Led to believe. Here is more on whats ahead. The u. S. Took new action against russia for its role in the crisis in ukraine. Did these sanctions freeze the assets of 17 Companies Including seven banks and Energy Companies . We have not seen comparable efforts. Our goal is not to hurt the russian people. Its to get them to change their policy. Iraq study group s at risk of becoming an apartheid state according to secretary of state john kerry. Anybody who understands what apartheid s wouldnt make such a comment. Secretary kerry has proven himself unsuitable to the position he holds. The sports world and beyond reacting to racist comments by the owner of the la clippers . We begin with a diplomatic firestorm in the middle east. The starter, secretary of state john kerry who told the try l rtrlitra try lat tral t that unless they moved to a twostate solution, with peace talks scheduled to end tuesday, kerry said a 2state collusion will be clearly underscored as the only reel alternative because a unitary state winds up being an apartheid state with secondclass citizens or a state that destroys the capacity for israel to be a jewish state. Condemnation of kerrys use of apartheid was bipartisan. Democratic senator Barbara Boxer says Iraq Study Group is the only democracy and any linkage s nonsensical and ridiculous. Eric cantor called on kerry to apologize to israel while senator ted cruz called on kerry to resign. Secretary kerry has proven himself unsuitable for the position he holds before any harm s done and to our Critical Alliance with the nation of israel that john kerry should offer president obama his resignation. And the president should accept it. For more, i am joined from washington by ambassador phillip wilcox, a former chief of mission and us consul general until jerusalem, the president for middle east peace. Ambassador, good of you to join us. I should say secretary kerry backtracked by saying if i could rewind the tape, i would have chosen a different word. It is a word best left out of the debate here at home. He is frustrated with in the but it was a mistake to use such an emotionally loaded word . Its a word that has been used repeatedly in israeli political circles, two i israeli primer Foreign Ministers said the same thing, its the continued process of settlement building and occupation continues, israel will become an apartheid state. There is nothing new here one could look at kerrys statement as a moment of clarity by a senior u. S. Official because it describes a potential reality if there isnt a sharp change, a serious return to negotiations to create two states. When you are talking about the settlements, you are talking about whats been going on the west bank, but abab israeli have the right to vote. There are none of the things normally you would associate with apartheid. You are quite right. Israel s a Democratic State. Perhaps the most Democratic State in the region. But if israel continues its quasi annexation of over two and a half million palestinians, it becomes a different kind of entity where it is ruling over another Society Without according them any rights and maintaining its rule through military force. Thats a very different from the situation within israel, itself. Thats what kerry was talking about when he referred to a unitary state . Yes, it was. Back in 2008, when he was an anyhow Center Running for president , barack obama, he told the atlantic israel and the palestinians have tough issues to work out to get to the goal of two states living sidebyside but injecting a term like apartheid does not advance that goal. Wouldnt secretary of state kerry have been better off stick to go what president obama said back then . He probably would. But its important that u. S. Leaders speak more candidly about the realities of this conflict. It is a tragedy that s heading for a train wreck unless the parties decide to take seriously the reality of the situation and reverse it through an israel withdrawal from its occupation and settlement of the west bank and east jerusalem. Otherwise, there is a looming disaster and its time for american officials to speak candid candidly about that. Isnt it time to say enough is enough and for the United States to walk away and say if you cant get it together, to hold your own peace talks and figure this out, just, you know, saz 20 years ago, james baker gave them the white house telephone number and said call us when you are ready to discuss this seriously. And not too long thereafter, the israeli people changed their government through their democratic voting process because feared that the government was damaging the vital u. S. Israeli relationship. There are signs that that might be happening again. Walking away is really not an option. This is a matter nots just in the interest of the israelis and the palestinians. Its angisraeli strategic interest. We are stuck with this as a nation. We cant walk away from it. We need to speak more honestly about it instead of begging the parties to negotiate by themselves. There has to be another solution. On the palestinian side, on sunday, Palestinian Mac Mam Abbas called the holocaust the most heinous crime to have occurred in the modern era. That is a bit of a backtrack from him from things that he had said decades ago. Do you think he was trying to send a signal to the israeli did because statement, he was in the process of reconciliation with hamas which contains the other area, gaza and the government said because they are terrorists they will not negotiate with hamas. Well, i think it would be wise for the israeli leadership to accept the abbas statement at face value rather than calling it an underhanded publicity stunt. Its an extraordinarily statement for a Palestinian Leader to make and represents a step forward. The question of palestinian unity is a different one. Historians recall that when the state of israel