Iran's Red Sea Threat Raises Stakes for Trump

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1:13Ben Meiselas:Donald Trump is panicking as Iran has more cards to play. Iran turning its attention to the Red Sea and the Bab al-Mandab straight after Donald Trump yesterday threatened to once again obliterate the Iranian civilization. Donald Trump gave an interview yesterday with state regime media, which calls itself Fox, and Donald Trump threatened to blow up all of the bridges, energy infrastructure, roads, and other infrastructure that Donald Trump believes that is whim he wants to destroy unless Iran decides they want to make a deal with Donald Trump. And Donald Trump says, they're telling me that they want to make a deal.

1:54Ben Meiselas:Iran is saying, we don't want to make a deal at all. And Iran is saying we're turning our attention to the Red Sea, the IRGC, now putting out statements that we will ensure that all shipping traffic, not just in the Strait of Hormuz, but just in general in the region, is shut down so that the United States feels real pain. The IRGC strongly hinting that the Bob El-Mondab Strait in the Red Sea is next, that they're going to shut down the same way the IRGC in Iran controls the Strait of Hormuz right now. The IRGC, of course, allied with the Houthis in Yemen. The Houthis in Yemen previously demonstrated an ability to shut down traffic in the Red Sea, and they've just been waiting for the orders to be activated by Iran and by the IRGC.

2:49Ben Meiselas:Donald Trump held an emergency meeting in the Situation Room last night. They then leaked that meeting to Barack Ravid over at Axios, who posted the following. Trump held a Situation Room meeting Tuesday to discuss a massive offensive in Iran that will be wider in scope than the current strikes around the Strait of Hormuz, three sources with knowledge said. And of course, Barack Ravid is the Trump regime's personal stenographer. He just puts out whatever they want the message to be for that day. And Barack Ravid was saying last night that the sources in the Situation Room meeting are saying the Trump regime is planning, quote, devastating strikes on strategic targets in Iran.

3:36Ben Meiselas:And as I noted, Donald Trump threatened he was going to blow up all the bridges, energy infrastructure, desalinization plants. He used the word desalinization plants. and other civilian infrastructure as well. If you just take a look, though, even what was happening yesterday and some of the massive strikes by the United States in Iran, at least 10 Iranians were killed and more than 15 wounded in a U.S. strike on the Iranian army's 388th mechanized infantry brigade in Bampour in southeastern Iran. And so a lot of these massive strikes that we're seeing by the United States are indeed having lots of casualties, but Iran is also responding very powerfully as well.

4:21Ben Meiselas:Iran has been striking back in Bahrain, in Kuwait, in Jordan, in the United Arab Emirates, and in other surrounding Arab nations. We've been covering those strikes. And of course, the IRGC warning the US and US allies, all energy export routes will be shut down. That includes the Red Sea, the IRGC statement, the enemy must expect the closure of other oil and gas export routes that serve the interests of the Americans and its allies. And one of the things that we've just seen in the past 48 hours as Iran climbs the escalatory ladder, as Trump escalates the attacks on Iran, Iran has been, they've hit what, seven, According to CENTCOM, Iran hit at least seven tankers in and around the Strait of Hormuz in the past seven days and four tankers in the past 48 hours.

5:18Ben Meiselas:And with respect to those four tankers, some of those tankers got pretty far outside of the Strait of Hormuz as well. And Iran has been shifting to using cruise missiles versus drones against these tankers and the cruise missiles harder to avoid, more lethal, more damaging. And that's why we've seen a lot of these tankers, these images of these tankers just kind of sinking in the Persian Gulf. And we have lots of video of Iran striking these very large cargo containers and these very large cargo ships. Now, we've been sharing with you some of the footage of Iran's response. For example, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard set fire and destroyed U.S.

6:03Ben Meiselas:military logistics and support center in Kuwait's Mina Abdullah port, an industrial and refining area in the south of Kuwait. Missile alert sirens in Bahrain, home of the U.S. Navy's fifth fleet, also struck. I'll show you this video right here of the Iranian Shahid drones slamming into US interest in Kuwait. You can see for yourself. Play this clip.

6:40Ben Meiselas:Iran has been releasing videos of the drones, of the ballistic missiles that they've been using. Here's one such video.

7:05Ben Meiselas:And here's another video that Iranian forces released about their launch of retaliatory strikes targeting U.S. bases. Let's play this clip.

7:25Ben Meiselas:here's a photo of a possible Iranian ballistic missile impact on a U.S. base in Jordan as well and I'll share with you this Iranian strike in Jordan you can see the Patriot interceptors really aren't working that well with respect to the strikes coming from Iran here play this clip

7:56Ben Meiselas:You have a map right here of the U.S. military bases targeted by Iran during the past three days as well. Iran's released satellite footage image of ballistic missile strikes of the U.S. base in Qatar, the Al-Udide base. Here we have the Fifth Fleet Base in Bahrain, the Command and Control center, significantly damaged. Here, another command and control center in Ali al-Salam air base in Kuwait, seriously damaged. But you take a look right here, folks, at the satellites and the marine traffic of the Strait of Hormuz, and you'll see there's pretty much zero traffic anywhere other than the Iranian route.

