a gun, a stone slash floods triggered by heavy rain of killed at least 315 people. i know affairs, the death toll could rise. i'll just say we're a spoke to displaced residents and backlog or the hottest hits areas. can you kind of had reports buried on demand in debris, the ruins of what with family homes? the fullest of friday's slot, destroyed thousands of properties across bygone province. isn't that going to move in again? this is my life about to you. see now all these what house full, one house of to another are scared reflect, came and took everything with it. and i mean, what i'm going to jack the thing on. it also took more than $300.00 lives, according to the taliban ministry for refugees. a number that is likely to rise. oh, many of the victims have already been buried or not. i mean, i lost 13 members of my family, including women and children, have a lot of flood waters washed out in time. the villages ended livelihoods. the guy

said to them, we don't have clean water to drink and there's nowhere to live, nothing to you. that is everything, including the school and the clinic, are gone. the seasonal heavy rains close the flash flooding, sweeping through several provinces across afghanistan by gland is considered the worst affected. while that is that rather than the i don't know what health is coming to us from the government. there is no life left for us. i mean, why should we go, this is my house and all of it is destroyed. there is no life left for me anymore. many of the roads in and out of the regions paved in money, making it difficult for rescue teams to reach remote areas. dig is needed to combat the palm. so i at the top, i expect the government and the un to provide us with shelter water medicine or somewhere to live so that all these people can be safe or not. the people in the bugs on a waiting for that dispute, we needed help to arrive. kindly tell a, hey,

i'll just get a heavy rains have triggered flash floods and lance lies in indonesia has proven. so what's the matcher that is $31.00 people have died including children. thousands are missing on a major road, has partially washed away making rescue operations more difficult. the number of people killed by slash floods in brazil, south in most states has risen to at least 143 people. levels are rising again in rio grande. they just solas heavy rains. continue, within half a 1000000 people have been forced. from there you can find more news features and analysis on our website that's i'll just say red dot com and then we will device. these continues here off to the bottom line. stay with us on the next towards the one is the biggest elections of 2024 in the general election will administer now

render movies be taking increase its food across the country. how will economic uncertainty and use some employment suede boots as in key states, and will the media be able to cover the vote freebie unfairly ongoing coverage the in the as an action on out, is there a a hi eric steve clements and i have a question does the us shield israel from the laws that are meant to deny weapons for human rights violators? let's get to the bottom line. the united states as the world's biggest supplier of weapons, decades ago, laws were put into place to prevent the supply of those weapons. the countries that commit quote, gross violations of human rights, perhaps the most famous of those laws, is the lacy law of 1997 named after it's lead sponsor, former senator patrick leahy. and just this past february, after months of israel's war and gaza, the by the administration published the national security memorandum that's known

as n s. m 20. and it requires the state department to report to congress or whether it finds it is real, is credible when it makes assurances that it's uses of us weapons do not violate us law or international law. so what are the requirements of those us laws when it farms other countries and are these mechanisms applied equally across the world, especially when it comes to israel. today we're speaking with stephanie curse gessner, deputy head of investigations for the guardian, u. s. and steven record, a distinguished fellow in the human rights institute at georgetown university law center. let me read something to you. this is v lahey law. lahey law says no, assist in shelby, furnished to any unit of the security forces of a foreign country. if the secretary of state has credible information that such unit has committed a gross violation of human rights. so if you just did a deep dive into the late he law on it's and it's practice and the use of it as applied to israel. what did you find as well generally, my findings were that, um,

the way he law, as many experts have said to me is not being really followed or executed in terms of israel. and that somehow, even though it applies to many countries, including you know, us allies are especially, was allies that it's not for some reason even though though there are significant reports of gross and allegations of gross violation to human rights. and that somehow it's not affecting israel, and my reporting really took me um, you know, i spoke to a lot of former officials and i saw state department documents and i really concluded that there are special policies in place really, mechanisms, mechanisms. yes. these are sort of deep in the procedures of the state department that basically give israel an out of these do not exist for any other countries or allies. can you share with us a few of these mechanisms that you found?

