned
about guarding against exploitation of their strong emotions after an event of a kind like that attack or the COVID
attack uh the COVID uh pandemic or the assassination of Charlie Kirk, but one
person who understands very well how to exploit the opinions and emotions
of American citizens. That's not just my assessment. He's boasted openly about how adept he is at manipulating American
public opinion for the interest of Israel is Benjamin Netanyahu. He really is talented at being able to deceitfully
exploit emotions and attach himself to them and then redirect them towards Israel's interest. And I've never seen
him do it quite as brazenly as he's been doing this week ever since the moment that Charlie Kirk was shot.
Benjamin, who was all over Twitter, attaching himself to Charlie Kirk, depicting Charlie Kirk as some sort of
ultimate and supreme supporter of and loyalist to the state of Israel. And
therefore, if you're having a lot of emotions about Charlie Kirk, you're sad that he was so brutally assassinated. if
you're angry about it, if you uh are remembering all the things to admire
about Charlie Kirk, he's trying to take those emotions and get you to believe that the only adequate vehicle for
expression of them is to believe everything that Charlie Kirk believed, and that includes, according to Netanyahu, that he was a one of the
greatest and most stalwart defenders of the American financing of Israel and arming of Israel and support for Israel
and subservience to Israel. And in fact, nothing could be further from the truth.
You can for sure find a lot of statements from Charlie Kirk, particularly over the LA uh the many
years where he absolutely expressed support for Israel. He talked about how his Christianity made him view Jerusalem
in particular as a very holy place and what he called Judea and Samaria. He
was definitely pro-Israel in a lot of statements. There's no doubt about that.
But as the American right began to become more about America first, as they became more inter non-interventionist,
as young people in particular began to turn against Israel and the war in Gaza, as all polling show they did, Charlie at
being part of this youth movement, being part of the younger generation, began openly questioning Israel in a way
that was very alarming to Israel, especially after Chuck Carlson had been
doing that, after Candace Owens had been doing that, after a large part with the American right, especially younger people. We're starting to question the
US's relationship. This has been a major major source of alarm
on the part of Netanyahu and Israel and the US uh the Israel lobby in the US. And one of their main goals is to whip
the American right back into line where they've always been when it comes to Israel. You've always had some prominent people on the American right like Pap
Buchanan and Ron Paul be extremely critical of Israel, extremely opposed to
US funding of Israel, but they were kind of dismissed and shunted to the side of
the fringe in large part because of those views. But it was really only after the last 18
20 months, 21 months when we saw not just this intense Israeli bombing
and killing and slaughter and ultimately genocide in in Gaza, but also the wars
that the US got involved in in in Yemen and then bombing Iran with Israel and on
behalf of Israel that the serious questioning of wait, why are we financing this country? Why are we
always serving it? Why do our politicians just talk incessantly about the importance of it?
And they don't care that that happens on the left. They kind of wrote the left off. That's why Netanyahu often
demonizes the two groups Israel regards as most threatening to their to their hegemony
in the United States, Muslims and leftist. And he always tries to fuse those together to make you believe that
Israel's enemies is your are your enemies. That's been a tactic of Israel for as
long as I can remember. That's why Ben Netanyahu was so excited about September September 11th. He understood that, oh,
this can be an American war against Islam, against the Muslim world, which is what we want more than anything. And
he came to the United States in 2002 when emotions about September 11th were still very high. And he sold the Iraq
war. Not saying that's the reason the US did it, but he was a vocal advocate of
the Iraq war, connecting it to 911, promising how it would transform the region. The Israelis openly wanted the
US to go and engineer regime change in seven different countries, including
most places where we've now done that, Libya and Syria and Iraq,
and also in Iran. That still is their goal. So exploiting the emotions of the
American people on behalf of Israel is something that Nahu indisputably is extremely good at. And he's been
ubiquitous in the American media. I mean, he's presiding over a genocide. Every day Israel is slaughtering
Palestinians in Gaza and destroying Gaza. But he believes, and he probably is right about this, that this is an
extremely important opportunity for Israel to exploit the death of Charlie Kirk, to exploit his memory, to exploit
the positive emotions toward him, the admiration for him being expressed on the right, to basically construct him as
a martyr of Israel. So that any admiration you have for Charlie Kirk means that you are revering
somebody who was one of Israel's closest friends. And that is simply false. You'll be
surprised to learn that Netanyahu is not telling the truth about that. And there's a lot of other Israel supporters
who are engaged in the same mission. Earlier today, Tucker Carlson, who is
one of the main reasons that a lot of the American right has started to turn against Israel, was on with Megan Kelly
and they were talking about Charlie Kirk and specifically this kind of
anti-interventionist, especially anti-war when it came to the Middle East and questioning of Israel
that he had been exhibiting over the past, at least since the beginning of the Trump administration in a way that has been deeply worrying to Israel.