8:38Ben Meiselas:As you know, the U.S. has reimposed the blockade, though, in the Persian Gulf. Iran has then shut down the Strait of Hormuz, and then the U.S. has blockaded Iranian ships. We've seen a few of these ships leave the Iranian side of the Strait of Hormuz, but there's no other shipping leaving at all. Iran has effectively shut it down, and they've demonstrated with cruise missiles, not even using the drones anymore, that they're just going to blow up each ship. I mean, seven ships in seven days, any ship the U.S. Navy tries to escort, Iran is blowing up. Remember what I've been saying now, I've sounded like a broken record when I've been talking about the strategic petroleum reserves, strategic petroleum reserves.

9:18Ben Meiselas:And I've been saying crack spreads, crack spreads, three, two, one crack spreads. And you're probably like, Ben, why have you been saying this for weeks and weeks and weeks? Because I knew how important it is. And so the crack spread price per barrel has now hit$68 per barrel right now, which is like the highest ever. And the crack spread is the difference between the price of crude, which by the way, is going up. And I think in the next 48 hours, we'll probably be close to $90 a barrel, maybe even higher. It's already past 80, but that crack spread is the difference between that and the price at the refineries.

9:57Ben Meiselas:And so now both the price of crude and the, So the crack spreads going up with it and the refinery price are both going up significantly at the same time. Oil crack spreads are going out of control, which is a strong signal of incoming shortages, especially in diesel. And that's precisely one of the things that I've been warning about happening. Now, with all of this taking place, last night, Donald Trump has been posting weird photos of himself at UFC fights, weird photos of himself with Xi Jinping, more weird photos of himself, Xi Jinping, a photo of a statue and he writes clean on it. And, you know, and then he gave that real demented interview with state regime media Fox, where he claims that Iran wants to talk to him.

10:46Ben Meiselas:They're trying to make a deal with him, just completely and utter lies and just totally deranged. Here play this clip. Three days ago, we had a deal. When was the last time you spoke with an Iranian official well not me but let's say my representatives I have spoken to them but my representatives over the course of mmm well actually an hour ago and what message was delivered they want to make a deal but every time they make a deal they break it they don't want to die people don't want to die yeah about an hour ago and what message was delivered You better make a deal. You're not going to have any, you're not going to have anybody left.

11:28We're being very careful with the civilian population, as you know, but I said, you better make a deal. You're not going to have anything left. And you think they will? They should. I don't know if they will or not. Sir, thank you for speaking with Fox News. Thank you. Thank you very much.

11:43Ben Meiselas:And then after coming up with that lie, Donald Trump then says, Iran, they lie about everything. All they do is lie. Here's what he says. Let's play this clip. They said they didn't want a nuclear weapon. Well, they say that. Everything they say is a lie. They lie. I've never seen anything like it. They also come out and they'll tell you we never discussed nuclear and we're in a room for five hours. That's all we discussed. And they'll walk out and say nuclear was not discussed. Everything was discussed. And then even though we know the Strait of Hormuz is closed, Donald Trump pretends that it's open.

12:13Ben Meiselas:I'll share this with you. On Monday, you announced that the United States is reimposing the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports. It started now. Shipping data trackers indicate that just 10 vessels passed through the Strait of Hormuz on Monday, less than 10 percent of what normally goes through this critical waterway. When you say the strait is open, what do you mean? It's open if people want to go through it. We're not opening it for Iran. That's the only one it's closed for. It's closed for Iran both in and out. but it's open now. A lot of things have happened, Trey, in the last few months. Pipelines are being built.

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12:55Ben Meiselas:You've called. And here's where Donald Trump said he's going to blow up their power plants. Let's play it. Do you anticipate that the strikes were seen this week against Iran will expand? Are you considering hitting energy targets or other locations inside of Iran? I'll save the energy targets for last, but ultimately we'll hit energy targets. But we're going to hit them very hard tonight. We're going to hit them very hard tomorrow night. We're going to hit them very hard the night after. And then next week it gets really bad for them because next week comes the power plants. Next week comes the bridges.

13:32We're going to knock out all their power plants. We're going to knock out all their bridges unless they get to the table and negotiate.

13:39Ben Meiselas:And then as I shared with you yesterday, I just want to show it to you one more time, that Iran's deputy foreign minister posted, or he was giving an interview, Garbabadi, and here's what he had to say. He goes, we're not negotiating with him. There's nothing else to talk about. There's just full-fledged war in the region right now with really no way out. Here's what he has to say. Let's play this clip. Iran did not leave the negotiating table It was America that stalled the Islamabad memorandum And we, in fact, did not take any action in this regard So look, the idea that they want Iran to return Is a request that will not be realized The Islamic Republic of Iran will not be the first country To request negotiations in the face of these criminal American actions We will not request negotiations with America.

14:37If America thinks that by tightening a circle of actions against us, military actions, economic sanctions, we will ask to go back and negotiate, it is mistaken definitely. They are mistaken. Secondly, if they think we will widen the Strait of Hormuz, they are mistaken about that too. this is currently a very key capacity. These two actions will not happen. There you have it, folks.

15:09Ben Meiselas:Let me know what you think. We'll keep you posted, of course, throughout the day. Hit subscribe. Let's get to 7 million subscribers. Thanks for watching, everybody.

15:29Ben Meiselas:together.