Benjamin Hall spent the majority of his career in the war zone. He's Fox News senior correspondent, author of that brand new book, Read All About It.
So, did you have a chance to see the briefing? I did. Yeah, I watched it.
So, a lot of stats thrown out, a lot of optimism. I think one of the things that stood out to me is. Uh That their ability to launch missiles is down 86%. And one way attack drone attacks are down seventy three percent. We're in day five.
Yes, and I think that the big question is not how many missiles, it's how the U. S. can destroy their launchers. And apparently, they are just watching from the skies. And every time they fire off one missile, Uh the infrared picks it up and the that launcher is destroyed.
almost straight away. I mean, they are watching every time one sets off.
So look, we're seeing Iran fire a lot less. My only word of caution is, is Iran trying to play a longer game? Are they holding back a bit because they know they are being hit so quickly? I'm not sure we know that yet. But certainly the stats look good.
A couple of things. The sad though the way I think Iran says is: well, America doesn't have limitless munitions, and we see the divide at home. If we give them any type of casualties or any type of stress and this starts being very costly and the water and energy starts going up, America will buckle and they'll get bored and they'll move on. Exactly. Many of us were asking at the beginning, why on earth would Iran be attacking the Gulf states and Qatar and Saudi Arabia when those countries had initially said we don't want to get involved in this war, perhaps even telling the U.S.
they couldn't.
Well, we think the reason is that Iran felt that America and President Trump were afraid of two things. One is that this would become a much wider regional war, so that's why they're attacking these other countries. They're threatening that. And the other is oil prices.
So they're claiming to shut the Straits of Hormuz. They're not actually shut. And the oil prices are rising. But President Trump is saying just yesterday, yes, they're rising a little bit now, but they're down a lot from Biden, for example. And they will be even lower once this is over.
So neither of those two threats that Iran has put on President Trump are working. And in fact, I think they have backfired on Iran because many of these countries now want to join in with the U.S. They are getting actively involved and Iran is ever further on the back foot. Do you know they hit Turkey today? And Turkey was the one particular Potential ally in the area that was not saying things condemning Iran and was saying, We got to stop these hostilities.
Today they hit Turkey.
Well, it's interesting to hear, and I think that they shot NATO, we're not sure which country, NATO forces shot down that ballistic missile before it hit Turkey. But there was an interesting question about whether Article 5 would be triggered if a NATO country was hit by Iran. Yes. You forget Turkey's a member of NATO. It is, absolutely.
But so again, I just think this is Iran lashing out and trying to escalate this war. And the other question is: who is making those decisions? Where is the command structure in Iran? You know, they talk about this mosaic.
So I don't think that it is one leader anymore. I think the different groups now have their own free will to fire as they wish, because if they talk, they are tracked by the U.S. and then they are targeted. Right. And you saw the apology come out from the foreign minister when they hit Oman.
So, okay, they said, well, the communication wasn't clear. I want you to hear Senator Jean Shaheen. She's somebody who's been critical. In the past, but I also want you to hear what some Democrats have been saying about all this. They're playing politics.
Here's an example of Hakeem Jeffries. I think this is so out of bounds. Also, Hakeem Jeffries was challenged. He was challenged on the fact that you're against this action, but you had nothing to say, or Democrats had nothing to say, when Barack Obama went into Libya, Cut 38. Back in 2011, Nancy Pelosi said that then President Obama didn't need congressional approval to bomb Libya.
Now House Democrats say President Trump needs that approval to bomb Iran. What's the difference?
Well, obviously, Libya and the circumstances connected to that were very different than the circumstance that we face in Iran right now. I mean, I don't even understand the genesis or basis of that question. Not suggesting that you're not asking it in good faith. Libya went on. As I've indicated, First of all, was not in Congress.
at the time.
So we're dealing with what we're dealing with right now. which is a catastrophic endless war as Donald Trump has characterized it. He characterized it as an endless war? Yeah, and there's a clip of Nancy Pelosi back then being asked, so does President Obama not need to get approval? And she very clearly just says, that's right, that's what I'm saying.
And so how the tables have turned. But Hakeem Jeffries also said earlier, our failure. Madam Leader, you're saying that the President did not need authorization initially and still does not need any authorization from Congress, one Libya. Yes. How can a politician just do such a U-turn for politics when there are lives involved, when the military is out there fighting, when you are ridding the world of this regime, and for the sake of politics, they just want to take a totally different line to the one that they embrace themselves?
I was talking to Senator Tom Brasso. I said, behind the scenes, before he went on the air, so behind the scenes, were Democrats outraged in the meeting when they were being briefed by the CIA director, the Secretary of War, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Secretary of State? He goes, no. They had good questions, we had good questions, it was fine. And I go, what do you think when they went out to the microphones?
He goes, it's just pure politics. Humor coming out saying we don't have any answers. What answers do you need? And this has been a persistent problem. Yeah, and I think also Hakeem Jeffery is saying a war which is absolutely going to end in failure.