was actually to be born, there was a deep split among the moderates and the extreme rightist terrorist elements in israel. Those were jewish groups. And theisitsis ligamentous to israelis managed to recognize those and develop political unity. Thats what the palestinians are trying to do. And until they become a unified community, they will not be able to speak with one voice in a legitimate way. I have got to say, it strikes me, and i realize that you are correct in saying so, but that at this point in time, that it is still extraordinary for a Palestinian Leader to be able to say that the holocaust was the most heinous crime in modernhit is still shocking to hear. Phillip wilcox, thank you for joining us tonight to discuss this important topic. You are welcome. Turning now to the crisis with russia, the u. S. Has imposed a third round of sanctions targeting russias defense industry. Seven dishonesty officials linked to vladimir peatutin circumstancet one, igor sechen, who is also referred to as darth vader for ruthless tactics as a form ter kgb officer. The rye vens in Eastern Ukraine continues unabated. They beat protesters with baseball bats in donetsk while others have held International Observers captive in slovyansk for four days. A mayor was shot and wounded. Speaking in the philippines, president obama said the sanctions were not meant to hit putin personally but a cal greatt brated effort to get russia to change its behavior. We dont know yet whether its going to work. Thats why the next phase if, in fact, we saw further russian aggression towards ukraine could be sectoral sanctions, less narrowly targeted, addressing sectors like banking or the defense industry. Russias Foreign Ministry called the new sanctions disgusting and meaningless, vowing a response from moscow would be felt painfully in washington, d. C. For more, we are joined from philadelphia by greg satel who serves as a forbes contributor. He lived nearly fourteen years as ceo of kcp publishing which overseas publishing in ukraine and published here is howb obaa administrations sanctions will destroy putin. When you put this round of safrpdz together with the rest, you have only touched a few dozens friends of putin, and at a time european sanctions are weaker. A Bipartisan Group of snairtsdz is saying enough of the wrist slapping. You disagree . You think this is more thanenat is saying enough of the wrist slapping. You disagree . You think this is more than wrist slapping. I do. I think there is a tendency to look at the first order of facts which are, in fact, the asset freezes and the visa bans and say this is just a couple of dozen people. Its not that big of a deal and the russians, themselves, say, you know, it doesnt really doesnt touch us. For instance, one of electricitied mirror putins closest confidents Vladimir Putins closest confidants, he says i dont travel overseas. It doesnt touch me. So threw things, i think, first thats doubtful. You are taufring talking about a region where the first thing you do when you start a business is set up your structure. He also, both of his children live in the west. One in switzerland and one in london. Second much all, its not the first order of effects that are so important. Its the second order. The sanctions are more than sanctions. They are designations which is a form of financial lep rose or a scarlet letter, some people call it. If, for instance, mr. Yakunin wanted to buy Vacation Property in dubai and ostensibly, it wouldnt touch the u. S. At all but at some point, he would have to transfer money and he would have to use a bank and there are very few banks in the world that dont have some sort of correspondent relationship with a u. S. Bank or deal with u. S. Dollars and if they violate those designations, the price can be quite high. We saw hsbc got hit with a 1. 8 billion fine, Standard Charter bank got hit with, i think it was, 3 or 400 million fine and if they want to court doing business in the u. S. , they will pay those fines. Similar to what happens to drug dealers ones you get the scar let letter . Yeah. You get in serious trouble if these banks end up doing business with them but yakunin told the financial times, i did not intend to travel to the u. S. I have no assets there. It does not bother me at all. Arent we just talking about at this point, just a few russian oligarchs and the Ukrainian Government says the sanctions arent enough . Well, the then you have the third order of facts meaning anybody who looks like him or seems like he might be yakunin or might be sanctioned sometime in the future cant borrow money, cant enter business deals we see the effects. Vladimir putin thought his economy would be growing at 3 or 4 . Right now, russia is effectively in a recession. So, i think while if you look at the people who are discredcriticizing the sanctions, they affirmative really criticizing the approach. They think it can be faster. It can be more aggressive but i think everybody agrees it has been he cant effective. Capital is flowing out, the stock mark is slowing down. The economy is in recession or will be in recession. The ruble is down but when they saw they werent any more than what they are, it bounced back . It is lower than it was a month ago. The crisis spread young. It hasnt hit the russian people. In 2008, putin, meddev and the Approval Ratings were quite height for about three months. This is going to take awhile the there is no easy answer to this. But i think the continuing ratcheting up of the sanctions real the effects are going to multiply over time. You think that will hurt his popularity rating . Because you did write that you dont think he is acting rationally when it comes tom the economy. Do you think it may not matter to him that he may simply not care about the economy, that et cetera just intent on this greater rush on expanding russian territory . I didnt say