tv SPOTLIGHT PRESSTV January 4, 2024 10:02pm-10:31pm IRST
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welcome everyone, now the united states and of the israeli regime have for years carried out acts of terrorism throughout the region of west asia to achieve their objectives of spreading their hegemony and to one day reach the holy grail and that is to conquer and dominate the region and its limitless resources, but unlike africa. the 17th to 21st century, there are resistant nations adamant that western plot will never materialize, we'll discuss the ramifications of washington and tell avive's acts of terrorism and neocolonial agenda on this episode of spotlight. and... former british ambassador to syria
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joining us from manchester. there we are. hello gentlemen, welcome both to the program, pleasure to have uh both of you. i guess we'll start with mr. peter ford, uh, ambassador ford, my initial question to you, your thoughts on the numerous abraizen assassinations and other acts of terrorism we've seen from the us and israel in the past, and we continue to see ' throughout the region, especially of west asia, which is our focus of this uh spotlight. i think what we seeing is a sign of israeli frustration and disappointment that the campaign in gaza is going so badly. their leaders have almost nothing to show for 10 weeks of intensive warfare on the people of gaza, and as a result, they are... resorting to these
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assassinations and atrocities, um, this is designed, i think to deceive israeli public opinion, the israeli public are demanding to see results, but they cannot see any results from gaza, apart from the killing of women and children, but they can see assassination in beirut, assassination in damascus. or atrocity in iran, this is kind of displacement activity, a compensation, an alternative for not being able to make any progress on the strategic level, much depends now on the wisdom of iran and its allies, based on past experience, i doubt that iran and its allies will allow the... themselves
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to be provoked, because that would only satisfy the israelis and hopeful therefore that israel will soon see that this acts have no purpose whatsoever. thank you, um, former ambassador, mr. ama, welcome to the program, sir. what do you think leads the us and israel to conclude for themselves that they have the right to carry out these uh acts against groups and figures, acts of terrorism in the region, many of whom carry out operations against them for their own self-determination, their own protection, to protect their sovereignty, their dignity, their their right of. homeland to preserve their own natural resources, in fact it seems the very groups that they target and individuals that they target are the ones that are acting in self-defense in the region. well, this is absolutely true, mean the reality is that what we are seeing is
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that there is no pretensing anymore, the powers like united kingdom, united states and is... are all now openly and publicly saying that they are only talking to their own supporters, a group of people who want more death, more destruction and more blood, and as they are failing to do anything more in gaza, i mean let's face it, what more can they do, how much more genocidal act they could implement in in gaza, so they going... beyond that, and they are killing people, and i will say killing people innocently, because this sort of assassination, it's which these powers of judge, jury and executioner, are are totally not only against international
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law, but they're against any aspect of legality and morality, so this is done just to give - sort of the... blood thirsty supporters, more blood, more destruction, more chaos, because that is the environment where they could actually operate and they want to create that environment, look what they did in afghanistan, look what they did in in iraq, in syria, elsewhere, wherever they've gone, whatever they've done internationally has been a pool of blood, river of blood, following them and in... justice and abuses, let's us not forget abu ghraib, guantanamo, really, what we are seeing openly and publicly, they're promoting the law of jungle and chaos and destruction
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of innocent people, and and ambassador ford, would you like to build on what um, mr. shah was saying, why can't regional countries get true justice for these many acts of terror committed by washington and uh tel aviv damascus has appealed dozens of times for illegal targeting of its soil by the israeli regime, tehran for the murder, as you very well know number of scientists, not to mention late uh lieutenant general suleimani, lebanon for past illegal occupation, many attacks by israel, hundreds of us assassinations in iraq, uh syria and afghanistan, alluding to what mr shajad just said not to leave out all the atrocities committed in so many different dimensions again. the palestinians, well i think the israelis and their enemies are well aware that there are rules of engagement, rules of engagement between two military parties, and
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what the the israelis would say that what what they did in beirot and damascus was within the the rules of engagement, that is the the... understandings, not written, not written, but nevertheless well understood between the parties that you can attack within certain limits, however, attacks on civilians are totally different matter, and the murders going on in gaza and elsewhere are totally outside the rules, but i noticed that the attack in beirut singled out palestinians, there wasn't one lebanese victim, this is quite important in terms of how his fullah reacts, but based on previous experience, i think we can be fairly sure that hisbollah and the other allies of iran
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and iran itself will not overreact, will not be provoked by whatever israel does in terms of killing civil. and military personalities, but ambassador ford, it's exactly that, the icc, you very well know try to carry out a war crimes. uh investigation into us uh soldiers and carrying out war crimes, lot of them were unsanctioned assassinations on political leaders in afghanistan, in iraq during those occupations and invasions, and the trump administration stopped them, stopped the icc from sending teams in there would not let them get visas to get into those countries to carry out those probes, so they know that they're committing uh basically terrorism on the civilian population, unsanctioned, unwarranted hits and still... a proper probe and essence exonerating themselves before things even get
