of resolutions have to be violated, how many more children have to be annihilated? this is not a war, it is systematic genocide, but we're evid in try, palestine will never die free palestine, hello, i'm chris williamson and you're watching palestine declassified, we're the only weekly tv show focusing on investigating and exposing the israeli

regime's global war against solidarity with the illegally occupied people of palestine. in this week's show we'll be highlighting how the growing public backing for palestine in britain contrast sharply with the british political class to continue to give sucker to israel. one such example is the increasingly voluable support for palestine on the terraces of celtic football club. these displays of solidarity have been frowned on by the club's directors and the union of european football associations. referred to by its initials uefa has even imposed fines. amina taylor has this report about a group of celtic fans known as the green brigade who display their solidarity with palestine at celtics matches. back in 2006, a seemingly unlikely bunch of football supporters got together to create the green brigade. staling themselves as ultras, they were declared anti-fascist group and from the beginning champion the cause of palestine. the green in of

the title refers to the hoops on the shirt of their football team celtic, team created in 1887 with the purpose of alleviating poverty in the immigrant irish population in the east end of glasgow by an irish priest brother walfred. the cause of ireland has always therefore been core to the politics of the green brigade. their devotion to irish republicanism and to the cause of palestine have attracted attention and attempts to constrain and abolish the group, but all attempts have so far failed. in june, 2012, a flory of palestinian flags flew proudly, and banner appeared reading, "dignity is more precious than food." this was a display of support for palestinian hunger strikers in israeli jails. "we did this in solidarity," they said, "we want palestinians to know we're thinking about them," and encourage scottish civil society. to look at the

injustice in palestine. in 2016, celtic were find 8,619 pounds by uefa for supporters of flying palestinian flags at an august 2016 uefa match against israeli team hopel bershiva at celtic park. the green brigade launched a crowd funder to raise 10,000 to pay the fine, but in the end raise £188, they donated the balance to palestinian. charities after the launch of alaxa flood on the 7th of october, the green brigade did not shrink from action, that day during the game with kilmanuck, surrounded by palestinian flags, their banners read free palestine, victory to the resistance. on the 25th of october 2023, thousands of celtic fans during a uefa champions league match against atletico madrid flew the palestinian flag and unfurled the same large banners. that read free

palestine and victory to the resistance. fans dedicated the song, you'll never walk alone in solidarity with palestinians in gaza. in response, celtic suspended the season tickets of green brigade members effectively banning them from the game. in november, uefa find the club 15,200 for the atletico madrid. action, the israel football association took of credit for the complaint that led to the fine, however, the green brigade returned triumphantly to celtic park on the 23rd of december last year and emits sea of banned palestinian flags, unveiled banner, quoting a section of a prisoner's christmas song, many homes, they are satinight, they whisper someone's name by the candle light, 20,00 plus killed. 8000 plus children, the spirit

of resistance is strong in celtic park as it is in gaza, all power to the green brigade. as always, we're joined by. president expert david miller. david's an academic and a former professor at bristol university and is a leading british scholarly critic of israel. david is also the co-founder and co-director the lobby and watchdog spinwatch. our guest contributor today is steve hedley who joins us via skype. steve is from derry in the north of ireland and is lifelong socialist and trade unionist who was the senior assistant general secretary of the rmt trade union until quite recently. he's also been an anti-racist pro-palestinian activist all his adult life and is life. long celtic fan too, his book, derry boy, will be published at the end of the month, and having had sneak preview, i can tell you it's a compelling read. welcome to the show. steve, let me start with you. i mean, you grew up in derry, as we've just said there, with an appreciation of the scottish raised irish republican leader james connoly. i wonder

whether you can explain for our viewers how the irish question and celtic fc are intertwined. well, connely was actually a hibernian supporter, he was instrumentally a big big hubernian found. was another irish team in in edinburgh, but um, the the link with the palestinians and the irish despora that settled all over scotland and did all over the world is that we were oppressed people, we were dispossessed people. um, for hundreds of years, britain had sent in settlers to ireland, taken our land, tried they have genocide by so-called famen that was stealing our food, so we naturally as an oppressed people sited with other. oppressed peoples like the palestinians, if you think that they in the 1840s, the iris were fleeing and dying in their millions, we see that exactly is what's happening in palestine now, and we want the show up most solidarity with those people, and the people in celtic park, the green brigades and the celtic ultras and

