presentendo gobierno de la politicia para ustedes. two assassinations within hours of each other that have pushed the middle east to the brink of an all-out regional war. the first one in claimed by israel killed hisbullah chief of staff fuad shukr in beirot and the other one took the life of hamas political bureau chief ismail hania in the iranian capital tehran. now israel hasn't claimed responsibility for that one, but the killing has israeli fingerprints. all over it, joining me now to

discuss all this, is a man who knew ismail of hania personally and has putting lot of blood, sweat and tears to the palestinian cause throughout his political life that spends decades. george gelowe, thank you so much for joining us. who was ismail hania? of you knew him quite well, and why was he key for palestinian liberation? well, over the last three. 103, four, five days uh, he's been the chief negotiator for the palestinian side in the apparent attempt by israel to free what it calls its hostages. palestinians of would call them prisoners, or the prisoners in the israeli jails should also be called hostages, because they're both the same. they're being held against their will, for no good reason, they were taken. by either side,

so the either both prisoners or the're both hostages uh, and he was the chief negotiator on behalf of the palestinian side, and not since medieval times, has a more high profile negotiator, being killed by the people he was negotiating with. this is i think the first thing to say, but his proper title was the head of the political bureau. "that's an important title, an important post, but it is a political post. he wasn't a military leader, neither when i met him in 2009 uh, when i took a siege breaking convoy from britain, uh, as matter of fact, he gave me his palestinian passport, which i have in a safe at home uh, because he wanted to give me a palestinian passport, but he had none to hand, so he gave me..." his and it was

touching at the time, ponnan of course, now and i will uh treasure it and pass to my of children, he was the head of the political wing of hamas, i'm not myself a supporter of hamas, i'm a a supporter of the arafat wing of the palestinian struggle, but i greatly respected him, and more importantly the... palestinians greatly supported him and they voted for him, and if there were elections in the west bank, he would win those elections by a country mile, so this was very important palestinian political leader, and i take the old fashion view that you can't pick other people's political leaders for them, you have to negotiate, deal with the people that they choose, and they chose him, they would have chosen him and again uh, he was very

significant and really quite philosophical gentleman, he was anyone's idea of a good uh, a good partner to talk with, which is why it of was such success in the position that he in held, you just mentioned he wasn't a military person, he was political bureau chief, why then was he targeted and why particularly? in iran? well, the second is easier to answer, it was a provocation to iran, because netanyahu's whole stick is to draw the whole region into all-out war in the hope that might be well founded, might not be, that the united states will follow them into that war and will make uh war against all of israel's enemies simultaneously with. russia and china of

on the side of the enemy, i'm not sure that netanyahu is right about that, but that's why it was done, if they wanted to kill him, well they could have killed him in doha. uh anyt uh, but they waited until he was guest of iran, and knowing that in iranian culture, in islamic culture, to kill an honored guest in your house demands the highest level of revenge, retaliation, and i think that we're going to see a retaliation of new kind, we're going to see something which... in quantity and or in quality will be quite unprecedented in the middle east, as to why him, just because he was there, because he was high profile leader of a resistance movement,

which is taking a great tol on the invasion force of netanyahu, just this day, seven israeli officers... of in some cases quite senior rank have been wounded and some of them critically wounded in hamas resistance operation raffa. this is a daily occurrence, this hamas resistance has not been beaten, of course nearly every house has been destroyed or damaged, hundreds of thousands of people have been murdered or mutilated, all inst. institutions have been destroyed, schools, universities, hospitals, anything civic or civil has been systematically destroyed, but they have not destroyed the fighting spirit the palestinian resistance, and he was an

emblem of that resistance, and the best known one, yeah, so it looks like almost like you know they needed some kind of a win, and through his assassination they feel like, they can tell their people that there something that they have achieved, but the other question, george is, we are well aware of how the western media spreads propaganda, but in this particular case, before any investigation was even begun by tehran, of course the incident happened in tehran, we had you know new york times for example talking about how the bombs were planted, how you know it was through whatsapp, what was the aim of trying to spread that propaganda before any invest? well it's the tel aviv times rather than the new york times, i'm afraid they've disgraced themselves throughout this conflict and for many decades before that, they are not a reputable newspaper, if they ever were, they are not one any longer, and they were quickly out the

traps with story that is completely false, the iranian sides say, and this is... enough that the model was carried out by a handheld projectile firing seven kilogram warhead, in other words a kind of rpg type weapon, and that required the murderers to get very close to the building to carry it out, that's bad enough, and i have no doubt the iranians are doing their best. to learn from the security failure that that is, uh, there was earlier talk about a submarine launched missile, but the iranian side have ruled that out and definitely they've ruled out the planting of explosives in the building allegedly two months before, which is what the new york