yeah, sure. so there are basically 3 that i found 1st, because the way the process works is all the different. um, you know, groups within the state department or departments that are looking at a, an incident, have to agree that a gross violation fluoride has occurred. that is not applied to anyone else. so in other instances, there can be a staff finding that this, this has happened. there doesn't need to be this broad consensus. and that broadcast is, i read your article was, you know, different bureaus and agencies in the state department, even our embassy, all have to come into agreement and alignment that and abuses occurred. yes. so why does this exist only for israel or the 2nd case is that israel is notified when such a review is occurring and of that ins. oh and that you know of the specific allegation and they have 90 days to respond. so is one form or official put it, this is just delaying the process. no other country gets this kind of notification

not to be fair. in my discussions of the state department, they said look, we discussed with a lot of the countries like there are discussions that go on. it's not that it never happens, however, but there's a formalized process with israel, the 90 day return. yes. yeah. okay. and then the 3rd mechanism, and then the 3rd mechanism, which is, you know, in plain sight, is that the lady law has been updated over the years in congress. and congress has updated it. and in 2021. there were a bunch of countries that signed new kind of agreements within the way he law agreements. so i looked at, you know, more than a dozen of them. and only in the case of israel is their language that says which both you know, it is rarely official and is really a master in fact. and the u. s. official senior us official signed off saying israel has a robust, independent legal system including its military justice system. so why is that important? it's important because it allows israel to say, look,

this violation may have happened or some, some might believe that it happened, but we have the capability is a strong democracy with a strong justice system to take care of it. and essentially, united states government is said, yes, that's the case. so what i'm hearing from you to put in late personal language is the, is, is really military courts are their own judge and jury? well, i think that the us government saying we believe that it's independence, that it's, that is that essentially they can review their own potential misstates, steve, i think our audience know thing. most people will know. america is the biggest arm sell sales entity in the world. i did not realize that there were as many filters and constraints on us weapons sales as there were. it was interesting to read that . in fact, we do have a system and that lahey law has mattered in many, many, many cases. can you give us a sense of the application of the law, the scale of it,

and has it applied to israel in the same way as it is applied to many other nations? sure, well 1st we need to distinguish a little bit between arm sales and military assistance. right. we're really talking about here is tax payer us taxpayer funded dollars being given to other countries, not their purchasing weapons here. and what senator leahy said towards the end of the 9 days when other human rights laws just didn't seem to be coming in to force, they just weren't being put in place or actually implemented was he said, well, if we have to be in these countries and if you think and gauge meant in these countries is so important and you tell us there's just a few bad apples in the barrel, then let's agree to a minimum floor. and that minimum floor has 4 parts. if we have credible information that a specific unit of a battalion a, a,

a company division is committing the worst human rights abuses and nothing has been done about it. let's at least not are give tax payer funded military 8 or training to those specific units. and that's what the way he law requires it. people need to understand the scope of american military assistance. we give tens of billions of dollars a way to other countries. it's fundamental to our nash, all security strategy at the moment. devil light footprint by building up the forces in country and partnering with them. and so the lee law just says, okay, if you're going to do that, and we have the information that there are bad units doing the worst possible things. let's warranty in those units and not work with those units. now, this law has been applied in scores of countries. thousands of times literally thousands of times, but so far as we're aware and in no case, has the state department ever been willing to apply, it is real. even in cases where the human rights community was pretty clear that

there was credible information that a gross human rights violation had occurred. steve, i had sent it to chris van holland on the show recently, and he said, we're seeing textbook war crimes every day on the television. or we're, we're able to see this in real time and real visuals and, and this is happening. we've seen senator bernie sanders and others, basically come out and talk about the dangers of being a complicit in what's going on. and so, but as i read stephanie's piece on the history of the application of the late he while with guards, israel, it seems like that law was set up to try to prevent. in fact, that complicity with senator sanders incentive in holland have been worried about. so what has gone off the rails here from your perspective? well, i think stephanie's superb article really does lay out a lot of the problems now, and i should say, this isn't completely unique to, to israel. there is a bias in the department of defense. and in the state department toward engagement,

