Date: Friday, 05 June 2026
https://ericzuesse.substack.com/p/how-can-anybody-respect-the-usa
https://theduran.com/how-can-anybody-respect-the-u-s-a/
How can anybody respect the U.S.A.?
4 June 2026, posted by Eric Zuesse. (All of my recent articles can be seen here.)
https://theduran.com/patrick-henningsen-hezbollah-just-drew-the-line-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ha9elCUGl-E
“Patrick Henningsen: Hezbollah Just Drew the Line: 'Israel Out of Lebanon Completely’”
4 June 2026, Dialogue Works
00:04
NIMA ALKORSHID: Hi everybody. Today's Thursday, June
00:08
4th, 2026, and our dear friend Patrick
00:11
Hennington is here with us. Welcome
00:13
back, Patrick.
00:14
>> Great to be with you, Nema.
00:16
>> Patrick, let let's start with
00:19
yesterday what has happened with the
00:21
case of Lebanon and the United States
00:23
announced that there is an agreement
00:25
between the government in Lebanon and
00:27
Israelis. What are the points? What are
00:30
the terms or the clauses of this
00:34
agreement is this is Hezbollah must
00:37
reportedly halt all attacks and withdraw
00:41
from south of the Leonian River. The
00:45
first point and Lebanon stated that it
00:49
has no hostile intentions toward Israel
00:51
and reportedly designated Hezbollah as
00:54
an enemy of the Lebanese state. The
00:58
Lebanese armed forces would assume
01:01
exclusive security control in the in
01:04
designated areas
01:06
excluding non-state armed groups.
01:10
Both sides reaffirmed
01:13
they don't seek conflict with one
01:16
another and agreed to continue direct
01:18
talks toward broader security and peace
01:21
arrangements
01:23
and political and security negotiations
01:26
are expected to resume during the weeks
01:29
of June 22nd with continued US
01:34
mediation.
01:36
Looking at this,
01:39
is that going to make sense for anybody,
01:41
do you think, in Lebanon? I'm I'm not
01:44
talking about the government and the
01:46
people and Hezbollah. Because the
01:49
problem with Israel is the fight between
01:52
Hezbollah and Lebanon and the problem of
01:54
the occupation of the southern part of
01:56
Lebanon is not related to Lebanese
01:59
government. And how do you see the
02:01
thing? Because Donald Trump is somehow
02:03
desperate. He knows Iran is putting
02:05
pressure on Donald Trump because they
02:07
said they're going to attack the
02:08
northern part of Israel. And you see
02:10
that he came out with this sort of I I
02:13
see I don't see any sort of future for
02:15
this agreement. But what is happening in
02:18
your mind with the case of Israel and
02:20
Lebanon?
02:22
PATRICK HENNINGSEN: The the draft proposal that you just
02:25
read there, that was written either by
02:27
Washington or combination of Washington
02:30
and Israel. they wrote it and they would
02:33
hand it to the Lebanese government and
02:36
tell them that's the agreement that
02:38
you're going to put forward. Uh this
02:41
this would not, it's impossible that
02:43
this would have come from Lebanon or
02:46
from anyone in Lebanon realistically
02:48
speaking. And what you have in Beirut is
02:52
at the moment uh what we call a trustee
02:55
government. A trustee government. So
02:57
like when you have a prison and the
03:00
prison warden nominates a few prisoners
03:02
to be trustees to govern over the other
03:05
prisoners, uh they have no power, they
03:07
have no sovereignty. They're just there
03:09
uh symbolically to deal with, you know,
03:12
the inmates uh as it were. Uh that's
03:14
what uh Joseph Ayun and NAF Salam are,
03:18
the president and prime minister of of
03:21
Lebanon at the moment. These are
03:23
effectively appointed by the United
03:25
States and Israel. So this is total
03:28
American and Zionist control over
03:32
Israel. And their goal, the United
03:34
States's goal, they've been very public
03:36
about it. Tom Barack is Trump's former
03:41
fixer, business fixer uh in the region.
03:44
And then he got promoted to special
03:46
envoy or ambassador to Turkey and then
03:48
he's suddenly special envoy dealing with
03:51
Lebanon. He's been very open that he
03:53
wants to see a civil war in Lebanon.
