of hello and welcome to spotlight. in more than 10 months of israel's genocidal war on the gaza strip at least 40,000 palestinians have been killed. that's about 4,000 people per month. israel has violated every norm and rule of engagement during these months of unabated onslot, all international attempts and pressure to bring about a ceasefire in

gaza have failed due to the unconditional support of the united states for the israeli regime. now mediators say the latest round of talks in doha have been constructive, will these efforts eventually bear any fruit to alleviate the sufferings of uh the people in gaza who are facing the worst humanitarian crisis in the world. joining us tonight's spotlight, we have palestinian scientist and author, mazen rumsia. joining us from bethlehem and we also have activists and political analyst batul sobaiti joining us from the british capital london. well welcome to the program uh to the both of you. let's start off with uh mr. rumsia and bethlehem. a dark milestone unfortunately has been passed over 40,000 palestinians, mostly women and children, have been slaughtered in. old blood

since last october as the israeli attacks across gaza continue as we speak, what's really gut wrenching and the palling here is that there's still not anything been done by the global community, no global intervention to prevent more innocent deaths and all the condemnations have fallen short of any tangible action. indeed this is a remarkable phenomenon that... never thought i'd see in my life that such injustice can be allowed to go on basically indefinitely after 10 months of of this slaughter and the 40000 that have been registered as dead in the hospitals of course to not include thousands and thousands still buried under the rubble who have not been issued death certificates or the many

thousands missing who might be in israeli jails being tortured to death and we already know at least 50 palestinians who died under israeli torture, rapes in jail etc. the horrors here in the west bank where i'm speaking from continue a pogram just yesterday in the village of egypt where basically settlers are allowed to rampage. under the watchful eye of the israeli soldiers, so the level of terror, basically state terrorism is unprecedented in world history, starvation of an entire people and by the united states for israel to use starvation and denial of medical aid as a method of coersion, this is a massive..." a

war crimes and crimes against humanity, one it boggles the mind that this is allowed to continue, and second is it really reflects badly a world order set up after second world war, that's now being dismanted regularly. misowati and london schools and shelters in gaza have been serving as as makeshift camps for families displaced. there, but the israeli regime continues to attack them, just recently school in the outdaj neighborhood in the heart of gaza was attacked, killing over hundre people were taking shelter there. what's clear now more than ever is that the israeli ensauden massacres not just against uh the resistance, but a genocide against all the people of gaza. do you see it in that light as well? absolutely. uh, the war is not against the resistance persay, it's against the collective palestinian people, because

the palestinians are effectively the resistance, a palestinian, just as someone who identifies as a palestinian, is considered a terrorist in the israeli occupations book, just... their identity as a palestinian condemns them to death, and that makes sense if we consider the very essence the israely contradiction, and that is with the very existence of the palestinian, because the settlers know that they are thieves and they know that the israeli occupation entity came about through the massacres of the palestinians, through their displacement, so the real enemy is effectively the palestinian people in their mother's rooms. all right, see um israel is using starvation and hunger as a weapon of war that's been clearly documented. talk to us about the motives behind that. how is fighting hamas and the resistance which the israelis have claimed since day one in any way tied to inducing famine and hunger on

palestinian children in ghaza? well the isist movement considers as your guest showed or mentioned that basically they consider all palestinians our enemies and it's part of the training they receive from childhood to see indigenous people, palestinian people, christians, muslims, bai, drus, whatever they are, as the enemy, regardless, if they are not jewish, they are an enemy, and they must be removed from what they consider a land given by god to the jewish people, this is the ideology of zianism. "this is what drives aninism and has so for over 145 years since it was founded as a european ideology that's mimicking the worst of the worst of colonial ventures in europe and so this this is what

drives it and what drives it something you we thought we knew it, we palestinians thought we..." knew it, but we never expected the extent of it, the extent of the brainwashing, the extent of the dehumanizing that they do for our people, the extend of lack of humanity very short, mean hard to even think you know mass rape of the soldiers, soldiers of palestinian dethanies, there is supported by 47% of the israeli public who support rape of to and torture to death of palestinian prisoners, this we never expected the level the brutality and the level of the malevolence basically of this regime, and it's and it's brainwashed public, but also

again as i said, what we didn't expect is the level of the zionist infiltration of western media and... politicians to the point where one zionist just donated to donald trump 100 million dollars and 50% of the donations for the democratic party in the us comes from zianists to ensure that the us continues to support them even against us own interest this is we didn't expect this level of filtration this level of global malevolence, if i may use that word horror, so terrorism and occupation, colonization is not just done against us palestinians, but it's done against people regionally and globally. mr.

