of the oasis comeback tour. the prime minister starmer has vowed to clamp down after thousands of fans were left with huge price rises. the daily star reports on the axed amazon prime show �*the grand tour.�* the paper says the show�*s host, jeremy clarkson, believes the world has become a dangerous place in which to drive and that's one of the reasons to end the show. welcome to hardtalk. i'm stephen sackur. the impact of israel's war in gaza is often conveyed in numbers. gaza's hamas—run health ministry puts the death toll at more than 40,000. the un says 90% of the population has been displaced, so there are powerful numbers.

but then there are images, which maybe speak even louder. my guest is motaz azaiza, a young palestinian photographer whose work has been seen by many millions around the world. he left gaza after 108 days of war. what impact have his pictures had on him, and on us? motaz azaiza, welcome to hardtalk. thank you for having me. it is a pleasure to have you. take me back some years. the young motaz decided to take

up the camera to start taking pictures in gaza. what was your motivation back then? my motivation was because i don't want to be a useless person. i was in high school and ifound my passion in photography... ..because my father used to have, like, a camera and i have a big album for me when i was young and i started taking pictures, capture everything. you say capture everything. what interests me is that for many years, while there was conflict in gaza — there were various israeli incursions, hamas were operating in gaza, there was conflict, there was death, there was bloodshed — your focus for a very long time was onjoyful subjects. life. 0n beauty, on life and love. because i'm someone like, i hate wars, i hate the bombing, i hate the occupation, i hate everything. and because of the picture for gaza now, for the people outside, they think gaza is all about war

and they think there is no life there. so i was the one who wanted to create and to make, to create and to make this picture clear for people. so i was taking pictures for life, forjoy, for the daily life of gazans. wars and aggressions were always dragging me to their site because whenever there is a bombing happened, ifound myself taking my camera and go out so i can document and take pictures. i've been doing this years ago. which brings us to october 7th, 2023. how did you respond when you heard what hamas had done, the murderous attack on southern israel, what were your feelings? what was your response? uh, actually, as palestinians, as a palestinian in gaza, we were shocked more than the israeli that that happened because we were expecting a war to happen in gaza, but we didn't expect it in that way.

but when you heard of the scale of the attack and the numbers killed, and of course it went beyond 1,000 people killed, did you have a sense of impending doom that this was going to mean something so dark, so terrible...? yeah, i told my friends and family, that it's going to be bad. because i know my enemy. i know how israel... israel, without even giving them a chance to justify their deeds towards palestinians, their killing to palestinians, they kill a lot of people without even expecting anyone from the international community tojudge them. so now we are giving them, like, a big reason so they can kill more palestinians. so i was caring more about the life of palestinians and the...our lives and how the life will go now. were you caring about the lives of the israelis who were murdered? 0h, like, i care about, like... icondemn, like, killing

civilians and innocent people if that happens, but, in the end, if they themselves don't care about my life as a palestinian, why should i care? because the problem is with this world that they start to care about gaza, and they start to hear about gaza from the 7th of october, which is really wrong, because the same things what happened there was happening for palestinians before, since a long time before. and we didn't find any response from the world for that, because they see that the israeli's life matters more than the palestinian, which it does not. i want to focus on the hours and the days after october 7th. you took a very clear decision to take your camera out onto the street... like any aggression before, because the bombing started from, like, let's say, 10am in the morning in that day. and ijust woke up at 6:30, so, like, everything happening, we didn't. ..

we didn't know what's happening in the first moments but then the videos and the images start to show up. i was, like, on the roof of my house. i didn't know what is happening. a lot of rockets launch. well, we can we can actually show an image, because it's very useful to see just how you were so very involved from the very beginning in what was happening. yeah. that is an israeli strike on what they claimed was a hamas command centre, obviously a high—rise building. ah, no, it was a residential tower. it got bombed four times before that, before this, this bombing, actually. it was full with people, but then they evacuated before the bombing. i want now to share a second image that you took that certainly went viral around the world. it is, it's an image that is difficult to look at. it's extreme suffering. yeah. it's a young woman, a girl, i guess. a girl. she's, like, 17 years old. yeah.

