has warned countries around the globe to prepare immediately for the further spread of the coronavirus. there's particular concern about the number of cases in iran. several european countries, including austria, croatia and switzerland, have just announced their first coronavirus cases, all apparently linked to the growing outbreak in italy. the outbreak has sparked sharp falls for the second day running on stock markets around the world. in new york, the dowjones index has slumped more than six per cent since monday's opening. japan's nikkei has fallen by more than 3% — hitting its lowest in 4 months. the us democrats running for president have held a bad—tempered tv debate, with the frontrunner, bernie sanders and the billionaire, michael bloomberg both coming under attack. senator sanders denied his programme was radical and that his ideas were impact is all over the world. ——in

this. —— practice. now on bbc news, hardtalk welcome to hardtalk. i'm stephen sackur. the past few days have seen rising tension in gaza. islamist militants fired rockets into israel and the israelis responded with air strikes aimed at the islamichhad group. hardly unusual and certainly not the stuff of international headlines, but that in itself is telling. in gaza conflict is the norm, so in gaza conflict is the norm, so too an in gaza conflict is the norm, so too an economic in gaza conflict is the norm, so too an economic blockade that has long choked the economy. my long choked the economy. my guest is dr yasser abu jamei, director of gaza community mental health programme. what happens to a people living with trauma and collective despair?

dr yasser abu jamei, welcome to hardtalk. it is great to have you in oui’ hardtalk. it is great to have you in our london studio. your home is in gaza and you work under the most intense pressure. i want to begin with your psyche other than your patients. how does it feel to be out of gaza? it is lovely. it would be really nice to be out of a place like that. what if you need a lot of things to be... a guess, partly, i

am thinking, doesn't give you a different perspective on what life is like for the people of gaza when you can look at it from outside? you feel that you are free. you start enjoying freedom. when you adjust in gaza, you feel like being locked inside. it is a big open—air prison. so when you have the chance to leave, just for a short period of time, then you feel the freedom and this is something that is not nice at all when you live in your country and you do not feel free inside. you are the director of the gaza community mental health programme. we think of gaza and we think of what happens in the conflict. we count up the casualties every time there is any sort of military confrontation with israel. you deal with the mental fallout.

confrontation with israel. you deal with the mentalfallout. do confrontation with israel. you deal with the mental fallout. do you think actually the mental health problems are more pervasive than the physicals? certainly, yes. the problem is that it is sometimes not obvious that people have an issue regarding mental health. we speak about the status of full being, a person capable of knowing his abilities and at the same time being able to cope with the stress and then we speak about being able to be productive and support his community so productive and support his community so when you look at these different components, certainly in gaza we have problems because these are not conditions that are normal. we have problems just enjoying daily life because for instance, being productive, we have his shoes and also about being helpful to the community. when you look at figures when it comes to poverty,

unemployment, it is staggering in the last few years. on top of that, we have the economic hardship et cetera et cetera. 2 million people live in the gaza strip stop 27 miles long and almost half of those people are actually children. i know a lot of your work also focuses on them. he wrote the words of the palestine director of the refugee camp. she says gaza's humanitarian crisis has left a n says gaza's humanitarian crisis has left an entire generation emotionally damaged. she says it ta kes yea rs emotionally damaged. she says it takes years of work with these children to undo the impact of trauma and restore their sense of hope for the future. my question to you is, can the damage be repaired? well, certainly damages can be repaired but you need to have ways for that repair to happen. any 15—16

—year—old child today has lived under three large scale offences. 2008, people were hearing the bombardment without having a safe place. in 2012, 48 days. in 2013, it was for 52 days where they continue to hear the bombardment and there was no safe place at all. 75% of the people killed during those days were simply civilians. we need to add to that those young people living in gaza, the general population, like anyone who is exposed to a traumatic event, you need time for the natural healing process to take place and go on with your life. you need time for therapy where you feel safe and secure. this status is not happening until now. as you know, you hear

about a certain escalation about bombardments and shelling taking place in the gaza strip. you think this not a one—off, but a constant, repetition of trauma. it is ongoing traumatic conditions and that is why the who are talking about notjust post—traumatic. the who are talking about notjust post-traumatic. in western society we talk about post—traumatic stress syndrome and indeed even depression. do they mean something different in gaza? well, certainly, i am a psychiatrist so we use a diagnostic statistical manual used for diagnosis and what we talk about in a gaza is that we have that, we see

