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announcer: funding was also provided by, the freeman foundation. and by judy and peter blum kovler foundation, pursuing solutions for america's neglected needs. announcer: and now, "bbc news" ♪ >> hello. ♪ i'm lewis vaughan jones. you will watchg "the context" on bbc news. >> relief across israel by the response by the israeli the terry wasn't as overwhelming and intense. >> just how little we know -- the israelis aren't saying anything, the iranians are not blaming the israelis, the international community has been largely muted. it's as if there has been a collective effort to play this whole thing down. >> we have been very clear from

the beginning that we do not want to see this conflict escalate. we continue to consult with our allies and partners including in the region. lewis: calls for de-escalation. we'll look at the new reality in the middle east and what happens next. also, we will be in new york outside the donald trump trial courthouse. a man in the last hour or two has set himself on fire. we're expecting an update any moment. we will bring you that. prime minister rishi sunak says he wants to tackle sick culture with the threat of removing benefits. and there is new music from taylor swift, and there is lots of it. we will get the reviews.

just before we start with our main story, want to take you to new york and let you know what has happened in the last couple of hours. a man outside the courthouse with the trial of donald trump going on inside set himself on fire and was taken away by emergency services. you can see microphones being set up. we are expecting an update from the nypd new york police department about exactly what happened. as soon as we get that, as soon as t microphones are ready, we will cross straight back to new york. world leaders are again calling for restraint in the middle east after what is believed to be an israeli attack on iran overnight. u.s. secretary of state antony blinken one of the top officials calling for de-escalation. take a look at this. this was overnight. according to u. officials, israel was responsible for airstrikes in the city of isfahan, near the center of

iran's nuclear program, the latest tit-for-tat exchange between the two countries. here is our diplomatic correspondent caroline hawley. caroline: we are not exactly sure what has happened. israel has not publicly acknowledged it carried out the strike, iran is minimizing it. so what do we know? we know a clear message was being sent. there were explosions in syria, iraq, and most senior-- most significant of all, deep inside iran in the city of isfafan, right in the middle of the country, home to an air base and several nuclear sites including this one, and also to missile factories. u.s. officials have spoken of an israeli missile strike, one iranian media said three small drones have been involved. very few images have shown any damage bbc persian was sent some footage. have a listen. according to the iranian authorities, iran's air defenses were in action.

no harm was done. on an iranian news agency, a reporter says he is outside a nuclear facility and there is nothing going on. the international nuclear watchdog the iaea confirm there been no damage to nuclear sites. and in case anyone and iran woke up feeling worried, iranian tv showed pictures of calm in isfahan, complete with soothing music. at a rally of supporters of the regime, the president significantly made no mention of last night's events, focusing on the barrage of missiles and drones iran fired at israel last weekend. >> this move was necessary, obligatory, unifying, and a source of pride and power for our great country. almost all

of iran's missiles and drones were shot down by israel with the help of the u.s., the u.k., and other allies. but this was a huge escalation. the first time iran had ever attacked israel directly after decades of a covert war. and it pumped it international alarm -- it prompted international alarm. it was the response to the strike by israel on an iranian compound in damascus at the start of the month targeting a senior military commander, and attack, iran said, on its sovereign territory to which it was bound to respond. it has been a very dangerous tit-for-tat come with each side wanting to project pow and land the last punch. iran said it would respond even more harshly to any israeli counter strike. but the fact that the presumed israeli strike has been limited and that the iranians are playing it down gives some hope that the two sides can now step back from the brink. but it is still a moment of

future risk and anxiety in the middle east and beyond. lewis: thanks to caroline for that. let's take a look at how we got here. on the first of april, iran's diplomatic compound in damascus was attacked, killing 13 people, including two senior generals. he air was widely presumed to have been covered up by israel. iran responded, launching more than 300 drones and missiles towards israel. the idf says 99% of them were intercepted. israel's allies including joe biden said netanyahu should "take the win" to avoid a wider conflict in the middle east. today israel is believed to have carried out airstrike's iran, u.s. officials said. israel hasn't officially confirmed this, and iranian state media has downplayed any damage. let's speak to a scholar in residence at the center for israel studies.

