and in the wake of the russian invasion of ukraine. now there's been nothing stated that around which would face sanctions at this point. but they face him stepping away. it's trying to sort of create a distance between himself and the club intent, the decision making, at least ah, hello, are you watching? 0 these the top stories this, our russian forces are continuing their assault on the ukrainian capital for 4th day. loud explosions have been heard across cave, all knives, and oil depot on the outskirts of the capitol is on fire caves. a 3000000 residents have been told to take shelter with fees, the battle will get close to the center. meanwhile, western nations are uniting to cripple rushes economy. certain russian banks are to be borrowed from the international finance system. rushes central bank,

which holds reserves with $600000000000.00 being targeted. we commit to ensuring that a certain number of russian banks are removed from swift. this will ensure that these banks are disconnected from the international financial system and hom, their ability to operate globally swiftness, the wealth dominant global enter bank payment system. cutting banks off will stop them from conducting most of their financial transactions worldwide and effectively block russian exports and imports. french president emmanuel mccall has condemned a plan change in bella, russian law that would allow russian nuclear weapons to be hosted on its territory . a referendum that's widely expected to pass is being held over the weekend, across has barriers president, alexander lucas shanker, to demand the withdrawal of russian troops from they soil,

more european countries ascending weapons and fuel to help you claim defend itself . germany has pledged a 1000 to anti tank weapons and $500.00 service to miss of the netherlands. also promised to send michelle to ukrainian forces. more than 100000 people have crossed from ukraine into poland. was so expecting to help as many as 5000000 people in the wings ahead. the grounds of checkpoints as so large, could take people 3 days to be processed. some refugees say they've been mistreated . and police have launched a crack down to deal with the growing anti war sentiment across russia. close to 2000 people angry over the war and ukraine had been arrested since the offensive began. those are the headlines, i'm emily angland. the news continues here on al jazeera, after upfront joe biden will deliver his state of the union address and march 1st.

the traditional speech will outline his achievement today, and we will respond and we have but with the cobra policy under pressure and award winning situation and you frame how the president reach your congress. he's on the right track. special coverage from washington in russia has launched a full scale invasion of ukraine following weeks of direct troop build up along the 2 country. shared border and failed attempts at diplomacy with reports that russian troops have entered here. we speak with ukrainian member of parliament last year about the lingo, who is currently in the capital. and we asked how we got to this point and what's next for her country, the leslie about the lincoln. thank you so much for joining us on upfront. as we speak, you are in ukraine on the ground there in the capital of kiev. what is the situation there right now? it's one of the nice 1036 hours that ukrainians have had at least

ukrainians of my age. great as us war. bleach war which is firing up all throughout the country. russia is targeting both military and civilian target. we are being hit all from all over the place on the ground and, and there and also from the side. and i guess. 6 ukrainians of shock. 5 of what we are seeing, what we are experiencing, and what we're living through, it's less than any kind of my math. you could have ever dream though. you say ukrainians are still in shock until very recently. ukrainian president vladimir vilicki was downplaying, the risk of an invasion to avoid panic. and a pull from earlier this month found that only 20.4 percent of ukrainians thought that a full scale invasion would happen soon. did you see this coming?

i was hoping this would never come. i have lunch and these a t as to her as for the best and the fact with the was of the many of the ukrainians. but to be honest, nothing can prepare you for a full long war with the biggest military power in europe, the biggest military power, the walls and the nuclear power. there's nothing that can provide you with stand that on your right. so really when the president of ukraine was saying that, ok look, we're actually a t, as we know we're going down, we had the stress of escalation and so on throughout the years, all of that was actually true. and i mean to have the population in panic in fear would have caused problems in the streets and would have actually played very well into brookins big masters on to eradicate independent ukraine from the face of

the earth. but instead, the population state bird was there was the ceiling of unity which was growing. and that's the feeling of unity is what is helping us right now with this child in poor speech to announce this attack on ukraine. he talked about how quote ukraine is not just a neighboring country. he said that it was, quote, an inalienable part of russia's history, culture and spiritual space. and that modern ukraine was entirely created by russia . given this mindset, was there any chance that ukraine would have a chance to function as an autonomous, a truly autonomous state? yes. on this is what your brains are fighting or, and this is why i myself or my follow mentary colleagues, the government, the present been, are asking a lot less than allies,

politically. what fujen has declared in his the crazy my speech is, is the back of life. carefully draw this for him by some credibly. and most of my it was an equally provides his mind on lack of knowledge about history whatsoever. so you print as an independent country, you credit russia or you bring in people love their freedom. we fight for our freedom. we bring our children up with the law of freedom. and this is what we're doing. and she, now we are fighting on the defensive, against an offensive from russia to have the right to exist and to live. and i think that while any nation in the world and he would be doing the same, they would be fighting with their country and the right of that country to exist in that same speech right away. put and also made the point that nato exercises had

