I think now is exactly the wrong time to appropriate the memory of someone and the and the emotion that comes with that, the really intense emotion that all of us feel at his murder and use it for your own parochial ends, like he stood for this, you know, and I think the reason that Charlie was able to bridge the gap, [00:00:18] particularly in foreign policy, is because he had, for example, genuine affection for Israel, which he expressed to me in private many, many times, like I love Israel. I don't think we should have another forever war. Regime, regime change, war against Iran. I don't think it's helpful to for people to jump in, particularly foreign heads of [00:00:35] state, to say, this is what he lived for, my cause or whatever. That's disgusting. Actually, don't do that. Recently, Vice President J.D. Vance hosted the Charlie Kirk Show. Obviously, this is following the murder of Charlie Kirk, and he brought on a number [00:00:52] of guests, including Tucker Carlson. Now, Carlson took a dig at the Israeli government. Rightly so. If you ask me, People like Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for attempting to exploit Charlie Kirk's murder for their own political means, [00:01:08] for their own political messaging. As Carlson alluded to, Kirk was a longtime advocate of Israel. There is no question about that. But over the past few years, he did make a number of statements that were also critical of the Israeli government. [00:01:25] So we're going to get to those momentarily. Now, let's just talk about Benjamin Netanyahu's response to Charlie Kirk's murder. So we'll note that at the time of these comments, we did not know who Kirk's killer was at all. [00:01:40] No actual suspect was in custody. We have no idea who this person is, what their motivations are. You need to know that context so you can understand just how patently absurd Netanyahu is in the statements he makes in the video you're about to watch. [00:01:56] He wrote me a letter on on May 2nd Second 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 called him and I spoke to him [00:02:16] 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. The people on the you know, on the extremes, the Islamists, [00:02:34] the radical Islamists and the their union with the ultra progressives, 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 Trump who's been almost assassinated twice or, you know, [00:02:53] they try to kill me here, too. But they got Charlie Kirk, and it's just Heartbreaking. You know, I really do have to hand it to Israeli extremists because they really do effortlessly make everything, literally everything about themselves. [00:03:13] That man is so utterly evil. And for him to talk about extremism when he is the leader of a country that has a government that is carrying out the mass slaughter and mass displacement of millions of people, is is so rich. [00:03:30] It really is to take something that had just happened, a murder that shocked the nation, a violent event that could make the political situation completely devolve in this country. At that moment, I remember thinking, this is going to lead to maybe riots, [00:03:51] political, additional political violence. People might get hurt. That's what I'm concerned about as an American. Netanyahu. What he's concerned about is exploiting the murder of Charlie Kirk for his own political means. He's disgusting. I'm not the only one who thinks so. I might not agree with Candace Owens on a whole host of political issues, [00:04:09] but I certainly agree with her when she's criticizing the Israeli government. And she took issue with Netanyahu's comments, especially as someone who was a close friend of Charlie Kirk's. Take a look. First and foremost, that letter he is holding up, he is severely misrepresenting. [00:04:24] Those sentences are real. But I am calling upon Bibi Netanyahu, the dear friend to Charlie Kirk, to publish the letters. Entire contents like, don't start with just two sentences. Publish the entire thing. You're holding it. [00:04:39] I'm saying you're severely misrepresenting the contents. That in May, Charlie was concerned about Israel and their influence on American politics and how they were pushing things that he felt were Work in conflict with his beliefs. [00:04:58] - Free speech here in America. - You know. And I also want to add to what Candace Owens is saying there, because Charlie Kirk was under a tremendous amount of pressure. Understand what the whole point of Turning Point USA is. [00:05:13] Turning point USA's entire point is to or was to help Donald Trump get elected. And in the future, help their preferred Republican candidate get elected. Now, that is a difficult thing to do when there's this disconnect [00:05:30] with the Republican Party, meaning the politicians who bow their heads to Israel and everything Israel wants. Who will, you know, put on the yarmulke regardless of what their religion is, even if they're Christians, and go pray at the wall. [00:05:46] But when you look at the Republican base, the up and comers, the young people, the very people who followed Charlie Kirk went to Turning Point events. They don't support Israel because what they're doing is being streamed. [00:06:05] The videos are everywhere. It turns out that most Americans, regardless of their political affiliation, don't like to see children get butchered. You know what Israel is carrying out right now? So yeah, Charlie Kirk was under a tremendous amount of pressure [00:06:20] because honestly, his own political views don't even really matter in that context. He has a role to serve, and that role is to help Republican politicians get elected. But what happens when the Republican