Here's what they had to say. He was one of the only people, I mean truly one of the only people to go to
the president whom he loved. He loved Donald Trump like personally as well. And I and I think the president really
loved him in a real way. Um, but he was one of the only people to go to the Oval Office and say, "Sir, I totally understand and think Iran's
really bad, but a war with Iran is not, you know, is is is something that could really hurt our country." I mean, boy,
that was an unpopular position. He didn't need to express it. Oh, of course. And he did it again. He didn't
have some weird agenda. He wasn't mad at anybody. He was for his country and he was for doing the right and wise and
difficult thing. And he said that he went to the Oval Office to say that. He took massive, massive abuse from his own
donors, which is also something that you don't see people. And he loved his donors. It wasn't a hostile thing, but
they had a different view. A lot of them, not all, but a lot. And they expressed it to him in a very intense
way. I know because he showed me and he said, "Look, I understand your perspective. This is my perspective and
we're going to do what we think is the right thing, the wise thing." In that way, too, he was the voice of young people. I mean, there are no young
people in the country anymore supporting this war and wanting Israel to continue its bombing campaign. That's just the
truth. Look at the polls. And he was in touch with them. And even where his own opinion may have differed from their
opinion, he felt like he owed it to them to bring their message to the sitting
president of the United States. I mean, it was that's what's been snuffed out.
I I think that's actually an extremely important point that Megan made there, which is that, okay, it's one thing for
Tucker Carlson to really become vocal against the wars that Israel is
fighting. Uh, and they are worried about that. It's also very worrying when
someone like Candace Owens does it, who's roughly Charlie Kirk's age, even though she doesn't quite have the
influence among say young people. I think she is more of a broader influence in in the conservative movement, but
it's very worrying when she does it. But Charlie Kirk, you know, I said this about Nick Fentes
about the enormous amount of influence that he has assembled when it comes to young people on the American right.
Charlie Kirk is one of the people you could, you know, say might have even might have more influence, have had more
influence among especially young conservatives than anybody else. More than Ben Shapiro, more than Tucker, more
than Nick Fentes. and he was very entrenched right at the
peak of Republican power of conservative power. I mean he was close friends with Donald Trump and JD Vance and you know
that's the president vice president and everybody down the line. So for Charlie Kirk to start representing this massive
change in American attitudes toward Israel, given that Charlie Kirk had
always been a supporter of Israel, given that many of his donors are extremely
pro-Israel, as Tucker said, in a way that could have been the most
alarming danger for Israel possible. the thing they were most worried about that he was
clearly moving away from that pro-Israel stance in a way that might have been almost a tipping point in in right-wing
politics. Just to give you uh one example of what Tucker was talking about, in
April of 2025, Tucker Carlson had basically said he was
in touch with people very closely at the White House and knew that there was a serious movement to have the United
States abandon its diplomacy that Trump kept promising was going to resolve the problem with Iran and instead to bomb
Iran, to go to war for for Israel and with Israel in Iran.
