Episode description
Chief of staff to U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell from 2001-2005, retired Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson talks frankly about the "special relationship" between the United States and Israel. Fear and intimidation lead the United States to ignore or condone human rights violations by Israel, even when U.S. lives are involved. Wilkerson discusses the parallels between the killing of U.S. peace activist Rachel Corrie 20 years ago by an Israeli soldier and Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh's death in 2022 in what many believe was an Israeli extra-judicial murder and says securing accountability for Abu Akleh's death is no more likely now than it has been for Rachel Corrie's family, whom he tried to assist when in the State Department. The wide-ranging conversation includes a discussion of the many factors in the U.S. invasion of Iraq, including Israel, and the misdeeds and crimes of the CIA.