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of hello and welcome to press tv spotlight, i'm marza hashimi. thanks so much for being with us. now the israeli entity continues to reak havoc in the west asia region. 80 days have come and gone since the start of its genocide on gaza. it has also increased as night rates and assaults on palestinians in the west bank. the regime has staged more attacks on south lebanon as well as on syria. and on monday in a targeted missile. strike it

assassinated iran's top military man in of syria, commander sayid razza musavi who headed the iran's revolutionary guard core in syria as iran continues to assist the syrian government in its fight against terrorists. musavi was a close companion of the marttered lieutenant general qasim sulaymani who the us assassinated almost four years ago in iraq. i'd like to now welcome my guess to the spotlight. anthony hall, professor of globalization, leathbridge university, out of lethbridge, and glendison, professor of political science, university southeastern norway, out of oslo. thank you both for being with me, starting it off with anthony. uh, i mean, the israeli regime has always been a

rogue entity, however it just seems to be exponentially um getting worse and just increasing its terror throughout the region. if you agree with that, why do... you think it is the case and what is it trying to accomplish? well, there's an individual by the name of benjamin netanyahu, i'm getting feedback in my, i'm not talking against myself if there needs to be an adjustment here, but he he is uh, take your headphones out for a couple of minutes, anthony, just talk, just talk, go ahead, can you hear me? i don't think that, can you hear me? yes, just hold it up, just hold up your mouth, it's okay, okay, how about letting the other fellow start? okay, we'll do that, i'll come back to you then, um, anthony, glenn, your thoughts, i'll just throw that question at at

you, basically in looking at this entity and what it is doing, uh, your thoughts on it, is it getting worse or or what is its goal and what's happening? well, i think that the goal of israel would be two folds, one of course they want to this to go after hamas and get back to hostages, but of course, as we've seen over the past 80 days uh, with the mass killings of israel, sorry of palestinian civilians, uh, it's quite obvious that there's a second objective too, which is to resolve uh, what then can be referred as the palestinian question, because this limited uh for israel, because what are they supposed to do on on this territory which they envision to be greater israel? there's the demographics is quite evenly split between the jews and the palestinians, so so obviously they've sabotaged very actively the

two state solution for for years and that that makes the question, how can you resolve this? so you can either all live in one state, but then of course it wouldn't be a jewish state anymore, or second, you can have apartide uh which would be uh what what the west bank is living under, but that's also not sustainable, and i think there's a third option, which is uh ethnic cleansing or even genocide, and i think that we definitely see the ethnic cleansing is being pushed very hard, which is why they're trying to well not just massacre a lot of people, but also drive them out of gaza as well, so i think that this is uh, they they try to take, i guess advantage of the heated. situation in order to resolve what they see as a greater challenge, which would be uh, yeah, getting rid of the palestinians, so it's it's quite a dangerous stage to have entered, the fact that they're also prepared to escalate the

conflict and spread it, i'm thinking then into lebanon, syria, yeah, hopefully we stayed cleared of yemen, but even trying to pull iran into this, i mean there seems to be... among some an ambition for much greater war, but that being said, not even israel is one entity, i think netanyahu obviously represents more of a hawkish and aggressive element within israeli state, of course, not only aspect of it, and i think the same applies for the united states, there's many there who sees this is an opportunity to spread the war and go after other rivals from from again lebanon, syria, iran, yemen, so i think there's different. aspects of the american and israeli government pulling this in different directions, so again, many different objectives, many different players, so overall it's a situation which can be quite chaotic very quickly. okay, well anthony, hopefully uh, you can hear me a little bit better, and with the zinis regime

and its targeting of the irgc commander sa musavy and damascus, why do you think that it has targeted him at this point in time? when the regime is in the middle of a genocide in gaza, going on is, yes, netanyahu is one player among many, but he knows where many of the pieces are, this is his moment, he is essentially trying to draw iran into some kind of regional conflict, even a worldwide conflict, and he knows that in order to draw iran in, iran, he's provoking, killing solomon, killing the the air to solomani in syria right around this time of season, reminding us what happened four years ago, this is very provocative, he's trying to provoke uh hezbulah and uh the plot from his