And Tucker came out with a big dramatic statement about how dangerous this is. And right around the same time, might
have even been the same day, day before, day after, it was really right around the same time, this is what Charlie Kirk
posted to X. Quote, "It's going unnoticed because so much other news is
happening, but the war drums are beating again in DC. The wararmongers worry this
is their last chance to get the white whale they've been chasing for 30 years, namely an allout regime change war
against Iran. So he's denouncing and warning about the so-called wararm mongers who he says
have as their primary goal an allout regime change against Iran. Who is he talking about there? Neocons, Israel
supporters, Israelis. Obviously, that's who had as their white whale an all-out regime change war against Iran. He was
denouncing them and warning of their dangers. This is what he said. Quote, "A new Middle East war would be a catastrophic mistake. Our military
stockpiles are depleted from three years of backing Ukraine. Our effort to restore manufacturing has only just
begun and will take years to bear fruit. War could worsen our already immense deficit and international debt. Iran is
larger than Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan combined. A war would not be easy and could easily become a calamity. Thanks
to President Trump's restraint during the first term, America has a golden opportunity to pull away from the Middle East quagmires for good. We shouldn't
throw that opportunity away so that some DC husbands can feel tough by sending young
Americans to die yet again. I mean, it's hard to overstate
what a significant statement that was. He wasn't just
warning about the dangers of a war with Iran. He was denouncing a very specific group of people in Washington in the
Republican party in the conservative movement, calling them hasbins and wararm mongers and warning about how
they were pushing for regime change in Iran in order to
benefit Israel. Now, what Charlie Kirk also was was very loyal to President Trump and oftentimes
he would express these things and he would find a way to still support Trump even when Trump did them. You can debate that. But in many instances, Charlie
Kirk's become increasingly outspoken about his discomfort with
the USIsrael relationship. And now that Charlie Kirk can't speak
for himself any longer because he was just savagely assassinated,
Benjamin popped up immediately to speak for him to tell you who Charlie Kirk was
when it came to Israel. Not in Charlie Kirk's words, but in Netanyahu's.
Here's what Netanyahu said on Wednesday. So this was the day after Charlie Kirk
was killed. quote, "Charlie Kirk was murdered for speaking truth and defending freedom, a lionhearted friend
of Israel. He fought the lies and stood tall for Judeo-Christian civilization. I spoke to
him only two weeks ago and invited him to Israel." Sadly, that visit will not take place.
Note that Netanyahu didn't indicate that Charlie Kirk had accepted that invitation or planned to go
and several sources very close to him indicate that he did not. Netanyahu added, "We lost an incredible human
being. His boundless pride in America and his valiant belief in free speech will leave a lasting impact." Yes,
Netanyahu is a very fervent believer in free speech. Rest in peace, Charlie Kirk.
I mean, he just swooped in. He saw that opportunity. And you notice what the only thing that mattered was he was a
stalwart friend of Israel. I spoke to him two weeks ago. So, there's this outpouring of love for Charlie Kirk and
then comes Ben say, "I loved him too. I'm mourning with you because he he was
such a stalwart defender champion of Israel and every chance that now he gets he
defines western values as Judeo-Christian so that Jews and Christians unite
against Muslims or so that Christians who dominate in the West
see Jews in Israel as an essential part of their agenda because we're they're
united. everyone is united in Judeo-Christian values, which he says is what Charlie Kirk
most vigorously defended. I've heard Charlie Kirk talk a lot about his religion, his Christianity.
As I said, I've been on his show. I've talked to him before, and I don't think Benjamin should be talking for him.
There's a lot of evidence of Charlie Kirk speaking on these issues himself, but this is what Netanyahu is absolutely
up to. The next day he went on Newsmax and I'm saying he's all over American media,
multiple media appearances day, all over X, all over social media, inserting himself into
this national upheaval around the assassination of Charlie Kirk, obviously for Israel's purposes. And he was on
with Greta Van Sust and this is what he claimed happened. You know, they're trying to delegitimize
the state of Israel. Charlie Kirk said to me that he wrote me this detail letter. You have to fight the slander.
These untruths, these vilifications have consequences. And he was right. But I'll
tell you one thing. We're fighting on the battlefield against the terrorists and winning. And he was fighting on the
battlefield of ideas. And I think he was winning. He was going to win. That's why they shot him. I hope they don't silence
him. I don't think people will give into these ridiculous, ridiculous lies.