others a large large crowd outside of the green brigade, support palestine 100% and do everything in their power to raise the issue the palestinians. well david, um, just say a little will you about the connection between glasgow and and palestine and and how is it related to the irish question? well, so i mean glasgow is about 30% uh catholic, yeah, almost all uh of irish origin and to uh regard themselves as as being irish and of irish origin, you can see it in the flags and uh uh in celtic park and in the the color green uh, and so that's the the key connection, and of course... as she's been saying, it's a it's a common sense of oppression, but i would go further than that, because of course you know what's happening in palestine is a settler colonial problem, and of course the issue in the north of ireland is settler colonial problem, the fact that britain still remains part of the north

of ireland and still not uh decolonized ireland fully, is that the reason why there's still an actual issue in the north of ireland, so people people in the north of ireland, naturally republicans the... naturally regard uh the question of palestine as something which is core to their sense of of being and so of course it's not surprising that you find the palestinian flag flying amongst celtic fans and you don't find it flying amongst rangers fans just across the city in glasgow at the other in the city because that's largely a team which comes from the the protestant and imperial tradition so there's the difference yeah well steve i mean the the banners at celtic park supporting the resistance are the kind of things which people have been arrested for in today's increasingly sensorious climate aren't they? mean, what do you think is happening with descent over palestine in this country? well, i think there's been a deliberate attempty oppress all the center, not even that, but even news about palestine, real news and if we look at there's not been

over 100 journalists killed in less than two months in palestine and you know what we're do what we're what people are doing itself is try to get that news and raise the... profile of palestinians and we are in a position where we're slipping in the authoritarianism, we have this ridiculous spectacle where people who are quite happy to see children blown up and mutilated every night on their tv suddenly find the the um phrase from the river to the sea is is somehow oh that inspires terror but seeing children blown up the they don't want to call for seasfire but that phrase from the river to the sea palestine will be free we're told inspires terroring people and i don't believe that i think it's a it's a deliberate attempt, one the many attempts to actually uh oppress freedom of speech, and if we're not careful, we're heading the words a very authoritarian regime, if those if people can't express their their freedoms of speech in this country, no indeed, he's absolutely right

there, isn't he, david, but it's not actually um illegal is it to to support the resistance and we're seeing all these arrests and and clamped down, it's rather odd, well so there's a contradiction in under international. law, there is a right of an occupied people to armed resistance, so resistance, including armed resistance, and that's a right which which the people of palestine clearly have under international law, but under terrorism legislation in the us. in the uk, there's a number of organizations which are listed as being quote terrorist and you cannot support them explicitly because that would be a crime under the terrorism act right, but of course not not all the palestinian resistance factions are on the list, so there's some you can support, the dflp, for example, democratic front for liberation of palestine isn't on the list, but more broadly speaking of course what resistance refers to, including armed resistance is a wider question of movement in palestine, hamas itself is called the islamic. resistance movement in arabic, that's the name of of the the organization, so there's a sense in which

resistance calling for resistance, even armed resistance is not the same thing as supporting uh so-called terrorism, and of course, but the contradiction is something which has to be worked upon, so steve's talking about from the river to the sea is being regarded as being someh genocidal and supportive of terrorism, but of course people are not being dissuaded by by by that argument, and what will happen really is that the more people? will say there's a right to resistance, the less it will be possible to prosecute people for that, no indeed. well, ste, what's your experience of of of trade unions offering solidarity with palestine? well, look, chris, i'm going to be brutally frank here, and i think that um, when trade union leaders get up and wax lyrical and indeed just announce their union policy as important and calling for an antigenocide, that's wonderful, that's great, but what's actually achieving? we have the royal fleet auxilillary which has got rmt members now it in the red sea supporting a genocide and now

those members aren't supporting the genocide but the leaders are doing nothing about balloting those members are instructing them not the work similarly you've got members of unite members of the gmb who are involved in technological firms and even arms manufacturers that are selling uh goods to israel which is enabling that genocide and and again we have these same people getting up on stage. in front of thousands of people uh getting clapped when they say that we should stop the genacide, what are they actually doing about it? you know uh the rhetoric doesn't actually match what's going on in the ground, the redrick doesn't match the the reality, so i think that the trade unions, it's incumbant upon trade unions, this isn't a matter of what's legal or illegal, it's a matter of what's right or wrong, are we going to stand like nazi war criminals uh, you and just say, well we were just following the law, we were just doing our job, are we are we actually going to try to stop? this genocide which is happening on our watch, yeah, well we'll just pause the