But that's such a strange thing to say because failure for what? If the objective here is to demolish the missiles and the nuclear facilities Iran has, that is exactly what's happening. We're seeing it day by day. And so to call this a failure when everything at this point is going to plan and going faster than we expected is again pure politics because the objectives are being met. Doesn't mean there aren't questions about what comes next.
And I think we're still looking to that. But right now, the US has shown immense military ability, working hand in hand with Israel to defeat the threat to the region, to our allies and to everything else. And so for politicians to come out and say it is already a failure Is politics alone? I know, by the way, we have Benjamin Hall here. Ben, first off, I was watching some Minister reporting this morning.
And they were saying so far on the streets it's still locked down. That regime is very much in charge. Besiege is walking up and down streets, making sure people aren't even texting negative things about the Ayatollah or the government. We're celebrating. Yeah, it's a big question what comes next.
And I know the regime has sent out text messages to every phone in Iran saying if you come onto the streets, you will be basically killed. We will attack this as if you are the worst threat to the country.
So the people in Iran are staying inside right now. The question is when can they rise up? What happens? To what degree does the regime have to be bombed before and weakened until they can rise up? You mentioned the besieged militia there.
I think it's important to point out that these are the guys you often see on motorbikes going around really at the forefront of killing the protesters, the 30 plus thousand who were killed. It's the besieged militia. And we haven't seen many of them hit yet. And I wonder if that's the next phase for the US and for the Israelis. You've got to hit the internal police force.
You know, as we heard in the briefing earlier, so far, They have had to gain air superiority, certainly in the south, moving inwards. Once they've got that, I think then they might focus on the domestic issues with Assyria in Iran. For now, it's been about stopping the attacks. Right, I think the next phase is to get the next level of leaders. And also, when the Grand Ayatollah becomes the new Grand Ayatollah, the son of the dead Ayatollah, I'm sure he's going to be targeted too.
Yesterday, they saw they took out a meeting that was looking to replace the Grand Ayatollah. They took out everybody in that building. Yeah, and it's interesting because the son of the Ayatollah, many people had talked of him being a successor even before this war began, but everyone had discounted it because he's known to be very, very corrupt. He's close to the IRGC. He doesn't have many followers inside Iran.
And it just looks like nepotism to put the sun in place.
So the fact that they have picked him is interesting. And it does mean that many people, even inside Iran and regime supporters, won't support him. But I think they wanted to convey the sense that the Ayatollah's dream continues. Everything the Ayatollah lived for will continue. But I don't think it's a good long-term plan for the regime itself picking this guy.
They say they got at most 15% approval with a country of 91 million. That's a lot of enemies. I'm not sure who wants that role right now. They said they all want to be martyrs.
So, for that sake, they put themselves up and they'll probably lose their lives. All right, so here's Dave Ignatius, as you know, a Washington Post reporter who really knows this region. Cut 27. Several sources that I talked to, who were very much in the middle of this, say there is no evidence yet of regime fragmentation. That's what you look for if you're thinking about regime change.
You look for fissures at the top of the regime that suggest that you can pull people away into something different. To quote again, one of my sources. The regime is a fabric. Trump. as yet to unravel that weave.
I thought that was a very clear statement of how Iran, despite all the pounding they're taking, still remains integrated at the top.
Well, they don't know if there's anywhere to go. The President says he's getting a lot of calls from people who are looking for amnesty. I don't know if that could be. Yeah, but we also keep forgetting, and again, the Secretary of War said decided, we are four days into this. This has just begun right now.
But yes, I do think that for the best and most efficient way for the regime to fall, you do need someone turning against the regime. You do need some kind of one of the groups moving against them. In 1979, it was the Air Force who were the people who rose up against the Shah and finally said, we're no longer with the Shah, and that created the cracks you need.
So, you know, we will be looking for which group inside Iran now, even if it begins with a localized police force, one group to start saying we are against them, that's where the cracks begin to fall. I want to get your take on the UK, because that's where you're stationed. And the President said this is not the period of Churchill, couldn't be more disappointed. Stormer, who's not going to do anything, and there's taking four days now to get a ship ready to go over and help people in Crete. But I saw this one woman.
Video column basically about how she sees things in Britain right now. And here it is, cut 32. It horrifies me to read that. And Jake is right, our amazing armed forces deserve all the credibility. They deserve good resources.
They deserve to have our full support. They deserve to be protected for crying out loud. We were exposed out there. We knew that there was going to be war in that region and we have left them undefended. And now France and Greece are having to run to our rescue.
Do you know what? I've got a message, not just for this Prime Minister, but all of you. All of you for the past 20 years. You have been self-indulgent. You have been naive.
Your policy principles have had totally the wrong priorities. It's been about keeping your seats, gaining your seats, pandering to communities who will never vote for you, who do not have our interests at heart. You didn't stop those pro-Palestine marches. You didn't prescribe the Muslim Brotherhood. You didn't prescribe the IRGC.