that he wasnt acting rationally in terms of that hes insane. What i said was that he is not acting rationally in terms of he is very ideologically driven. I dont think its greater russia he is after so much is this eurasian ideal where he wants to make russia an island unto itself which doesnt participate in the international order. I dont think the sanctions are going to deter him. Hes quite driven with what he wants, and he doesnt have a whole lot of good options anyway. But they will undermine his ability to act and an authoritarian regime is expensive to run. There is no point in corruption if there is no money in it. Right. Obviously could get extremely expensive if he decides to expand beyond his borders and moved in to Eastern Ukraine. A lot of thoughtprovoking stuff. Greg satel, good to have you with us. Thank you . Thanks for having me. The world inside and outside the nba is appalled by the alleged racist remarks by one of its owners. What should happen to him now . Also, could the battle with the element did turn into a battle between nations . A Climate Change discussion you have not hurd. F hermella is tracking the top stories on the web. What seemed like good news for u. S. Education is being met with secretcism. I will tell you more later in the show. Join our conversation by tweeting to us at ajconsiderthis or leave a comment on our facebook and google pages. Racist remarks allegedly from the owner of the Los Angeles ClippersBasketball Team have triggered a new and heated round in our National Conversation on race. An audio post to the website tmz has the voice of what appears to be clippers owner Donald Sterling telling a woman said to be his former girlfriend not to post a picture showing her with basketball great Magic Johnson and not to bring black people to clippers games for more, i am joined from San Francisco by mark spears who covers the nba for yahoo sports and here is Edward Williams with the root and an Al Jazeera America political contributor mark, i will start with you. You cover the nba. Sterling is a guy who had a terrible reputation in general, especially on racial issues. Why is this guy still the owner of an nba team . You know, thats a great question. This is something that should have been a bigger topic years ago. This isnt the first time. This isnt the second time. This isnt the third time. There is a long history here of racist acts and its very sad that its got tone this point, but i think the thing is, when you have audio, when you actually can hear it and its not just hearsay or a report, i think it hits harder at home than when its just text. So this audio is certainly stunning and is bothering people all over the world. Stunning is almost an understatement edward, Donald Sterling was quote in a legal deposition in a lawsuit that was filed by his formal general manag manager, elton Baylor Baylor said sterling said, personally, i would like to have a white southern caucchioliing poor black players. I mean you read this stuff. Its difficult to believe but again, when there is this kind of smoke, there has to be some fire. What should the nba do . I think that it speaks to a plantation mentality across american sports, but specifically in the nfl and the nba. I think whats sad about this is as stark as these comments were and as disturbing as they are, it speaks to a culture within the sports. And one of the things i thought was really striking was that in this entire debate, people forgot to mention the fact that the head of the ncaa a couple of weeks ago, when talking about whether or not players actually had enough to eat said something about well, if they want breakfast in bed, i will give them that. These sports and these arenas are places where the bodies and talents of black boys are exploited and i think that this is a part of the culture that we have all become to accept. And so to frame this man, this coach in particular as the enemy, i think that we need to take we need to look at our part in all of this. I think you may be over stating it. I dont know anybody has come to accept that. I am not sure that they have. I think they actually have. I think we need to consider that. Mark, what are nba commissioner adam silvers options in handling this if this is confirmed to be sterling, what everybody beliefs, including his estranged wife . He is not a coach. Its an owner. The one thing they have, if all of the owners agree to it, if they get three quarter of the involved, they could push him out. I think the nba can take control of the team and sell the team. Thats probably the most they could do. Thats a lot. They push that hard. Lets see tomorrow morning. This is a big, big day. He is new on the job. This is his first big deal. This might be the biggest thing he ever has to deal with his entire tenure as an nba xhurl commissioner. He has to make a big statement. The players are watching. The clippers have talked about doing something about at home in game 5. They are waiting to see what adam silver does first before they go a step further. Keep in mind this is rodney king an vee anniversary tomorrow. This could blow up into Something Real bad. I dont want to see that. To be swift and hard with his decision. We will have to see what he does on tuesday. President obama has now weighed in on these disturbing comments. He is in malaids i cant. He caulked the remarks incredibly offensive and racist added this. When ignorant folks want to advertise their ignorance, you dont really have to do anything. Thats what happened here. What else would you like to hear from the president . I think the president spoke eloquently and succinctly on this topic. I think what he said was important. He acknowledged and the president has bigger issues to deal with. I think this is an issue to be dealt with, with the nba. The players are making their statement with their silent protests. I think it will be i