tv The Bottom Line Al Jazeera May 23, 2021 2:30am-3:00am +03
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the question, both state and federal inquiries are under way that our reports federal charges, me follow indeed. but there are growing cold for a wider investigation of louisiana state police itself. its lies, its delays, and its actions. alan fisher, i'll just eat up. and finally, italy has won the eurovision song contest for the 1st time in more than 30 years and didn't clench the title. thinking of phone calls shut up and behave fun from the 1st united countries taking part in this year has been kept from home. because the pen ah there with me. the whole rahman in reminder of our top stories, the united nations as $800000.00 people in garza no longer have regular access to
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clean water. as a half of the pipes were damaged and israeli ass strikes, humanitarian aid is beginning to trickle in to thousands left homeless by the 11 day from bob and, and in television there was a random installation in support of the palestinian people, 100 sick part in the raleigh, organized by left wing and palestinian israeli political parties. hundreds of thousands of people have marched across europe in solidarity with palestinian protest as in london, calling on the government to impose sanctions on israel, organized as what more than a sci fi palestinian see, say they've been persecuted for more than 70 years. the volcano has her up to any debt because it republic of congo near the city of goma, vulcan, ologist say the laveries heading towards games. airport. thousands of people have side across the board to ra wonder could draw. millerio is in eastern congo. the correspondence of the associated press and spoke to me earlier from benny. most of the mission we get that day left is near the airport and more than
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3000 local population from government have fled to. you can add 2 to rhonda to to play volcano. you're going go from can, can already stretched hospitals in rural parts of india are reporting arise and rare, and deadly infection. amongst creative iris patients, dana's black fungus, doctors say it's difficult to treat you to a severe shortage of medicines. and 1000000 people who now died from corona virus across latin america. argentina has gone back into lockdown for the 1st time since last year to days of soaring infections. it's reported more than $35000.00 new cases for a 3rd day in a row schools and all non essential businesses are closed until the end of the month and the nighttime curfew is in place. you can follow those stories on a website at all. just have a dot com, it's updated through the day about with more news and half now,
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next to launches era. it's the bottom line to stay with us. growing up in parson, unforgiving circumstances. children learn to pay dangerous gain. the thing is to have worn down by frustration and broken promises, young men living under the constant threat of imprisonment. they took me to the chief and blindfolded me the time for them to regain control of their lives is when the boys return prison 9. inside and out on al jazeera, i am steve clements. i have a question. is the democratic parties traditionally rock solid support for israel slowly eroding. let's get to the bottom line. ah, when president joe biden got to the white house, he had a long list of priorities that he wanted to tackle. and the palestine israel issue was probably competing for last place on that list. but he always does that open
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wound of the palestinian israeli conflict has a way of forcing itself onto the world to agenda. and now biden is facing calls from within his own party to really address it for us present finally called for a cease fire. after about 10 israelis and $200.00 palestinians were killed, including scores of women and children. but the administration has mostly emphasized strong support for israel and issued some mild statements expressing concern about the loss of life on both sides. the biden white house is also blocked, the un security council resolution, criticizing israel for the hostilities. 3 separate times. there's been a harsh criticism of israel not only by progressive members of congress and even centrist like foreign relations committee chairman, senator bob minette. this are now demanding that by and do more, some american see a change in the dynamic of the palestine. israel issue in the united states, but are things really changing. today we speak the university of michigan history, professor juan cole, whose influential blog on u. s. foreign policy in the middle east turns 20 years old. next year. it's called informed comment, and it's
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a must read blog on this crisis professor called before we begin, i had a chance to ask senator chris murphy about the biden administration stance on the bloodshed in palestine and israel. do we have tools in our tool kit that can help the us be influential this time because we seem to have been in this episode again and again and again. and the question is, do we have more latitude today after the abraham accords? do we have less latitude? what tools do we have? well, as you know, it's harder for us to influence events in israel or in the palestinian territories because of the lack of if on both sides that are interested in dialogue. unfortunately, netanyahu has been rewarded politically for moving further away from the palestinian state. equally, hamas has been rewarded for organizing militant opposition to israel. so we don't have the kind of brokers that we used to have in the region to get to a peaceful future. so well, we still have tools, right?