point of view is he needs to negotiate things in a way that the us, if iran just comes into the conflict uh based on these uh some pieces of provocation which we're seeing, then he's kind of in in the driver seat, he he needs to bring in the usa, and gosh knows what's really going on between the usa and... israel, but all the time they have been planning this, they they plan this thing in gaza together, but now the timing is everything, and iran is really the center of the show, and uh, it's very interesting to be talking to you on christmas day at this very moment in history, yeah, and it is quite an interesting christmas in general, we see what is going on, in general, and well, well, glenn, let's look at that, i mean, anthony talked about that he's that it's a provocation and wanting to get a wider war,

um, well let's look at that, because we know that the regime is having a quite a difficult time, actually in gaza, yes, they have been very successful in killing women and children, have not been as successful against the palestinian resistance on the ground, and many say needing a way out or a way to expand this in order to get other players involved, um, your thoughts on that, side is it that they want iran and hezbullah and then the us and nato and create this uh critical situation that it's global war or your assessment of what the regime is doing? well usually what makes israel quite successfully is is able to pin all other actors against each other and pick out one target, one adversary to to destroy, this is what it usually does, so uh this very active effort to to pull to provoke other actors and make it more of a regional war, it does break a

bit from israel's habits, but that being said, what what it's doing now in gaza isn't working simply, i mean they killed now more than 20 thousand people, and only a tiny minuscule of them are actually hamas fighters, and with this mass killings of course they're going to create lot of more resistance fighters which will join hamas or any other. movement so uh so from this perspective it's it's counterproductive even what what they're doing so i think you know but they're not going to back down either so i think that's that's what they're going doubling down and also as long as they're just massacring civilians in gaza uh you know the international community is not very sympathetic they indeed the standing of israel in the world and the united states is dropping quite rapidly because of uh what's being done, however if they can make this into a wider war, you bring in hesbolah or

syria or even iran, this would be very different, because because under these circumstances this this actor has been demonized for so many years in the west that it would be much easier to form coalitions, get a more more support from the wider west, so again i think it's also an opportunism because "they have lot of adversaries, their neighbors been growing much stronger over the years and i think there simply in interest to address this issue and start to go after more their uh yeah adversaries, but uh again this is a recipe for disaster, i think especially in the united states, i think there's many who have more apprehension and more caution trying to put some restrains on israel, but uh obviously not enough. well, anthony, your take..." on that, do you believe um that if there was a wider situation uh, for example,

if syria, iran, hazbullah were involved, as glenn said, these entities, countries have been demonized for so many years, that would have make it easier for the united states to form a coalition, although let us say that the united states was not successful even forming a coalition against the yemeny military recently for the red sea, so your thoughts. the uh situation in the red sea and in yemen uh visa uh shipping on the red sea and the chaos that the what do i call them the answer, the uh yemenis, the hootes, this has become a regional situation, this has been the wild card, now what makes this so unpredictable is that the yemen force are truly idealistic, they are in it to defend the besieged uh people of gaza against a

genocide, and that is their position, and they have withstood a onslaught much like the people of gaza have are going through right now, and so they have used their strategic position and have created really a chaos, their position is... no ships that are going into israel or coming from israel, it's having an enormous effect on the israeli economy, it's creating all of this uncertainty, uh, saudi arabia won't join uh, this group of the willing, i noticed my own country, canada is joining it, why would we do so? i'm very angry at my own government, they haven't consulted us, so this situation in yemen really has made it much more regional kind of situation already, and it has creating a whole list of scenarios,

including in monday things like the insurance industry over how they will deal with this, and the... container fleets that go from china to europe. this is major uh intervention in the whole free flow of the global economy as it should be, and now us and israel have to face this, and no doubt they will downplay it, but i'm thinking the regional war is already on. it happened with that intervention on the red sea, that very principled, bold, and strategic intervention by the people we used to call the hootis who are now really speaking for nation state called yemen, right? yeah, definitely yemeni military, have they have been exceptional. well, i i want to go back to the assassination that has taken place. our correspondent in syria had said that uh, the

previous days there had been reconnaissant planes, israeli and american reconnaiscent planes over that area. "do you think that it's a possibility that israel coordinated this with the united states, glenn? well, it's uh, it's possible, and well, it shouldn't be surprising. i think both israel and the united states has demonstrated their preparedness to attack and kill iranians abroad, of course with solemani setting a very dangerous president, so i think that the..." the the objective of course from the americans and israel is would be to signal a the turns, so they want to deter iran from having any role in the region. keep in mind every time we use uh when they use the language to describe iran uh allies, they always refer to them as iranian uh supplied,