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hairy, quote unquote. yes, and every day in the west bank, the israelis break international law, the way they they treat the occupied palestinian population, they try to justify themselves in terms of self-defense, but nobody talks about the the right to self-defense of... the palestinians and the the the the violations are very very clear in in the the west bank, but it's important to understand that up there on the northern border of israel, what's flying across the border in terms of missiles and and rockets comes within undeclared war with undeclared rules of... in terms of analysis, we we have to put emotion on one side and
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judge with a cool mind what is going on, and this is as the sayid said in his speech yesterday, the israelis have to understand that if if the israelis attack, there will be no rules. "that's a very important distinction, at the moment there are unspoken rules, but if israel comes in very heavily against hisbullah, there will be no rules, and mr. the iranian leader just the other day, spoke about soft and hard power, a diplomacy versus militarism, interaction as opposed to adventurism, um, basically dialogue versus terrorism, if you really want" get down to it, so why doesn't washington entertain listening to regional nations and people, seeing what is dear to
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their hearts and to their cultures, instead of trying to militarily and through these kind of acts impose itself upon them, why doesn't it tell or employ the israeli regime to basically open dialogue instead of carrying out so many unsanctioned assassinations and acts of terror throughout the region? well, what evidence is there that they have ever listened whenever? a colonial power have listened to reason in implementing the colonial intentions and legacy. this is indeed the way the colonial power have always acted and this is the way they're acting now. the only different right now in comparison to 20 years ago is 20 years ago they were claiming that they adhere to international law, they adheere to... moral principles, now they're underminding it. i mean, mr. ford
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knows that the israeli ambassador in britain openly, publicly promoting genocide against the palestinians, she was on air saying that there are tunnels under every house, every mouse, every school, so all these places in gaza are legitimate target, this... is genocidal talk, this is actually ambassador of of israel is promoting genocide and genocidal act and united state is supporting it and britain is supporting it, look, there is nothing hidden anymore, the fact that you know mr. ford is saying that he hopes iran and you know hizbullah and so forth will be smart enough not to react. but the reality is that if israel continues the way is behaving,
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then no one will have any option other than make a stand against them, because it's quite clear that they don't understand any language except the language of violence and guns and in that sort of situation when you come to the conclusion that there is other option then for the for the sake of human. and stopping these genocidal act escalating to other area within the region then people have to take action and that will be a disaster. and uh thank you mr. shah and ambassador ford, mr. masu shah said it, where's are evidence that it's ever worked or they have ever tried to make it work, washington dialogue in the in the region of west asia, i like to there aren't many cases, in fact you can say there's barely any if one, but there is a small case here, the jcpoa, and i like
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to talk about this, make this case in point that the u.s. participated in the jcpa for years uh hammering it out. bringing it to fruition with obviously um a group of other nations, deal that alleid their concerns regardless how ridiculous iran may have thought those concerns uh may have been at the time, but uh regarding its nuclear program, but iran complied and disassembled centrifuges and transferred uh research level uranium out of the country, and we know how that ended with the us withdrawal from the deal, but the point i'm trying to make is something different, that negotiations worked between two adverse. there was no terrorism involved like the israelies killing nuclear scientist, it wasn't needed, they tried diplomacy, it worked, until trump in may of 18 withdrew from it, it worked, why do we not see more of that, why do we see uh more leaning towards acts of terror when they've shown they don't work in the long run or the short run? i'm afraid we're operating under
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the law of the jungle uh is apparently preferred by the united states, because the united states is the biggest beast in the jungle, and therefore they're happy to apply the the law of the jungle and include their ally israel in in that, but it's important to bear in mind that the the access of resistance has not been idle, they have not been sitting on their hands waiting to be... attack, the extension of the conflict to the red sea, the extension of the conflict to iraq and the us bases in syria, the extension the conflict to northern israel, southern lebanon, where half the israeli army is tied up, these have been very strong actions on
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the part of the axis. of resistance, so what what's going on here really is the israelis trying to get revenge for actions which have already been taken in support of gaza by the access of resistance. we must not give credit to the the the israeli story that the other muslims are doing nothing to help in practice to gaza, as i mentioned, lot is happening in iraq, in syria and on the border with lebanon and in the red sea. and mr. shaja, something just popped in my head, another good example where diplomacy prevailed uh for years, you know the tension is between north korea, and this is outside of our scope of our conversation here and the us, but uh, kim
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jong yun met with donald trump twice, they had two summits and as a result, maybe it wasn't groundbreaking, but guess what, there wasn't a nuclear. missile test for four years because just because of that those two meetings that really nothing really materialized from, but at least the us got that, there was a decrease of frictions with uh pyongyang and there was zero missile tests during that time, but mr. shad to the ambassador's point, i want to come back to you, all the assassinations and relevant acts of terrorism carried out by tel aviv and washington in the region, what is that done for region, regional security and their own security in the region, because you know the definition.