Now, a lot of people who are very close to Charlie Kirk, like Candace Owens,
said that the letter Charlie Kirk wrote to Netanyahu was wildly distorted and and
misrepresented by Netanyahu. I mean, if he's going to talk about the letter, he ought to
release it so that we can actually see whether Netanyahu is accurately describing it.
Here is Netanyahu on Fox. This was also yesterday. I'm telling you, Netanyahu's
primary mission this week was exploiting Charlie Kirk's assassination.
You would think he's like someone with nothing to do. It was just like a the best friend of Charlie Kirk and he's in mourning and grief and grieving. That's
why he's all over the media. This is his number one priority. And you should really think about why. Why is
the assassination of Charlie Kirk and his desire to speak to the American people about it such an crucial priority
to him while his country is engulfed in not just wars but all kinds of political crises that he's at the center of
scandals and crisis upheaval. Here's Netanyahu on Fox. This was
yesterday where he elaborates on this letter that he alleges Charlie Kirk wrote and
makes other claims about Charlie Kirk views about Israel. Prime Minister, you have your own memories of Charlie Kirk.
Please share them. Well, Harris, before I do that, I have to say that we're just heartbroken.
myself, my my wife, my family, my son actually, and his 2019 visit to Israel.
Had lunch with him and his wife Erica were shattered first as human beings
because a great human being has been taken from us. Uh he's was an
extraordinary friend. Uh he you know he he said he wrote me a letter on on May
2nd this year. He said, "One of my greatest joys as a Christian is advocating for Israel and forming
alliances to defend Judeo-Christian civilization." A few weeks before the tragedy
yesterday, I I called him and I spoke to him and I said, "Please come to Israel." I invited him to Israel and sadly that
visit will not take place. But he was he was a defender of our common Judeo-Christian civilization. He was
unbelievably excited to walk in the footsteps of Jesus here. He and while
Yes. Netanyahu says he was excited to walk in the footsteps of Jesus here. And while Netanyahu is spouting this noxious
garbage about Charlie Kirk trying to plan the emotions of the Fox audience
on the screen it reads Netanyahu Netanyahu says Kirk is an was an
extraordinary friend of Israel. I mean, the propaganda is so brazen. Can
it get more propagandistic? And Harris Faulner is really, she's one of the just absolute dumbest and most
mindless personalities on Fox. I'll never forget one of the best TV
moments that she ever provided, which was when she had Condisa Rice on Conda Rice
after the Russians invaded Ukraine and Harris Faulner said to Condisa Rice, "Look, how can this not be a war crime?
My understanding is that if you invade a sovereign country that hasn't attacked you, that's by definition a war crime.
Like not remembering that she's sitting next to the woman who was one of the main architects of the invasion of Iraq.
It's like she does not nothing connects. She's just an absolute vacant propagandist for the Murdoch agenda.
Very loyal to the Fox agenda. But in any event, so she's the perfect
person for net to come on with. She's never gonna get a ask him even like a
minimally challenging question. He's just gonna let her speak and then talk about how beautiful everything he said
was. But on the screen it says, "Kirk is an extraordinary friend of Israel. In case you're wondering what the purpose of all this is, here's the rest of this
if you can bear it. He valued our bond, the bond between America and Israel. He uh you know, he
uh uh did so many things to defend free speech. He had his truth. He stood up
for it. But he said, "You can you can come and debate me." He invited that debate. He certainly didn't invite the
violence, the horrible violence that tried to silence him. And you know, this is a worldwide problem. the the people
on on the, you know, on the extremes, the the Islamists, the radical Islamists and the their union with the ultr
progressives, uh, they often speak about human rights. They speak about free
speech, but they use violence to try to take down their enemies, whether it's
President Tribe, who's been almost assassinated twice, or, you know, they try to kill me here, too. Uh, but they
got Charlie Kirk and it's just heartbreaking. They got Charlie Kirk. I
don't think Muslims had anything to do with either of the two assassination attempts on President Trump.
And I from everything I understand don't believe that anything to do with the assassination on Charlie Kirk. The
assassination of Charlie Kirk. What he's trying to do is he knows who Israel's two main enemies are.
The American left and Muslims. Now, he's also very aware that the
American right, large portions of it are also starting to turn against Israel, which is why this is such a priority.