thank you for coming on the program. >> thank you. lewis: what did you make of the choice of israel's response? >> i think israel wanted to send clear message it could reach iranian territory with its sophisticated weapons and technology. also sending a message to iranians that there air defenses and systems were penetrable. i think that was the main message here. i don't think israel wanted this to get out of control or to become a wider conflict or to lead the iranians to counterattack, and therefore i think israel's decision in this case was extreme the wise. lewis: why do u.s. has this -- how does this recalibrate, i suppose, on both sides where we are now? >> i think the correspondent got it right, and i would want to underscore the fact that both sides have been in -- responding to one another's attacks -- lewis: dan, i'm so sorry to

interrupt. we are going to go straight to new york. there's a press conference taking place. >> you are going to then hear from the fire commissioner on the condition of all the people that were involved, medical conditions. and then we will have our chief of detectives and he will talk about the investigation of the incident today. with that, i will bring up the chief of the department. >>hank you. thank you, commissioner. good afternoon, everyone. i'ma try to talk out so you can hear me. this afternoon directly opposite new york county criminal court at 100 center street where the trial of former president trump is currently taking place, we observed a male walking to the park, he walks to the center of the park. when he is in the park, he starts shuffling around his clothes, he opens up a book bag. from the book bag, he takes numerous pieces of papers,

pamphlets out. he throws the pamphlets throughout the park, and then he lls out a canister and pours some kind of liquid on himself, a liquid we believe is an accelerant, and he likes himself on fire. the male, he takes a couple of steps while he is on fire and eventually falls onto a police barrier and falls down to the ground. he is on fire, another area in the park were some of the accelerant spilt is also on fire. civilians called officers, members of the police department. they run into the park, they make efforts to put him out. they use their coats, they use their fire extinguishers. we were able to extinct the fire, and from that point we remove him to the cornell burn unit, where right now he is there in critical condition. at this moment i will let our fire commissioner talk about the condition of the mail and the condition of people who -- of

the male in tthe condition of people who also help. >> as the chief mentioned, the victim is in critical condition but is alive and intubated at cornell burn center. there were three nypd officers and one court officer, for officers whoad minor injuries from their exposure to the fire. we were on scene, ems did toe. transport the patient, and we have our fire marshals helping with the investigation at this time. >> good afternoon, everyone. the male involved in this incident is maxwell azzarello, male born in 1987. hi driver's license indicates he is from saint augustine, florida. what we know from speaking to other witnesses and family members is he arrived in new york sometime earlier in the week. we have his car being in saint augustine, florida, on the 13th.

anywhere between the 13th and today he arrived. we spoke to family member today and they were unaware he was even in new york. as the fire commissioner stated, he is at cornell burn center right now. the accelerant used appeared to be an alcohol-based substance use for cleaning. that is all we have right now. >> right on the line, left right, and we will decide who is going to take -- reporter: let me ask about security. are you going to put in more officers? strategy -- >> listen, mark, after every incident we have an after-action and we will talk about whether we at officers or not. just so you know, we had a lot of officers in the area. it is open to the public to still walk through the park. there was no security breach. reporter: any evidence of motivation -- [indiscernible]

>> the pamphlets seemed to be propaganda-based, almost a conspiracy theory type of pamphlet. some information in regards to ponzi schemes and the fact that some of our local educational institutes are fronts for the mop. a little bit of a conspiracy theory going on here. >> [indiscernible] >> no, we are going to go to the video, but it appears he entered to the park, walked into the middle of the park, committed the act. reporter: [indiscernible] -- insight into the individual's state -- >> very preliminary, but dealing with a family, we just made notification that the incident took place. reporter: -- able to get this far in, light himself on fire, obviously in critical condition right now -- [indiscernible]