03:56
Now, he's not using those exact words,
03:58
but he's talking about using the
04:00
Lebanese military to disarm Hezbollah.
04:04
That's effectively promoting the idea
04:07
that or forcing the idea of a of an
04:09
armed civil war in Lebanon. And you
04:13
know, this is very easy for Americans
04:15
to be talking like this because they
04:18
have no uh they're not Lebanese. They
04:22
have no stake in Lebanon. Lebanon is
04:24
just a space on a chessboard for the
04:28
Americans. And for Israel, it's uh
04:30
future territory that they want to
04:32
annex. That's all. So when you hear Tom
04:36
Barack or Trump or anybody from the US
04:38
or from the uh Atlantic uh Council or
04:42
the State Department, what passes for a
04:44
State Department these days in America,
04:46
which is basically an, you know, an
04:48
annex of the Israeli embassy
04:50
effectively,
04:51
uh but when you hear this type of
04:54
rhetoric, um this is just basically the
04:57
US working with Israel pretending to be
05:02
separate parties. the US pretending to
05:04
want to restrain Israel when in fact
05:06
they're an absolute completely perfect
05:09
partnership and they're reading from
05:11
exactly the same page. America Americans
05:14
do not care about Lebanon, Lebanese
05:17
civilians. As far as Americans are
05:19
concerned, Arabs living in South Lebanon
05:23
are a nuisance and they would they would
05:26
like to see them uh moved out. They
05:29
would like to see that area depopulated
05:31
like Gaza. uh and the West Bank and to
05:35
make way for more settlements, more uh
05:38
expansion of Israel. So that's an
05:40
important part of the Greater Israel
05:41
project is the annexation of South
05:44
Lebanon, not just to the Latani River
05:48
because Israel needs the freshwater
05:49
source. They can't be dependent on
05:51
desalinization.
05:53
They need Lebanon's fresh water. So they
05:55
effectively Israel has always coveted
05:59
Leban Lebanese uh fresh water. They want
06:01
to steal it. You know, they want to
06:04
steal that river, that water. Uh just
06:07
like they've stolen the Golden Heights
06:10
just like they are uh planning to steal,
06:13
and this is important, Nemo. Uh
06:17
it's not just the Latani River. Israel
06:19
would like a buffer zone above the
06:22
Latani River. Why? Uh because it's not
06:26
just about what's on land in Lebanon.
06:29
It's what's offshore.
06:31
We're talking about natural gas deposits
06:34
off of Lebanon. The United States
06:37
through its various agents and financial
06:39
institutions and by creating a lot of
06:42
sectarian division and arguments among
06:44
Lebanese billionaires
06:46
uh Lebanon has not been able to exploit
06:49
its natural natural gas deposits uh off
06:53
the coast of of the Levant. Um, hence
06:57
while the billionaires are arguing over
06:59
who's going to get it, it's not being
07:01
properly exploited. Lebanon continues to
07:04
be a sort of defunct economy,
07:06
dysfunctional economy, uh, with a
07:09
currency in freef fall. It's, you know,
07:10
a complete disaster. That's all by
07:12
design because Israel has always wanted
07:15
to maintain that as as a non-performing
07:20
energy asset of of Lebanon to buy time.
07:25
So where whereby they could get into
07:26
position to take it and now they're very
07:29
close to to getting it. And that's the
07:31
main that's one of the main prizes in
07:33
all of this besides fresh water and also
07:37
to to steal the ag the uh very very
07:41
fertile agricultural land in the south
07:44
in much the same way that the Israelis
07:46
have already stolen uh and occupi
07:48
illegally occupied the sheba farms.