and obviously, she was buried under rubble after an israeli military... the camera helped to find her because there was no light, and i used the low shutter speed so i can find her. you mean when you began filming, you literally had no idea she was there? yeah, she was screaming and we were hearing, but there was no, like, there are small holes, but no—one�*s seeing, so, use my camera, flip the screen. we found her there, and humanitarian workers start to dig so they can get her. and she's now in tunisia. she had, like, 67 surgeries in her legs. that, i mean, that's extraordinary. it's a picture which makes you believe that probably that human being could not survive what she was going through. but she did survive. yeah, yeah. she survived. but for sure, she's still suffering. and she lost her family. what i want to get to is what you go through as a photographer, but also as a gazan, when you come across scenes like that and you get your camera out, and i believe that rescue operation to get her out

of there took many hours and she was desperate for water. nine hours. how do you decide how to behave, how much to use the camera, and how, as a human being, as a gazan, to get involved and help? because before i've been a photographer, i was a humanitarian. i'm a member at the national disaster response team with the prcs, palestine red crescent, so i have some trainings, i have some experience. so because i also care about humans, the humans, before i get the picture, a lot of times i missed a lot of pictures because i want to save this human, because i see that he's injured, i can see him injured, he needs me to help him more than taking a picture for him. so sometimes i lose myself. i don't know what i'm acting. iact, like, crazy. i start to scream, to shout around the people. i want to do something but because i have my equipments, sometimes i don't have, like, the first aid so i can use it

to help the injured people. but i used also my car to take injured people to the hospital rather than just parking your car, take the pictures. do you feel internally conflicted when you're faced with this sort of thing? yeah, yeah. because you see, like, thousands of people are getting killed, and you want to save lives more than taking pictures. but at the same time, the world should see, and even, like... it's really difficult, because you take a picture to show the world, the world does nothing. you save this life, take it to the hospital, there is no place for him to be in the hospital. you put him on the floor, and then after two or three days, or the same day, he passed. so you are losing in there. you've had a little time to reflect now because you've been out of gaza for some time, but how complicated were your feelings? yeah, i didn't give myself the opportunity to really grieve or to start just crying about the people i lost, because one day i was covering

what is happening, and i heard the news about my friend's house got bombed. i went there, i found my friend, he's half body under the rubble. he passed. they are twins. and, i spent hours getting him out from the rubble. i put my camera aside, and afterjust five hours, i received the news of my family's house got bombed in my own town. i believe that's in deir al—balah. deir al—balah, yeah, which is now, like, containing more than 1.5 million people in deir al—balah, which is a small town, and also already, like, israel invaded the eastern part of deir al—balah. so... so you went along, with your camera, to your own family's house? was it your aunt? yeah, my aunt's house, yeah. and you had to take... well, you didn't have to, but, the decision was to take pictures... ididn�*t take... ..pictures for them because they all were flesh.

we didn't find any complete body for them, because their house is very small, and the bomb that israel threw on them was very big. so, no—one survived, and they're all literally flesh. and till now, we didn't find any body for my aunt. we don't know where she disappeared. so, yeah. so i didn't have the time to grieve or show any emotions. and i start...i continued what i'm doing, because when you lose that much of people in a short time, your heart becomes dead. dead heart. dead? yeah, it's very dead, because now there is a different thoughts now in my mind that i should... ..accept it, in a way, to another. you were putting pictures on your social media feeds. they were going around the world. you ended up with, i think, something like 17, 18 million followers on instagram. they were having an enormous impact

in one way in that people were looking at them, but were they having the impact that you wanted them to have? i was hoping for a change. i was hoping that the world, when they see these images, especially that, ok, the followers are like 18 million followers, but the reach is billions. i reach one day, like, a billion views on my content or my account. so, yeah, i made something, but in the end, it changed nothing because i start to believe that no—one is stronger than israel, and israel has no respect for anyone, and no—one can do anything for israel, because even the icc, when they are like... ..knows that benjamin netanyahu, the prime minister of israel, he's, like, a war criminal and he should be arrested, the us will stand up and say, "no." so... so, yeah. you were bearing witness, but, to a certain extent, you were also becoming an advocate.

you were using words like genocide. yes. you put on some of your social media feeds pictures which to israelis were utterly outrageous and unacceptable. that is, side by side images of netanyahu and his cabinet and hitler and his associates. yeah. you knew what you were doing with those images. yeah. you crossed a line. you know, bearing witness is so important. but then you were messaging in a way that turned off a lot of people. do you, on reflection, think you mixed up two different messages? yeah... maybe. but the people should understand that i'm dealing with this as a human, a normal human like them. and no—one told me that you will wake up and you will start to face heavy airstrikes, and you lose a lot of friends and family, or being,

like, in a genocide, thousands of people lose their life and you will act normal, or you should be prepared for this, because nobody will be prepared, especially what's happening to my own people. so whatever i do, it's justified. no—one told me that i will face a genocide and i will be, like, be that being famous, or the whole world will see me, because i'm not prepared for this. that word, of course, is now subject to an international court ofjustice case brought by south africa. yeah. you use it. the israelis say it's entirely unacceptable and they reject it entirely. why? we may wait years for the icj to make theirjudgment. i'm not waiting for anyone. i need action for now, because i'm not counting on the international community any more. i'm counting on the people, because i want to stop the killing of my people in any way. it's... it's not fair.