that but we have something that is additional to that, the state of pre—or post. what was his condition pre—or post. what was his condition pre— traumatising? he or she was certainly exposed to previous traumatic injuries and then there is no post because life does not go on ina no post because life does not go on in a safe condition where you enjoy being alive. i wonder if there is a danger, in a funny sort of way, being involved in psychiatry in gaza, over diagnosing the problem because in the words of the chair of the mental health unit in the ministry of health, she says it is not the people who are sick, it is our situation that is sick and you cannot remedy a person's mental problems if they are entirely related to a situation which they

cannot change. certainly, today we do not speak when it comes to psychiatrist most about the medical model but the... that sounds like jargon. medicine, psychological and social so you need all the time to keepin social so you need all the time to keep in mind these aspects of life. it is not what happens inside your mind, what genes you have, where you we re mind, what genes you have, where you were born but also deeply and when it comes to disorders like ptsd and all those anxiety disorders, you need to keep in mind the stresses that one lives under. let me ask you a question related to this. gaza is such an enclosed space were experience is collect collective and you cannot separate yourself from your patients. in 2013, yourfamily

home was bomb and destroyed by an israeli military strike. how many members of your extended family were lost? we live in an area and u nfortu nately lost? we live in an area and unfortunately my family enjoyed the biggest loss when it comes to a number of people. each single life matters a lot to everyone. in that single attack, 27 people got killed including three pregnant women and seven children. three story building was levelled to the ground basically. it was not there anymore basically. it was not there anymore basically. in that context, and it is obviously it is impossible for me to imagine what impact that must‘ve had on you and yourfamily but in that context, how, even weeks and months afterwards, can you offer meaningful help to others when you

must have been in the darkest place yourself? it is a very challenging condition, certainly. the other thing is that you need to look for help and help comes from different places. one of the places that office help is yourfamily. an a professional way of help is your colleagues. you chat with international community and professionals who offer some sort of careful caregivers with supervision. you are massively under resourced in terms of mental healthcare inside gaza. you have a pitiful number of trained psychiatrists. very few number of people. the issue also is that the number of clients and patients who arrive at the community centre almost increased by 50% since

2014 so rather than having 2000 patients per year you're having more than 3000 patients per year and it isa than 3000 patients per year and it is a huge responsibility and all the time resources are not up to deliver the needs. do you have kids? i have five children. you are going back to gaza at the end of this week. is that a part of your psyche which thanks, i do not want to go back and i would like my children to live in the freedom i am experiencing right now, far away from gaza?|j the freedom i am experiencing right now, far away from gaza? i can tell you even more than that. i spent together in the uk in 2011 when i did my masters and my kids were still younger and they did not come with them because of schooling. i was all the time asking myself why my children are not enjoying the same spaces and life that other people enjoy and this happens with

me whenever and wherever i go to but the answer is not to take them out of gaza, the answer is how to make gaza a safe place and how to make people enjoy freedom in that place because it is not only my children, there are more than 900,000 children in gaza who go through these conditions. people come to visit you in gaza from international ngos and governments as well. you the successor to a very well—known psychiatrist who established your mental health programme. he was internationally known and respected. his son describes the sense of frustration that politicians, diplomats, ngo leaders would visit his father and express the greatest sympathy about what was happening to the people of gaza, would pledge of support and yet, in the end, nothing ever change. do you feel that sense

of frustration? ijudge something, when he established gaza community mental health programme his idea was to help children and women who suffer from to help children and women who sufferfrom mental to help children and women who suffer from mental health and the stresses that we are living under. imagine since those years, friends that you have mentioned, they keep all the time, a simple centres which is, it's time we come to gaza with that it would never get worse but each second visit, where you we were mistaken and it got worse. we are frustrated with these conditions but the people who visit us are also frustrated. there is a need to change things in gaza. let's talk about politics. not in the sense of specific party politics butjust the overarching sense of where the palestinian people of gaza are going

and what they can hope for. the message from harm us, —— hamas is all about that word resistance, struggle, confrontation with israel. do you think that concept, that ideology is of any use to the people of gaza anymore? well, i'll tell you what the people of gaza feel, you know. for example, any father of three or four or five children, he already knows that his young children are not going anywhere with their education, you know. more than 70% of young people, 70% i am saying, 7—0, are unemployed. the poverty figures in gaza, 54% of the people are under the poverty line, which is more than 1 million people. deep poverty, more

than 53%, over 100,000 people. 1 million people. deep poverty, more than 53%, over100,000 people. so when you speak about those figures, what can the people do in order to change things, you know. but the danger, if i may say so, doctor, is that the result of that sort of despair is a sort of nihilism amongst the people. and i am thinking now of hamas and its effo rts thinking now of hamas and its efforts to encourage people every week to go down to that militarised borderfence week to go down to that militarised border fence with israel, week to go down to that militarised borderfence with israel, to get week to go down to that militarised border fence with israel, to get as close as they can, some of the young people are encouraged to throw rocks, to resist, as they put it, and the inevitable consequence, because the israelis have said that they will not allow what they regard as terrorist activity on their border, the inevitable consequence is that snipers open fire, and over the last, what, 1.5 years, hundreds of mostly young palestinians have