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we have a leverage important security relationship with israel, important humanitarian relationship in the palestinian territories. we don't have the leadership there that we've had in the past. okay, so that was sen, chris murphy, democrat of connecticut, whom i caught up with in congress earlier today. now let's get to our discussion with fessor call one. let me just ask you to, we've been discussing this for decades. are there elements of this particular crisis that seem different to you? the, well, the differences primarily on the american side in the sense that you have had impassioned speeches of while mainly democrats on the left in congress are pretty roundly condemning then the net 10 yellow government to israel for its actions in gaza and not accepting the israeli narrative about these things, which is that this is merely
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a matter necessaries. self defense are the issues are being re framed almost like black lives matter in terms of palestinian human rights. there is a change also in the middle east and that we have for the 1st time in a long time seen solidarity across the green line. so the palestinians are striking today, not only in the west bank and gaza, but in israel proper, where 20 percent of the population is a palestinian heritage. so there is a cross border solidarity in middle east. there is some solidarity with palestinian right. that doesn't necessarily mean a lack of sympathy for israeli wounded in congress. and this is not something we saw in to 2014, 2012 or earlier. you know,
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i think a lot of people are looking at, you know, what were the sparks of this was the grenades and the ox them off to was it the, you know, the residents in east jerusalem that had been were being removed and now it's under supreme court review it when we kind of look, is it, is it a mahmoud abbas not postponing presidential elections yet again. but when you look at that origin, and you sort of look at joe biden, and i have to say there's love loss between b, b, netanyahu and joe biden. what is your, how would you grade the, by the administration's response so far? because it seemed to me that he really said, you know, as 8 days before he called for a cease fire, and i'm not really sure yet what the u. s. position is. so there isn't any daylight between the biden administration and the not to know government on the issue of the israelis are taking advantage of the height intentions and the firing of those
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little rockets from gaza to degrade us military capabilities. and to do so without regard to civilian lives in property. and probably although this is difficult to know for sure. some of the israeli actions and gods are intended just to make the gaza strip even more uninhabitable, to encourage emigration or from it. but in any case, the barton administration has blocked un security council attempts to call for a cease fire and has given every support. israel announced $725000000000.00 in or $1000000.00 in, in through the military aid, right. in the middle of all this, there isn't any daylight between washington and israeli government on this issue.
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one, i want to play a clip for you of an exchange with net price, the spokesman of the state department. let's listen. i want to ask you, buddy jenison, but the talk about what you said by the principal of self defense, does that in any way apply to the past, can you do? they have a right to self defense, do pasting. you have a right to self, i'm in broadly speaking side, we believe in the concept of self defense. we believe it applies to any state. i don't think that, but i certainly wouldn't want my words to be construed and i understand i want to do. i don't want hub on this either, but you know, those rate is killed. 30 people just now. you know, including maybe 5 or 6 children, you condemned that you can condemn the killing of children side. i'm asking you condemn the killing of health and you children. obviously, these reports are just emerging and i understand i was just speaking to the team. i understand we don't have independent confirmation of facts on the ground. yes,
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i'm very hesitant to get into reports that are just emerging. no, i think many people understand the notion of self defense and they understand that there's, you know, their issues on our side of this. but when it gets to the horrific pictures that we have seen of the death of women of young children, you know, scores of that may be more than 100, as we, as we said earlier in the show. why is it so difficult for our officials to basically say that to red line? well, because the doctrine of force in self defense pertains to states are, according to the united nations charter and the palestinians don't have a state have the self defense tense issue as a red herring. in a case, the issue is rides, the palestinians have no right there. stainless, when you don't have a state, you have no court, you have no, you have no structures that guarantee your rights palestinians don't know if they
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own anything. israelis can show up and take away their home. and the only recourse palestinians have at the moment is really court. sometimes you really military wards by which you're on the whole and by and large going to favor israeli things. and so they don't know if they actually own their own home. they don't know what rights they have and, and guys, at the moment they don't have a right to have a bookshop that may be blown up at any moment. and so this is the actual issue here is rights. and it's not a matter of self defense. the palestinians can't defend themselves, they're seamless. they don't have the means to defend themselves. the world community is always talking about. last is a terrorist organization and him, us engages in terrorism occasionally. but the fact is that there are a few tens of 1000 say irregular militiamen who if they actually went out to fight
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israeli army would all be killed in an afternoon. i'm os has been firing those little rockets at israel. most of them land in the desert or 3rd of them have landed inside garza, some of them have injured palestinians or they're not an actual military force. and they've killed so far since i still of these began over a week ago, very tragically, because all life is precious, but they've killed la people then in some mass shooting attacks from the united states by one individual. so this is not a military confrontation. they're not, we're not talking about self defense here. we're, we're talking about occupation. we're talking about denial of rights many years ago, professor cole, we were together at a conference and the late now late national security advisors, big brzezinski, spoke there about a crisis sort of like this. and he said, look,
