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https://ericzuesse.substack.com/p/former-government-insider-proved  

https://theduran.com/former-government-insider-proved-u-s-a-dictatorship  

Former Government insider proved U.S. a dictatorship while calling it a democracy.

24 October 2026, posted by Eric Zuesse. (All of my recent articles can be seen here.)

https://www.aljazeera.com/video/centre-stage/2026/1/22/aje-onl-cs-josh_paul-220126

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0S2w7VYLhRU 

“Former government insider takes aim at US’s policy on Israel”

AlJazeera, 22 January 2026

0:00

Introduction

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It is US weaponry, US financing, US diplomatic cover on the global stage that has enabled and that continues to enable Israel to conduct these operations uh and to do so without any fear of accountability.

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Genocide accusations

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Taking center stage today is Josh Paul. For over a decade, he worked as Director of Congressional and Public Affairs in the US Bureau of Political Military Affairs. It's a role within the State Department involving the approval of major arms transfers and sales. In 2023,

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Paul resigned from his position in protest over the US's role in enabling Israel's war on Gaza. Since leaving, he has gone on to co-found a new policy, a lobbying and political organization driving change to US policy towards Palestine and Israel. Paul joins us to

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discuss his resignation, if Washington has learned anything or if the US is doomed to repeat its mistakes. Josh Paul, welcome to Center Stage. >> Thank you very much for having me. >> So, let's start with this. On September 15, 2025, a UN commission determined

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that Israel is committing a genocide in Gaza. The commission alludes to the role of the US when it says the transfer of arms and equipment could amount to aiding in the commission of a genocide and failure to stop it amounts to complicity. What do you think is the significance of

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International perspective

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this finding? So I think first of all it is stating what I think has been obvious for a very long time that Israel's actions in Gaza constitute war crimes now to the point of genocide just as its actions for many years in the West Bank have constituted apartheid and ethnic cleansing.

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I think it also again confirms that there is a US responsibility here. Uh it is US weaponry, US financing, US diplomatic cover on the global stage that has enabled and that continues to enable Israel to conduct these operations uh and to do so without any fear of accountability

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uh without any challenge to its ability to operate uh and to continue to execute these operations that are doing so much harm. So I think these findings coming from the United Nations Commission of Inquiry are certainly significant uh and will weigh on other countries around the

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world as they consider their legal responsibilities under the genocide convention. I don't know unfortunately that they will change all that much immediately in America. >> It has to be said the US and Israel have swatted away that characterization of what's going on in Gaza.

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We're recording this episode in September 2025. The UN General Assembly has convened in New York. And this year alone, 11 countries have recognized Palestinian statethood. There are now 157 UN member states, that's 81% of the General Assembly, that recognize

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Palestinian statethood, but the US does not. Will this make an impact? Well, not only does the US not yet recognize Palestinian statethood, but of course, we heard President Trump in his speech to the UN echo Israel's talking point that recognition of Palestine is a

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reward to Hamas. Self-determination is a right under the UN charter. Self-determination of all peoples is a right, not a reward. And the Palestinian

3:44

US policy vs public opinion

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people deserve it as much as any other people on this planet. whether this shift in America's allies in particular some of its closest allies the UK Australia Canada uh drives any sort of change in America I think the answer is probably not uh and that is because the

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problem we have here in America is ultimately not a policy problem it is a political problem there are plenty of experts within the US government and of course plenty of people across America who can see that the path we are on is wrong is harmful not only to the

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Palestinians but also to our own interests around the world. Uh and yet there are political obstacles that prevent us from saying what is obvious and from changing our course. And until those shift, I'm afraid we're stuck. It definitely doesn't seem to be a

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perception problem because a recent Gallup report showed it was a poll showed that 32% of Americans only 32% support Israel's military actions in Gaza. If there is such underwhelming

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Political obstacles

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support among the American populace, why hasn't that translated to a shift in policy on Capitol Hill? It's 50% now who recognize that what Israel is doing is a genocide. And it's over 60% across all voters, Republicans and Democrats, who think the US should be stopping its

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lethal military support to Israel. The problem we have is that that popular perception and the mobilizations we've seen on the streets of America, across the campuses of our colleges and universities, is not translating into political change. And that's because in

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great part the American political system is not really set up to listen to the voice of the American people. And what is happening in the context of Palestine actually has reverberations that go far beyond that and implications for the functionality of OUR DEMOCRACY, because

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what it shows is that essentially the views of the American people matter less than the incentive structures for our politicians. Does speaking up, does being critical of Israel get you elected or does it make you lose your seat? Does it bring you funding for your campaign

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or does it bring a candidate to run against you with more funding than you have? Now, that's beginning to change. Uh we saw in the last election Kamala Harris lose in significant part because she was unwilling to shift on Gaza. So

6:12

Driving political change

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what do you see as being something that could shift the the policy? We had mass protests across the US on college campuses. There has been an outpouring of awareness about what's happening in Gaza as people see images of starvation and uh mass death. More than 65,000

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people, Palestinians killed um in Gaza. So there is awareness. Where do we get from awareness and sympathy towards what's happening to the Palestinians to action by the US government? >> So I think ultimately this comes down to political incentives and I think there

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are three that really matter. Uh the first and the most important one would hope uh is votes. uh whether Americans are willing to come to the ballot box and make this a single issue, make this the defining issue on which they will support an incumbent or oppose them.

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Another matter here in our system unfortunately is money. Uh are the resources there behind candidates who are willing to speak up uh to call what is happening in genocide to push for a change in American policy or are the resources stacked against them? Um both

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of those are things that my new organization a new policy is working to address. The third aspect frankly is also uh public opinion and the Overton window the the notion of what is acceptable to say and that we do see shifting and shifting significantly. Uh

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we see now over 20 members of Congress calling Israel's actions genocide. Uh we see members increasingly willing to speak up to call for uh suspensions of lethal arms transfers. We have seen former Biden administration officials, senior officials uh who could have made

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these decisions when they were in office now at least finally saying this is the time to use the leverage we have through arms transfers, which of course is something that I've been arguing since the day I resigned and before. So

8:15

Military aid impact

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available data shows that between 2023 and 2024, the US gave Israel almost $23 billion in direct and indirect military aid. You are perfectly poised to answer this question. What is this money being used for? And are there any restrictions on how Israel can use this money?

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>> So the majority of this money is being used directly to finance arms. the fighter jets that are dropping bombs on Gaza, the bombs themselves, um the firearms, other weaponry. Um some of this money is also being used for America's own operations. And this is

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one of the problems here, right, is that Israel's operations, not only in Gaza, but across the Middle East, increase the chances of conflict, destabilize the region, and pull the US repeatedly into situations where we have to redeploy our forces from the homeland or from the

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Indo-Pacific back to the Middle East. And this costs billions of dollars. We're putting our forces in harm's way for a conflict that we are not a part of. 

9:23

And I think a lot of people feel there's a disconnect between this amount of money. Israel is the largest

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beneficiary of American military aid. It's a country of 9 million and there is no formal army among the Palestinians that it's facing. How do you sort of reconcile that? >> Well, not only is that the case, but Israel also has a pretty successful economy. In fact, they operate operate a

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trade deficit with the United States uh in which we spend more with them than they spend with us. Uh this is something that President Trump in particular has been very focused on and yet we continue to finance their military allowing them to finance for example uh free education

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and healthcare for all of their citizens. 

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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.