been killed. for you, as a psychiatrist, do you wish that the leaders of hamas would stop encouraging young people to do that sort of thing? well, i'll tell you more than one thing. first, more than 3000 children got wounded during that1.5 years, than 3000 children got wounded during that 1.5 years, not only a few hundred. i think 3300 children we re few hundred. i think 3300 children were wounded. second, a lot of the people, they were just going to demonstrate that they were not happy with the conditions, that we are living under crazy conditions, and no—one is really doing anything about it. knowing that no—one at all, you know? we live a life that is getting more and more deterioration in front of the eyes of the international community, and nothing is really happening. most of the people were going spontaneously, but of course there were some effo rts but of course there were some efforts to send people to that. and the other shocking issue, which is what is that... how was it so far with the alternative, with the

original plan, which is the peace talks, you know. and this is the thing that is sending the most negative message with the palestinian people. where is the pa now? how are things happening with the peace talks? i mean, where is palestine now? where is the country of palestine? well, the palestinians are deeply divided. your... gaza, is, asi are deeply divided. your... gaza, is, as i said, ruled by hamas. the west ba n k is, as i said, ruled by hamas. the west bank is ruled by the palestinian authority, dominated by fatah. for 13 years, these two authorities have been at loggerheads, sometimes literally fighting each other. what we see in both gaza and the west bank is corruption. we see curbs on freedom of speech. we see people who are repressed by their own leaderships. this is part of the problem. it is not all a sort of psychological state created by israel. this is also created by palestinian leaders. yes, but this at the same time doesn't justify why the palestinian

people now are living under blockade in the gaza strip. this doesn't justify way we have hundreds of thousands of settlers who have increased in the last 13 years in the west bank. this doesn'tjustify that we are going to have a capital of, i mean, jerusalem, recognised by some countries as the capital. this doesn't justify anything like some countries as the capital. this doesn'tjustify anything like that. i understand what you are saying, but i just wondered i understand what you are saying, but ijust wondered whether there is time and again you are a not a politician, you are a psychologist. is it time for a different kind of thinking is to help palestinians express themselves and think of their future? one specific example. there is a real problem, according to israel, but also to international observers, with the messages that are embedded in palestinian schoolbooks, from grades two to 12, according to one analysis by the

impact research institute in the hebrew university, palestinian schoolchildren are exposed to incitement and intolerance against jews and israel in subjects from social studies to history to arabic. there is violence or incitement to violence, hatred, radical, inappropriate and disturbing content aimed atjews. again, as a psychiatrist, would you send a message to your own leaders saying this is damaging, it's damaging the minds of our young people? let me tell you something. you know, yesterday i was working in one of the famous bookstores here in london, and it is all the time enjoyable to walk, because really i consider them fancy bookstores. we don't have such things in gaza. and just going through some of the shelves, i saw a very interesting atlas. it shows a lot of maps. and interestingly, it was maps of neighbourhoods, uk neighbourhoods,

that were bombed during the world war, you know? do you think that those maps are a threat to anyone? you see a direct parallel?” those maps are a threat to anyone? you see a direct parallel? i am asking. do they — i mean, do they show any threats to anyone? if we say... so when schoolbooks aimed at children as young as seven and eight contained violence, incitement to violence, anti—semitic wording and imagery, you... it certainly doesn't contain that. it certainly doesn't contain that. it certainly doesn't contain that. it certainly doesn't contain that. we need to ask people what they mean by it, if there is any sentences like what you said. to my knowledge there is nothing like that. but again, if i see my grandparents were born here, would that be something that is not good for anyone? if i say that more than 500 villages were simply... people

we re 500 villages were simply... people werejust, 500 villages were simply... people were just, you know, 500 villages were simply... people werejust, you know, uprooted from those villages in 1948, would that be something that's not good to say? is that inciting violence? i will give you another example. i was reading something — sometimes i read something interesting, you know. it was about the door of ten downing street, you know. and it was an interesting story that that door had to be, you know, at a certain moment, to be repaired, because a sheu moment, to be repaired, because a shell fell in that door during the war. and they had to paint the whole place. it is part of history, you know? history is important, but... it doesn't mean that something is not right. history doubtless is important, but for the 2 million people of gaza, what matters most is the future. a final thought for you, and again it's about a mindset, an approach. donald trump and his so—called deal of the century, has caused outrage amongst palestinians,