there is a bias against having fights with other countries. and so for instance, it took a decade before the state department would apply. the recently adopted law and child soldiers and the, i mean everybody got a waiver for a whole decade just because they don't want to fight with other countries. i don't want to have, you know, they've got lots of interest, etc. so it's been hard to apply this law in many cases, but in the home, you know, in other cases, despite those difficulties in pakistan, in nigeria, in columbia, the state department eventually has been able to apply it. now, sometimes what they'll do is they'll say, and this is relevant to the point about consensus. they'll say, all right, you don't agree. you don't think the information you the defense department. don't think the and the information is credible. you, the embassy are arguing that the case, the, the criminal proceedings that took place were adequate to deal with the problem. we

don't agree with the human rights bureau. don't agree with the political mirror, a political, military affairs bureau and state of and don't agree. let's just suspend the unit. we won't agree that it's in the eligible for all future purposes, but let's not go forward with the training exercise. so let's not go forward with the 8 that happens about 10 times for every one time. they actually say this is a unit that's on the ineligible list. it's, it's quarantine. and so, if you put in place for israel as stephanie's article documents as a requirement that every one agree you are just from the start, you're taking out of the way he law, about 9 out of every 10 cases where the law had, in other cases, been effective, we just had steve 4 cases as i understand it may have the numbers wrong, but 4 units that were identified recently and is we all have having committed gross violations, human rights violations and abuses and secretary of state anthony blinking, determined in those cases that the actions taken by the israelis were enough to uh,

basically forestall any action that we did in sort of the certifying their re this seemed to be very, very controversial in human rights groups. can you tell us more? yeah, i, stephanie mentioned that that. uh yeah, this, this provision in the agreement with israel, the says upfront, we think that israel's judiciary is independent and robust. all right. here's the, here's the same agreement for greece. doesn't say anything like that. so far as i know, greece as a robust and independent judicial system, but they didn't think it was necessary to say that in the agreement with the government of greece. and the, the fact is that they've been very serious concerns about the independence of the is really military judicial system. and to be clear, it's fair to make distinctions between countries and be israel does have a relatively independent judiciary and press as

a compared to many other countries where the united states is working. but that doesn't mean it's perfect anymore than our courts are perfect or our system of military justice always gets it right. and there been very serious concerns that have been raised not only outside of israel by human rights groups, but by credible voices within israel, including a bus. a panel of senior retired is really judges who looked at the military justice system some years ago and had a series of critiques that the prosecutors, for instance, weren't sufficiently independent of the chain of command so they can be influence. so it's not to say that that is real, doesn't have compared to, you know, many other countries that we're, we're in, right, a better judicial system. but that doesn't mean that it gets it right. or that adequate punishments have been handed down so that you can find the way he law. that effective steps have been taken. stephanie, one of the pieces in your article where we kind of refer to a weekly,

but you actually put a word in term to it as an institutionalization of this process. and you were the 1st to report about it designed or stand is the is real leahy vetting for which is part of the organized structure of decision making. i love to hear more about that, but also with regards to cases that do rise and you go through a litany of cases of individuals that were essentially murdered and extra good. few additional killings i found by that, but by both sides of cetera with no penalties, et cetera. we have the killing of a colleague of our a serene abu auckland, who was also one of these cases that rose to the very top of the is really justice system and, and, and review. and also the us system is no militants in the area shot in the head, etc. and other of these cases i'd love to hear about some of these cases that you investigated. but also the is really lahey of getting for them. well yeah, to, to,

to your point, i mean, it's disturbing to say the least that among the cases that i mentioned in my reporting to involve american citizens, your colleague sharina bu, clay, and also omar aside, he was a 78 year old who died in police custody and he had lived on a united states for many, many years. so there, i think it really raises the question of where, um, you know, why the us government, why the state department is not taking greater actions at least on behalf of its own. you know, citizens and under the circumstances they is really, is really reading for, um, was essentially created because there are certain countries in israel's, one of them where there was so much so much military assistance given that is actually difficult to track the, you know, the, the state department, so they did it as a tracking mechanism not as