politicians are very much pro-Israel? [00:06:35] What happens when your donors are pro-Israel? You don't want to upset the donors, but you also don't want to lose the Republican base. So let's get to some more details about this, because it is true. I mean, look, Charlie Kirk was very much supportive of Israel [00:06:55] Overall, there is just an abundance of evidence to prove that. But there were a few moments where he was critical of Israel. So let's take a look at the examples. I'll start with one of the first examples, dating back all the way to October 12th of 2023, when he appeared on the Patrick Bet David podcast. [00:07:14] So I've been to Israel many times. The whole country is a fortress. When I first heard this story, I still have the same gut instinct that I did initially. I find this very hard to believe. I've been to that Gaza border. You cannot go ten feet without running into a 19 year old [00:07:29] with an AR 15 or an automatic machine gun that is an IDF soldier, right? The whole country is surveilled. Was there a stand down order? Was there a stand down order? Six hours. I don't believe it. Israel's decided size of new Jersey. [00:07:45] When I took a helicopter ride from Jerusalem to the Gaza border. It's 45 minutes. Wow. Six hours. They're live streaming. The killing of Jews was did somebody in the government say stand down? This is the closest thing to the Holocaust that any of us have lived through. [00:08:01] But the fact is now Bibi and the Israeli hard right government has a mandate. I got to be careful the way I say this to they're going to try to ethnically cleanse Gaza. Yeah, I mean, that's and I don't use that term lightly. [00:08:16] - Okay. - That was pretty candid. So I mean, I remember seeing that interview at the time that it aired, and I was pretty surprised by it because he was totally accurate about what the intentions of the Israeli government happened to be. [00:08:33] So I want to be clear. Okay. Again, there are all sorts of conspiracy theories out there about how Israel is actually the assassin. No evidence of that. What I'm taking issue with is government officials from Israel, people like Benjamin Netanyahu, [00:08:48] exploiting Charlie Kirk's death to make it seem as though he was just his support for Israel was unmitigated, you know, using it to essentially push his political message in support of Israel. [00:09:04] I just find it so grotesque, so disgusting. But nonetheless, I've got some more to share with you. So before Trump's strikes on Iran, you know, the strikes on Iran's nuclear site specifically, Charlie Kirk fervently advocated against regime change in Iran. [00:09:21] He did not think it was a good idea for the United States to get caught up in that regime change war. Here's one example. Did you know that we only have a problem in Iran at the scale and the magnitude that we currently have, because we involved ourselves in regime change? [00:09:39] America has a long history of regime change with Iran. The moral here is that we should not invade Iran and we should not support regime change. Sometimes you get something way worse, Like Iraq. You get ISIS. Libya, you get civil war. [00:09:57] Yes. Yes. Correct. And that wasn't the first time. That wasn't the only time. I should say, where you can see Charlie Kirk pushing back against the notion that we should get embroiled in a war in Iraq on behalf of Israel. Now, in July, Kirk hosted a number of young conservatives to discuss Israel [00:10:14] and AIPAC, the Israel lobby. And here's a quick snippet of how that conversation went down. So you're you're ethnically Jewish, ethnically Jewish, and you have concerns about AIPAC? Yes, I do. I'm told that by some people that if I criticize AIPAC, I'm anti-Semitic. [00:10:31] I think it's ridiculous. Yeah. I feel like it's great to have a concern for your country. Do you think that the that AIPAC represents. Again, I'm not saying I believe this, but I think this is what you're saying, that it represents a kind of cutting in line of prioritization [00:10:48] away from the American people. Yes. Would you guys say that's a fair summary? 100% meaning that like, okay, we vote we're citizens, but a separate group gets higher priority because of whatever reasons. So guys, first of all, I love that he hosted that conversation. [00:11:07] I actually hadn't seen that before. He's providing a platform for American Jews to voice their personal opinion about the impact of the Israel lobby on American politics. That's incredible. And that's a good thing. [00:11:24] So as much as I disagreed with Charlie's politics, as much as we debated one another, sometimes aggressively. So I really appreciated the fact that, I mean, he's not being disrespectful to these people, right? Regardless of what he believes, he's providing a platform. [00:11:40] And there are so many young Americans who follow Turning Point USA who were exposed to that point of view because Charlie hosted that type of conversation. So last month, Kirk and Megyn Kelly [00:11:56] griped about supporters of Israel who demand complete and total fealty to the Israeli government. Now, I want to note before we show this video, if you only take this clip that we're about to show you, you would think the entire conversation was about the pressure [00:12:12] from Israel supporters that they're getting frustrated with. But if you listen to the entirety of that episode, there's tons of pro-Israel commentary. I believe the regurgitation of pro-Israel talking points. So I want to give you that full context before we play the clip. [00:12:28] But with that in mind, let's take a look. The behavior by a lot, both privately and publicly, are pushing people like you and me away. I have text messages, Megan calling me an anti-Semite. I am learning biblical Hebrew and writing a book on the Shabbat. [00:12:45] I honor the Shabbat, the Jewish Sabbath. 