You were weak in support of Israel. You sabotaged our self-sufficiency when it comes to energy production, concreting those oil wells, banning exploratory. Drilling in the North Sea. What on earth do you think you're doing? You're domestic terrorists.
You're sabotaging this nation. You're compromising food security by attacking the farmers.
Well, guess what? When international maritime shipping routes close down, food can no longer reach our island. Everything that this government and, quite frankly, previous governments have been doing for far too long now has been pathetic, it's been weak-willed, it has had its eye off the ball, it has been narcissistic, it's been about looking good in public, and at the same time, you have put Britain in a desperately precarious situation. All right, I just want to give you an idea. Does that echo some of the people you know, Benjamin Hall, the frustration?
You know what? She said something really interesting right there. She's put a finger on it: that all these politicians in the UK are just trying to keep their own political seats. They're pandering. And many of the seats that Keir Starmer and the Labour politicians will be fighting for come from fairly Muslim parts of the country.
Muslim communities. And they know that if you go against Israel, if you don't support this war, that you will win those votes. But if you do support this war, many Labour MPs are going to lose their seats. And in fact, we just saw a by-election a few weeks ago in which the Green Party ran because they released their campaigning in Arabic. Are you kidding?
Yeah. Not all of it, but they were releasing Arabic policies for these people because that's how many of them win their votes in some parts, some parts. Obviously, not all of the UK, but in some parts. And so, yes, it is purely political. Kier Starmer is on the back foot right now.
Peter Mandelson, you have all these other issues, which means he may well be out of his Epstein files. Epstein files, exactly, out of 10 Downing Street at some point. And then the weakness that they've shown in the Middle East right now. And finally, the UK is getting involved because Iran attacked our air base in Cyprus. And so finally, we're on board.
And yet, for the UK to stand up and say we will not allow our bases like Diego Garcia to be used by the US side by side when you're trying to remove this horrible regime, which we've said all along we will. We want to get rid of their missiles. We want to get rid of their nuclear facilities, but we won't help you do it.
Well, now they are helping to a certain degree because they were hit. And so why create this difficulty, this break with the U.S. and President Trump when you were going to join them anyway? It just seems to be so badly played, not just in the UK, but in Europe as well. I mean, looking at Germany, Italy, Spain, not allowing its bases to be used.
America has had to pull its air tankers out of Spanish bases because they won't allow it. These countries need to stand side by side with a country who supports them, who pays for all their military spending in NATO. It's ridiculous. Not anymore. It backs up everything the president said.
If you're not going to spend to 2%, now you can't get them to spend two.
Now the new number is five. With 1.5 being infrastructure, you wouldn't even talk about the energy. You've capped your deep sea wells. You could have energy off your North Sea. And we're buying it from Norway.
He's taking it from exactly the same place. Green maniacs, back in a moment. This is Ainslie Earhart. Thank you for joining me for the 52-episode podcast series, The Life of Jesus. A listening experience that will provide hope, comfort, and understanding of the greatest story ever told.
Listen and follow now at FoxNewsPodcasts.com or wherever you listen to podcasts. Hey, we've got a few more minutes with Benjamin Hall. Benjamin, it's a tough week to bring out your book, but we do want to mention, this is related to war, it's a new children's book, read all about it. And the premise is?
Well, I'll tell you, it's about a little hedgehog. He goes into the forest, he saves the day, is the basic story, but it's based on this little hedgehog that I took with me to all the war zones I covered. And it reminded me of home. And then it was with me. I've got it here, actually.
Can you believe it? It was with me during the attack in Ukraine. It was inside my body armor. And this little hedgehog survived. And it was a few days later when I was just staying, trying to stay alive.
I held on to this little hedgehog, and it gave me the strength I needed. And I finally got to hospital and I had all these facial injuries and I didn't want my children to see them. And so again, it was the hedgehog who sent messages to my daughters instead of me. And so this hedgehog became a really big part of our family. And it sent messages home.
And finally, I got home and I said, you know what, we're going to talk about the hedgehog goes around the world and he saves different things. And in the book, it's about saving the forest. It's about stopping the bear. And the main message compared with what we're seeing in the world right now is, and what I want to tell all children, including my children, is if something isn't going right, if something, someone is going to be going. Doing the wrong thing, you stand up and you stop it.
You don't sit back and not do anything. You have to get involved. And I'm so concerned nowadays, you see people around the world just filming things. They don't get involved, they don't want to get in it, stop people doing anything. That's part of the message of the book is You find a way of Stopping things that are evil.
You get in there and you fix them.
So that's the main message, and it's about journalism, too. His dad is a journalist, and he uses the words to spread it around.
So it's a book about courage, hope, and resilience. And it's one that sounds great. Where do you get it? You can get it in bookstores, you can get it on Amazon anywhere. It's called Read All About It, and it came out yesterday.
All right, Benjamin Hall, thanks so much. I'll talk to you again. You're going to be here for a little while, right? Yeah, a few more days.
Okay, thanks. Brian Kilmichove. Back in a moment.