But you notice how deceitful is like, yeah, Muslims and the the union of of
them with the ultra progressives. This was before anyone, this was yesterday, before anyone had any idea who the
person was who shot. We still don't really know much about this person. I know that everyone on the left is saying
he's a grier. Everyone on the right is immediately saying that he's some sort of DSA socialist type.
There's a lot of conflicting signals as there are in a lot of these cases with young killers who are obviously
radicalized in like on the internet with memes and the like.
I don't think that they're overwhelming his overwhelming uh there was like a discernable right-le ideology, but more
will come out. I don't I'm not really attached to that. I really don't care. My point is that Netanyahu before
anything was known about him is saying telling the Fox audience that's who killed your beloved leader Muslims
and the sup super progressives that's against us and he's always trying to tie
himself to Donald Trump. He has corruption charges against Trump. So of course he's against Netany oh they're
doing to me what they did to Trump. He's claiming they tried to kill him and
he's saying that's what happened with Trump as well. Everything is always trying to imply to
Americans that Israel and America are like this. There's no separation. We're basically part of exactly the same
country, the same mission. And exploiting Charlie Kirk's death to
to do it um in such a brazen way, I think, is extra repugnant. Now, it isn't
just Netanyahu doing it. huge amounts of Israel. Uh here is a tweet today from
Hillel F, the fanatical Israeli uh propagandist. And here's a picture of an
IDF soldier, helpfully uh blurred out. You wouldn't want to expose him. And
he's holding a gigantic missile, which I'm sure was either sent by the United States and or paid for by the United States. These are the ones that are used
to blow up ball of Gaza and kill children. And he wrote in there in memory of Charlie Kirk. And then he posed for it. Just in case you're not
understanding, this was Israel's loss as well. Israel loves Charlie Kirk every bit as much as
you do. And Hill the tweet was direct from Gaza. He'd be so proud.
Do you see how they're talking for Charlie Kirk? Like he'd be so proud to have a missile with his name on it
that's going to blow up kids in Gaza. As Megan Kelly said, he he was
representative of the younger uh wing of the conservative movement that was turning against Israel and turning
against his wars. Nobody has the right to say that about Charlie Cook. I'd be so I'd be so proud to see Israel blowing
up kids in my name. Here is Yaki Lopez. Don't know who that
is, but who cares? Who wrote, "Oh, he's an Israeli official." Yeah,
that makes even more sense. This afternoon in Tel Aviv, Israel remembers # Charlie Kirk and then there's a
picture of some sand castle that someone made. Can we where it says Charlie Kirk
his legacy will continue to shine and there's a cross and a star of David
and then two Israeli flags at the top.
I mean, could you imagine that if you like if you if you died and then people just started trying to use you as an
avatar of things that you didn't actually stand for or represent. I talked about that last night with all
the calls for censorship, or even the broader theory that the
people with blood on their hands aren't just the ones who pulled the triggers, but the ones who speak and give opinions
that inspire that. He was contemptuous of that theory. It's one of the things that he and I like very much had in
common ground. Charlie Kirk was an absolutist free speech defender. There are a lot of people on the right who
claim to be and we've seen over time that many if not most are frauds,
but Charlie Kirk was a genuine free speech advocate and he in that tweet we
read was responding to a lot of the reaction on the right after that couple got killed outside of the Israeli
embassy in May in Washington. And he was like, "Look, I warned this couple. They're beautiful couple. They had all
their lives ahead of them. is a horrible tragedy. The person who killed them should be punished to the maximum extent of the law. But he said, I'm seeing a
lot of conservatives saying it's not just he who has blood on his hands, but also people who demonize Israel or were
against the war, called it a genocide. He was like, no, that's not how it works.
Words are not violence. He said, "Violence is violence. So stop trying to say that people who never engage in
violence have blood on their hands because of their views that they expressed."
And he was telling that to his fellow conservatives in the knowing that this theory is extremely dangerous and has
been weaponized against the right that if you express certain views you're
causing these people to be endangered. You know, the first time I ever encountered that theory, this theory was
back in the 1990s. There was like this spate of murders of abortion doctors.