07:51
That's Lebanese territory as well. And
07:54
so that's very profitable, fertile
07:56
agricultural land which is Israel is
07:58
seeking to take and then to eventually
08:01
export product uh from there. And if you
08:04
look at what Israel does whenever it
08:06
steals territory, uh it very quickly
08:08
goes to uh develop the economic assets
08:12
of the lands that it steals and then it
08:15
will want to make that a performing uh
08:17
economic asset. And that just further
08:20
sort of in their mind justifies the fact
08:22
that they're there, they're going to
08:24
occupy it illegally and they're going to
08:25
take it. And they say, well, you know,
08:27
the the people who were here before, the
08:29
Palestinians or whoever, they weren't
08:31
doing anything with this land, so we
08:33
just took it and now it's now it's it's
08:35
profitable. Now it's developed and it's
08:37
because of us, the Israelis. So they
08:40
will if if they're allowed to, they will
08:42
continue this pattern of behavior
08:47
uh into Lebanon onshore and offshore.
08:51
That's the first thing. So they and they
08:54
they've cloaked this under the uh the
08:56
idea of security. Okay. And and then one
08:59
of the big sort of frauds in all of this
09:02
unfortunately and and really this is at
09:04
the core of a lot of the problems in the
09:06
region um and the big enabler of Israel
09:09
is to label everybody a terrorist.
09:13
anybody that is opposing their uh
09:16
aggression, their occupation and and
09:19
remember Nema uh Israel has throughout
09:23
all of this and years prior to October
09:27
7th, Israel has always uh maintained
09:30
possession illegally of Lebanese
09:33
territory. They never fully withdrew
09:36
from South Lebanon. They still maintain
09:38
illegally occupied pieces of land in
09:42
South Lebanon. Okay, that is why
09:44
Hezbollah exists from the beginning.
09:47
Hezbollah as a uh political movement as
09:50
a indigenous organic militia uh defense
09:54
militia, armed liberation struggle uh
09:58
opposing an illegal occupation of their
10:01
land. by definition under international
10:03
law and the UN charter that's the
10:05
classification of Hezbollah. Uh and that
10:08
goes for Palestinian resistance as well.
10:11
Okay, that's that is why they have a
10:14
mandate to do what they're doing. And so
10:16
it's it's about defending the border
10:18
because the Lebanese army, what they
10:20
call the Lebanese army, bless them, but
10:24
they're just they're they're just a
10:26
jumped up uh security force, domestic
10:30
security force.
10:32
the the Americans because of and and
10:35
this is coming from Israel. One of the
10:38
important roles of the Israeli lobby in
10:41
America is to make sure that pressure is
10:45
placed on Washington
10:48
to to to dictate terms
10:52
for the Lebanese military. Okay? What
10:55
they can and what they cannot purchase
10:58
as a military. Okay? And Israel has
11:02
insisted that Washington impose
11:04
restrictions on the Lebanese military.
11:07
So they cannot have any air defense
11:09
forbidden by the Americans. So they
11:12
cannot have an air force forbidden by
11:15
the Americans. It's that's kind of
11:18
ridiculous if you think about it, but
11:20
that's the that is the actual state of
11:23
play in Lebanon because Israel
11:27
needed to have full occupation uh
11:31
occupational control over Lebanese
11:32
airspace for for the last few decades.
11:35
One of the important reasons for that is
11:38
Israel wanted to have access to Lebanese
11:42
airspace in order to send its IDF uh
11:46
jets into Lebanese airspace to fire uh
11:49
missiles on Syria.
11:52
Okay. For 15 years and to do it with
11:55
total impunity. And if Lebanon had air
11:58
defense or any ability to police their
12:01
own airspace, Israel would not have been
12:04
able to basically act as uh the moderate
12:09
rebel or al-Qaeda air their air force of
12:11
al-Qaeda and the moderate rebels in
12:13
Syria from 2011 forward until until
12:16
al-Qaeda took control of Damascus with
12:20
uh Muhammad uh Al Galani, al-Shar as
12:26
he's called now Akmed Al- Shar. So Abu
12:28
Muhammad Al Jalani Akmed Al- Shar I
12:31
think I got the right
12:32
>> right.