times uh claimed falsely, i have no uh doubt, uh, it's to so confusion, to so uh doubt... about the loyalty of people involved to start a witch hunt for scape goats as to how this dreadful thing was allowed to happen, was able to happen, but the israelies are accomplished killers, you have they have killed so many people before, and in so many different ways, as i told you, i'm an arafatist, president arafat was almost certainly murdered by them uh by poison. uh by by poloneum uh, which of course would have required someone close to him to administer it, but i have no doubt that it was an israeli operation. i was with him at his death bed in paris when he passed away, and i

could clearly see that this was too rapid and too total, a collapse to be uh just through normal illness or ill health - so they have, they've assassinated palestinian leaders, all of hans predecessors were assassinated by israel, mr. rantisi. uh the founder of hamas, sheikh yasin, they were all murdered by israel, but it doesn't seem to have gotten through to israeli propagandists that you can cut down the flowers, but you can't stop the spring, you can kill the leaders, but you cannot kill the cause. indeed, to a remarkable extent, hamas has got stronger and stronger and stronger after each. of its leaders have been murdered by israel, is this case of you know when they say a martier is

actually more dangerous than when he is living, because if we look at the case of haniah, if we look at the way the world has reacted to it, the classical sunni shia divide that the west has always played it, do you think that he is actually more dangerous now in that in martidom than when he was alive? well, i don't think he was... dangerous in any military sense, he was dangerous because he he seemed to embody the hope of negotiation that could end uh what is now 76 years of disaster, catastrophe uh which has plunged the region into war after war after war, ideologically, yeah, undoubtedly his stature will have been enhanced in the pantheon of... uh he will loom larger and someone has already picked up

his mantle uh, i have no doubt uh the youth that followed uh ismail hania will follow the next leader too uh so if they killed him because they thought he was dangerous i suspect they haven't seen anything yet now of course there is a question of the reaction that will come uh especially from iran and lebanon, um, there's a lot of questions of now the west asking iran, don't escalate, and we've seen it in united nations and asking iran not escalate this war, why did they not tell netanyahu to kill is while honey, which has actually escalated things, yes, depends when they want to start the clock uh, for the escalation, what israel has been doing for the last 300 plus days is... beyond the world escalation, the murder and mutilation of

hundreds of thousands of people, most of them women and children, one would have thought was the ultimate definition of escalation. murdering political opponents in other people's capitals is very big escalation and was deliberately designed to be so, so they keep coming with what they call or don't call, but they're all the same, mediation efforts, whilst iran has, i think, made clear that uh, what is there to mediate about this great crime was committed in our capital city, as deliberate insult to us, and we must answer it. now, if someone came along, i mean, imagine this was the bazar in in terron, if they came along... and made some exceptional offer, the the abandonment of all

occupied territories, the imprisonment of netanyahu, the end of this war and all fother wars, the freedom of palestine if that's what they were offering, i'm sure iran would be ready to trade that kind of deal, but that's not of course what they are offering, the americans are offering to return. to the nuclear deal, well we're way past the nuclear deal, way way past it, out of washington today it said that sanctions on iran will be lifted, but these are uh false promises and any case would not expiate a sin, a crime of the magnitude that has been committed, and it isn't just iran of course, the lebanese resistance are... mulling their response, the iraqi resistance, the yemeny resistance, the

syrian government, whose territory was seized so long ago, now there's not that many people around unlike me, who've actually been there and seen the crime that they committed in 1967 when when the beatles were top of the hit parade, that's how long ago uh the crime the seizure. the golan heights dates back to, so it's it's the whole region, it's the whole cresent of resistance, and crucially, it's the masses inside. the arab states that are not in the axis of resistance, who are boiling with rage and desire for for retaliation, that's why the foreign minister of jordan had to go to teran, because they have to show their people uh that they are not enemies of iran, friends of israel and

the united states, of course whether they are will be seen in the next... days or whenever the retaliation happens, dito, the president of egypt, making it clear that he would not be part of any anti-iran axis and so on, well we'll see about that, but these leaders are only saying these things because of the public pressure inside their own countries. that that's a very interesting, think assessment, especially given the fact that you know the west has always divided the muslims in order to be able to conquer that. so the sunni shia divide is what we see iran against all the other arab nations. do you think this time they have failed? because even among the common men you in all the countries we are watching we can see a united front in morning ism khania for example. do you think that this time this tactic has failed? i hope it's failed uh you can always

count on some sectarians to uh uh continue to uh consider it more important, whether you pray like this or pray like that uh, whilst your the hands of both of you are being cut off uh, you'll always find such people, but i hope uh certainly in the region that this has marked a significant turning point, after all the forces that are striking israel are shiite militias and shiite armies, shiite countries, the countries states differentiate between the country, the state and the people that are collaborating with israel, call themselves sunnis, though they are a pretty poor example of that, so let's hope that the

sacrifice made by the remaining family, by the way, ismael hania has lost six. 60 members of his family, 60, six zero, so any hanes left, and i condol them now, the the blood will not have been shed in vein, if it marks an historic turning point of placing a side uh doctrinal differences for the sacred cause of palestine, absolutely, now i mean, "you've mentioned iran a shia country, in the forefront really of fighting for the rights the palestinians, why do you think that is the case? i mean, this can be at the detriment of iran itself, but they are the strongest voice, they have been for a long time, um, for a sunni population really of palestine, why is that? yeah, i mean, as far