And you know, they would be in their home and somebody would come and just snipe them or outside their office getting into their car, someone would
just shoot them. And there was this extreme effort by the media and liberals to blame prolife
activists for those shootings. And there was one shooting in 2009 of an
abortion doctor. And this abortion doctor happened to be somebody that Bill O'Reilly frequently
talked about and highlighted on his Fox program because he was a very prolific
uh abortion doctor, but he also performed later term abortions. They were legal, but Bill Riley was morally
opposed to them. And Bill Riley would go on every on the air every night and say that this guy was a murderer.
In fact, his name was Dr. Tiller. And Bill O'Reilly would always say, "Tiller
the killer." And so the media tried saying, "Look, it's not just the guys going and
shooting these abortion doctors. It's the people on TV and the pundit constantly saying abortion is murder and
abortion doctors are murderers. Because if you keep telling people that, of course, it's predictable they're going to go and kill abortion doctors." And
maybe that's true. But Bill O'Reilly didn't tell anybody to go kill anybody. He didn't advocate
violence. There's no view that you could express that doesn't have the possibility that someone listening might not get inspired
to go kill somebody. And it's extremely dangerous to free speech and just to the truth
to try and transfer words into violence to say Bill O'Reilly has the blood on his hands for the murder of abortion
doctors or Tucker Carlson has the blood on his hands from the massacre in Buffalo because the guy who did it wrote
a manifesto talking about the grace replacement theory and they claimed Tucker Carlson also talked about that. It wasn't true. The guy had a totally
different worldview than Tucker. But even if they had identical mindsets, Tucker would not be responsible for that
anymore, then some liberal is responsible because some fanatical fan
of Rachel Matto goes to a softball field where he knows Republican members of Congress are
playing and tries to murder them after having spent two years posting Rachel Maddo clips saying that Russians that
Republicans are Russian agents. You have to separate words and violence. And this was a foundational view of Charlie Kirk.
Now, one of the things that Charlie did recently because he was getting very kind of torn about the Israel issue
because he was somebody who was concerned about anti-semitism. He didn't want opposition to Israel spilling over
into anti-semitism. He also did have a spiritual connection to Israel the way a lot of Christians do
because it's where Jesus was born and died and a lot of other events of that kind that are regarded as holy by Christians.
And at the same time, his America first ideology, his anti-war views
were leading him to also start questioning US support. And he also knew that a lot of
Gen Z conservatives were very much against Israel. And so he kind of
assembled some Turning Point interns and uh other members who are Gen Z to talk
about Israel to try and kind of get to a consensus point about where young conservatives should be. And this is
part of what happened. Resonate with you. Oh, yeah. Exactly. You're not anti-Israel. You don't wish
them harm. You're you're not, you know, like cheering on Iran. No, I I support is I think they're our
ally. I want them. But you would be called an anti-semite by some people for saying this. And I think that's ridicul. I don't hate
Jews because I think a nation should defend themselves. Exactly. Like I I think that's the most
ridiculous thing ever. I feel like it's becoming like the word racism. like we just disagree with them
so we just have to call them a name. I don't think it they're actually anti-semitic. I think people just can't
agree with them and they can't prove them wrong so they just throw a word out and be like you're anti-Semitic for
because you think that we should stop sending our money there. Oh my god. Hallelujah. I didn't realize I forgot that that uh that guy made that
point. So true. He's saying like, "We spent all these years criticizing liberals who just scream racist and
anybody disagrees with them, but now I'm watching all these conservatives scream anti-semite the minute you question whether the US should be supporting
Israel." And you can see Charlie Kirk having being very sympathetic to that view, saying, "Yeah, just because you
don't want the US financing Israel anymore doesn't make you an anti-semite." I see amongst the people I'm around, I
do see more like general disdain towards, I mean, just being honest, Jewish people. That's correct. just because they're
constantly being told that you hate Jews. And it's like, fine. If you're going to say I hate Jews over and over
and over again. Like, if I'm going to be convicted of the crime, I might as well do the crime. I fear the same thing
happens with all the talk of race. The more we talk about it, the more the more racism actually happen.