been taking place in ukraine over the past few years. and he said that military contingency of nato countries have been almost constantly present on ukrainian territory under the pretext of exercises. given that nato has always been used as an excuse by moscow, do you think that needles, involvement, and ukraine carrying out exercises, but falling short of giving ukraine actual needle membership? has it ultimately hurt the country? black ukraine needs nato. nato need ukraine in order to stabilize relations with russia. that is, a sooner claim comes with who on member of nato. that's it. region has nothing else . if i for the spheres of influence, as she likes to call that would have been decided and, and over and game. but what, respectfully, the, the approach that's been taken so far. that is to say,

the nato exercises the lack of full nato membership. did give, put in the pretext necessary to engage in the actions we've seen over the last 36 hours. if it wasn't for an acre, which i would have found another pretext. because fusion was ukraine inside of russia does not admit an independent ukraine. fujen is crazy on this has been proven time and time again, starting from his speech starting from the show shows the trial style the way he made his decisions to invade ukraine and have recognition, so to speak from his people to invade ukraine. look, we are dealing with a psychopathic leader of a very, very big country of a very big army and other nuclear states. and i think that the world should really be mindful of that and not give into his lives on his manipulations. and be aware that if we are all to coexist normally,

we should follow the rules set up for us after world war 2, which works pretty well, i guess. and one countries followed them. but when one country starts pulling out from those rules, it's the responsibility of the international community to stand up to it. it says so and the un charter which all these countries that are now nato allies, they have signed together with the great. so it's now been around ability of the international community to stand up for ukraine, because ukraine has done nothing wrong. we have made a free choice as the sovereign state. we have not threatened russia in one way or the other. we have made a decision about how we act with our own territory. was our own military. and who are all partners? russia didn't like it. so russia uses its force and its might to invade ukraine. i think you can sort of fans here. ah, the

a who is in the role and who is in the right a, how can ukraine much, much smaller country was much, much smaller and less developed army a be a threat to, i'm sorry, i repeat myself, but the sad, biggest song in the world and the biggest down in your house, we can, we can agree here that russia is part of the aggressive last week. president zalinski appealed to the international community as well as you have just done thing. we don't need your sanctions after them. barduage will happen. and after our country will be fired at or after, we will have no borders or after we will have no economy. why would we need those sanctions then? multiple countries, multiple countries of now announced that they will impose unprecedented sanctions on russia. do you feel that this is ultimately too little too late? what are these unprecedented taxes? where are they?

i don't see them on the see. then presidential sanction would be the swift why chris wants to switch rachelle from swift. swift operations are used with russia to buy oil and gas well, and gas for the main commodities resources which feeds the russian. the condoms. if they're switched off from the swift means that they don't get the payments for the oil and gas. so immediately we sort of took 2 birds with one stone. there's also no installation of russian markets and of russia's biggest market. and clearly this would be the sanction which, which had the most just switching them off from the swift and finding another way to pay for the oil and gas. well, of course they won't care about switching off from this list in that regard. so it's, it has to come together today i think that the, the early right and correct rowse marley and legally thing to do. do you know of the international community is a,

provide you with enough defense capabilities and actually just contingent here. and you can see that we can stand for the blitzkrieg that back from russia and to is to import such sanctions that will actually isolate that country, or rather that's crazy leader from the rest of the world because the world does not need to be poisoned, was the success, city of taylor, terry, and regime in an address to the nation on the 1st day of the invasion, president zalinski said we have been left alone to defend our state who is ready to fight alongside us. i don't see any one. you've talked about the kind of thanks if you'd like to see the type of moves you'd like to see the international community engage in. is there anything else you need the international community to do to recognise, to engage in order to see the current crisis and quickly but the international community can choose either to act or to continue to was just political statements. political statements are very nice. we are very grateful for

them. they, they show who side to who people are on. but look, when you do treat the hash tag, stand with ukraine or support ukraine. it's not the mouth. you know, it's not the most stop. the russian miss 1000, the russian lanes hovering over the cave and the russian thanks. moving into our roads and destroying them completely along the villages and along with what needs to be done and really show us. if you are prepared to stand with us because you are standing with us, not, not just for the sake of ukrainians and a pretty big country in europe as well. you'll standing with your own safety and security. what we need now is actually un peace be be skipping contingency ukraine since we are not the nato members of a fine, fair enough. but to un was the general assembly can adopter from ocean on sending peacekeeping a contention since ukraine. they don't need the security council for that. we can