>> thank you. we are very concerned. of course we are going to review our security protocols. this gentleman did not breach security protocols. the park was open to the public. of course we are going to look at everything and with the magnitude of what is going on right here, we will reassess our security with our federal reporter: how does that change -- >> like i said, we are going to go back to the command, we will talk to federal partners, we will make decisions if we need to tighten up security. maybe we will shut down the park. thisill determine once we talk with our partners with the court officers to make sure that with everything going on, the gravity of the eve going on right now, we will make sure we have security. reporter: from the video and some eyewitnesses, it took of humans for police officers to get there. was there no presence already

here? [indiscernible] -- emergency like this for ems or the fire -- it took police officers -- >> anthony, i would give a piece of that to the fire commissioner, but we are working with the crts and all the agencies that need to be over here are here. but you got to remember that the park is open to the public. there was no reason for anybody to already have a fire extinguisher on standby. nobody knew this guy was about to light himself on fire. two minutes is a pretty quick response time to be able to get to a vehicle, get a fire king wisher, runaround just fire extinguisher, runaround -- get a fire extinguisher, runaround, its singers this fire. >> as they mentioned, we will work with nypd to review what happened and if additional resources are necessary, we will place them here. typically for any major security

event, which this is can we have additional ems resources on the scene. fire only sometimes, there usually is not a reason for that, as you typically would not have in a public park -- >> [indiscernible] >> i would have to confirm what time they responded. we typically in any high- security event have more ems resources on scene. reporter: [indiscernible] >> not everything that you see but here is part of the plan. there was a large security plan for this, and trust me, when we had our meetings before this took place, we met with fdny, ems, court partns, secret service. i'm not quite sure what else you

are looking for. reporter: well, an ambulance on standby -- >> ems and fdny were in the area during the trial as well and they are totally aware of what is going on, and our response time today was pretty quick. reporter: do you know if the man said anything before, during the incident? >> as of right now what we have shown is that he walked directly into the park and began to throw the pamphlets in the air and then lit himself on fire. that could come out during our investigation. we have a lot of witnesses here. a lot of people are coming forward. we hope if more people come forward we can put more information together. as of now we don't have that he is making statements. reporter: [indiscernible] >> yeah, we are looking through

his social media and what he did online prior, and it appeared that he did post something in regards to this event prior to the incident. reporter: -- posting something like this trial when you are gathering intelligence, social media is something you look at, and obviously looking at the substack post -- paraphrasing , but i'm the man who set himself -- >> all the social media will be scrubbed. we did not know him prior to the incident. but going back, part of the investigation, all of the social media, any associates, we will be looking at all of it. reporter: any connection between -- [indiscernible] >> at this point, very

preliminary. we don't have that. >> emily? [indiscernible] >> is a right now, he is considered likely, which means he is very critical. his condition is not good, but ias of right now he is still alive. reporter: [indiscernible] >> we are looking for that right now. five minutes ago before we started the press conference i didn't see any criminal history in new york. >> it has not been asked yet, but i want the commission to his debt into talk about what he did immediately after to make sure the area is safe. >> thank you, commissioner sheppard. immediately following this incident i requested the bomb squad to come. the bomb squad searched the area for any secondary devices. they are doing this right now behind me, with canines checking over vehicles. as of right now, has been no additional devices found. hasn't been any devices

found, sorry, with or go to this incident. we will continue to search the area. as far as her question about enhanced security procedures, we will look into this. maybe we will have to shut this area down, but that is something we will do, have a conversation and get back to plaza. reporter: can you talk about what personnel -- >> yeah, we are knocking to talk about specific numbers, but we are working with numerous city agencies and federal partners in this area. obviously were working with courts, we are working with the secret service come we are working with sanitation, whose building is right here, we are working with fdny. there are a lot of city agencies were part of this, but we will not discuss what number of personnel we have. last two. reporter: share what was told to donald trump's service detail -- >> we will not share