you've spoken very powerfully about your experiences in gaza, but we began this conversation, early on, we talked about looking reality in the face, not turning away. one of the realities is what happened on october 7th. yeah. and ijust wonder, on your feed, at no point, i think, have you used pictures of the murdered israeli civilians from october 7th. but just as you don't want the world to turn away from your pictures, should the world also look in the eye those images that came from israel on october 7th? and shouldn't you look at those images, too? yeah, but i wasn't there. all what i posted from gaza was me capturing, because i trust myself. people, millions trusted me because i was there and these images come through me. i wasn't there, so... how should i post about something like this? i wasn't there, i don't know

what exactly happened. and at the same time, when you say, like, "the world should look also for. 0k, yeah. in the end, humans. but when an israeli officer go to the world and say that they are human animals, that palestinians are human animals, and you expect me to deal with him as a human? no, i'm not going to deal with him as a human. if he's not seeing me as a human, why should i? why the hell should i see him as a human? because he's not seeing me as a human. he doesn't want to see the palestinians as humans, because until now, at least, the two—state solution, we didn't have it because israel is not accepting it. they don't want it because... well, of course, hamas is not accepting it either. let me just talk a little bit, if i may, let me just talk a little bit about the reality of being a photojournalist in gaza. of course, internationaljournalists are not allowed into gaza. israel doesn't let them in. why? well, i'll tell you why they say. they say it's for operational security reasons and also for the security of those journalists. security of journalists. ..

but the bottom line is, they're not allowed in. people from the bbc are not allowed in. we, for images, for accounts on the ground, rely upon palestinian journalists. yeah. i want to know whether you feel that palestinian journalists can operate freely and independently, given the constraints of war, but can they operate freely, independently in gaza and let's say the west bank, too? is it possible? yeah. possible. idid it. human rights watch, for many years, has said it's not possible. there are enormous repressive pressures coming from hamas and indeed the palestinian authority in the west bank on journalists. i did it in gaza, and ifilmed one person who's, like, cursing israel and hamas at the same time. no—one did anything from me. so, i'm not here to defend anyone, 0k? but i'm telling you that there is a lot of propaganda against us as palestinians and like, accept it or not, why 7th october happened? why?

truly, it was like a reaction for the besieged gaza strip. if you keep putting pressure on it, on hamas, and you are seeing what hamas have been doing, even preparing themselves for it. you wrote something very interesting after you left gaza. you said on social media this, and some people took it as an oblique, a sort of cryptic reference to hamas. you said, "if the death and hunger of their people..." that is, the people in gaza. "..do not make any difference to them..." i mean, you didn't name them, but, "to them", then you said, "..they don't need to make any difference to us. "cursed be everyone who has trafficked in our blood, "burned our hearts and homes, and ruined our lives." some took that as a reference, actually, notjust to the israelis... yeah, yeah. ..but to hamas. it's not only hamas. and you know why i wrote this? i didn't say even a word why i did write this. this was in ramadan. and a friend of mine,

he's very close friend to me, he was sending me messages, and my number's with the whole world now, so i received thousands of messages. so he was sending me, he asking me to help him for money and to get him out from gaza. he was waiting for the united nations truck for the flour to his family. an israeli sniper killed him in his chest. his name's mohammed arifi. i lost control as a human for losing this close friend to me and i wrote this because everyone is responsible. everyone. israel is the first responsible, because it's a part of occupation, so he's responsible on us. and every palestinian leader is responsible for our lives. because now, i see, like, palestinian leadership is now trying to find a solution for the palestinian division between themselves, like fatah, hamas... so why the hell you didn't do that before this happened? i'm also...|�*m speaking as one of the people of gaza,

i'm not here just to defend someone and attack someone. no, everyone is responsible for the lives of palestinians. first israel, as a power of occupation, because they are the main reason for all of this. and second, palestinian leadership, because you are the reason also for it. you are a reason. don't tell me that you are not a reason for this. you were like... you accepted the situation of palestinians in gaza. before 7th october, did you know what was happening in gaza? a lot of young people were trying to kill themselves for the lack of opportunities and the poverty. you are not able to travel. not able to start a life. me, myself, sometimes i was thinking about it, because... you mean, deep, deep depression? yeah! deep mental health problems. yeah, because... it wasn't a life. so let me bring it back to the personal, if i may. yeah. you did get out of gaza, unlike so manyjournalists who have been killed in gaza. and a lot ofjournalists also get back, get out from gaza.