12:33
>> Yeah. So the the the former deputy to
12:37
Abu Baku Abaghdaddy an ISIS and the
12:40
founder of al-Qaeda Syria who Donald
12:42
Trump has lauded and invited to the
12:44
White House and sprays perfume on him
12:46
and does selfies. That's a head chopping
12:48
al-Qaeda leader. Okay. He benefited from
12:52
Israel's air support. Okay. he and all
12:55
the other terrorists backed by the
12:57
United States, backed by Israel, trained
13:00
and uh backed by Jordan, backed by
13:03
Turkey, backed by France, backed by the
13:05
Netherlands, backed by the UK,
13:08
backed by Germany,
13:10
backed by, you know, pretty much NATO
13:12
full stop. Backed by Saudi Arabia,
13:14
backed by Qatar, backed by the UAE,
13:18
backed by Kuwait. Okay. So, Lebanon's
13:21
very important because that allowed for
13:25
constant and very safe deployment of uh
13:29
air missiles and munitions and so forth,
13:32
hitting targets constantly in Syria.
13:34
That that ultimately led to it being a
13:37
failed state,
13:39
hitting infrastructure, claiming that
13:41
they were targeting Hezbollah. So, that
13:45
that's very important. So it's very easy
13:47
to create thisi civil war situation in
13:50
Lebanon. It's very very easy for the
13:52
United States and Israel to engine try
13:53
to engineer this. Okay. Uh and but the
13:58
but the the fact remains the Lebanese
14:00
army uh they're not equipped to fight
14:03
Hezbollah. They won't I don't believe
14:05
they can credibly do that. Uh it would
14:08
lead to a sectarian civil war in
14:11
Lebanon. you know, after the country has
14:13
recovered from, you know, decades of
14:16
western and Israeli imposed civil war,
14:19
which the first Lebanese civil war was
14:22
characterized in such a way that even
14:23
Leban Lebanese were brainwashed to think
14:26
that it was between factions within
14:28
Lebanon. So they're constantly uh
14:31
suspicious uh t taking sides uh partisan
14:37
uh sectarian mentality that developed in
14:40
that country where it's very clear when
14:43
you look at the history and you step
14:44
back that was a that was a foreign it
14:47
wasn't a civil war it was a foreign war
14:50
uh Lebanese was used as the battle space
14:53
for it okay that was really in many ways
14:57
uh a war between Syria and Israel as
15:02
much as anything. Uh and le Lebanon was
15:05
the battle pitch for that. And it was
15:07
the United States uh working either
15:09
behind the scenes in the front of house
15:13
during the Reagan administration and
15:14
then later behind the scenes with USAD
15:16
money uh the CIA working behind the
15:20
scenes. to to uh to to maintain this
15:23
level of instability and dysfunction in
15:26
that country.
15:28
And so here we are in 2026. uh America,
15:33
the neocons, uh the wararmongering party
15:36
led by Donald Trump and Netanyahu in
15:39
Israel, they believe they're very close
15:41
to achieving their ultimate goal, uh
15:44
which is to wipe out any disscent, any
15:46
resistance, uh in the Levant. Uh and so
15:51
the the the problem is that it it's
15:54
probably not going to be practical. It's
15:57
not going to work. And you know to the
15:59
idea that you could get a Lebanese
16:02
government to say that they wish no harm
16:05
on Israel after Israel's been massacring
16:07
Lebanese civilians. Massacring
16:10
people in Beirut, people in Tyer, people
16:13
in right across Nabatia, right across
16:16
the entirety of the south. It's just
16:18
it's laughable and it's such a betrayal
16:22
of the Lebanese people by this puppet
16:24
this US American and Israeli puppet
16:27
government in and it's the sha shameless
16:30
to the any Lebanese official would
16:34
read such a statement but you can tell
16:37
it was drafted in Washington. It's very
16:39
clear this is uh it's a very um
16:44
uh the arrogance in that statement. This
16:48
it's a it's it's a foreign drafted
16:51
statement probably more like drafted in
16:54
in Tel Aviv, rubber stamped in
16:56
Washington and then handed to the le the
16:59
Lebanese president and prime minister
17:00
and they'll stick it on their desk and
17:02
say read that read that and that's that.
17:06
So realistically, it's almost impossible
17:09
for them to implement this. Besides the
17:12
fact that, you know, Israel's just been
17:14
bomb bombing with imp impunity, they're
17:17
now bombing the UNESCO World Heritage
17:21
Protected site, the city of Ty.
17:25
There's so many different civilizations
17:27
layed on top of each other in Ty. It's a
17:29
wonderful and amazing piece of history.