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? [00:13:00] These are these are stakeholders, right? These are stakeholders. These are leaders. These are potentially donors to Turning Point USA. And the donors don't like the criticism of the Israeli government [00:13:15] or the way they're prosecuting. I mean, are we really going to call it a war when you have multiple organizations, including a US, I'm sorry, a un, group calling it a genocide, a group of genocide scholars calling what's happening in Gaza genocide. [00:13:33] It's a it's a genocide. And there were a few occasions in which Charlie Kirk was willing to push back. Donors don't like it, but young Republican voters who don't support Israel like it. So you see what kind of position Charlie Kirk is in, right? [00:13:49] That tug of war that he's experiencing as the leader of this organization, Turning Point USA. Now, the day before he was killed, this is on September 9th. Kirk hosted Ben Shapiro on his show. This is getting a lot of attention. [00:14:05] After we watch it, I'm going to give you more context of of why this exchange was happening. I think that context is important. So while Kirk largely refrained from commenting on Israel, he, played devil's advocate. So let's take a look at that. [00:14:21] So we've seen, news this morning that quite honestly, I'm a little confused by. And I was hoping you could navigate it and help us understand, which is that Israel, bombed Qatar, which houses a lot of Hamas officials. A what happened here? And if I were to introduce just a skeptical question, [00:14:39] will this potentially endanger America's own interests in the Middle East? So please, Ben, help me better understand this situation, a claim I receive often, and we're starting our campus tour tomorrow is that Israel is committing genocide. How do you respond to that, Ben? Is the media totally presenting the truth when it comes to Israel? [00:14:55] Just a question. You know that maybe we shouldn't believe everything the media says, because I know I've been conditioned to ask a lot more critical questions over the last couple of years. So, Ben, some people would accuse Israel of wanting to ethnically cleanse. Some people in the Israeli government are saying, [00:15:10] again, it's all over the place, right? You have opinions all over. In your opinion, what would a good outcome five years from now be, and how does one respond to the claims of ethnic cleansing? So I went back and watched that episode with Ben Shapiro, and the way [00:15:26] that I read it and I could be wrong, was that it was an effort to try to quell the rage, the disagreement, the anger toward Israel that's been growing among young conservative men, [00:15:42] young conservative voters, because they have a conscience and they see what's happening in Gaza and they have a problem with it to their credit. So bringing Ben Shapiro on. You know, you have Charlie Kirk playing devil's advocate in order to allow for a staunch Israel supporter like Ben Shapiro to, you know, [00:16:00] perpetuate the pro-Israel propaganda. I don't think that it's effective, but that's what I read that whole exchange as. And I think people are kind of reading too much into that. But with that in mind, let's move on to Bill Ackman, [00:16:16] because he's part of this story as well. Yesterday, Tucker Carlson stated that Kirk faced enormous pressure from Turning Point USA's own donors to support a regime change war in Iran. And I believe that to be true. Here's the clip of Tucker. [00:16:31] It did worry me because I think your description is perfect. He was one of the very few who took that message, and stood by it. I mean, right to the very end. This cannot get bigger. We don't want another regime change war. But, man, some of the people who send money to Turning Point, his donors were very tough on him. [00:16:48] So tough on him that I could feel it. You know, I talked to him a lot in the last few months and he was under enormous pressure. He never bent. He never became bitter. He kept his integrity to the very end, to the very end. And I just think it's important to say that because it's true. Absolutely. [00:17:05] And honestly, that concern was mirrored by Candace Owens herself. So on a similar note, Owens and Bill Ackman are now essentially scrapping online dueling, if you will, over whether or not Ackman threatened Turning Point USA [00:17:22] because of the fact that Charlie Kirk, on a few occasions was critical of Israel. Now, Owens is alleging that Ackman wanted to force Kirk to regurgitate Israeli government propaganda. And here's more of her argument. I called him and I spoke to him, and I said, please come to Israel. [00:17:40] - I invited him to Israel. - Bibi Netanyahu in that phone call. What took place was a couple of weeks ago before Charlie lost his life. Charlie was in the Hamptons, and he had, more than one event. [00:17:56] But he had, essentially what was staged. An intervention was staged by Bill Ackman. Because Charlie's thoughts, Charlie's rational thoughts about Israel were a no no. [00:18:12] Bill Ackman was very upset and threats were made. That is what, I am I am told it was at this time that Bibi Netanyahu was called and Charlie was invited to Israel. [00:18:28] This was an under duress situation, I would say. And just like Charlie was being invited to Israel, I was invited somewhere else. And when this arrived to me, it felt like a threat. You know, I got to tell you that it felt like a threat. Like, not like, hey, come