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this is like killing hostages, that you know, these people are in the care, they're occupied by israel, and this is like killing hostages. and the, i'm quoting brzezinski, this, these are his views. but when you kind of look at that legacy of time at that moment, palestine always came, came up as a strategic fault line between the west and the arab world. that was, it was filled with that much consequence with the abraham accords. now with so many arab states having normalized with israel, one wonders if there is any strategic relevance in palestine. any more. and whether it's just a moral play at this point. what are your views of that? because i, i remember you being in the room and brzezinski said that, but that was a moment when, when palestine and its fate seemed a matter more than it does strategically to the various stakeholders in the region . today. i would argue that the palestinians have never been strategically important and that's why they're in the position that they are i,
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it's never been important to anyone to settle this issue and make sure that they don't remain status. there been lots of stainless people, but their state listeners has been resolved by the international community because it's been recognized as a kind of atrocity, taiwanese and japan, and 971. when, when japan recognized the one china we're left without you know, diplomatic recognition for a while, but eventually the japanese solve that problem in one way or another. but the palestinians, there are 5000000 of them who have been less state, less inside the area controlled by israel. plus the state was palestinians in lebanon, in syria, and even the palestinians in jordan, who are given citizenship. their citizenship is a 2nd class citizenship. and often fragile and 40000 of them had taken away from
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them not so long ago. so that's the big issue is that these people are state was and there's no oh since since since egypt made peace with israel, which was a separate piece. another late 1970 or there's been no strategic player. any place that had an interest in protecting the house and one, richard hoss the president council on foreign relations has said that the that the real instigator of this was president mahmoud abbas, of palestine. who yet again postponed elections. he's been in office, you know, something like 1112 years past. he's going to his 12 years past his 4th 4 year term . and that this created the dynamic where hamas wanted to demonstrate it's muscle in strength and legitimacy to palestinians. what,
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what complicity does mahmoud abbas and the palestinian authority have for the conditions we see now? well, no, no. the boss is irrelevant. and, you know, the palestine authority was supposed to have all of palestine by the late ninety's and maybe not tenure himself destroyed. that prospect of the peace accords and left the color staying authority was only 40 percent of the west bank and even they're, they're, they're under the thumb of the israeli military occupation. they can't do anything with israel, doesn't want them to do. and then they're basically policing these people for israel. so ma'am, i mean richard hobbs just wrong. what about the situation on the ground? the people in the united states don't, don't actually follow events in the west bank and gaza and they're almost never on
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the news unless there's some big blow up like this. but if you read the palestinian israeli newspapers about what's been going on in every little town in and dillard's in the west bank, then you see brutalization, you can see colonization. you see these militant squatters settlers from israel on palestinian land that they stole from palestinian families of burning down there. all of the trees, cutting them down in dating their property, a building on it, taking over their homes. and this is a daily staccato performance of occupation. and in garza, the israelis bomb the airport 20 years ago. and there's no harbor the guys do tend heavily on protein for fish, for protein. they're not allowed to fish beyond 3 to 6 miles
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by the israeli navy. the israelis carefully monitor what material and when building material goes into the gaza strip. so these people are, are living in health and it's a tinder that can explode at any time. and so looking for a particular trigger for it is a fools, aaron did not at my boss. i mean, the particular event of the invasion by the israeli government outrageously of the locks the mosque of the attack of worshippers throwing a flash bombs, the setting of fire due to rugs during a holy period of the month of ramadan. sure, that's that set off a lot of problems, but it's not one incident. it's it's,
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it's everyday life that's creating these, these, these constant tensions and flare ups. and as long as the occupation goes on like this, and as long as israel actively colonizing palestinian land, then there's going to be trouble. one in my discussion with not only senator chris murphy, but just casual conversations with other senators i had up to day. i heard from them that what has hit their radar screen with a feel is different that they have noticed about this conflict versus that many other times we've been, you know, around the circle is that era of israel, e or rising in protest that there is violence inside between jewish israelis and arab israel is inside israel. this is a new feature. is this a key element of how this unfolds? how does this fit into the puzzle? right, so i called the palestinian israeli on the model of italian american,
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the palestinian israeli had been relatively clear and they're heavily please. and until $966.00, they were actually under internal military rule inside israel. but they, you know, a lot of toasting in, in israel live in the villages that are not officially recognized by the israeli government as existing. and we don't have permission to, you know, it's a wall falls down to repair it or to fix their toilets. and the will include party has actually gone in and recognize some of these villages and given them these permissions to have a decent life in return to which so the palestinian israeli voted look food even though it campaigns on them being terrorists, threats to the state and so forth. so there had been mechanisms inside israel,