as i know, and if there is one, i've never met them, there is no single shiite in gaza, uh, "everyone there is a christian or a sunni muslim, yet iran has done everything humanly possible, and some things that most people thought were impossible, to come to their aid, and this is surely uh very significant, it will be significant on the judgment day for sure uh, but it should be significant before that in the history that is being written now, uh, the resistance. that we spoke about earlier in gaza is only able to resist because of the support from iran and they have said so many times, many, many times, hania said it, uh, khalid mishael said it, all of the leaders of the resistance organizations have paid tribute to iran for the help that they have been giving. i doubt,

and i've never met one if there is, if there are any sunnis in hezballah, but hezballah has now given hundreds of martars and is ready to give thousands, maybe tens of thousands more to resist israel, and if possible to help to liberate palestine. this is undeniable, and that which cannot be denied, will eventually silence even the... most foolish sectarians who continue to seek to exacerbate differences, absolutely, and i think it is very much part of the shia islam to stand up for the truth. and to stand up against the oppressed, i think this is seen through the history of shia islam, it doesn't matter who you are standing for, as long as people are oppressed, you will stand for

them, i think that's where it springs for, but again, given what we are watching here in the uk at the moment in terms of the riots, the anti-muslim protest, islamophobic messages on the streets of london, do you think that has got anything to do with the death or the martydum of ismail han? yeah, well, the leader of these race riots, who ironically is right now sitting a sunlounger a five star hotel in cyprus, paid for by the israel lobby that pay him a monthly stypent of 160,000 pounds per month. that's a lot of money, serious lot of money. uh, he himself said so, that uh, people like him. have moved into the actions they're now taking because the weekly marches in london and elsewhere around the country in support of the

palestinians, so we don't need to look in the crystal ball, we can listen to uh the leader these riots himself, that's what he said on video uh, so uh these race riots, for that's what they are, of course, "they hate muslims most of all, but really if there were no muslims, the rights and the mentality behind them would still exist, they hate people of color, that's why african people who are not muslims, sikhs who are not muslims, hindus who are not muslims, black people of all kinds have been attacked savagely by mobs over the last few days." in england, there's no pretense of uh, of finding out what religion they are before they try to lynch them, and they set up road block in a town,

city really called middlesborough, and they were literally saying on camera that white drivers could come through, but black people would not be allowed to drive through, and god knows what would have happened to them if they'd fallen into their hands, so... their race riots, but of course uh the existence of a thriving muslim community in britain is a particular thumb in the eye for them, because the muslims in britain have made success of their lives, despite government policies of neglect and deindustrialization and so on, the muslim population in britain has done very well through hard work. building small and medium-sized businesses into big businesses, they have the fruits of their success sitting outside their door and in the

in the carriage way and the the drive, the they they have a community, they have strong family ties, extended family ties, the children might one day be with their grandma, but the next day be with their aunt. as likely as to be with their parents, they they have mosks, they have community organizations, all the things that many of the uh people who are on the rampage over the weekend don't have, they don't have community, they don't have extended family, many of them don't have any family at all, many of them have many times been in jail, many of them are on drugs. "most of them are on alcohol, uh, they are people who have failed in life, and that bitterness is what you see coming out in these riots. it's very

interesting, because you know, we watched one the radio presenters interview, guy who was blaming immigrants for not getting a job, and when they probbed him, it found out that he was sex offender, and that was the reason he wasn't getting the job, but of course it was the fault of the muslims, it's such an interesting discussion to..." but we are out of time, thank you so much time and thank you all for watching, goodbye. when you go to our states, our soils are pierced on all sides to search for precious metals such as gold, but often there is not even the slightest accessible road to reach the areas where they exploit gold, much less some basic social services, that is why decided to revolt and take the destiny of our countries in hand,

imperialism has... 1ous tricks in his bag, you must be vigilant, vigilant and very vigilant. i therefore hope that these moments will be for us story that we will write, not just for the aes, but especially for africa and for the whole world. by the time you see this, the world might be at war, the middle east and west asia, almost certainly so, the world waits for the new superpower in the west asian theater of operations, the islamic republic of iran and its friends in the access of resistance to retalian, to the

israeli savagery that killed. quiero decir a todos los responsables del equipo de infancia del principado. asturias que son un cortijo, tanto los responsables de la consejería, los juzgados de familia, el equipo psicosocial, ellas y cruz roja todas juntas forman un cortijo, yo no me voy a rendir, no voy a parar hasta recuperar a mi hijo.

that minds israel intensifies its attacks on hanuness in southern gaza with several civilians killed in a missile strike a tempt housing displaced people, the palestinian prisoner society calls on the un to car about investigation into israel's systematic torture of palestinian detaines and iran says that it is no option but to use its legitimate right of defense in the face of israel's aggression somit un security council's in action.