here and we can educate you because you're my friend. [00:18:47] More like this is your last chance. And I know that Charlie was offered a ton of money in this moment. And I know for a fact that Charlie denied that funding. That Charlie denied. And what BB didn't include there? [00:19:05] He declined to go to Israel. Okay, so just keep in mind that literally. Okay. Just one day after that meeting, Kirk made his comments about the pressure he's facing and the criticism he's getting [00:19:23] on Megyn Kelly's show. So the timeline makes sense. Everything adds up here. And I'm also inclined to believe Candace Owens, to be honest with you, because I have personally seen the wrath of pro-Israel figures in this country threaten you. [00:19:40] And if they see that they can't really do much about your employment, they'll go after your family members. They'll try to ruin your life. That's currently happening to my husband right now, who's not a political figure at all, has never even uttered a word about Israel or what's happening with the genocide in Gaza. [00:19:55] But since these people can't touch me, they're going after my husband and attempting to get him fired from a job that he loves. That's who these people are. They're despicable. Despicable. Because even if you have a family member who looks inside, [00:20:13] thinks about their values, their morality, and obviously has a problem with innocent people getting slaughtered in Gaza, apparently you can't be against genocide. If it's Israel carrying it out, they'll come for you and they'll try to ruin your life. [00:20:28] Despicable people. But let's get back to Ackman. According to Ackman, he and Charlie Kirk got in touch in May of this year. He's denying everything okay Kirk told Ackman that conservatives in particular young conservatives were getting tired of defending Israel [00:20:43] and that this was very concerning to him. Now, over the course of several calls and meetings, Kirk and Ackman discussed a plan to mobilize a group of Turning Point ambassadors who could go and debate issues like Israel on college campuses, [00:20:59] much like Kirk was doing. Ackman asked Kirk how he could learn more about why conservatives are drifting away from Israel. I don't know, it could be the butchering of children that we see endless images and videos of online. Are you stupid? Aren't billionaires supposed to be smart? Like what an idiot. [00:21:17] These people have no humanity. Like, it's just soulless. Absolutely soulless. Kirk suggested that they could convene a group of conservative influencers to discuss the matter. So that idea eventually became the Hamptons meeting, as they're calling it. And Owens did mention it. About 35 influencers did attend. [00:21:36] And Ackman said at no point, at no point did he threaten, blackmail or even offer money to Charlie Kirk. Now, Ackman also claimed that in the weeks after the meeting, he and Kirk maintained a cordial relationship, discussing a number of issues, [00:21:51] not all of them related to Israel. So what happened? According to Kirk's producer, it's important to hear from Andrew Colvert. That's the executive producer for The Charlie Kirk Show, who also weighed in on this matter, saying, I have been asked about Bill Ackman, about the [00:22:08] Bill Ackman event more than a few times. So I asked our staff who were traveling with Charlie to find out what's true and what's not. His team was with him 100% of the time when he wasn't in his hotel room. Here's what they told me. Bill never yelled at Charlie, never pressed him on. [00:22:25] Bibi never gave him a list of Charlie's offenses against Israel. There was concern raised about having Tucker at SAS. So that was the Turning Point conference that they had where Tucker Carlson talked about how, you know, [00:22:42] Jeffrey Epstein very likely was an asset for Mossad in order to gather, you know, damning and embarrassing Intel on powerful people to blackmail them. Turns out that, you know, Ackman didn't like that speech. [00:22:57] I rather enjoyed it. But let's get back to the tweet. Charlie's reply was honestly, people telling me not to have Tucker makes me want to have Tucker. Good for him. And I'm going to lock him in for Ampfest to. Charlie personally told me he had a very cordial relationship with Bill [00:23:14] and the event was productive. Those are the facts. So in reality, Charlie Kirks views of Israel were a little more complicated than Benjamin Netanyahu and the various right wing genocidal freaks in that government have been regurgitating in the media [00:23:32] since Charlie Kirk's murder. And to use that murder for your own political messaging, your own political means is rather disgusting. To take everything in the news and somehow effortlessly turn it around and make it about Israel is particularly disgusting. [00:23:49] We're talking about a country that has bribed almost every politician in this country, so they'll bow their heads to the government even as they're committing genocide in the Gaza Strip. The annexation of Palestinian land in the West Bank. They're going to steal the Gaza Strip, too. [00:24:05] Of course, the annexation of land from Syria, they share faulty, you know, deceptive Intel with the United States in order to drag us into fighting their wars, as we did in Iraq. [00:24:21] That's what Israel is. And I'm happy that there are examples of Charlie Kirk criticizing Israel on the record. So for anyone who's been fooled by Benjamin Netanyahu's lies in the aftermath of Charlie Kirk's murder, these are the real facts. Every time you ring the bell below, an angel gets his wings. [00:24:38] Totally not true. But it does keep you updated on our live shows.