go the same way that the van in korea and mentioned 50. we've seen pictures of bombs out residential buildings. embassy international says that it's confirmed that civilians were killed in a ballistic missile strike outside of a hospital. in vall had our and eastern ukraine. ultimately, what would be the human cost of all of this for the ukrainian people? it will be huge because it's not just the need yet casualties of war that we are still counting. but it is also the future of our children. the mindset was which they are often. i'm a mother those 3. my oldest is 8 years old. he's a boy, and already i can see the ban, which this is doing to him hearing older as strikes the sirens. i is seeing all the playing, having to constantly go down and seek shelter. ah, you know, this is what of the future. ukrainian generations of going to grow up out was lots

of psychological issues because of the war. and that has to also be known and understood, but so far as about civilian targets. so 33 civilian targets have been hit. in the last 36 hours. this is absolutely and humane and unacceptable. 3 of those targets work in the gardens, children. they don't stop at nothing of the book and they're crazy liter. will you stay? and if i'm staying because i am a member, i have responsibility to my people and i have responsibility to, to my country as the national many grade i was born and raised them. i also, i have responsibility to my family today. ukraine is mobilized, meaning that everyone who can hold a gun is fighting and is holding that gone against the russian aggressive

does no way i can lead or a whole bunch of reasons that she has to go. thank you so much for joining us in our front. ok, ah. in the past year the ice cream company been and jerry's was accused of terrorism. actress m a watson was called an anti semite actor, mark ruffle faced, virulent attacks on social media. and a 4 page ad in the new york times portrayed musician do a lipper and models bella and ged deed superimposed over an image of hamas rocket. what do they all have in common? speaking out and support a palestinian rights, but the backlash isn't limited to high profile companies or even celebrities. in recent years, there have been hundreds of cases involving censorship. and silencing of those in the west to advocate for palestinians is the label of anti semite being used to suppress voices calling for human rights. joining me now to discuss this are the

morality. she is founder and director of palestine legal and barry trachtenberg. he's a professor and historian of jewish history at wake forest university. thank you both for joining us on up front demo. let me start with you. how is it that standing up for the human rights of one group of people, palestinians has come to be equated with anti semitism? well, i think we have to understand that this has been something that decades in the making . we're talking about a state israel that has done everything in its power to prevent a people that it occupies that it has dispossessed, that it oppresses that it practices apartheid against it. it's done everything in its power to prevent palestinians from gaining self determination from gaining their human rights. and so one of the main tactics that again has been decades in the making is an effort to sneer. anyone and everyone

questions. israel foundation on the dispossession of palestinians as anti semitic. the other pillars that, as you noted is too near them as terrorists if they resist, if they, you know, question israel's practices. and so we have to see it in this broader and much longer historical context of the ways that israel has been trying to repress it, growing solidarity movements with the palestinian people. and this effort to typically read the fine anti semitism in a way that encompasses basically any criticism of israel is, is, has, has really gained ground in the last several years. in particular, to the extent that this definition has been codified in laws around the world,

including in the us and europe, especially very backlash against celebrities and companies. makes the headlines of course, but there's also widespread retaliation against those who are less high profile, including really especially college students. academics. how has this issue affect the campuses in scholars it what this does is it forces students and professors to really self censor in profound ways. we've had a number of high profile cases in the academy, professors who have lost their jobs been denied job offers who have faced regular assault on account of their scholarship, which is peer reviewed. it's accepted by the profession itself. but very often it's outsiders, you know, potential donors to, to university supporters of israel, who mouth large media campaigns to try to get those professors defunded to get them

stripped of their titles and get them kicked out. the university's student groups also face this fordham university. there's a group of students who've been advocating for justice in palestine for years, who cannot get their organization formerly recognized by the university, because that message is caught out that they are anti semitic when there's no hint of that whatsoever. and as many jews who want to participate in movement who are also banned from doing network demon to barry's point, one of the things that is remarkable about the backlash is that it has affected even jewish people. even jewish people have been accused of anti semitism. sen, bernie sanders, who is jewish, and lost family in the holocaust. a he's been accused of anti semitism based on his view that the u. s. should not be an apologist for these really government as well as for his support, a palestinian rights. a lecount minister accused natalie portman, who is israeli and american, of engaging in borderline anti semitism. when she declined to go to israel to accept an award out of protest against former prime minister benjamin netanyahu

policies. what do you make of the fact that even jewish people are being censored and accused of anti semitism? well and very alluded to, you know, this really is about policing 1st and foremost, palestinian expressions of their own history, their own experiences, their a reality under israeli oppression. and it also functions to make pariahs of anyone who stands in solidarity with them, who expresses support for palestinian freedom, who criticizes israel's own practices. and so i think it's part of the current developments over the last 10 or so years where you've seen increasing questioning within that jewish community of israel's practices. and that's in large part due to a strong grassroots palestine solidarity movement that has really integrated