discussion there for moment, just to watch our next report now about celtic's namesake that was established in palestine in 2019. aida celtic is the name of football team which grew out of the palestine solidarity work of the green brigade, at the infamous match against the israeli team, hopolcheva in 2016, ufo fin the club total of more than 8,00 lb for the crime of flying hundreds of palestinian flags. these constituted illicit banners. the green brigade launched a hashtag on twitter #matchthefine for palestine. from gaza to the west bank, palestinians showed their support and thanks for the campaign. photographs of children and medical volunteers displaying the hashtag appeared, video messages from ida camp in bethlehem. filtered through a gazan football team posed the longsider thank you celtic love from gaza

banner. these actions laid the foundation for legacy beyond the campaign. donations flooded in from all over the world. the initial target was quickly surpassed and more than 180,000 was eventually raised. the money was divided between medical aid for palestinians and the laji center from aida refugee camp near. bethlehem in the illegally occupied west bank. aida celtic, football academy was launched in 2019. since october 7th, iida celtic have faced harsh challenges and the solidarity has continued. according to academic study, aida refugee camp is the most targas space on earth. on november the 26th, over 100 tier gas canisters were fired into the camp, many landing on the foot. pitch on october the 25th, the poet and writer dr. rafat alayer posted on x, the bombs are

falling, as i am writing this, celtic fans are amazing, thank you from gaza, from under the israeli bombs, your solidarity means a lot to us. in december, fans were quick to point out that dr. alarer had been murdered by the zianist. at the end of november, show staff member, dima alhaj was murdered alongside her husband, their six-month old baby boy and her two brothers. over 50 family and community members sheltering in the same house. also died. al-haj was a former glasgow university masters student who had been in close touch with celtic fans. at one in the morning on the 10th of december, 2023, occupation forces invaded aida camp and broke into the laji center to remove the palestine flag, which proudly flew from its roof. the

flag pole was cut with an electric saw and stolen alongside the flag. the pole was later installed on the occupation base which overlooks aida camp, flying the zinanis flag. by sunday evening, new palestine flag was proudly flying from the laji center roof once again as a celtic posted in response, they have nothing in their whole imperial arsenal that can break the spirit of one palestinian who doesn't want to be broken. "david, the green brigade, they're excoriated only in in certain quarters, and yeah, they they played a blinder didn't they in the uh development of saltic, yes, so they did this hashtag and they raised all this huge sum of money, which which more than 20 times almost paid the fine, and they give all the rest of the money

to bits and for the to create this club, which of course now is a is a going concern in..." uh which of course as we've seen is you know heavily tier most heavily teargus place on earth it's it's said so this was a an amazing way of turning round this oh you support terrorism kind of argument into saying well actually there's this practical solidarity coming from glasgow which is actually aiding the resistance uh in the west bank against designers so mean extraordinary and it led to huge and outporing of celebrity support uh musicians giving them money of course the the special uh football strips that they've done with the palestinian flag and the celtic strip and of course the logo of primal scream glasgow band with irish connections so all of that is is part of the mix yeah yeah well steve i mean what's your take on ayader celtic and and how this experiment has actually gone? well i think it's wonderful i think that the palestinians now recognize that the support they're

getting from the irish despora and people in glasgow who are supporting celtic and i think it's terrific i think uh resist isn't just about violence and actually the the occupied people's right to oppose the occupation, it's also cultural, it's also through sport and whatever form it takes, wherever people come together in large numbers like football teams, then um the resistance is is what happens and resistance to designist occupation and i'm absolutely absolutely so proud that my my club seltic card a hands and aiding that resistance in palestine by giving all that money. that they raised - you know uefa, uefa tried the uh stimy resistance in celtic park and what happened, this resistance sprung up in palestine because of that, because of the funds that were raised and i think that's magnificent. yeah, meanwile of course, davids have been actively trying to subvert the green brigade, haven't they? yes, so the israeli football association made a completely made the

complaint which led to the fine, which led to them having the hashtag campaign, which led to the... work that they've done in in the west bank and of course you know the design is then under - we saw in the film there i 1 o'clock in the morning breaking into the the football club taking their flag taking the flag poll then using the flag pool to to fly the israeli flag in in the occupation base overlooking them mean how ridiculous is that it's incredible that the the occupation stops to that kind of thing but we've seen this time and time again in the last three months that the humiliation the theft of of people's things, even that case of the the british idf, so-called idf soldier rifling through the the laungerery draw of a palestinian woman, absolutely incredible, the depths to which this islands are stuping, no indeed, well steve, it seems that the - camp is perhaps the most tear gas place on earth, and