17:32
And Israel has no qualms, nor does the
17:35
United States, about leveling that city,
17:38
turning it into a pile of rubble and
17:40
then getting Jared Kushner or whoever to
17:42
build some new uh high-rise towers there
17:45
and say there's going to be a resort
17:47
there. They they have no problem with
17:48
that at all. Uh Alexander the Great,
17:52
Egyptian, Bisantine,
17:54
uh Roman, uh
17:57
further a field going back. Uh it
18:00
there's so much history entire and then
18:02
the excuse that Israel says is well
18:05
there's Hezbollah hiding in the
18:06
Christian area so we're going to flatten
18:09
and kill you know an 80 80% civilian 20%
18:12
combatant that uh kill kill ratio
18:16
casualty ratio so many civilians will
18:19
die but it's not just that it's about uh
18:22
destroying the the dwellings. There's
18:24
also a major Palestinian refugee camp
18:27
still in Ty. I don't know how many
18:29
people are. It's very densely packed. I
18:31
I've been to Ty many times. I know it
18:34
very well. Very densely packed. 20 200
18:38
plus thousand people in that very very
18:41
small Palestinian refugee camp. So,
18:44
Israel will use these as excuses as they
18:46
have done for forever. They're just this
18:49
is constantly this is during the
18:51
Lebanese civil war in the 80s. uh in 90s
18:55
the whole basis of Israeli involvement
18:57
was that they were uh taking out
18:59
Palestinian terrorists in Lebanon and
19:02
now it's Hezbollah. Same exact excuse.
19:05
Hezbollah would not exist if not for
19:08
Israel's illegal and brutal occupation
19:10
of South Lebanon. Full stop. And and
19:13
Hezbollah is not a proxy of Iran. That
19:17
is a fake talking point that keeps being
19:19
pushed adnauseium by the United States.
19:23
Okay. They're not they're they're
19:25
absolutely from South Lebanon. There's
19:27
no question about that. And they don't
19:28
have an expeditionary terrorist
19:31
uh branch. Okay. It's not al-Qaeda or
19:34
ISIS,
19:36
whatever you believe those organizations
19:38
actually are, but it's nothing like
19:41
that. But that's how it's been
19:42
classified legally and prescribed by the
19:46
United States, uh, Israel, Brussels, UK,
19:50
Germany, France, and a few other
19:52
European countries, Canada, and the US.
19:55
And that's it. So, and that gives you
19:58
basically cart blanch to carpet bomb
20:01
anywhere where you suspect that these
20:03
so-called terrorists will be, including,
20:05
look at Gaza. That's the whole basis of
20:08
the genocide in Gaza. It was it was a
20:10
war on terror. That was the banner that
20:14
Israel perpetrated this genocide
20:17
underneath.
20:19
Simple. So it's the same this this is
20:21
the source of so many problems in the
20:24
region. It it's it's the prescription
20:28
and the labeling gives the perpetrators,
20:31
the state actors the license to to uh
20:36
enact state terror policies of total
20:39
annihilation in the war on terror in
20:43
according to their legal justification.
20:47
And that creates the instability, it
20:50
creates the crisis, it creates the wars.
20:52
It's the same reason that the US and
20:55
Israel are have been attacking Iran.
20:57
They're claiming that Iran is a
20:59
terrorist state, that they're funding
21:01
terrorism and so forth. Okay? So, but
21:04
but the bottom line is if you if you
21:06
strip back all of these labels, anybody
21:09
who's resisting the US or Israeli
21:13
aggression or occupation will at some
21:16
point be labeled a terrorist by the
21:19
legal system in the West and by Israel,
21:22
of course. And that's just a constant
21:25
pattern that keeps repeating itself over
21:27
the last, you know, 50 or 60 years.
21:32
…
—————
Investigative historian Eric Zuesse’s latest book, AMERICA’S EMPIRE OF EVIL: Hitler’s Posthumous Victory, and Why the Social Sciences Need to Change, is about how America took over the world after World War II in order to enslave it to U.S.-and-allied billionaires. Their cartels extract the world’s wealth by control of not only their ‘news’ media but the social ‘sciences’ — duping the public.