iranian supported suggesting that iran is always standing uh pulling you know the threads of its uh mer it's mayor puppets or its vastels, but lot of these are actual allies and partners of iran, and uh, you know, the the notion that they can just assassinate any iranian military leader as there's some part of a terrorist group or something is of course quite absurd, but they kind of created this whole narrative now that uh iran's role in the region is one of terrorism even though they're the one you know helping uh syria to fight terrorists within syria uh but but nonetheless uh that that's what they've taken on themself and so it's of course it's hard to save the united states, i haven't seen any evidence uh who supplied the intelligence, but the there's few restrains left, we see the same in ukraine, the americans are bragging that they are giving you the intelligence uh to to assassinate and kill uh russian leaders, so youf they're willing to do this against the

world's largest nuclear power, i don't see any reason why there would be any restraint against the killing. military leader, so again, this new lines being crossed every single day. indeed, new lines are being crossed, and hypocrisy more and more exposed. anthony, we have seen during the last 80 days with the uh genocide in gaza, that many people are waking up, especially in some of the western countries that they were not aware of the crimes of the israeli regime. at the same time, do you think that people are also becoming aware of the... total hypocrisy the israeli regime and the american regime in the region uh just as glenn was just talking about for example killing an iranian commander and then basically because of they say um he's a terrorist when we know uh iran has been at the forefront in fighting terrorism just as we know that lieutenant general qasim soleimani was at the forefront

in fighting daesh and yet the americans killed him. do you think this part is is uh being... exposed that more and more people are really understanding the roots of this hypocrisy that comes from washington itself? well, there's a lot of ignorance, ignorance to overcome, but yes, of course, people are waking up to the extent of the crimes against humanity that are taking place. my understanding of iran since i first visited there in 2014 is iran since 1979 has heritage. of dealing with impressed people, people who are pushed to the margins, and the hooties of yemen would be an ideal example, and while we're on the subject of solomani. "let's pay him respect, let's pay this martter great respect, and look to what's going on in yemen, for instance, and see his

mark, see his mark in hezballah, see his mark in syria, see his mark in iraq, see his mark in coordinating an approach which we call the resistance, the axis of resistance, that the bullies of the west, that the inheritors..." this imperial ruthlessness of the british empire, of the american empire, now embodied and almost epitomized by what we're seeing in with the government of israel as their most ruthless you know manifestation of a principled and unprincipled maniacal genocidal regime acting in the name of some imperial vision, some zionist vision, so the uh ability of people on the margins, smaller people to become equipped to get a sense of standing up against the dominant powers of

the world, and now this applies to bricks, it applies to russia, it applies to china, it applies to iran, and it applies to you, even saudi arabia, and it's moving this bricks idea, so i think the uh empire, the uh entity that the axis of resistance is opposing, they're defining themselves much more clearly, it's becoming much more clearly, even in the west, that we, the people in the west really don't have any say in how our governments work, whatever the opinion poll say to biden or, that there is momentum and there is a concentration of military intelligence, media, judicial, psychological. warfare uh pressure and power and contamination of decent society, that we need a rule of law, we need immediate genocide

procedures at the international court of justice, not at the sad, corrupt icc, but at the international court of justice to enforce the genocide convention right now, because it's obviously being violated and "where is the trust in international law in the united nations unless there is something dramatic like an actual trial on the genocide convention, which is clearly being violated. why would we have any trust in international institutions right now? the system requires some kind of organization of people along the lines that solomoni had in has delivered as left his legacy. iran is..." is the inheritor of this legacy, the hooties are a perfect example of a small marginalized people who are now making a huge difference in the world because of their principled stand, and we

need to follow that example. all right, and we're looking probably at the end of the rules based system, and so it be interesting times to see what comes. thank you so much both of you for being with me, we're out of time. anthony hall, professor of globalization out of lethbridge, and glenn dyson, professor of political science, university of south. to norway out of oslo and thank you viewers for being with us on another spotlight, i'm marza hashimy, signing out for myself and other group right here in tehron. goodbye.

headlines at presh tv, top commander of iran's irgc is assassinated. an israeli strike a neighborhood close to the sayid zenab shrine in the syrian capital. the bodies of more than 8,00 palestinians are missing in gaza as the death toe from the israeli onslot surpasses to 20,000 mark. hamas leader yahya senwar says resistance fighters have killed or wounded some 5,00 idm soldiers during the on.