While I had intended to follow up on my previous editorial, “Ukraine: Self-Destruction Par Excellence,” by discussing how Israel, too, appears caught in self-destruction, recent events have shifted my focus. I found myself instead drawn to the ramifications of the so-called “Tatar Attack” launched by the Israeli Air Force on Doha, targeting mediation meetings between Hamas leaders and Qatari officials working toward a potential ceasefire agreement. Despite conflicting statements regarding the results of the attack, its circumstances and what they reveal about the true role of the American administration were the focus of a rich dialogue on the 10 September episode of Judging Freedom, between Judge Andrew Napolitano and renown American economist and public policy analyst, Columbia University Professor Jeffrey Sachs. Following are excerpts from the interview.
Judge Napolitano: Before we get to Israeli blackmail of Washington, how significant have the week’s meetings been for the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the Eastern Economic Forum and BRICS? How profound is that economic gathering thumbming its nose at the West?
“Basically, we should understand that the United States now is about 14 per cent of the world economy… China at this point is about 19 per cent. It’s a larger economy. Not shocking because China has more than four times the US population. So when the BRICS get together, this means China, India, Brazil, Russia, South Africa and a number of other countries not quite so large, we’re talking about more than 40 per cent of the world GDP, a grouping that is larger than the so-called G7 countries, which are the countries in the US alliance: the US, Canada, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, and Japan… And Donald Trump sits there giving his orders to each of these countries, and they look and say: ‘Well, he’s not our boss. He’s not our emperor’… Now the US is making demands of more populous larger economies, demands that are absolutely weird and arbitrary and hypocritical one after the other. It’s just not playing well and it’s not strengthening America. It’s not getting other countries to bend to our will. It is accelerating their view that the US is an unstable, rude, intemperate, unreliable, untrustworthy place. Maybe we should get together ourselves and have a calmer, more stable relationship among ourselves.”
I guess the timing of the 50 per cent tariffs on India from the western perspective couldn’t have been worse.
“Trump told the Europeans you should put 100 per cent tariffs on India and China because they’re importing oil from Russia. So more demands on the rest of the world, which of course all of them completely brushed aside, but which just makes the US even more absurd in the eyes of these other countries. And with instability rising throughout Europe, we should get our house under control.”
What is your take on yesterday’s Israeli and US supported attack on Doha?
“Illegal, reckless, profoundly destabilising. Again, this is just like the attack on
Iran a few weeks ago where the attack was to kill the negotiators of ongoing negotiations. Honestly, Israel can yell Hamas all it wants. Who they tried to kill yesterday were the people negotiating the ceasefire. Israel doesn’t want a ceasefire, it wants to kill as many Palestinians as it can or ethnically cleanse them or crush them one way or another. It doesn’t want a ceasefire. That’s why they bombed Doha, tried to kill the negotiators, and ordered their troops into Gaza City all on the same day with hundreds of thousands of Palestinians clinging to their lives right now facing another onslaught. This is a murder machine. This is not a State of law. And by the way, Trump said he didn’t even know about it for something that’s been prepared obviously for many, many weeks. And it’s quite possible he doesn’t know about it because it’s quite possible that he’s basically the figurehead and that the Mossad and the CIA certainly knew about it. But maybe they didn’t happen to mention it to the President until the last moment. This is absolutely possible in our system.”
Why is it that the Doha radar and air defences were down when the Israelis attacked? Aren’t the radar and air defences for Doha operated by the enormous US military base right outside of Doha?
“Wouldn’t that be nice to know how that happened? Again, Donald Trump may well have been the last to know. It’s possible, I don’t doubt it, but the United States government surely knew Israel was not flying all that way without the US security apparatus absolutely knowing what was happening. Period.”
Well, we know that the Royal Air Force jets refuelled the Israeli jets midair. If the RAF was involved, MI6 was involved. If MI6 was involved, CIA was involved. It doesn’t take very much to connect these dots.
“Of course. This is the most important point. We are not run as a democracy. Donald Trump may be in no more position to do much about this than we are. This is Mossad, which is a global killing machine… Even Donald Trump who was disappointed and found out at the last moment and made the call by the way supposedly to warn the Qatar side as the bombs were actually dropping. Talk about a figurehead. That’s a figurehead.”
Who would negotiate with the Israelis ever again? And who would accept an American lure into a negotiation ever again?
“The Gulf Cooperation Council should absolutely end the diplomatic relations with Israel, end the Abraham Accords, and not only because of yesterday’s attack, but because of an ongoing genocide in Palestine… The Arab League, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, the SEO, the BRICS, the African Union and the UN General Assembly all have to say to the United States this is absolutely untenable, it’s illegal. It is in war crimes, it is in gross violation of the will of the world. They might mention that is gross violation of the will of the American people and it is leading the world to disaster.”
In line with the expert perspectives that I have presented regarding the circumstances surrounding the Israeli attack on Doha, I am presenting the remarks made by one of US’s most prominent analysts, former US Marine Corps intelligence officer, and former UN Special Commission weapons inspector, Scott Ritter, during an interview with Lebanese-Australian entrepreneur, business influencer, citizen journalist, Podcast-host, political commentator, Mario Nawfal. To a question asked by Mr Nawfal on why would the US be involved in the attack on Qatar when it stands to lose Qatar as an ally and the support of other Arab countries, Mr Ritter replied: “With all due respect, Qatar is not an ally because America doesn’t have allies. Qatar is a subject nation. Qatar understands that if they piss off the United States, excuse my language, we terminate their existence. I mean, this is the reality of how the entire Middle East relates to us. That anybody who is our ally isn’t our ally because we will betray them, and we have betrayed them. But they don’t have the ability to walk away from this. They are so deeply embedded in the United States, financially, security wise. Qatar is not an ally. If an ally, we wouldn’t do this to an ally. The United States is an ally to nobody. And this should be the lesson the world needs to gather from this. When you deal with the United States, the United States only uses you as a tool… They think they bought America, Trump’s loyalty by giving them a Boeing 747 and treating them like royalty. Look how he treated them… I’d like to believe that we have the ability to be friends and allies with people, but not now. Nobody can trust us. We simply cannot be trusted anymore.”
Watani International
28 September 2025