palestine into the progressive move. very, there's also a generational piece to this as well. we're seeing divisions grow between younger and older generations of jewish americans as well over israeli politics. one jewish writer for rolling stone put it. she said she was raised to quote, unequivocally support israel. but she also explains that because the conflict is defined by quote, either you support israel or you support its destruction, it's difficult to quote, even consider the other side. do you see a move toward younger people, younger jewish american to particular supporting a critiques of israel and if so, why it's happening. i think because of the gap between sort of the promise of israel and the reality of israel has just grown so great. and as, as younger generations are paying more attention to questions of racism,

america, systematic oppression of people of color engaging in issues of, of queer rights. people recognize that there can't be this exception for the, for israel. and you know, my students, when they come into my class that i, that i teach at zion is that many of them has gone to israel on the free trips that are provided to college students for jewish college students called birthright. they've been raised going to jewish summer camp. they've been raised having a full on sort of zionist education, but they come to my class, really troubled by what they see on the news. right. so many students in the class this fall who were really worried because when at the time when they're signing up for classes last spring, there were there was the takeover checked her on communities and checked her out just out of sight of jerusalem. and students signed up for my class because they want to know more about this history. so i think larger and larger numbers of students are starting to engage in this question critically and they're looking to

professors to teach that work. but very often teachers are sort of held back there with strained for, from teaching this kind of history. because the penalties for doing so can can be so high dimmer antisemitism is on the rise with sharp increases in anti semitic incidents and acts of violence in recent years. at the same time. so as the suppression of palestinian advocacy in 2020 alone, your organization documented at least 213 incidence of suppression. including a severe and harassment campaigns for those supporting palestinian writes. what are the consequences of restricting the range of opinions allow about israel and completing antisemitism with criticism of israeli policies and consequences are quite stark. you know, this is about people's reputations about people's jobs, about the way that we can operate and talk in

a civil society. you know that what we see at palestine legal, we're hearing from hundreds of people every year. is that there are, there is what we have termed a palestine exception when it comes to free speech in this country. and it's, it's just the tip of the iceberg, right? when we look at the ways that israel and israel advocacy groups here in the u. s. haven't tacked palestine advocacy to harassment campaigns or legislation that is curtailing our right to boycott for palestinian rights. these are templates for how the far right in this country is attacking other movements as well. the same kind of legislation is now being used to attack the environmental justice movement to attack the efforts to curtail gun rights. you know,

the proliferation of guns in the us, we already see legislation being used against them. so we know that palestine might be easier because it's a less popular opinion to support palestinian rights in general. it might be easier to suppress speech for palestinian rights, but it, it's, it's, it really is the kind of ice breaker for the curtailing of, and the undermining of all of our 1st amendment rights. so it starts with palestine, but it doesn't and there, and that's why we all have to care about this. very, thank you so much for joining me on up front. that's our show up front. we'll be back. ah.

romania is ancient florida. some of the earth's most christine there, crucial fall society and crucial fall battle against the climate crisis. but illegal logging by a ruthless tim, the mafia is destroying both the landscape and people's lives. logging in romania is our guns violence dealing with the bills amidst plains of corruption and the role of powerful multinational people in power investigates when mania weight of the forest on out is era holding the powerful to account. as we examined the u. s. his role in the world on al jazeera, a reporter's retreat in a brutal civil war. if a commodore hadn't been there, the israeli invasion would not have been so well reported. the commodore had become journalistic center. you could be in a safe enclave and then you went out into civil war. i started off leaving this

while the grand suite at the commodore hotel. the next room i was in was underground, the tiny prison. so as a hostage, a route to commodore war hotels on al jazeera, this more than 12000 migrants, mostly haitians in the camp that sprung up in their real texas over the last 2 weeks. they won't asylum b, u. s. authorities are overwhelmed. this is just the latest flash point in a months long serge of people illegally crossing the border. and as little in the camp for them. you can see the time frame to try to try to stop paying for getting back into the country club that they went across to make sure to get through the site because there was enough food for them to be there in the car. we met nicholas on the mexican bank to the river, searching for food, a medicine for his family. he hadn't realized until we asked him about it. the us

authorities rules are now flying haitians back home. there is no president, crime as high students can't go to school, there is no work. the economy is down. people can't put up with deportation, is not good for us. ah, large explosions continued to shake, ukraine's capital keep residents rush to bunk is, is russia steps up its military advance? ah, hello, i'm emily. ang, when this is al jazeera, alive from doha, also coming up we will stop protein from using his war chest west in the allies, swiftly, a gray to cut some russian banks from an international.