a mechanism of overall concern that this could be a constant problem. yeah, my understanding is that it was done because there needs to be some some efforts to, to track these countries. the other countries are of egypt and ukraine, where there is a because the scale of a foreign assistance is so great. um, and you know what i found my reporting and i think this is what's kind of the point that a lot of people are making. now is, these are all going to be instances that had been reviewed in the past are way before in october 7th. what, how, how has the us government's approach to these things? how is the fact that all these exceptions have been made for israel? how is that affected the current conduct of the war? and i think that's where i think that's where the 2 things kind of meet for your article leads to the notion that at least to impunity. i think that some of the people you interviewed. i think it was josh paul, other folks that have resign from state department rules. they're concerned these

are people not secretary assistance. actually they're there. they're doing the nuts and bolts of policy making and policy review and policy implementation. some of home including judge paul who resigned because they believe at least to infinity, right. they believe it leads to impunity and that basement. yeah. if you're kind of looking the other way, even when it comes to the murder or suspicious death of your own citizens, and what is really the then then doesn't that send a message both on the political level of the government level, but also the individual units that aren't really being held accountable at all. i think it's all really coming to a head now. there is this interesting moment right now we're president biden has put on pause the delivery of some weapons. now, reportedly here's put the pos on those, those weapons because of concerns about how they may be used in rasa. now, as far as i'm concerned, i don't know if that's because of national security memorandum 20 uh,

which chris van holland had been pushing or because of the late he law or joe biden, just operating with, you know, a got feel. is there a problem in this it, when you kind of look at a relationship like this, where we're not using law, but we're using god or me. i mean, i'm just interested in the suspension and whether it's an inflection point for a different approach, or whether it's a speed bump with the same behaviors. continue your thoughts the as well. you know, when i, when we sell weapons to a country, so we're not, it's not tax pay or underwritten not, not military a, but we sell weapons to a country. we actually makes that country pay a little bit more than the cost of the weapon to administer the sale and to administer investigations of whether or not the weapons are being used in a way that's consistent with us law. they're not transferred to other countries that we wouldn't have sold them to in the 1st place. but somehow, when we're actually giving the, the aid it a, you know, the,

the idea that we should, we, the american taxpayer should have the ability to say, well, we support is really always real. as a, as an ally, they were attacked. they've right to defend themselves, but we would like to know how the aids being used and if the 8 is being used to commit gross human rights violations, right? we don't want our techs peer dollars used for that. it's a, it's a minimum floor that, that, you know, ought to be applied. right. but apparently, i mean, i think the big question, steve and, and stephanie, i think that the door that stephanie opened, at least in my mind, reading this incredibly interesting history of the failure to apply this, this law. and the case of israel, as we applied elsewhere, is what's the state of the american brand when it comes to human rights? as we talk about human rights violations all around the world, what is the state of america standing, being able to comment on that? if in fact you have such huge glaring loopholes in the application, even with one of your closest allies. yeah, i mean, i think of a case of sharing

a block away, and that's, this is the appropriate place to talk about it as a, as a journalist myself, you know, it's just so outrages that there's not been any accountability whatsoever. and what, you know, again pointing to really an extreme example of, of that killing, of that it really does do a significant damage to it ministration or president who, who swore that this is going to be a religious central part of his foreign policy. you know, where, where are we seeing that it's and i, i think that there could be a lot, you know, if there was any, at any motion to, to address those issues and go very far away even even a long way, even in the individual cases. and by the way, you know, congress has been calling for it. you know, there are many members of congress who've been very vocal on that case. and yet, uh, we still don't have that more information about it. steve. you know,

the united states on human rights has both the failure and the virtue of being inconsistent on this issue. that is to say, so it, it, it, it least in some cases does this. it certainly talks a good game and, and there's, it's, it's important to reinforce the value of human rights. i mean, we have data for fiscal year 2020. i think that's the last year that i have this data for. and there were $129.00 units that were found in eligible into the lake a lot in that one year, a $129.00 units. there were 994 units that were suspended from getting a better. so we didn't, we didn't necessarily find them ineligible and put them on the pariah list. but we just said there's enough here that we shouldn't go forward. so that's $1123.00 cases in one fiscal year where the way he law stopped tax period from going forward . the units that were credibly alleged to be involved in gross human rights violations. that's not nothing. you can go on the us on,