baity, the us, qatar and egypt held a new round of talks to mediate a ceasefire deal for gaza, hamas says any agreement muscle to... comprehensive cease fire and the complete withdrawal of israeli forces from gaza, there's been a lot of back and forth with the truth talks, but the fact of the matter is the israelis don't want a peace agreement, do they? just look at the recent assassination of senior hamas leader uh ismail honey, especially uh when we look at the case of benim netanyahu and the warmongers around him who are basically extending this massacre as their political careers will surely end when this war does. absolutely, netanyahu's insistance um is really on continuing the war, and netanyahu himself has become the real existential threat to the israeli occupation entity, because the continuation of this war is only consolidating defeat for the entity, even um the minister of defense, iba gallant um has

challenged the manhood and the supposed bravery of netanyahu um by not uh signing this deal uh because everyone in the entity knows that the... ination of war is simply a consolidation of defeat. netanyahu is willing sacrifice the israeli occupation entity his own personal interests and he's also hoping and beting on the fact that you know they might able to discover, 10 months on, the tunnel networks within ghazah or to locate yahya sinwar or just to achieve something anything before the war concludes and ends with the israeli occupation entity, having achieved not a single military strategic objective on the ground of uh ghazza, and in addition netanyahu of course, his main strategy, as we've been discussing, is to continue to create the most unbearable condition for the palestinians, because of course um they they unanimously. occupation entity don't agree with two-state solution, um, a one-state solution uh is also not

possible. um, they are not able to uh reoccupy ghaza again or consolidate their control post war because of the shift in the in the power balance on the ground. so um, all they can really do is is inflict and create the most unbearable conditions for the palestinians. so netanyahu is resorting to the outmost degree of delay in this matter, because he knows that america will not abandon the israeli occupation. entity, america uh will not let its own project be defeated, given israel is america's project, so america holds the responsibility for protecting the israeli occupation entity, and for that reason it's not jeapardizing, putting and exerting too much pressure on netanyahu to achieve the seasfire, because the reality is that it is in america's interests to um achieve this cease fire and to not continue the war, so in reality netanyahu him self has become an exist an existential threat not just to the israeli occupation entity and causing its mass

fragmentation leading to the point of civil war, but this is also crucially jeopadizing america's whole interests um in the region and so the israeli occupation entity is in a real uh deadlock and it's unable to achieve anything right now because it wasn't able to defeat uh hamas on the ground and consider the fact that hamas is the weakest link within the whole resistance access. "the us constantly claims it doesn't want a broader war or any dangerous escalations, but its words and its actions surely are in contradiction. on wednesday was revealed another multi-billion dollar military aid package was approved for the israelis, describe for us the us's shameful hypocrisy regarding the gaza genocide and also regarding israel's regional crimes. indeed, giving another $20 billion dollars. worth of military aid, offensive weapons to kill civilians in in the ghaza trip and in the

west bank, on the one hand, on the other hand, claiming they want to cease fire, this is of course illogical, and the world sees it, and they see this hypocrisy, they see that on the one hand you're a partner in crime on in genocide, and on the other hand you claim you want israel to deal more gently with the local population, if you want, that's the language they use, sometimes to be more, careful in not harming civilians, of course the us knows that they are partners in crime of intentionally harming civilians, intentionally killing civilians who have nothing to do with the conflict, actually israel, is losing its gorilla war with hamas fighters in gaza strip, so they clearly have

nothing to do bombing schools and hospitals and and un shelters and tent cities is not certainly something against any resistance forces, it's intended to liquidate the palestinians, i don't even say terrorize the palestinians. because terrorization can be done with the with very limited strikes, but they intend to really liquidate the palestinians period. we have 8% so far of the palestinians in gaza who have been killed or injured. that's a huge number, if it's equivalent in the us, it would be equivalent to about 24 million americans who are injured or killed. and and this is unprecedented proportionally of course, and and there's no

way to understand this other than a genocide intended to finish off the palestinians. mr. waj, the killing, raiding and kidnapping of palestinians is happening a daily basis in the west bank, which has been a growing trend of israeli violence against palestinian since the start of the regime's genocide. in gaza, so far over 630 palestinians have been killed in the west bank by both israeli soldiers and we spoke to here. believes that the settler violence is also a part of a greater plan to eradicate palestinians and it has intensified on purpose. do you agree with that? absolutely. um, the resistance is expanding in the west bank in actual fact in all manners, in terms of its tools, its ways of confrontation, if we remember it began with the intefather of the rocks uh to then the

cold weapons um that were utilized to now more advanced weaponry such as explosions, um, the west bank is turning similarly into ghazza with time and is being ramped in capabilities and capacities. um, we remember few weeks ago, the knessit passed a proposal to not to unanimously reject the idea of palestinian statehood, um, they want to effectively end the american prospect of um, two-state solution, they've never believed in the prospects of palestiny stateho to begin with, during the uh oslo accords, um, the... greatest amount of land and annexation happened during the 90s, mean it's to the extent that they don't even want the pa that is currently ruling in the west bank, they don't want that in ghazza, that's the extent to which they're rejecting this idea of palestinian statehood, so in actual fact um what the occupation entity is seeking to do is to create also unbearable conditions in the west bank in such a way that um this idea of reaching a two-state solution compromise

um is less likely so all tools that we're seeing right now that are being mobilized um the crack bounds in the west bank and against the citizens of of that area is within the context um of a growing resistance there um and the israeli occupation entity of course it doesn't need any pretext to practice aggression against the palestinians and the israeli aggression is systematic against the very existence of palestinians right israel as we just mentioned is ramped up its daily raids in the occupied west bank. ever since the regime launched its genocidal war on gaza, there are no israeli hostages in the west bank, there are in fact thousands of palestinian hostages languishing in israeli prisons, how come this part keeps getting swept under the rug by mainstream western media, well the mainstream western media is

