In the second excerpt from the John Pilger Special, to
be exclusively broadcast by RT on Saturday, courtesy of Dartmouth
Films, Julian Assange accuses Hillary Clinton of misleading
Americans about the true scope of Islamic State’s support from
Washington’s Middle East allies.
In a 2014 email made public by Assange’s WikiLeaks last month,
Hillary Clinton, who had served as secretary of state until the
year before, urges John Podesta, then an advisor to Barack Obama,
to "bring pressure" on Qatar and Saudi Arabia, "which are providing
clandestine financial and logistic support to ISIL [Islamic State,
IS, ISIS] and other radical Sunni groups."
"I think this is the most significant email in the whole
collection," Assange, whose whistleblowing site released three
tranches of Clinton-related emails over the past year, told Pilger
in an exclusive interview, courtesy of Dartmouth Films.
"All serious analysts know, and even the US government has
agreed, that some Saudi figures have been supporting ISIS and
funding ISIS, but the dodge has always been that it is some "rogue"
princes using their oil money to do whatever they like, but
actually the government disapproves. But that email says that it is
the government of Saudi Arabia, and the government of Qatar that
have been funding ISIS."
Assange and Pilger, who sat down for their 25-minute interview
at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where the whistleblower has
been a refugee since 2012, then talk about the conflict of interest
between Clinton’s official post, which held throughout Obama’s
first term, her husband’s nonprofit, and the Middle East officials,
whose stated desire to fight terrorism may not have been
sincere.
John Pilger: The Saudis, the Qataris, the Moroccans, the
Bahrainis, particularly the first two, are giving all this money to
the Clinton Foundation, while Hillary Clinton is secretary of
state, and the State Department is approving massive arms sales,
particularly Saudi Arabia.
Julian Assange: Under Hillary Clinton – and the Clinton emails
reveal a significant discussion of it – the biggest-ever arms deal
in the world was made with Saudi Arabia: more than $80 billion.
During her tenure, the total arms exports from the US doubled in
dollar value.
JP: Of course, the consequence of that is that this notorious
jihadist group, called ISIL or ISIS, is created largely with money
from people who are giving money to the Clinton Foundation?
JA: Yes.
Pilger also questioned Assange over increasingly frequent
accusations from the Clinton camp, and Western media, that
WikiLeaks is looking to swing next week’s US presidential election
in favor of Donald Trump – perhaps at Russia’s behest.
But Assange dismissed the prospect of Trump, who is behind in
the polls, winning as unlikely – and not necessarily due to his
standing with the electorate.
"My analysis is that Trump would not be permitted to win. Why do
I say that? Because he has had every establishment off his side.
Trump does not have one establishment, maybe with the exception of
the Evangelicals, if you can call them an establishment," said
Assange. "Banks, intelligence, arms companies, foreign money, etc.
are all united behind Hillary Clinton. And the media as well. Media
owners, and the journalists themselves."