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island among enemies against violence people who want to throw them into the sea and so forth and so on, so conflict is exactly what they need, without conflict there will be no state of israel, the reality is that that is part and parcel of it, and you know the examples you gave with the nuclear deal and indeed korea, these are sound bites which you... by trump and others to sort of justify the their ongoing policies in reality if any of those deals or any of those um sort of negotiation led to anything substantial, we wouldn't have these problems continuing, the reality is that even jcpoa from the beginning
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was was designed to come to disaster and not to be successful, it was it was just there to prolong negotiation and indeed fool a whole lot of people, it was never meant to come to anything and it didn't come to anything. indeed the same thing with north korea, i think we need to understand that as as mr. ford said, this is the rule of jungle, they prefer the rule of jungle, they feel the are powerful enough to only operate in the middle of war and chaos and sort of destruction and disaster, and indeed because united states feels that is end of his. germany and of his power is becoming even more dangerous because usually powers, superpowers when they are when it comes to the end of their time they
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become much more violent because they have to flex their muscle, they have to show that they are powerful when their power is diminishing, and i think that is what we are seeing, and professor ford, can i get you to weigh in on that as well, when you have this policy of these clandestine... assassination, these acts of terror, sometimes utiliz utilizing you know extreme far right wahabi groups and tack fear groups in the region to carry out some seriously dirty work, but it ultimately does not get you syria a silver platter, it does not get you to run iraq, it does not get you afghanistan, it basically gets you kicked in the face and kicked out of the region and has you have a diminished capacity in the region as a result, when do you start entertaining changing your policy? uh, look, "these recent israeli and american actions show weakness, not strength, that they are what you do when you're losing a war, if you can't defeat the enemy army, as
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the israelis can't defeat hisbollah in gaza, you have resort to tactical assassinations, but this these are signs of of of weakness and and failure." to me they show that the conflict has now entered its final phase, what the conflict is about now is saving israeli face or for disguising, for hiding their failures, they have nothing to show for 10 weeks of intensive warfare, so what they're doing is now they can say that they've killed one hamath commander, they've killed in it. general, but these are substitutes for strategically, these actions are completely unimportant, they will not change anything in the strategic equation,
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but they will help nethanyahu, make him look like the strong man, but the one day soon the israeli public will have a reckoning with their prime minister, this is why he wants to keep the conflict. going for months a low level, this is part of his exit strategy, if if he has one to wind down the war in a way that people will not see how big a failure it has been. okay, gentlemen, i want to thank you both for joining us in the program, time has gotten the better of us, it was a pleasure to check in with both of you, mr. masoud sh there, chairman of the islamic human rights committee. joining us from london and mr. peter ford, former british ambassador to syria joining us from manchester, and viewers, this brings us to the conclusion of the segment of your
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he devoted his life to the freedom of alcords, his critical role is undeniable in uniting palestinian groups. against the israeli regime, he is behind pivotal moments in a history of resistance movement in the region. to know more about lieutenant general qassim sulaymani, the martyr of al quots, do not miss this documentary.
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top stories here on press tv. israel consent continues pressing ahead with his aggression against the gazo strip is deaththoll exceeds 22,400, most of them, women and children. the un security council strongly condem a terror attack in the iranian city of kermon, the daesh terrorist group has reportedly claimed responsibility for the deadly attack. iraqi officials expressed anger at us drone attack against the pmu office in baghdad, some iraqi lawers have called for the expulsion of the american ambassador.
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