conversations we had with secret service, but everyone involved in the trial insight is aware of the incident that took place outside today. last one. who do you want? reporter: [indiscernible] >> that is under investigation, but i will let you talk about it coul. as a right now -- >> as a right now, we have from walking to the park. that doesn't mean he didn't take a train here or came via car. we have a vehicle identify connected with him and we are currently searching for that car. reporter:- appears to be someone and tied trump and earlier you blocked off barricades for trump supporters protesting. i noticed that he lit himself on fire on the trump supporter side. do you have any reason to believe he was targeting trump supporters? >> as everybody up here said earlier, we do not believe this was targeting any particular person or any particular group. we just right now our labeling it as a conspiracy theorist and

are going from there. the investigation will continue. thank you, everybody. >> thank you for your time and attention. thank you. lewis: so that update from new york police department with some new details about exactly what happened outside the courthouse. the man who we now know max well azzarello, born in 1987, from florida. he walked into a park just opposite the courthouse. he opened the bag and throws pamphlets with conspiracy theories into the air come and then pours a liquid on himself and sets himself on fire. we have pictures of the aftermath. this is when the fire extinguishers had been used there. he is taken away on a stretcher. using a critical condition right now in hospital. three nypd and one court officer have minor injuries. we know as for the men, as he is taken away, he arrived earlier this week in new york and his

family members didn't know that he was in new york. police also saying that there was a social-media post or posts prior to this incident, but he wasn't known to them. as for the security outside the court building, no immediate decisions, but they are going to reassess security, as you would expect, may be shut down that park opposite the courthouse might be one of the measures that they consider and are still searching the area for any potential secondary devices. none found so far. so, that is what happened in the last few hours outside the court. let's take a look a little earlier. this is donald trump going into court, because it is the end of the first week of that trial. he is facing 34 counts of a fraud linked to alleged hush-money payments made it to the adult film star stormy daniels. he has pleaded not guilty, of course. let's speak to a former federal

prosecutor. thank you very much for coming on the program. >> thank you. lewis: so let's focus on events today inside the courtroom. bring us up to speed with what is happening. >> yes, so we do have a jury that has been selected. they have been working today on alternates -- in other words, these are jurors who are going to take the place of the actual jurors in case a juror has to be excused from the jury for one reas or another. it appears we are on track for opening statement on monday. lewis: ok, opening statements, what does that mean, what are we expecting? renato: sure, opening statement are were both sides decide what they believe the evidence will show. it is a way for both sides in the case, prosecution and defense, to set forth the issues in front of the jury and make sure that the jury is prepared for all the evidence they are going to receive, and put it into some sort of context.

to a juoror, a lot of the evidence and witnesses is going to seem overwhelming. there will be a lot of different witnesses and evidence. this will allow them to put some context on it. lewis: ok, and the events outside, which we have just been talking about, what impact will they have, or do they have, those kinds of incidents have on what is going on inside? renato: i think it has very little impact, if any. the jurors are all focused on what is going on inside the courtroom. obviously there is some news coverage, we have had some on this broadcast. but for all practical purposes, that should not impact the jury. the judge will instruct the jury not to watch media accounts, particularly regarding this trial, during the course of the trial. the jurors are going to try to abide by that.

if one juror happens to see this by mistake, they may bring it up to the judge, but i would be surprised if this results in a juror being excused. lewis: interesting stuff. ok, lots to take in for next week. for the moment, we will leave it there. thank you very much for coming to talk us through that. renato mariotti, thank you. let's take you to the live pictures in w york and reflect on what we heard from the nypd, hosting that police press conference, giving us details about what happened, because of course there were plenty of police outside the court, as you would expect, plenty of press and media as well. and so they witnessed, lots of people outside the courthouse witnessed that man, to the park opposite the courthouse, pour a liquid over himself, set himself on fire, after he had thrown pamphlets up into the air with conspiracy theories on them. his name, maxwell asaz

zarello, born in 1987 and from florida. he is in critical condition. police saying they will be reassessing security outside the courthouse. plenty more to come. stay with us. i'm lewis vaughan jones. announcer: funding for presentation of this program is provided by... financial services firm, raymond james. bdo. accountants and advisors. cunard is a proud supporter of public television. announcer: funding was also provided by, the freeman foundation. and by judy and peter blum kovler foundation, pursuing solutions for america's neglected needs. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

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