really owned by the zionist movement globally, there are very very few. you left independent mainstream media or media that are alternative media like democracy now and others in the us or in some western countries, what we see in the west is basically a breakdown of the system that was created post world war two that claimed the west to be democratic institutions. freedom of expression and so forth, the evidence of this is everywhere, the evidence of the breakdown, even denial of people, the right to demonstrate, even threatening to deport and actually sometimes deporting people for freedom of speech, in the us, donald trump

promised to basically end any kind of show of support for human rights and of palestinians or supporters speaking out at universities and on the streets, this shared so callalled western democracy is shared, it's it's it's gone basically, the the masks have fallen off of it, and the people of the west ironically see this and are very distressed about it, sometimes they feel powerless to change things, some of them feel empowered and go out in the streets and demonstrate as we saw millions on the streets, hundreds of thousands in london alone, etc., but i think that needs to grow much, much more for it to make a difference at the political scene,

sure, and missobei, the lebanese resistance move in hezbollah has carried out fresh attacks against... israeli military positions in the north of the occupied territories as part of the retaliatory campaign in support of uh of palestinians in gaza. how do you view the heightened tensions along the southern lebanese border, especially with hesbollah vowing retaliation for the assassination of its top commander forad shook, can the israelis deal with the consequences of a full-blown war with hezbulah and possibly the entire resistance front at this point? absolutely not uh... the bigger the biggest crisis in actual fact in the existence of the israely occupation entities happening right now, if it cannot defeat the huzen resistance within 2006 within 362 square kilometers. um, how on earth is it going to be able to expand uh that fire of conflict and and maintain it on several fronts, in particular when we're seeing the reality of um the firm rooted

nature of the resistance, you know, in terms of its you know capabilities, in terms of its organization, in terms of its planning, in terms of the most important component is the fact that its forces have very deep faith in their lofty goals and they enjoy very high morale, they are ready for sacrifice, they're filled with anger that's result that that is resulting from the occupation and the injustice and so um what we're seeing in actual fact um in ghazah is gorilla warfare against invaders with light arms um and they demonstrated the ability to adapt to the most difficult circumstances now top analysts say that um the resistance in labanon the islamic resistance is is 10 if not hundred folds stronger than that of the uh ghazan uh resistance um so it's in a real existential threat. for sure the islamic resistance in lebanon will retaliate and this is something that's not defined in time. in actual fact, the disturbance and the anxiet and and the anxiety of the israeli occupation entity, in

my opinion is even bigger punishment than the response um that uh they are awaiting, you just consider the effect that that is having that that is having on the morale of the settlers uh across the entity. look at the investment projects um that are being dropped um look at the airlines - that are being cancelled, the state of panic and hysteria and the ability to not uh, you know, live normally is really crumbling the entity and leading it to the verge of civil war, because the settlers see netanyahu as responsible for this existential uh defeat and crisis. mr. rumsia, lot of criticism has been directed at arab governments for their inaction and passivity in the face of israel's crimes, most notably the ongoing uh gaza genocide, which is now... past 40,000 killed, if some arab governments would have showed a unified stance in the form of sanctions and cancelling normalization agreements, it would have gone gone a long way in putting pressure

on the israelis, why is that not happened? well, i mean, before i say why it did not happen, i will say that as a palestini under occupation, we know our enemy, although as i said earlier, we never... expected they would be this vicious, the level of viciousness, we expected some level of viciousness, but not this level of viciousness and meanness, but to expect also that level of viciousness and meanness from the arab governments who are selling out their souls to the devil, basically they're working handing love with the american government, with the israeli government to undermine the palestinian. cause and liquidate the palestinian cause, thinking stupidly that this will protect their thrones and their positions on seats of power, it actually won't, because we've seen

israel is not just in palestine, the resist movement is interested in ruling the whole world, and they already rule rule a lot of capitals, and they are empoverishing, and you can see even donald trump's... speech about saudi arabia for example in the emirates, basically to him the are cash reserves that he can milk any time he wants to, and he's acting on behalf of zionist, of course he himself is zionist, so i think it's it behoves us to understand that the arab leadership really don't even understand its own future interest, their children, okay, you may... end up staying a king or or a dictator like cc in egypt for a while, but what about your children, they have to live under an israeli ruled system which

impoverishes them intentionally? israel is even thinking of an alternative sways canal that connects the red sea to the mediterranean, they are thinking of new road connecting asia to europe through saudi arabia, and and what they call israel, sure, europe, so it's it's going to damage the economy of everybody, and they have to understand that in the long run their children will not live even in the privilege they get as dictators. all right, we're going to have to leave it there, thanks to palestinian scientists and joining us from bethlehem, and also thanks to about activists and political analysts joining us from the british capital, london with brings us to an end here on this edition of spotlight, but thanks to you our viewers for also staying with us tonight's program. it's good night for now and see you next time.

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