yeah. and you've had now months based in doha, and you've been able to travel to some extent around the world with your message and your experience. yeah. how is your mental health now? because having been through what can only be described as extreme trauma, along with everybody else in gaza, now you're outside of it. how do you cope with that? i don't know. sometimes i feel like i... ..i don't know how to cope with it. and sometimes i feel like i lost a lot of things from inside. sometimes i cry with my own. sometimes i feel like i lost my emotions. now, like, when i hear someone got killed, "0k, what do you do?" because, like, i lost my life, like everyone else in gaza. and i lost my family. so i'm now, like, as a new life.

i'm just, like, sorry. what i'm doing, sometimes i feel like it's useless, because i... people are trying to personalise what i'm doing. they wantjust to support me. it's not about me. it's about, like...the people are why i went out from gaza. because the people want to do something. ifound myself, like, having a power. i didn't ask for it. i didn't ask anyone to follow me. and ifound myself having a power of people. so, ok, i went out. i'll keep making noise so people can move to something. i went to a protest. i went to interviews. i went to a place that never a palestinian has been there. but people start to personalise it. 0k, as much as it's supportive, but it's not me. i want you to just keep talking about what's happening. you are 25 years old, but as i'm talking to you, in a funny sort of way... you feel like old? yeah, you feel much older. this is the made of gaza. because, when you are in a conflict area under occupation, everything is with a struggle.

for people of your generation, in their 20s or even younger, the young people of gaza, can they emerge from this with hope? a belief in a future? no. this time, no. in the previous times? yes. this time, no. because every house in gaza lost at least one. at least. a lot of families disappeared. a lot of people still under the rubble. and if you want to get out from gaza — because believe me, if the rafah crossing is still working, a lot of gazans will leave — even when they leave, after they pay everything they have, where should they go? i mean, they talk about, you know, there is no ceasefire, but maybe there will be a ceasefire one day. there will be. they talk about rebuilding gaza. are you telling me that, in many ways, you feel the people

of gaza cannot be rebuilt? yeah. what's the need of rebuilding gaza and the problem still exists? if i'm still under occupation? and to have my free country... look, this will never end. this will never end. we're never, like, under occupation and everything is restricted — this will never end. and no—one will have safety and no—one will have peace. i don't have peace as a palestinian. motaz, we have to end there. that's fine. motaz azaiza, i thank you very much forjoining me on hardtalk. thank you so much for having me. thank you. thank you very much. thank you.

hello there. whether we like it or not, september is the month where we transition from summer into autumn, and we're already seeing the first signs of that. we had a warm southerly, a humid feel, and 30 degrees on the 1st of september, but already a northwesterly flow is driving fresher air across the country. by the middle part of this week, temperatures will revert back to where they should be at this stage in the year, generally from 16—21 celsius. monday brought a day of heavy rain across scotland in particular, and that's easing away, but still a trail of showers which will linger for quite some time during tuesday. so we're going to start off across the midlands with one or two isolated showers — these could become more frequent as they drift east, heavy and thundery into the afternoon across eastern england.

south west england, wales and northern england, dry, settled and sunny, and after a lovely start across scotland, it will cloud over with some showery outbreaks of rain into the west and to parts of northern ireland. here, 14—18 degrees the high, but we could see 23 in east anglia — and that's 73 fahrenheit. now, as we move through tuesday evening into the early hours of wednesday morning, the showers across england and wales will tend to fade. we'll have a cluster of showers just pushing in across northern ireland, and we could have a coolish night in scotland. low single figures perhaps likely in rural areas, so a particularly fresh start here first thing on wednesday morning. high pressure is trying to build in, but we've got this weak weather front toppling across the high, and that could be a little bit of a nuisance. a band of cloud,a few scattered showers east of the pennines running down towards the southeast. not that much rain on it. a little bit of showery rain into southern scotland and northern ireland, but on the whole wednesday will be a day of sunny spells,

scattered showers, and once again those temperatures ranging from 14—21 celsius. as we move out of wednesday towards the end of the week, it gets a little bit messy. we've got this area of low pressure, this front drifting down into france, and it could merge with another spell of wet weather pushing up from the near continent. all—in—all, that could lead to quite an unsettled weekend across central and southern england. but for scotland it looks drier and brighter as high pressure lingers longer.

welcome to newsday, i'm steve lai reporting live from singapore. the top stories this hour... israel's prime minister benjamin netanyahu asks for forgiveness for not saving hostages — but insists a deal with hamas won't be reached if israel loses control of the philadelphi corridor between gaza and egypt. translation: i am begging for our translation: i am begging for your forgiveness _ translation: i am begging for your forgiveness that _ translation: i am begging for your forgiveness that we - translation: i am begging for your forgiveness that we did - your forgiveness that we did not succeed in bringing them home alive. we were very close, nearly there. the final stretch of the race to the white house. kamala harris and joe biden hold their first campaign event since the president ceded his nomination. warnings from the german chancellor are you ready to fight? are you ready to win? are you ready to elect kamala harris our next

president of the united states of america?