i mean, what should we make of the zionist attacks on refugee cums and and children's football? well look israel is just a rug state now and that's a rug state that's getting backed by the united states and what we see is um just incredible things i mean the they're gassing people and gassing children at the football uh they're murdering children 800 children now uh dead in palestine and we see the united states baging this united states biting crying crocodile tears he could cut off the money any stage he just needs to stop funding israel and it would stop so this pretends that uh america or some how try and they intervene in a good way is it's just a pretense, it's just the by time, but i think that the what what what is remarkable and i grew up by the way in derry getting tier gas by the british army and they... they would go round the discriminantly gassing people uh in the bog side and the craig and and other nationalist areas so again that's that's why we support palestine because we've experienced it ourselves and i think that the more you

oppress people the more they fight back for every every person that they've killed in palestine it's going to be 10 people their family or their their friends who who are going to want to pick up a gun and resist i mean that's the reality of the situation so what is really doing is is everybody they oppress everybody they gas they're taking their own grave no indeed. and the the uh the images of the occupation soldiers forcibly uh removing the the flag and the the flag poll it kind of suggests a a sort of level of what can we put it contemptible pettiness doesn't it? yeah mean we have seen a a veritable catalogue think even those of us who have known and thought that zionism was genocidal uh from the beginning um have perhaps have been surprised by the level of pettiness and sheer brutality and the parading of men in their underwear and forcing them to to

denounce hamas uh the the the shooting of uh people waving white flags as they try to move in the direction told they've been told to move by the zin. mean it's truly despicable and the levels of brutality of contempt that that you see - in in in the in the propaganda, i mean the example of those the four women who are held uh by uh the resistance factions have been this and the resistance has been denounced by all these zins propaganda saying these poor girls are held by the evil hamas and of course what they are failing to to know is that these are women who are active duty um military officials are soldiers who've been who have been taken as hostages or... prisoners by the resistance factions and and we see no understanding uh from from the zionis that that what they're doing here is a brutal genocidal occupation and it needs to stop and

there is absolutely no understanding of that displayed by almost any zionist in the uk or the us or anywhere else and that's a sign really of depth of misunderstanding the zionists have have have revealed they do not understand the horrors that everyone else sees and that's why of course scientism must uh be totally ended as an ideology? no, mean i saw just before we we went on air to get more images of of palestinians being being stripped and and held and you humiliated in that way, but just w just to return back to if i may to uh to the uh to the to the green brigade because mean uh you know as well as holding banners aloft you know proclaiming support for the resistance and so on, mean it seems in many ways that you know they're making a more of a... significant political stand than the uh official - palestine solidarity campaign, yes, so you saw the some the banners there, mean end zionism is a is a is a remarkable one really, because in the

the official palestine solidarity movement, we cannot talk about zionism an open way, we can't talk about ending zionism and we can't really talk in the end much about genocide, so the the the politics of the green brigade is way in advance of the official palestine solidarity movement attached to this palestine solidarity committee, now of course scotland, as you'll recall, we've had mick on from the scottish palettine, solidarity campaign, the scottish palestine solidarity campaign is of a peace with the green brigade, much more advanced in its politics and what we need to see in this the palestine solidarity movement is move towards a much more militant sense of solidarity with palestine and and no mei mouth stuff about about, oh we can't talk about zionism, zionism is genocidal ideology, it has to be uh removed and destroyed from the world and we have to do that by resisting wherever it is and solidarity movement, it seems to me could learn some lessons from the green brigade, indeed, indeed, and i think uh, the the grassroot support is moving well ahead, isn't it of the of of the official campaign, but unfortunately - we're going to have to

draw the discussion to a close now because we're right out of time. i'd like to thank our guest steve headley and of course our residence expert professor david miller. palestinely classified, we'll be back next week with more forensic investigations and analysis, but in the meantime you can follow the show on facebook, twitter and telegram where we post regular clips and updates and remember, to share today's program on your social media platforms to help us continue growing our audience, so until next time, this is chris williamson, saying bye for now, 10 years of chaos and war in syria, the ruins left in syria, who benefits from the

continuation of this war? what is the view of the west, particularly america towards war in syria and the support of many countries for creating chaos in syria? why syria, a different narrative.

ladies and gentlemen, we're going live uh now to the uh lebanese capital bay router

secretary. family may peace be upon his companions and may peace be upon all of the prophets and the messengers may peace be upon you all. if you can give me the image of the god says in his glorious book in the name of god the merciful they compassionate.