and there are very clear reasons why. but just focus and there are very clear reasons why. butjust focus on one aspect of it. he is saying that, were a deal to be done, the americans would pledge at least $50 billion to invest in the west bank and gaza. he is talking about the most massive infrastructure programme, which would include roads and tunnels to connect gaza to the west bank, to end this state of imprisonment and perceives that you've talked about in this interview. is it not with the palestinians at least considering a more open, flexible, creative, maybe we could call it pragmatic approach to the situation, the reality, that they face today? won't we palestinians pragmatic when we a cce pted won't we palestinians pragmatic when we accepted that more than 80% of the state will be the state of israel, we are ready did that, more than 20 years ago, 25 years ago. and if you look at them out, that is the deal of the century, you will not

only see one gaza strip. you will see six, almost, different gaza strip. we already know what does it mean to live a life like that. why should we consider accepting going through a different small group of places or enclaves where palestinians should live, and that palestinians should live, and that palestinians should live, and that palestinians should go there? we are ona palestinians should go there? we are on a daily basis controlled, even sometimes the official say that we are counting the calories that go into gaza strip. it happened once that somebody said something like that. why we should consider continuing to live under that? for what reason, you know. we would like to live... this is humanity, we are living on the 21st century. the international community made laws, and the international humanitarian law, that really controls many things, and tells what is right, what is wrong. we are asking for nothing more than our rights. so when you think of the future, do you think of hope or despair? if i am

not hopeful, i won't be doing myjob now. i am not hopeful, i won't be doing myjob now. iam hopeful, and i think things should change, you know. things should change for the better, not only for the palestinians but for the international community also. dr yasser abu jamei, thank you very much indeed for being on hardtalk. thank you. thank you very much. hello there. we're stuck in this colder air stream through wednesday and thursday, and that means more showers, more wintry showers as well, and we've already seen snow falling to quite low levels. now, as those showers ease off

across central and eastern parts of the uk, we'll see temperatures dropping away. many areas having a touch of frost. particularly cold though, again, in the north—east of scotland. and given those showers, some icy conditions, especially for northern and western parts of the uk, where those showers keep going into the morning. in general, fewer showers, perhaps, on wednesday. a few will get across to the midlands, eastern england, eastern scotland, but most of them, certainly during the afternoon, towards northern ireland and western scotland. snow mainly over the hills. some heavier showers, mind you, and temperatures of 5—9 degrees once again. chilly in the breeze, but it won't be as windy in the south—west of england. here during the evening, though, cloud is thickening up. we've got some rain moving in. that's moving into the colder air. so there's the threat of some snow overnight in the brecon beacons, perhaps a centimetre or two of wet snow over the cotswolds, and later into the chilterns as well. it is mostly rain. further north, the air is colder, of course. wintry showers keep going, and there'll be some icy patches around as well. now, it's this area of low

pressure that brings the threat of some wet snow across more southern parts of england and wales. that then moves away into continental europe on thursday. but it could take much of the morning before that wetter weather to clear the south—east of england. once it does, we're all into that cold north—westerly airflow. sunnier skies, showers mainly for northern ireland, northern and western scotland, and the north—west of england. but many places in the afternoon, away from here, i think will be dry. still, temperatures struggling to 5—7 degrees. another frost, actually, on thursday night. and then we look into the atlantic to see more weather systems moving further north across the uk. it'll be a cold start, cloud will increase. we'll see outbreaks of rain moving in from the south—west. you can see how the wind direction changes. we pick up more of a south—westerly wind. we may well find some snow over the tops of the pennines, southern uplands, towards the latter part of the day. temperatures 6—7 degrees for most, but milder, perhaps double figures, for southern parts of england and wales. but that rain may well get

steadier and heavier, actually, on friday night, saturday morning, before pushing away. then a few more isobars on the chart as well, and we're back into that colder, showery airstream as saturday goes on. so remaining very unsettled over the weekend. a spell of rain and some showers, wintry over the hills, more rain on sunday, and feeling chilly in the wind.

this is the briefing — i'm ben bland. our top story: the coronavirus spreads across the globe — as countries from south korea, iran, to italy battle to contain it. and the first case in latin america has been reported in brazil. head to head — democratic presidential candidates clash in the last televised debate ahead of super tuesday. vladimir putin thinks that donald trump should be president of the united states and that's why russia is helping you get elected so you lose to him. outdoor heaters could soon be banned on the streets of paris but cafe owners warn this could harm their business.