This is like I try to tell Thank you for saying this. Like because like this is I
try to tell these people and they're like, "We must get more aggressive." And so like let me ask a question. if we were to say if we were to remove like if
people said what Tucker said is anti-semitic I don't hold that view but it's like a lot of people on Twitter are
like calling us out and like if whatever that's not going to happen but um if we
were to cancel Tucker would anti-se anti-semitism increase or decrease I think increase because that means any
supporter of Tucker Carlson's statement therefore makes them anti-semit and association 100%
exactly but the binary that's presented is that if you don't passionately talk about it,
you are a hater. That's probably destructive for everybody involved. So for me, I'm
trying to find this new path, which is I love Israel. I visited there. My wife and I had the best experiences ever. I
saw where Jesus rose from the dead and he walked on water. But also, I'm an American and I represent a generation
that can't afford anything and that we are like flooded with illegals and no one speaks English and our hospitals are
clogged. I think we need to have the prudence to reject the Jew hate. Like, okay, we're not going to put up with
that. That's dumb. But also, if you call everyone an anti-semite if they don't take a puritanical view of the Netanyahu
government, then I think that's it's bad for everybody.
I mean, you can just see him kind of grappling with this issue and he has a bunch of young Turning Point people
there with him saying like, "Yeah, I I'm sick of this. I'm sick of the fact that you can't question Israel without being
accused of being an anti-semite. And like if anything, it's going to make us actually become anti-semites.
And he was pushing back against the saying, we don't want anti-semitism, but what's breeding it is this demand that
you just bow to Israel and cheer Israel and support more money for Israel and more wars for Israel.
That's what Netanyahu is doing. He's jumping into this breach where Charlie Kirk can't speak for him anymore. That's
why monuments are being built in Tel Aviv and his name is being used on missiles and Netanyahu is on TV every
day talking about Charlie Kirk being the greatest friend that Israel has ever had.
Charlie Kirk went on Megan Kelly and I'm showing you this because I want you to see Charlie Kirk speaking for himself
rather than Netanyahu doing it for him. And Megan Kelly uh in particular has
been a stalwart supporter of Israel. Like pretty much the standard conventional view on the right that
Israel is our ally. We should support them. They're in a sea of radical Islam
which is also our enemy. And you know she's a very
fervent supporter of Israel. She has been her whole career in a way that aligns with Fox and fits right in there
and you know that's Megan Kelly has some pretty standard views of foreign policy very much aligned with like the Bush
chain era where she emerged from but she's also been questioning a lot of those. I've been on our show a couple times debating with her and she's very
open to those debates and has started questioning things that she would never have questioned even a year ago.
And Charlie Kirk was doing the same. And as a result of their even slight deviation from
the pro-Israel line, Charlie much more than Megan, but both of them, they started getting accused of anti-semitism
in the Israeli media. Charlie was being attacked as some sort of like in following the footsteps of Tony Carlson
and they were both very angry about it and Charlie K went on and Kelly and they both kind of aired out their anger and
sort of said like look back off or you know you're going to drive people
away from you even more. I I feel the connection to Israel and I but at the
same time simultaneously when the hostile reaction is that now
Megan and Charlie are enemies, right? Boy, I'll tell you like you're you're
you're you're going to you're not going to I won't say lose, but you will weaken and just basically deflate two of your
strongest advocates if that continues. Right. And it to me I laugh because it's like I've been bullied by the best of
them, the best and it it didn't work and
it's not going to work with them. Then the more you try to tell me I can't criticize Israel, the more likely I am
to do it to focus on exactly what you're doing, right? Like what what are you doing that you're so defensive? You
don't own me. I don't I don't take $1 of money from any Jewish affiliated group.
That's not that's never been what what my shows model. I take, you know, Cozy Earth is my sponsor. Uh people like
Genuisell, those are the people I take and I and I probably would feel reluctant to criticize Genuisell, which is a great product, so I probably
wouldn't do it anyway. My point is simply, I have my honest opinions, which
is why I had credibility for the two years I've been defending them, right?
And I still have that credibility. And I don't need lectures from my friends who are more pro-Israel than I am or who are
just American Jewish people who are concerned about what's happening. I don't need lectures on my coverage.