on the state department website right now, and look at a list of countries over the last 5 years. you know, bangladesh believes burkina fast, so burundi, cambodia, georgia, you know, the list goes on where the law has been applied. but then you come to israel and clearly there's something going on there. there are cases with credible organizations, clear documentation, gross violations never been found to fall under the way he law. and i think you get in terms of the question of a sense of impunity. you just look at the reaction from the government of israel to the mere suggestion that one unit might be put on the pariah list. and it's absolutely clear that, that this was utterly unexpected. and they're pushing back very, very hard. if there's one positive thing that's coming out of this, it's that i used to call the late law the most important law. nobody's ever heard of. well, now people understand that that,

that law exists and it's there to protect their tax payer dollars from being used to underwrite human rights abuses. and they want it in force. well, one of the quotes in stephanie's article, which came directly from senator leahy and we'll conclude here, is that the law has not been applied consistently. and what we have seen in the west bank and gaza is a stark example of that. over many years i erred successive us administrations to apply the law there, but it does not happen and stuff, you know, give you the last word. i mean, this is an amazing quote from the senator who drafted in and, and took this legislation into law. your quick final thoughts um, well there's a sad uh, paper trail i would say paper trail, it starts at least one that i saw starting with uh, george lee bush. um colin powell going all the way up to um, well leading up through successive ministration. so until today and which senator leahy is sending letters on a regular basis saying what about this case and what he lot,

what about that case and the way he will all is really cases and there's just essentially silence on the other end. it's chillers and palm peo, colin powell, all of the basic. these were hillary clinton about hillary clinton, carrots, and we'll have to stop there. john kerry, stephanie curse, guest for investigative journalist with the guardian. u. s. and steven record at georgetown university law center. thank you so much for being with us today. really appreciate it. so what's the bottom line? the united states is always thought of itself as a nation of laws. the laws supposed to matter and no one is above the law, even presidents. but when it comes to american actions outside its borders, between is just much less legal and a lot more money. let's face it even when congress works on legislation, meant to demand accountability and support human rights enforcement, subject to domestic politics. a good example is the lacy law, which costs for reviews of americans, weapons shipments and reports about their use and abuse, and israel's war and gaza. we've watch textbook cases of war crimes,

to quote center to chris van holland. and yet we can't get the same finding a fax from us state department and the bite into ministration. this leads to impunity. and that makes the world a much less safe place. and that's the bottom line, the if you're watching this pre recorded report then al jazeera has been banned in the territory, all is, well, we'll just stream to be any stray me when my country is closing down such important networks only because ition sooner being came here this decision puts other networks working in the occupied was time for inside israel proffer also, independent journalist would be targeted we, i thought it was 0. we shouldn't be aware of that as a badge of honor to be banned by the government that stands indicted for general

size at the national court of justice. in the solomon islands, the deadly legacy of world war 2, remain on the lounge. why displaced it and exploded it now i do this. they are literally the sense of taking the time on the one. 0, one east meets the solomon islands. some tante scape of war that ended decades ago on, on these cultures solutions that gives us know for a future that we have to find creative solutions, not just turn our backs on. i don't think that has a number. think about it as a person and yourself and that person's shoes. so as you can see for this is my us, my life, or at least in my life, those dishes we want, we want the education, we want to break. because the women and my country, they're not sweet to come up to us. we are in the night all

a to we are human beings on this earth to be trees and the coins. we are working in their thoughts. that's our ancestors. whatever has been done before can be done even better, as long as the human being is doing it. you just have to keep pushing because no one else can see. the vision is keywords. you a meeting of mine's the tragedy from me, of a democratic solve africa, or if it's how quickly we sort of adopted the very told re global, know the intertwining of money and politics campaigner andrew find state and photographer shock you do on on active is on the crisis in concert. what is happening today is top thing on our watch. the news from now they will be people asking, how did you let it happen? studio will be on script part one on on disease. the government challenges

here where the, the little girl is posed from the rubble in northern garza following on his very s, trying that reportedly to him mother human costs of israel's expend infinity offense. the carry, jones to mrs. i'll just hear a lot from the also coming up a different gnostic blow for israel. egypt shows its anger against the offensive

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