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whereby the palestinian israelis were kept with us and they are the least educated and the least will last a part of the israeli population. i think their frustrations have to do with in part with their attempts to become more part of the israeli fabric, their, their joint list in the we've been so many recent elections but last summer or they manage to get 13 members of parliament of 120 and they should have been a swing vote and all the other parties which are jewish based parties refuse to deal with them, refused to have them in the cabinet, refuse to have any talks with them. and they were sideline. so it
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would be as though, you know, the african american caucus in the house of representatives were poised into all the other politicians and congress, and you can never have an african american in the cabinet and so forth. so i think that the nice, the relative electoral success of joint was and then it sidelining and then recent to watch and they didn't bother to come out and go very much. all of this as added to the frustrations there are local problems that i said they're heavily police with regard to security. but actually there's a lot of crime in the palestinian israeli areas that we really please don't bother to follow up on. and there have been protests about lack of state provided security and the right agent. so there are, there are a lot of tensions here. and then i think the actual mosque invasion really set them off because the majority of them on the one i remember back in 2006
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instigating an enormous uproar against himself. jimmy carter said that israel was becoming an apartheid state, were now many years past that point. and i guess the question is, what are your views on, on, on that framing? and is there any solvent? see any more to a 2 state solution which, which is hardly discussed anymore, occasionally comes up with sort of, you know, the, the, you know, the religious incantation that the 2 state solution must exist. but what are your thoughts on, on the choices that face israel and palestine now? well, there is no plausible to state solution any longer. if you look at a map of where the squatters settlements are from israel over into most in territory, it's become swiss cheese. ballast indians bided up into can times they're, they can't even get to one another without going through is really checkpoints,
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there roads. whereas really only, so there's not going to be 2 states. and by the time jimmy carter talked about apartheid in israel, palestine, it had already been a reality for decades. and that's just going to go on. i should underline that apartheid has become a term of art in international law. some people say, well, the situation isn't exactly like in apartheid south africa. but actually, south africans often say that from their point of view, what's going on seems to be worse than what they experienced in a park in south africa. but the rome statute of the international criminal court defined apartheid as a systematic denial of rights to one ethnic group by another. and that certainly what's going on in israel palestine, the palestinians are being denied rights that the jews out there
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on the order of 40000000 people between the jordan and the mediterranean. all of them under israeli rule and one way or another. and jews are privileged to policy there just the which if you were sitting down with president biden or other stakeholders who may matter more than president biden, what would be the bank shot that might get us into a different course than we're in today in this, in this tragedy that's unfolding every day as we watch you know, the new palestine is real, situation is so heartbreaking, and most people just turn away from it. and there's always this hope that there is some magic bullet. there's some solution. there's some set of negotiations that were resolved. there aren't, this is that this is as hopeless a diplomatic situation as you could possibly imagine. this is, this is beyond diplomacy. now this is apartheid and it will just go on like you and i will be ancient and sitting on a rocking chair is
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a near desk and we'll still be talking about it. there is no prospect of us getting better anytime soon. well, it's one of the few times. i fear you're right. i wish you were wrong. thank you for your sobering comments. juan cole, university of michigan professor of history and founder of the inform comment blog on u. s. foreign policy. really appreciate you joining us today. thanks so much steve . so good to you. so what's the bottom line? the murder of george floyd spark the national conversation in america, the centers on white supremacy and the racist legacy of colonialism. so naturally the debate on palestine and israel has shifted slightly in the united states, especially among the younger generation and within the democratic party. notice how new york city candidate for mayor andrew gang had to immediately acknowledge that palestinians actually exist after he took a one sided position on the conflict last week. and notice that some american media and human rights groups are coming out israel for being an apartheid state now. but that doesn't change the harsh reality of us policy toward the region is really
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interest still reigned supreme in washington. and israel is the regional superpower and of closely aligned with the united states. now that israel has normalize relations with the u. e, with bahrain, sudan, and morocco, plus jordan and egypt who are already there. you can see that the fault lines in the region have dramatically changed the israeli government, thanks to little cost of doing what it's doing right now. and in less than 2 years, the republicans who are unapologetic, supporters of israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu major went back control of congress from the democrats. all he has to do is wait. so even if it's true that support for israel in the democratic party may be shifting ever so slightly. it's not likely that america is going to save the day. and that's the bottom line. ah, news,
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