Okay? I'll call it like I see it. And you have no right to come on this show and demand a debate with me because I've
said something you disagree with. It's my show and I'll decide the coverage we do.
Okay. I mean, that was a month ago. I mean, does that sound like Charlie
Kirk is the most stalwart defender of Israel? Here's a little bit more uh from what
they talked about on that day. Got text about you, Megan, saying, "Why is Megan like doing the
bidding of Hamas?" I was like, "What are you talking about? Megan's the best. Like, what? She's amazing." And I said,
"Why are you texting me about Megan?" And at that point, and so this is what
they don't understand. You and I, Megan, and Tucker is in the same category and they've tried to go after Tucker.
Yeah. Is that the And and the more you attack our moral character,
the actually the more we're going to double down into direction because screw you. I don't do it that way. Okay.
Right. Like when Tell me I'm wrong. Cool. Tell me if I've got my facts wrong. By the way, on the Epstein thing,
now Tali Bennett says he was an Epstein agent. We have to be pursuers of truth. They've denied it. Fine. Let's keep digging. Okay. Fine. But the the
by the way, that's another thing. Charlie Kirk was speaking openly about the possibility that Epstein was tied to
the MSA to Israeli intelligence. He wasn't just like wondering about it as one of many instances. He was clearly
uh suggesting that the evidence he's seen is enough to make him strongly suspicious that Epstein was tied to the
Israeli government and to the MSAD. Is this the person that sounds to you
like some is this Ben Shapiro? Is this Barry Weiss? Like some sort of agent or asset of the
Israeli government doing its bidding? There might have been a point where Charlie Kirk was that,
but that isn't who he's been over the last several months.
And don't listen to Netanyahu about Charlie Curry. Listen to what he
says himself. the the thing that I don't think I think is being lost is like on
some part of the population you can scold them into silence right but
if I have any deviation of a purity test any deviation whatsoever such as hosting
a focus group right Megan with a bunch of our students that went viral having Dave Smith or Tucker at my
event it is all of a sudden oh Charlie is a uh he's he's no longer with us and all
that. So, wait a second. What do you mean? What does with us mean? Exact. That's the other thing. The Turning
Point uh annual conference is has become an extremely important stage for
conservatism, especially for young conservatives. And not only did Charlie invite Tucker
to give a keynote speech, which he did, and talked about the wars in Israel and the like
and did it aggressively. I mean, he gave Tucker a major platform
at Turning Point USA despite the fact that Tucker has been under massive attack by Israel and its supporters in
the United States for supposedly being an anti-semite, for not supporting Israel. He also had a debate on Israel where he
invited Dave Smith, the very uh harsh critic of Israel who's
a libertarian and invited some neocon who defended Israel. So there was a lot of questioning of
Israel at the Turning Points conference and that enraged
Turning Points founders and donors rather who are extremely pro-Israel and a lot of people in the conservative
movement. That's part of their what they're reacting to. Exactly. Right. I'm an American. Okay. Like I I I
represent this country and I I don't even understand that paradigm. But Megan, I think you would agree with this
and I want to make sure we fast like really zero in on this personality types
like you, myself, and Tucker. The more that you guys privately and publicly
call our character into question, which is not isolated, right, Megan? It would be one thing if it was one text or two
text. It is dozens of texts. Yes. Then we start to say, "Hold the boat
here." And and to be fair, some of my really good Jewish friends are like, "That's not all of us. It's all But these are leaders, too, though, right?
These are these are stakeholders, right?" So, there you have it. And I find it
utterly obnoxious. Like I said, imagine that you die and you've devoted your life to various political causes.
And in the wake of the emotions left by your your death or your murder, in swoops, Benam Netanyahu to try and
recapture the American right as his little pet to say, "Oh, you love Charlie
Kirk. Well, then do as Charlie did. He was a unwield unyielding and passionate
supporter of Israel and of the American Israel relationship. It's despicable. And I think it's so
transparent that it's unlikely to work on anybody other than people who are already what ready to believe whatever
Netanyahu says and and believes in the pro-Israel uh fanaticism.
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